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The Silvercore Podcast explores the mindset and skills that build capable people. Host Travis Bader speaks with hunters, adventurers, soldiers, athletes, craftsmen, and founders about competence, integrity, and the pursuit of mastery, in the wild and in daily life. Hit follow and step into conversations that sharpen your edge.
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Travis Bader: I'm Travis Bader,
and this is the Silvercore podcast.
Silvercore has been providing its
members with the skills and knowledge
necessary to be confident and proficient
in the outdoors for over 20 years.
And we make it easier for people to deepen
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We provide, please let others
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If you'd like to learn more
about becoming a member of the
Silvercore club and community,
visit our website at silvercore.
ca.
Today's guest spent time in
his youth, working in rodeo.
As well as hunting and fishing, he's
a celebrated author with books on
leadership and marksmanship, a decorated
warrior serving 21 years in the U.
S.
Army with over 15 years in the
elite special forces operations
detachment, Delta Force.
With tours in Bosnia, Desert Storm,
Somalia, and five tours in Iraq, he was
there at the Battle of Mogadishu made
famous by the movie Black Hawk Down.
He's an entrepreneur and founder
of Viking Tactics, which provides
training, gear, and accessories.
And he's a custom knife maker, which
he uses to help raise funds for the
nonprofit stay in the fight foundation.
Welcome to the silver core podcast,
retired sergeant major Kyle Lamb.
Kyle Lamb: Man, I think
we're done right there.
You said it all.
That is the best intro
I think I've ever had.
Oh, my God,
Travis Bader: you did not make my
job easy because I am only scratching
the surface of the information
that's publicly available out there.
So I know there's a heck of a lot more
to Kyle Lamb than what I put in there.
That was, uh, that was not easy.
Have you always had this
eclectic background or is that
something you kind of grew into?
Kyle Lamb: I've always been a weirdo.
So it, you know, I was the
guy that was at school.
I always had a 22 or a shotgun in my car.
Mm hmm.
And I drove a car.
I didn't have a truck.
I had a 73 Buick Centurion and I would,
yeah, I would go out and hunt or fish
or whatever before or after school.
And then I rodeoed and
then I played sports.
So I played football and ran
track, um, played baseball
and student council president.
And I, I won the spelling bee one year.
I trained for several years
so I could beat Carrie
Kandigator in the spelling bee.
It's just like, I don't have
a very good attention span.
And, uh, because of that, I just, I do
a lot of different things and, and that,
you know, that's something we were talking
about before we got going, you know, the
ADHD deal, you said you were diagnosed.
I was not diagnosed, but I'm
practicing, I think, because I do
have a little bit of a difficulty
focusing on one thing for an, uh, an.
A super long amount of time.
So like, if I'm going to write a book,
if I set a goal that I'm going to write
a book, I don't really have an issue with
that because I'm going to write the book.
Now I may take a couple of
little, uh, beaver runs from,
uh, on the way to get into that.
That actual successful product in
the end, or maybe not successful,
but completed project in the end.
But, uh, I guess, you know, what I,
what I say to that is if you have
kids that are like us, don't punish
them, you know, work, work for their.
And I, and my, like my grandson, he,
you know, he's never been diagnosed
with it either, but he's a busy dude.
Like he's always got stuff going on.
So what do we do?
We take him for a walk.
We take him out in the woods.
He's been shooting this year.
He killed his first deer.
He's nine years old.
He killed his first year
with an AR on our property.
Um, we're down in the lower 48,
so we can hunt with ARs down here.
And he, uh, he was just,
you know, he's super stoked.
He's been shooting for years and years
getting ready to go on that hunt.
And I guess the moral of that story
is if we just, if we didn't get him
outside and keep him busy, he gets
in trouble because he's going to
get, he's, yeah, he's going to do.
And I'm the same way.
And I imagine you've been in
trouble a bit in your life too.
Travis Bader: I got kicked out of
a few different schools and for
discipline and like really not
even discipline type problems.
It was my interest exceeded what
the school's capabilities were.
So I like chemistry and
chemistry meant disappearing or
invisible ink and explosives.
Well, schools didn't really like that.
Right.
And I liked, I learned how to pick locks
in grade four, cause I like puzzles.
Right.
And well, that doesn't really fit.
So, uh, yeah, I, I agree with
you and the medication thing.
So when I was in grade three, about
halfway through grade three, my
family's like, well, We're done, you're
going, we've got these pamphlets.
There's a, uh, a boarding school
that can take kids free of charge.
I think it was a military porting school.
See ya.
Right.
And I've looked at that and
at grade three, I'm like,
no, I don't want to do that.
That sounds scary.
In hindsight, it probably would have been
one of the best things I could have ever
done because it's a different structure.
But they ended up taking me to
a doctor, got diagnosed, and he
actually put me on the highest dosage
of Ritalin on an experimental run.
In the province, we can
only prescribe so much.
And I have to take eight pills in the
morning and another five in the afternoon.
And, uh, up until grade seven,
integrate seven, I'm like, I'm not
going to go into high school with
these took myself off cold to Turkey.
So I agree with you, don't medicate them.
There are ways that we can deal with them.
Getting outside for me
Kyle Lamb: was massive.
Yeah.
And you know, and the other thing
too is, so speaking of being
outdoors, eat what's outdoors.
What do we have outdoors?
We have fruits and vegetables, and we
have meat, and I don't care if it's
fish, or beef, or moose, or elk, or
whitetail deer, or turkey, I don't care
if it's what color of vegetable you
eat, but eat it, and I think if we do
that, like my grandson one day, we, one
of our little special times, I've got
a grandson and a granddaughter, and we,
one of our special things together is we
like to eat popsicles, And we'll go grab
a popsicle in the summer and we'll sit
out on the porch and eat this popsicle.
