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A production by and for veterans to learn how to help one another task a bite out of veteran suicide. We take with veterans about their service, things they would have done different, and what advice they would give their younger self. We also highlight community resources for veterans and provide an opportunity to connect veterans with community projects to help seniors and children.
Ed Bejarana: Ed, welcome to the Veterans Club, a production for and by veterans and first
responders. Each week, we gather as a community to share stories, laugh and build friendships that
can stand the test time together, we can help prevent veteran suicide one cup of coffee at a time.
Well, Greetings, friends
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: and neighbors and enemies. Welcome to another episode of the Veterans Club. I'm
your guest host. I'm Sergeant Major. Sergeant Major Roy Lewis. US Army retired, and I'm really
excited. The Veterans Club is a great opportunity for vets to get together the tagline, I love the
tagline of Veterans Club. It's where, where we empower our listeners to make a difference in their
community and focus on a helpful future. And I love that. So I want to say again, welcome to another
episode of the Veterans Club. And we are have a special guest with us today, no other than, I think
you're a master sergeant, right? You've retired as Master Sergeant.
Daniel Kilburn: No, sorry, I only made it up to Sergeant First Class. I wasn't politically correct
enough, right?
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: As no other than Sergeant First Class, US Army retired Sergeant Daniel Kilburn,
and he is, I'm going to go into my introduction of my guest, and he has a plethora of credentials
here that are amazing, but I'll tell you how he's really important to me as well. But Daniel
Kilbourne is American. Is a America's five star leadership coach. Daniel has opened up
communications. He's built resiliency, and he developed leadership by preparing vets and their
families and organizations to have tough conversations. Now he's really just a subject matter expert
on the topic of urban disaster planning. He's an expert with over 30 years of experience training
young men, foreign nationals, and also he's worked with the Department of Defense civilians to
divide on the today's modern battlefield. And he's the author of several books, one of them being
the first the family urban disaster planning book he's written, and it's also required through the
book that was a number one best seller, and it was called the book. It's called the Book of
influence and the book of and also the book of member mentors. He's earned his master's degree in
project management while serving in the military, and he has over 26 educational certificates from
the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Center of Disease Control and the National Fire
Academy. What also makes him very special is that he is my battle buddy, we serve together as team
ed teammates on the special ops team in Iraq. And I want to say again, welcome Daniel Kilbourne to
the soldiers Club.
Daniel Kilburn: Well, thank you, Sergeant Roy. You know, I have to say I'm so grateful and so
wonderful to see you. Haven't seen you in so long. Happy to know that you're out there doing
something and and I'm very grateful that we can come together and push out some information that
somebody will pick up and do something with, and it'll help make their lives better, because they're
special. They need to go out there and do something for the world. That's why they're here.
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: Absolutely, absolutely, and I love what the vision that the Veterans Club is
doing, and other organizations now are doing, that they are purposely reaching out to the veteran
community to make sure that US vets were not forgotten, that we still have a purpose, that we still
can contribute to our communities, our our society or whatever. And I'm so glad you had the
opportunity to come on this this afternoon, really, thanks for joining us today.
Daniel Kilburn: Well, thank you for having me take it as a compliment. Yeah. Well,
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: I want to ask you a couple of questions and and just fire away. The first
question I had was I have for you? Is that, what is your experience, or what was your experience in
transitioning from from a soldier to a citizen? What
Daniel Kilburn: was your experience? Well, it was, uh, it was like I was walking through a door and
I didn't know it was on the other side. When I say, didn't know I was on the other side. I had this
long time of being in the military when I was in active duty, you know, we have the hierarchy, the
instructions, the the structure. Then I walked into a world where I could not understand, I did not
recognize or see any type of structure. And so I just started doing things. What am I going to do?
Okay, I was in Monterey, California at the time when I first ETS out of the seventh idea out of Fort
Ord. And so I got into the industry, which was hospitality. Me. So okay, I can start waiting cages,
all right? And that worked for a while. Then I started cooking, and then Restaurant Management,
which was more floating into what I did, you know, managing in the military, but it was still a
hodgepodge of things, because there was no structure for me. There was nobody out there to say,
well, Daniel, here's the handbook. There was no handbook. And bringing that up. I wrote the handbook
now, so we'll talk about that later. And so that was the big thing. It was just a lot of information
wasn't there because I didn't know I needed it. You know, we don't know what we don't know, right?