So they get to go and choose the
popsicle they want out of the freezer.
And we head out there and
grandpa has a popsicle with him.
And it's just, it's just like
a special time, you know?
And, and really any time with
your grandkids is a special
time, but that's especially.
So one day I was grabbing popsicles
and I really hadn't thought about it.
And I grabbed a red one and like
a pineapple one or something.
And I, I, I'm like, which one do you want?
And my grandson looks at me and
goes, grandpa, I can't eat red.
Cause it makes me crazy.
And it's true that the red something to
do with the red dye would make him like.
Insane for just you know for an
hour, but he'd get in trouble because
of it Well, that was our fault.
That's not his fault.
Don't feed him a stupid red popsicle
Give him one that's white or green
or purple or any other color.
He was fine So I think you know keeping
those kids exercised to work off a
lot of that that excessive Energy they
have I know for me It's that way my
wife every morning makes me go work out
because she knows that if I don't work
out I'm going to be a complete Dirt bag.
So make me go for three to five mile
walk, you know, whatever it is that we're
going to do, but get out and get moving.
And then of course, you know, if you
get outside, you're going to feel
better in the first place there.
Um, I was going to tell you a
couple of stories about growing up.
Um, one of them happened when my mom died.
So this was not that many years ago.
She was like 93 or something
when she passed away.
So go to my mom's funeral.
Now you got to put this
all in perspective.
I'm in South Dakota.
At my mom's funeral.
That's a significant emotional
event for a dude to have their mom
die Whether I mean, I don't care
what you think about your mom.
You only have one mom That's your mom.
And my mom was a character.
She was, uh, she was a
character born in like 1925.
My dad was born in 1911.
You know, she went through the dirty 30s.
She, she could, she was, I don't
know how you would call it, thrifty.
Some people would call
her tight or whatever.
But she could, you know,
she was, that's how she was.
So I go to the funeral.
And after the funeral, my, my niece
is there and my niece is a year older
than me and she's a school teacher.
And she's standing over there with this
other lady and as soon as I see her and
I, I, this isn't serious, but you know,
when I saw her, my trigger fingers started
to twitch and uh, I'm like, Oh yeah.
So this lady walks up and she goes.
And this lady's just grumpy.
She goes, do you remember me?
And I go, yes, ma'am.
I do remember you.
She's like, oh, you do remember me.
And I'm like, yeah, and I'm thinking
my son needs to meet this lady.
This is one of my school
teachers and I want him to meet.
This lady's like an evil
beast woman, you know.
So I said, hey Lucas, come over here.
I want you to meet one of
my old school teachers.
I go, Mrs.
Waldo.
This is my son.
Lucas, and she's like, did your dad
ever tell you what he did to me?
And he's like, no.
And he goes, well, you know
what he said to me one day?
He got in trouble, and
he called me a bitch.
And I was like, alright,
well I'm at my mom's funeral.
I appreciate you, uh, telling
this great story here, but I don't
need to hang around any longer.
So I was like, Oh yeah, good seeing you.
And I walked away.
So later on, we get in the car
to leave and my son, he's grown.
He's not a little kid.
He, uh, got in the car.
My wife didn't know this had happened.
I said, Lucas, sorry about that.
That was kind of weird.
He goes.
Dad, I only met her for like two
minutes and I think you nailed it.
And it's like, this lady has been
living, I've been living in her head.
Like I've been sitting on a lawn chair,
smoking a stogie in her head for 30 years.
And I was like, you,
you gotta be kidding me.
Like I had a great influence on
this lady, obviously from, from.
From from that many years ago,
and then one other quick story.
I got a call from my old English
teacher I didn't get a call, but I
got a an email through our website
It said I had a guy that went in
my he was in my English classes and
speech classes And he acts a lot like
you do and his name was Kyle lamb.
Hmm, and I was like, mr.
Kinder Yeah, this guy was a great teacher.
He was an awesome teacher He would
we had a kid in our class that really
didn't talk to anybody that we had a I
had a very large class for South Dakota.
There was 20 kids in my graduating class.
My wife was from a school about
50 miles away in Castlewood,
South Dakota, and she had 12.
But uh, this kid, he was a nice
kid, but he rode a motorcycle.
He wasn't particularly well kept.
And the teacher, Mr.
Kinder says, uh, what are
you going to talk about?
And he goes, I don't know.
I don't have a subject.
I don't know what to talk about.
And he goes, well, what
do you really like to do?
Well, I like to ride my motorcycle.
And he had his dirt bike.
And he goes, I want to do
a class on your motorcycle.
And he goes, well, like, what do I do?
And he goes, well, what do you, what do
you maintenance do you on her motorcycle?
Well, I, I changed the oil.
Okay.
Change the oil.
Can you teach us how to change oil?
And he goes, yeah, but
how am I going to do that?
And he goes, you're going to bring
your motorcycle in the school, in
the classroom, and you're going to
teach us how to change the oil and
this kid's like, Whoa, no kidding.
There you go.
There's a teacher that that teacher is
a five star teacher because now he's
taken a kid and he's taken his interests.
And he's shown him that your interests are
just as good as anybody else's interests.
They don't have to be the same.
You know, I'm going to give a speech
on guns or I'm going to give a speech
on fishing or hunting or whatever.
He's going to give a speech on how
to change the oil in a motorcycle.
And I saw that kid like dynamically
change right there in front of our eyes.
And so Mr.
Kinder, I said, Oh, Mr.