And when we're going out into an unknown, and you know, being in the military, we dislike unknowns
very much. So when we're going out into the unknown, you know, I'm doing my intelligence, my intel
gathering, as well as I possibly can, but still, I didn't have the tools to work there, because I
didn't know how to work those tools that I needed.
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: Yeah, that's so true. Well, the theme, I forgot to mention, the theme of our
show today, is reconnecting the veteran, reconnecting the veteran. And that's why I led off with
that question, because I, as we all know with us vets, every veteran has a story. All of us have
stories and and just like you, you've probably been asked, people will sit back and say, You
veterans act like you know each other all the time. You've you've come from different you know,
ages, ages and hits and parts of branches and everything, but however, we have that connection with
each other. So I private club,
Daniel Kilburn: yeah, yeah, private club. And only a few people, uh, been in it. A lot of people
don't understand it. You know, I did my research for a different article. I'm writing, a lot of
people that know less than 1% of the country population is actively involved in defending this
country through our United States military. Less than 1% are actually that thin green line
protecting the other 99 plus percent. Oh, I
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: didn't know that. Wow, wow. So that makes us even more special. You know, our
contribution to society is definitely evident. Wow, wow. Great, great statistic. Another question I
have for you is, with that being said for us vets, what do you perceive the issues now I know like
you know when you and I got called up, you remember when we got whatever airport we came in, we
always were met by the Vietnam vets, and that really impacted me when I saw that. You know, remember
how they were just they escorted us to the airport and from the airport and and I remember talking
to one of the guys, and they said they didn't want what happened to them, happened to us? Yeah, but
here we are 2024 in your opinion. What do you perceive to be the the issues, the challenges for us
vets today?
Daniel Kilburn: Well, it's an interesting thing is a lot of the issues, we're all human beings. So
regardless of the job we have or the station we have in life, we're still human and being human
beings. We have the same phobias, the same ups, the same is now the same voice talking inside of our
head, you know. And a lot of the times doesn't begin. It doesn't matter what sector or society we're
in, that voice is not a very positive voice. Sometimes we talk to ourselves worse than we talk to
the person that we dislike the most, and that's just something that we use to protect ourselves
somewhat, believe it or not, it's a protection skill to keep that rustle in the bushes over there is
that some saber tooth tiger going to jump out at me, you know? So that's one reason we do talk to
herself, then we beat ourselves up and so, so I say that's the biggest thing, especially, like I
mentioned earlier, that transition stepping into somewhat of an unknown. And if we have an unknown,
then we are automatically going to fabricate the worst case scenario that we possibly find. Some of
us would dive deep into that fabrication and live it out, which can be very destructive. So so
that's what I would like to do, is help veterans, or anybody, especially our veterans, be able to
look in the mirror and see that wonderful person looking back at them. We're all here for a reason.
Every one of us are here for a reason, and that reason just to do something significant, something
special, something profound for them. Now we might not know what it is yet, but that doesn't mean
it's not true. I mean we're here. I mean our Heavenly Father did not put us on this earth to be
destitute, to be poor, to be living under bridges. We were brought here to do something unique and
special. And somebody out there on top of each and every one of you, someone out there is waiting
for you to come into their life to teach them something, show them something, share something with
them, hold their hand, but have a shoulder to cry on. It doesn't matter. Someone who's out there
waiting on each and every one of you to be something for them. So grab that, take it and understand
that's that's why we're here. All right, so let's just make it happen and have fun doing it.
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: Wow. Well said, well said, you know, well said. And I'm so glad that that that
is. That is starting to come to the top now as a as an issue. With all of that being said, I know
when your presentations and your workshops and stuff, you address some of these issues, especially
in your new book, which we'll talk about it later on, but my next question for you is, what are some
of the things that US veterans can do to reconnect. You know, the you know, we have technology now,
and it's, some of it is great, and some of it's scary, but what are some of the things can we we
best can do to reconnect?
Daniel Kilburn: Well, it all boils down to communications. As you know, Roy, we were in the
military, and what we did, we needed to communicate clearly. We couldn't have vague goals. We needed
to be precise in what it is we're looking for, right? We needed to have a plan of action, how we're
going to follow through with it. We needed to be resilient, because all plans don't work. You know,
most often, they're going to fail pretty quickly, but that's okay. Get back up and do it again, and
ideally, let's keep a smile on our faces. All right, you know, let's have fun. You know, I hear so
people say, well, darn it, Daniel, life is serious, so I need to be serious about it. So I'll back
up and regroup here. You need to be seriously about your life. You need to have fun with it. Come
on, like I said, you know, we weren't put here to be drudgery. You know, I'm having fun talking to
you. I gotta smile my face. I remind my face. I'm having fun. Okay? I remind all you to do that and
you're having fun. Remind your face, but, but, but. So that's our biggest issue, is understanding
what it is we want. We have to have a plan. If we don't have a plan for ourselves, somebody else
will have a plan for us, and we might not like that plan. The next thing is, of course, is be
playful. Have fun with when I mentioned that, yeah, life is serious, but be seriously fun about your
wife. I know the loved ones, the people you care about, you're not a judge to them, and you want to
go out, right? Look posters, go to movies, have fun, eat dinners. You know, whatever you want to
smile. Smiling is good, and then just persevere, you know, stick to it. And guys keep moving
forward, and you will succeed in whatever your plan of action is,
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: right, right? And do you think like, you know, how, as as veterans, you know,
we're kind of So, so self protected. I mean, how do we let people in that want to help us, you know?
Because right now we're dealing like that statistic you just gave earlier, 1% just 1% so with that,
if that, with that being true, there's a world out there that doesn't understand us, you know. So
it's quite true. There is. So how do we create a bridge? How do we build a bridge to open up those
you said, communication? How do we build that bridge to open up the lines of communication to a
world in us
Daniel Kilburn: here, here's something each and every one is Rory, you are the most important person
in your life. I am the most important person in my life. All the people are listening to this
realize that you are the most important person in your life. So the way to build this bridge is to
idealize what you want to do with your life. Okay, now, once you understand how you can do something
with your life, instead of reaching out and trying to grab and take, what can you give? That's where
the communication comes into when we're talking to people, what's going on in their life. It's not
exciting with them. Let's start up. What's the down? Can I do something for them? Do I have a
message for them? Just listening to people, sometimes it's the only thing they need. So, so we build
bridges by being genuinely connected with the world around us. And that can be a lot of different
things, but we have to connect more by being outward than being inward. Well,
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: yeah, I think it leads up to, I think you've answered my next question I was
about to ask you is, how do we build that confidence? And I think that's, I think you're alluding to
that, how do we build that confidence? Because, you know, again, we're talking about us vets. You
know you're talking about men and women. We came out of a culture where, you know our culture is you
have to be confident to be a soldier, sailor, marine, airman, Coast Guard, whatever. New one, air a
Space Force. But now you coming out of here into environment where you don't have that anymore, but
you're coming into, I look at it all as you kind of a loose environment or whatever, because we,
let's face it, our environment is structure. It's just a very structured base. And I always share
the story of my son, who's serving right now, currently over in Europe. Right now, he was growing up
as a kid. He was just kind of all over the place, but when he decided to join the military, we
noticed my wife, and I noticed he loved structure. He loved what the rules were, and he and his
confidence has just grown. And you seen that you're a lot of I failed to mention too, folks, that
mister Kilborn is a former drill instructor as well. And you see that when you were a drill and and
I know without. Doubt because I was, I'm a former drill too. It just it gave it's so awe inspiring.
See these kids that come into your platoon and they don't have the confidence, they're scared to
death, and then after a cycle, you take them from here to there, and that confidence, just like you,
you it's priceless. Totally priceless. Well, get that, you know, as a veteran, you know we're coming
in again, and you you've kind of alluded to, but we're coming back into this environment. Now, how
do we build that confidence back?
Daniel Kilburn: Well, most of us have a lack of confidence because we don't know what it is we're
doing. Okay, once we're comfortable doing it, we're confident, like driving the car. First time, we
hopped behind the wheel to start driving, and we were much younger. We put that confident today. We
don't even think twice about it. The key goes in, we turn it on, we drive away. We're good. Okay, so
a lot of it takes experience. I mean that the bottom line is the experience. You're not going to get
that experience unless you know what direction you're going, and that's where the planning comes in.
You need to have a goal. Need to have a very clear goal, a SMART goal. Okay, we're not going to go
into smart goals, but all of you know what they're but we need a SMART goal that we can move forward
to, even if that goal is something we've never done before, and I recommend that you make sure it is
something you've never done before, because if you, if you just stick with things you're you're
comfortable with, you're never going to grow. We need that new stuff going into our brains for us to
become more confident and to be able to facilitate what we're doing in the world. There's a couple
other things that people don't have issues with, and I probably just think six reasons people don't
do something. One is creating confidence going out accomplishing things. First of all is the goals.