Kinder, I, you know, I wrote a,
I've wrote a couple of books.
Can I send you one?
Sure.
That'd be great.
So I sent him a book.
And two months later, I
hadn't heard from him.
And I, I emailed him and I
said, so you got the book.
What do you think?
And he goes, it's fine.
And I'm like, he's still
an English teacher.
You know, he read it like an English
teacher, I'm sure, but he's, he's one of
those teachers that I really looked up to.
And I think that inspired me as
an instructor that I want to be.
Like Mr.
Kinder and, and be able to come across to
people like that and focus on what their
interests are and making them better.
Cause as an instructor,
it ain't about you.
It's about your student.
And if your student doesn't get any better
at the end of the day, it's your fault.
It's not their fault.
A hundred percent,
Travis Bader: a hundred percent.
Yeah.
We just wrapped up a, uh, of course we
have a new batch of hunter education
instructors coming through the province.
So they asked if I could.
Teach them basic method of
instruction and classroom management,
dealing with difficult students.
And, you know, as I'm in
there, I'm thinking about it.
I almost failed grade seven.
The teacher only passed me because I
was such a pain in the ass that they
didn't want to see me there again.
I was, I think five
different high schools.
And she told me that
straight up to my face.
She's like, I think high
school, do you good?
I don't want to see you again.
You should have failed, but you're going
on, uh, five different high schools.
I went to like, I'm not a school person.
Why is it I'm teaching
people how to teach?
How did I end up in a profession
where I'm running this?
And maybe it's because you go through
that school of hard knocks and you learn
all the ways that don't work for you.
I don't
Kyle Lamb: know.
Well, and, and, you know, and
we had a very robust shop.
Class type environment too.
So, I mean, we had chemistry teacher.
That was awesome.
I wasn't a big chemistry guy, but he,
you know, when I got to, I guess it's
not chemistry, biology or whatever,
cutting up frogs, I was like, Oh yeah.
Well, you're not supposed to blow up
stuff, but light and Bunsen burners
and getting, we'd make stuff blow up.
Um, And then we had our shop class where
we learned to do 110, 220, we learned to,
I already knew how to arc weld, I thought.
And then I had this, this, uh, this guy,
Kendall Thompson, who was my instructor,
he passed away a couple of years ago,
but he taught me how to MIG weld.
I wish he would have
taught me how to TIG weld.
He never did.
And I don't know, maybe we
just didn't even have that.
But now when I MIG weld, every
time I MIG weld, I think of him
because he's the guy that really.
Showed me how to do that.
And now I make knives, so I'm making
Damascus and San Mai and I'm using
my, my welder to do stuff like that.
Um, yeah, I think that in America and
I suppose in Canada, it's the same
way, you know, in some areas they,
they somewhat frown on Vo tech type
schools, but where I grew up, that was
like, that's, that was the place to go.
Like you want to go learn, truly learn.
A craft you went to votech.
You didn't go to college.
Now.
There's a lot of kids that went
to college and God bless them.
They went to college and
they're still paying for it.
So good for them, but those other folks
that went and became diesel mechanics
or welders or plumbers or HVAC people
or whatever, well, they've already
retired because they went through that.
They got, they made a lot of money if
they were willing to work hard and.
You know, that's, and I joined the army,
which was, that's my vo tech school.
Um, and I did that for
21 years when I got out.
I mean, I get a paycheck
every month because of that.
At least I still do now.
I don't know if they're going to take
that away from us or not, but, uh, it's.
I just think that the, the attitude,
the, the, what's the guy's name?
Um, Mike Rowe.
Okay.
Uh, the dirty jobs guy.
Yeah.
Yeah.
He does a spectacular job of
getting kids involved in going
to, to learn something like that.
And, and when I say Votech.
You know, if you can go become a nurse's
assistant or, uh, work as cleaning
teeth or, or anything like that.
I mean, there's so many great things
that you can learn and when you're
done, you have a job versus, you know,
you go get your philosophy degree.
And when you're done, you still have
to work at Starbucks, or I guess up
where you're at, you got to work at Tim
Hortons or something like that, you know?
Yeah.
Yeah.
We've got a couple of
Travis Bader: Starbucks
kicking around too.
Yeah.
Anyway.
I had a buddy did a philosophy thing
and goes to university and gets
his master's and on and on it goes.
I'm like, what the hell are
you going to do with this?
Well, he ended up working for government.
So I guess there's always that, right.
But, uh, uh, ethics and
government, he started working.
And I just thought that
was an oxymoron, but.
Good on him for, uh, for going in
there and putting his two bits in.
Kyle Lamb: Um, we, we talked before
this, we said we were going to talk
about politics, politics, religion,
and I guess we ought to hit on race
while we're at it too, but yeah,
politics, man, I was joking with you.
Yeah.
I was joking with you before
we started about, yeah, at
least we don't have Trudeau.
We've only got a Biden, but it's pretty,
uh, man, it's pretty dire circumstances
right now in Canada for you guys.
And it's, it's crazy that as an American,
I can see that like your farmers and
how they're struggling and they're
getting just abused by your government.
Um, I don't know, man, it's, it's sad.
The energy thing is what really
is upsetting to me because.
You guys can make, um, natural
gas oil guys can, what was
it like the natural gas?
So it's easier for you guys to process
it because it's already cold in Canada.
That's right.
So.
Yeah.
People are trying to say we
should be green and do all this.
Well, if you want to be green,
then you should buy all your
natural gas from Canada.
You know what I mean?
Totally.
So I don't know.
It's, it's,
Travis Bader: uh, they've got
the whole green thing backwards.
Go get yourself electric vehicles.