You need to know what we're doing, very clear and concise on it. And I'm going to use this analogy.
You've probably all heard it. Let's go hug the trees or save the whales, right? Very nice sounding.
Tell me what tree do you want to hug and what whale Do you want to save? I'm serious. And what
forest are the what ocean are? The bigger the goal is, the harder is you're going to ever accomplish
it might sound good, and people say, Oh, that's the best thing since sliced bread. Okay, what kind
of bread is slicing I'm serious. Okay, so when we want to hug the trees, is going to be a pine tree,
an elm tree, a maple tree, what forest is it in? Because that's part of your goals. If you want to
accomplish something, know exactly what it is, and then you can learn how to do it, because that's
the next thing to step into, is most people don't know how to do things, so we have to learn. Come
on YouTube has got a video for everything. Doesn't mean that they're all correct, but it's got it.
Platforms like this, one of people coming in and talking about things that can be accomplished. They
have information. There is a wealth of information out there, and people want to share that
information for multiple reasons. One is it massages. There we go. Got this great thing for
somebody, right? And I help somebody. It makes it even better. Okay? Now, what's it? The other one,
some reason they can't do it. Let's say, take care of hyper situation, or a gaming situation. The
game drops you in a box, and there's no door where you can't get out of it, right? You can't do it.
A lot of people can't do things because of financial reasons, and we'll talk about that later. They
can't do things because of educational reasons. They can't do things because there's something
blocking them. When we have the goal, we have a directional going to the city roadblock. So we
didn't biology, right? You know, we were looking at the potential failure in front of us before we
got to it. That's our risk assessment. It's very important that we continue to do that. We still
don't cross the street when the light is red. We know that, right? Sometimes the lights green, we'll
still look back and look and forth before we start crossing. Okay, but, but this is still part of
life. You know, this is how it works. What else mistakes? People are so afraid to make a mistake. I
need to be perfect. No. How long did it take you to stand up and learn how to walk? You probably
don't remember, but I guarantee you fell down. You kept getting up. That perseverance. You kept
getting up, you kept walking. It didn't matter if you make a mistake, that's part of your perfection
is being imperfect. So embrace it. People love it much better if you can prove that you're a real
person, as opposed to pretending that you're the perfect, whatever. What else? Maybe if you don't
want to do it, depending on what it is, moral or ethical issues, yeah, I might not want to do it
Okay, or maybe I don't like that person, so I'm not going to do it for him. You know, there's
reasons for that. And the final one, permission. You need permission. I mentioned earlier that our
heavenly father put us here for a reason, so we have permission. So whatever it is you think you
want to do for yourself and for the world, do you have permission? Don't wait for no one to tell you
how, because you've got it already. It's given to you the day report. That's pretty much what I
think about. Some things we can work with, you know, and sometimes you take time, but it's really
not that hard, you know. It really isn't again we, we create most of our own barriers inside of us.
Well, I
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: tell you, Daniel, I still want to call you. Sergeant, you're a sergeant,
whatever, so they put you in the ground. But I really wish we would have had that as our exit
strategy, leaving the military, because that is such, such good words of wisdom that we really
needed to hear. Because, I mean, I know that feeling. I'm pretty sure you maybe felt it at one time
when we got we could, you know, I guess for me, the hardest thing was, for me is that when I came to
that point, I still have it, but it was the first month I realized I'm not going to be able to put
this uniform anymore, on anymore, you know, I felt like the athlete just played this last game, uh,
last game of football at university, or something like that. And for that moment, I was like, lost.
I just kind of like, okay, what now? But we're almost at the top of the half hour, and I want to
give you a few minutes here. You know, these are, these are great concepts here and and if someone's
looking to get in contact with you, with your Can you give us a little bit of information about your
books or your upcoming projects that you're doing right now that that can be a blessing to those
that are just kind of listening to this,
Daniel Kilburn: this call, okay, well, contact me. The easiest way is to go to www dot talk with
daniel.com. It goes right to a calendar page. It's a calendar page, okay, so you can go in there and
make an appointment with me, and we can get a zoom call and talk about stuff. I do that with
everybody because we need to have that communication. I really dislike trying to have email context
conversations because you don't hear so we can do that. Www, dot talk with daniel.com set up a
schedule. We'll get on the Zoom call, and we'll discuss what it is that you want to do to leave a
legacy for yourself, your life and your children.