And actually noticed just recently, a lot
of, uh, electric vehicle manufacturers are
seriously cutting back on their production
because the public appetite isn't there.
The cost to produce is, uh, so high.
And the, the myth of that being
green is starting to come to light.
The amount of energy required in order
to maintain, to create and sustain
the electrical vehicle grid is, um,
is tremendous, but it sure sounds
good from a political standpoint.
Oh, you know, carbon tax and you know,
we're going to make the world green.
You wouldn't be against
the nature, would you?
You're not, you're not anti,
uh, sustainability, are you?
And I think they just framed the
whole argument completely wrong.
And it's.
You're, you're right.
It's easier from somebody on the
outside to look in, from a US
citizen to look into Canada and say.
What's going on over there than it is
for somebody who's on the inside, who's
so indoctrinated and is only hearing
half of the information like our news.
If I pull up CBC on Instagram
or meta, I can show it to you.
The whole thing's blocked.
And who would think that would
happen in a place like Canada?
The, the thing that gets me is it's not.
Biden, and it's not Trudeau, it's
the people that would get behind and
vote something like this in and think
that this is a good idea, right?
These are just figureheads
for a zeitgeist or a, um.
Yeah.
A public sentiment that is just
absolutely awry and it will swing
back, but it's going to have to get bad
Kyle Lamb: before it does.
Well, they, you know, you have one of
the greatest minds and, and I don't
know what you're going to say to this.
You may completely disagree.
I already know who you're going
Travis Bader: to say, and I
already agree with you, but go on.
Let's see if I'm right.
Kyle Lamb: We're going to say Peterson.
Roger that.
I was going to say him.
He is, he is absolutely one of the.
Great.
Now, I don't know if you
call him a philosopher.
I don't know what you call the guy.
He is a thinker.
Yeah, he's a thinker and he's
brilliant because he does the thinking.
He doesn't let other people think for him.
Oh, wow, that sounds kind
of crazy, doesn't it?
Like, free thinking?
That's what America was founded on.
Canada, I mean, you've, you've,
you've always kind of been, and I
don't, I'm not trying to be mean
by saying this, but you've been
under the foot of other countries.
With whether it was the French at
one time or the Brits or whatever.
So in America, we were
under that foot too.
And then after you guys come in
and burn down the white house.
1812 there.
Yes.
Yeah.
But, but my, my point is now you
got a guy like that, that, that if I
was Canadian and I was the Canadian
government, I would be embracing.
How amazing that dude is, and I would
be leveraging his thoughts and all
the people that he has that he talks
to because he doesn't just talk to
people that echo what he thinks.
He talks to people that are completely,
have a completely different view than him.
And now they're talking about
taking away his license to practice,
which doesn't really matter because
he's not going to practice anyway.
Sure.
However, That is ridiculous.
The attacks that they've, that the
government has put against that man.
Travis Bader: Yeah.
Re education mandatory re
education is what, which was
held up by the Supreme court.
Um, why?
Because his views differ because he
is on social media and presenting in
a way that's oppositional to what the
status quo or the, I'm going to do
air quotes status quo is said to be.
Yeah, I philosopher, sure.
Thinker.
I just think he, it's like Einstein.
He says, I'm not smarter than most people.
I just spend more time thinking
about a subject than other people do.
And there's no doubt the guy's smart.
But the amount of time and energy and
effort that somebody will put in to
look at a problem and not just try
and justify why your pre, uh, assumed
position is, is correct, but try and
attack it from the other side as well.
And then try and look at what history
would say about it and try and look at how
the other people and put that together.
And he'll formulate an opinion, I
guess, not even an argument, so to
speak, but an opinion on it that
people will take as an argument.
And, you know, I think we have a
lot to learn on our social discourse
and how we can talk with each other.
I don't have to agree with a guy on
everything to understand he's a thinker.
Kyle Lamb: He's, I don't
know, I don't know him.
I've never met him.
I would love to meet the guy.
And I would ask him if I met him,
I would ask him one question.
Do you want to guess what that would be?
Travis Bader: Okay.
There's a whole bunch of questions going
through my head, but, um, uh, why don't
you move to the States would be one of
Kyle Lamb: them.
I have, I have one question.
So I'm a Christian.
Okay.
So my question to him.
Okay, so is, is, is he, has he's
publicly said he's a Christian?
100%.
Oh, he has.
Okay.
Well then you've answered my question.
I never need to meet him because
that's the question I had because
he has dug so deep into Christianity
and the Bible and he's explained it.
He's taken it down a different route
than anybody I've ever heard discuss the
Bible and it's very intriguing to me.
That doesn't mean I agree
with everything he says.
But man, he inspires, he inspires
thought and I think that's, you
know, that's like, uh, have you ever
heard of, um, Oh, what's his name?
Um, on combat unkilling,
uh, Grossman, David Gross.
Yeah.
Grossman.
So he's been on the podcast actually.
Okay.
Good.
Good.
He's a, he's a stellar dude.
Sure.
He is.
He's, he's an, um, Yeah, he's an amazing
guy, good Christian guy and all that, um,
and I, I'm going to say this, and I don't
want to say this disrespectfully, but I
disagree with some of the stuff he says.
I agree, but how did I get there?
How did I get to that?
I listened to what he had to say.
He inspired my own personal thought
and I made my own decisions and what's
he's done in law enforcement and the
military around the world, not just
in America or Canada, but around the
world, he's inspired soldiers and cops.
To think about the act of killing and
think about all this stuff of being
in a gunfight and everything so that
when they get in that gunfight, if
something happens, like you have, uh,
um, like you start to lose your hearing
because, uh, uh, what do they call that?
Um, there's a name for it.
But anyway, as you, as you get in
that position, you have a auditory
physiological, but a psychological,
uh, affects your hearing.
Okay.
Whatever.
Well, yes.
That may, that may or may not
happen, but if it does happen, now
you know, or you get tunnel vision,
or you, whatever it might be.
And I think that, you know, that's
like with, uh, the Christianity
stuff with Jordan Peterson.
He, he just, he's really made
me think, not just about that,
but a lot of other stuff.
And I have a hard time when I turn on
Any of his podcasts or any of that, I
really have a hard time shutting it off
because he can be talking to somebody
about the stupidest trivial stuff
and he'll inspire thought, you know?
Yes.
So I want
Travis Bader: to, I want to, so
when I say a hundred percent,
I'm thinking about this now.
I want to make a hundred percent sure
that he has said that my recollection
is that he said he's Christian.
A friend of mine actually
works on a security detail.
Um, Uh, maybe I'll see what we can do
to, uh, to get a, a reach out to, uh,
maybe ask that question or how that
introduction made because, uh, yeah, he
is an interesting fellow and the emotion.
That's the other interesting
thing, how emotional that he'll
get about these different topics.
Because he spent the
time thinking about that.
He looks at what history
has to say about that.
And the best predictor of
future performance is going
to be past performance.
And I think he can see where
certain thought processes and
politics will be, will be heading.
And it's not always a pretty place.
Kyle Lamb: Yeah.
He's got a, they've got a lot of
their stuff right here in Nashville.
I'm just outside of Nashville.
So.
I don't know if his daughter lives
here or what, but daily wire, they do
a lot of their stuff out of Nashville
and he's working with them now.
So very interesting guy, but kind of going
back to, um, kind of our backgrounds, the
outdoor thing, you know, the clean water
act is something that I, I kind of got a
kick out of when the back country hunters
and anglers were all hot and bothered
about, well, you got to sign this thing
saying that you support clean water.
Oh, well, what kind of dirt bag
doesn't support clean water?
That's not what they were.
That was not at all what
they were trying to do.
They were trying to take away our rights
and they're trying to say that If a duck
lands in a pond in this state and then it
flies to another pond in another state.
That's that's um, Commercial
or I forget what they call it.
Uh, there's a name for it But bottom
line is they're trying to say that
because of that The, um, EPA should
control anything that has a bank.
A bottom and a high
water mark interesting.
So that's what they were pushing for So
let's let's talk about what has a bank a
bottom or a high water mark if you live
in town Your you have a bank a bottom and
a high water mark on your ditch So that
means all of a sudden the epa can come in
and control what you put on your grass Or
if you have a garden what you put in your
garden, they can control every possible
thing And backcountry hunters and anglers,
I think I haven't tracked them for a
while now, but I think they've been kind
of called out for how goofball they were,
um, they were for backcountry hunters
that were going in and smoking dope.
And, you know, they'd never really
hunted, but like, man, I'm going to
go, I can kill an elk and I'm going
to go stick a few arrows in a few elk
and eventually one's going to die.
And I'm going to post some
selfies with this elk and then
I'm going to go smoke more weed.
And I'm like, Where I come from if if
you smoke weed you got to put that down
on your 4473 and you're not allowed to
buy a firearm But where they're from
which is also in America, they must
not have to do that So I went to one of
their get togethers here in Nashville
just to kind of feel it out and you're
gonna think I'm lying But this place I
walked into was packed with a lot of very
hairy very smelly dudes There was three,
there were three people in that place.
Cause I, I really looked to find it.
There were three people
that were wearing shoes.
Really?
Me, my buddy, and they got a squirrel
hunter that they put on meat eater.
Often he's kind of a character.
He, he had boots on and I had
shoes on and my buddy had shoes on.
Everybody else had like flip flops
or, um, Oh, what are the ones
that all the hippies wear the,
uh, Birkenstocks or Birkenstocks.
Yeah.
They all had like these and I'm like,
bro, where I hunt, you can't wear
flip flops, you gotta wear shoes, man.
You know, cause stuff will bite you or
you can't climb up a hill or whatever.
But after that, I'm like, yeah,
I probably don't need to hang
out quite with these cats.
And I think a lot of real hunters
were kind of sucked into that.
And now hopefully they're, they're
more awakened to the fact that it.
My, they might not have actually
been on the side of, of true hunters.
Even one of the guys that was the main
guy on their board, he ended up writing
that, that book, the gunfight book.
Oh, which guy was this?
Oh, let me see.
What's his name.
Travis Bader: It was, uh, land.
Tawny, I think was the
name of the, uh, the
Kyle Lamb: guy in charge.
Uh, I got it right here.
Let me look it up.
It's, um, Ryan Bussey.
Okay.
Heard that name.
So Ryan Bussey, he, he realized after
25 years in the firearm industry
that he was anti gun fair enough.
Yeah, he wrote this book about,
called Gunfight and I, I got
a call one day from a guy.
He said, man, you made the book.
And I go, what book?
He goes, there's a book called Gunfight.
And I'm thinking, that's awesome.
I'm in a book called Gunfight.
Then I find out it's about
this leftist dude that wants to
take away guns from everybody.
And he said that guys like me and, and,
uh, Matt Best from Black Rifle Coffee, we
have made it sexy to have the AR 15 and
made it more acceptable and we're just
bad people for doing this and I'm like.
Man, that's so awesome.
I call up Matt best.
I call up Matt and he's
like, Hey, what's up Kyle?
You know, and I go, you ain't gonna
believe it, bro, but you made it
in this book called gunfight and
he's like, Whoa, that's awesome.