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: Because how do we get your books? If we want to buy your books, how can we
purchase
Daniel Kilburn: they're all on Amazon. My disaster management planning book, family river disaster
planning is on Amazon. Of course, that's where I got started. In coaching in the civilian sector was
for disasters and emergencies. Particularly in Florida, we have hurricanes every year, and more
people are not prepared than are prepared. And my latest book is actually strictly focused toward
the military and the Veterans commanding your future, yeah, commanding your future. And it's all
about the transition. Some of the things to look at when you're transitioning out of the military
and that structure in the hierarchy into more of a flat surface in a looser environment of the
civilian world, as far as jobs and careers, that's what that book they're both on Amazon, on Amazon
as well. Yes, it's on Amazon. Yeah, they're both have Kindle books and they have paperbacks. Okay,
so if you have that free Kindle thing, you can get it for free and read it, you know. And they're
not big bucks there. You can knock these books out in an hour. This is pretty simple, but then
follow through, you have to do something with them. It doesn't matter what you're reading. If you're
not doing nothing with that information, it doesn't get it. Want to
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: also too. Want to make the invitation too. If there's anyone of our listeners
out there that would love to have you come as a guest speaker to do a presentation, they could meet
you at that same website. Oh,
Daniel Kilburn: sure. That'd be perfect. Yeah, that way we can get together have talked about what's
going on and, you know, take notes and facilitate it.
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: Wow. Well, I want to say thank you, Daniel for coming on the show sharing your
wisdom. That's exactly what we were looking for here on the on the Veterans Club. And I want to
thank Ed Ozo, our producer, giving me an opportunity to come on here and to share in the vision. And
this is so, so much needed nowadays for our veterans the stuff that's going on, I know a lot of
crazy stuff is going on in the world right now, but however, this is the this is a community, a
network of us vets, we it's a community. It's a community that I've learned to embrace over the
years. I'm very proud of this community. I I've grown. I've gained so much from this community, and
it's a great just, I think you would agree with me, Daniel, it's a great opportunity for us to get
back. We're no longer in uniform. You know, those days when we were drill sergeants, we run, you
know, run to those truths. Man, I love some good cadence, man, but I can't do it anymore, but it
gives me the opportunity to give back to our quote, unquote, veteran community. And I just want to
thanks. Thanks for being here today.
Daniel Kilburn: If you don't mind another moment, take another moment, because I remembered you
asked me about my current project, and I really didn't mention it. I mentioned financial literacy.
Majority of the problems people have finances. We're not gonna go deep into that, but currently I'm
working with money mentor, which is a family 3c nonprofit, and we do financial literacy program.
Items, and I'm currently engaged with putting together financial readiness training packages that
are mandated by DOD for reserve units locally here in my community, next month to teach these units.
We're actively seeking the opportunity veterans organizations, reserve and guardians to teach them
financial literacy, which most people didn't get, come on, great. Can you remember how much
financial literacy, of course, what did you get when you were in the military? Did you get a lot?
No, but
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: I got in trouble financially.
Daniel Kilburn: Yeah, we'll see. That's where I'm going. So we don't want that to happen, right? So
that's what I'm doing with that keep people above ground and above board and above the water with
their financials so they can live the life they're meant to live.
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: Awesome. And again, I want to say thank you, Daniel for coming on board. We
probably want to have you on again at another time as well, because I'm just now just scratching the
surface and stuff, and I I'm interested to hear the book you just showed us. I want to hear some
excerpts, excerpt from that book. I've already going to go ahead and purchase it so I can just kind
of read up on that stuff, because that's, again, that's the vision for the the Veterans Club, the
reaching out to us vets and making sure we're taking care of each other, leaving no man behind, no
no no fellow comrade behind.
Daniel Kilburn: I would appreciate that. I'd also appreciate your feedback once you review it
absolutely
Sgt Major Roy Lewis: well. Thank you guys for another joining us on another episode of the Veterans
Club, and we'll see you next time. Thank you.
Ed Bejarana: Thank you for tuning in to the Veterans Club podcast. Please click the subscribe button
to receive an alert when our next episode publishes, and please share this episode with a friend.
You never know when a fellow veteran might need a friendly pick me up until next time. Stay veteran
strong. You