What'd I do?
And I said, they said that we're
the, the reason that so many
people want AR fifteens in America.
And he's like, yeah, right on, you know?
And so we were actually proud of,
of making it into the book for that.
Um, I never bought the book cause I
don't want to, I don't want to put my
money in there, but, uh, I just think
it's interesting how things get twisted.
And, and, you know, I guess the point
of all this is not that you should not
back good organizations, but you should
really know what they truly stand for.
I would say before you, you go out there.
Travis Bader: What do they
say about the road to hell?
Lined with good intentions, right?
It's clean water.
Who wouldn't go want clean water?
That's a great intention.
Read it, go through, find out what
the fine print says, because even the
people with the best intentions might
be going down that Primrose path.
Kyle Lamb: Yeah, we, you know, we get,
um, we get pushed in corners every
now and again to do stuff for 501c3s.
on the veteran side of things.
And a few years ago, my wife went in for
back surgery and, and, uh, as a military
guy, and, and, I mean, I guess you could
say this in Canada too, you kind of feel
like if I go in for surgery, I'm going to
get surgery because I was in the military
that you get, you're supposed to get
medical care for the rest of your life.
Well, that's not quite the truest case,
and I guess in Canada you probably
find that out every now and again, too.
And we went in there, and they had her
on the table, putting a little fancy hat
on and getting her wired up, and then
they said, Oh, we just realized that the
insurance didn't approve your surgery,
so we're not going to do the surgery.
And at the time, my
wife could barely walk.
She had this severe back Injury that was
just like a freak thing and she needed
to have that surgery now or she could
quite possibly Lose the use of one leg
permanently and she looked at me and kind
of grimaced and she goes the checkbooks
in the center Council of the my truck
go grab it and just write a check So I
went down and I grabbed the checkbook
and I had to write a pretty big check to
have her surgery And then I had to write
another check for the anesthesiologist
and when she, a few weeks, well, it
was actually two months later when she
finally kind of had this all behind her.
She's up and walking.
I mean, she was walking and pain
free an hour after her surgery.
So a couple of months after this, she kind
of finally gets her head clear from the
stuff she's taken and she's back in it.
And she goes, you know, if we
would have been in the military,
we couldn't have done that.
And I would have had to go home
and just get on painkillers.
And I would have.
Who knows what would have happened.
And she goes, I want to start a 501C3.
And I'm like, yeah, you know,
no, we don't want to do that.
And she goes, I want to start a 501C3
where we help people, not just military
and law enforcement, but any human being.
And 100 percent of the money that
we take in goes to help them.
So the moral of that story is not that,
that I want you to send all your money
to the stay in the fight foundation.
The moral of that story is go
find the people that actually.
Do with your money what you would do
with your money, you know We don't we
don't take one dime out for anything
other than to help people So that means
all the administrative fees and all that
comes out of our pocket That's our tie
to that organization And if if you send
a hundred dollars that hundred dollars
is going to go to this person to help
them, you know, do whatever so it's it's
it's made my brain hurt a little bit
less because now I can say more I can
say no more often to people that I don't
know if they're actually doing that.
Or if I research it, or my wife
researches, we can see exactly
what percentage is going to
help people and what percentage
is going to help themselves.
And it's anyway, that's been a very
interesting little ride for us.
And, and we actually talked about this
the other day, cause you're making knives.
Travis Bader: Yeah, I started,
I figured it was, um, half faced
blades, Andrew Arabito chatting
with him and he's like, Traff.
Pick up a grinder, just start
grinding away on some metals.
Just see what you can do.
Right.
So I did that and picked up a grinder
and been playing around and now I just
got a forge and buddy gave me an anvil.
So I'm going to start
playing with that a bit.
Yeah, that's, but your knife making
that you do, you can't buy your
knives, so to speak, can you?
Kyle Lamb: No, you have to do
a donation to the stay in the
fight foundation and, and.
It's a gift.
It's not a, you're not, I
don't know how to put it.
I mean, we're doing it the
legal way that we can do it.
Uh, it was kind of funny.
The last dagger I finished,
um, this guy, he saw it.
It wasn't even finished yet.
And he goes, my buddy wants that.
And I was like, I'm thinking
that ain't for sale, bro.
You know, cause this is
my first V 42 dagger.
I've made other daggers, but not a
V 42, like a case V 42 dagger, which
was the original knife that, um,
well, it's the American and Canada.
SF World War II in 1942,
that knife was what was ish.
No, no, no, no.
That's a different knife.
Okay.
Now this was designed loosely
on the Fairbairn Sykes, but this
is a completely different knife.
They wanted it different because they
wanted a more of a premium blade because
a lot of those knives were made in, in
England and they were mass produced.
They're, they're a fine knife,
but they're mass produced.
So the stamped parts and this
and that drop forge, whatever.
The case that won that contract,
and there was never a lot of
them made, but you know, it was.
All those parts are still made by the
original jobbers that made them in
World War II, which is pretty cool.
So it's a, it's a, it's a longer knife.
It's a sleeker knife.
It's hollow ground.
It's, there's a lot of
cool stuff about it.
So I had made this knife and
actually that knife, I call it a
V42, but it wasn't hollow ground.
I've got five of them I'm making right
now that some of them are hollow ground.
Some of them have blood grooves,
which the V42 never had.
The V42 is the dagger that had
the thumbprint on one side.
Right.
Okay.
Yes.
Yeah.
So it has a thumbprint and that
thumbprint was meant as an index point.
So, you know, which way the blade was.
And it's like, if you look at that knife,
I don't care which way the blade is.
It's you're going to go through the ribs.
It doesn't matter.
It's such a sweet little blade.
It's like 610 thousands wide.
So it's a very thin, thin blade.
So this guy says, well, my
buddy said he'd give you a
thousand dollars for that knife.
And I went sold, you know what I mean?
That's a great deal.
So then he calls me.
Yeah.
Hour later he goes.
Yeah, I talked to my buddy and he
changed his mind He's not going to give
you a thousand dollars for that knife
and I was like, okay, that's cool.
Whatever I mean, I don't I
mean doesn't matter to me.
I'm doing it for my brain.
I'm not doing it for money I'm doing
it for my mental health, you know,
and uh He says, yeah, he decided
that because all the money is going
to the stay in the fight foundation.
He's going to give you
2, 500 for that knife.
And I'm like, wow.
So he got the first V 42.
And then this guy that bought it,
he actually bought another knife.
Um, Alan Elishowitz,
you're familiar with him.
Very high end custom knife maker
makes folding knives predominantly.
He has been a, uh, huge inspiration
to me, not just inspiration.
He's actually been an instructor
to me and helped me learn how to
hollow grind, how to just, he's a,
he's just an amazing knife maker,
but he's an even better instructor.
So, uh, I made some San Mai that
was three layers of, of, uh, 1084
and then two layers of nickel.
And then he made a dagger out of it.
Well, this guy not only bought my
knife, but he bought that knife.
As well and all that money went to stay
in the fight foundation So my buddy
called me later and he said, you know,
the reason he did that was He said he
can buy any custom knife he wants and
it's only worth 800 or a thousand or
fifteen hundred dollars or whatever but
Your knife is worth more because not
because you made it, but because that
money is going to go to help people.
And I thought that was a good
reality check for me because it's
not worth any more because I made it.
It's worth more because you're going
to help people with that money.
And, and I also don't feel
bad now, but when I say the
other day we put a, a little.
Tomahawk out that I made.
It's not a Tomahawk.
It's like a, like something that
you would get from Winkler knives.
And I had a, a scrap piece of
80 CRV 2, which is what Daniel
Winkler makes all his out of.
And Daniel Winkler, Winkler has been
another guy that has just bent over
backwards to help me with my, my journey
to make knives and, and do this stuff.
And, uh, I made it kind of a weird
shaped handle because the piece of
scrap, I couldn't make a straight handle.
So I make kind of a swoopy handle
and, and, uh, The other day we put
it out online for 500 and a guy
that's been in my classes bought
that and he donated 500 bucks.
So that's, it's, it's a very,
to me, it's a very cool story
of, of how this has went.
And it takes a lot of pressure off
me because I don't take orders.
And I don't take, I build
what I want to build.
And if I don't want to build it,
if I want to throw it in the trash,
I'm going to throw it in the trash.
I'm not thinking, man, this guy, Travis,
I got to make this knife for him.
And it's been six months.
I got to get it.
I got to get it finished.
And the last thing I'm going to say is
I was going to send you some pictures
of my knives, but after I saw your
knives, I was like, well, this guy, he's
already making better knives than me.
So your knives, your
knives are beautiful, dude.
I mean, they are absolutely beautiful.
My first few knives.
We're forged and well, I take that back.
When I was a kid, I made knives and
shop class in school, but, uh, I
guess that's probably frowned upon
these days, but, Hey, we all did that.
We all did it.
No, your, your knives are gorgeous.
And I think when you get that forge,
you're really going to enjoy it
because it takes, it, it, it changes.
Stock removal is a lot of fun,
and I think stock removal is a
good way to refine your technique.
At least that's how I use it.
But then once I kind of refine that,
I will send you some pictures later.
I just did a couple of integrals.
And taking a piece of steel, actually
I took seven pieces of steel, and I
made this, it looked like a big glob
here with this one piece sticking out.
And I forge welded that all together
and then that became one of them.
I made a guard out of it.
I never really seen that done
as an integral and I know guys
do it, but I, I made it a little
bit bigger than I should have.
And I thought, man, I can make that
into a guard, not just into a bolster.
So I made one with a bolster, a smaller
knife, and then I made one with a guard,
which is a pretty big, a pretty big knife.
I'll send you pictures of it, but
it's, I'd never done that by myself.
I made one with Jason Knight,
who's an unbelievable.
Master bladesmith and between him
and Alan Elishwitz, Alan taught
me how to use a milling machine.
And it's just been,
it's been just awesome.
If you ever get to Nashville, you
need to look us up cause you come
out here and we'll, we'll heat
up some steel and make something.
I mean, it's, it's just so fun.
Travis Bader: I have no idea what I'm
doing, but when it comes, like I got
the forge, I got one in, I look at this
thing and I'm like, why did I order this?
I could probably make this thing myself.
Right.
But fair enough.
Now I know I can see what it looks like.
It's a Atlas forge.
I fired it up a couple of times,
just done the, um, Whatever that
treating is that they ship with it.
I haven't put any metal
in to bang away yet.
I have like, when I was younger,
I would do a bit of welding.
Like I worked for an armored car
company when I was 18 and like most of
my jobs, I never actually did my job.
I'd find other things that
were interesting and I'd do it.
I worked for A& W as a teenager
and I'm like, brand new place.
Hey, um, do you have an alarm system?
Oh no.
Do you have security cameras?
Nope.
I'll set them up.
Do you need.
Uh, cabinets built, so I'm paid
as a fry cook and I'm building
cabinets and doing their locks and
alarms, everything, but my job.
So same thing with the
armored car company.
And, uh, I look in the corner
and I see all these, uh, broken
aluminum hand trucks and, uh, Oh,
what are you guys doing with that?
Oh, I don't know.
We just piling them up and
maybe one day we'll fix them.
I said, well, if I could fix
them, would you guys pay me?
Right.
And, uh, can you weld aluminum?
I'm like, um, I've never
welded aluminum in my life.
I'm like, sure, sure.
Like, let me see.
Right.
Kyle Lamb: Yeah.
And there was probably no
YouTube video on it back then.
Travis Bader: There was it.
But I go to the welding shop and,
uh, they say, Uh, I had access
to a little TIG welder and I
was playing around TIG welding.
I'm like, yeah, your, your TIG welder,
it doesn't have enough power to be
able to weld these thick aluminum
hand trucks, but you can stick weld
aluminum with these special rods.
So I started doing that.
Um, I don't even know where, where the
hell I was going with this story, but,
uh, anyways, working, working with
all the, uh, The metal, I, I have a
background a bit and playing with metal.
I have no idea what I'm going to
do when it comes down to forging.
Like, do I, uh, I get
Damascus, I get that.
And San Juan, that looks so cool.
Like, I, I guess you want to form
it in an anaerobic environment,
if possible, weld it into a, uh,
Kyle Lamb: uh, container.
Well, yeah.
Yes.
And no, here's what I would say,
listen to some of these guys that
do it for a living and you're going
to get completely different stories.
And I'll give you an example.
Kyle Royer.
Do you know who that is?
Travis Bader: I've heard the
name, but no, I don't know who
Kyle Lamb: he is.
If you were going to say who's
the top master bladesmith in
America right now, and everybody
got in there and gave an answer.
A lot of people are going to
put him in the top five now.
Are there other people
that are just as creative?
Absolutely.
But his work is just stunning.
And he's, he does classes
online and I'm signed up.
So every beginning of the month, he
downloads his videos and you can go on
there and he does a really good job.
He's kind of a kooky dude.
He's ADHD guy as well.
That's why he's successful.
But I've picked up so many little tidbits
from him and I've seen how he makes.
Damascus, and then I've watched how,
uh, Jason Knight makes Damascus.
They both end up with the
same finished product.
But you get to choose how you're
going to are you going to do
this way that Kyle Royer does it?
Or you can do the way
that Jason Knight does it?
I've done it both ways and and what I
would say is I don't like breaking a
canister off when I'm done So like I
don't like welding everything up with
sheet metal and then having to take it
off So I'm probably going to use the
Jason Knight technique which is not to
do that and if you do it right and your
steel is clean and you You know, there's
different ways guys spray it with wd 40.
They dip it in kerosene There's all
kinds of different ways to do it and
i've experimented and I can get now
with sanmai I actually do weld the whole
billet and the reason I do that with
sanmai is because it's simple you weld
all the way Around the edge with sanmai.
You're generally not going to forge
the knife all the way out You're gonna
you're basically forging a piece of
steel and then you're going to do You're
going to cut it out like you would
You know, to do a stock removal blade.
So yeah, when you get ready to do that,
just, just ring me up and I'll, I'll
just walk you through what I've done.
And it's, if you ever, if you're
going to do San Mai, um, nickel is
a really good steel to start with
because San Mai forge welds, it
doesn't have to be extremely hot.
It's gotta be pretty hot,
but it doesn't, it's, it.
It forge welds really, really well.
Um, and what I'm using is that nickel
sheeting that is behind lights, like in
your, the lights in your ceiling have
that little piece of nickel that reflects.
That's what I'm using is that
some of that sheeting right there.
So it's only got to be enough to, to, and
I'll have to send you some pictures too.
I've got some, uh, some knives I've done
with that, that are, that are very cool.
But San Mai is fun because it's
not as much work as, as Damascus.
The other thing I was going to say
is if you really want a good workout,
go ahead and knock out that Damascus.
It's a, it's a job, man.
When you do that by hand,
I've got a 25 ton press now.
So that.
That changed my world, but uh, doing
that with the first couple billets
I did were with my arm and it,
Travis Bader: it was a lot of
Kyle Lamb: work.
Yeah, that's how guys did it.
You know, a lot of guys
still do it that way.
Travis Bader: Yeah.
Well, I don't think I'm going to be
jumping into the big press or the, uh,
the, the hydraulic or electric hammer
forges, uh, quite yet, but, um, who knows?
We'll see where it takes me.
I, all I know is I'm learning things.
What's a ricasso.
Okay.
I got to learn this, a
choil in different places.
There's so much that I don't know about
knife making right now that, uh, I.
I don't even know what I don't know.
I don't know what to even
Kyle Lamb: ask.
Yeah.
And that's, I didn't know either.
And then, uh, what was funny,
Eleanor Eichwitz and I were friends
before I started making knives.
And I, I said, yeah, check it out.
And I sent him a picture
and he goes, bro, you suck.
And I'm like, well,
he's just an honest guy.
He's he doesn't, I appreciate that.
I do too as an instructor.
I don't want you to tell me I'm
doing great if I'm not doing
great I want to learn so he goes.
Yeah, bro.
You suck and he goes I'm coming.
He goes I'm gonna teach you how to grind
Okay, so he doesn't just say I suck
and then turn and go the other way He
says I suck and by the way, I am going
to teach you and I thought I was like
dude You tell me when I should come and
he goes You ain't coming to my shop.
He goes, I'm coming to your shop.
I'm going to teach you how
to grind on your equipment.
Beauty.
So this dude shows up with grinding jigs
and because he does his stuff very precise
He makes 18 knives usually at a time I
think it is And when he gets done with
18 knives You can take the parts from
one folding knife and put them in another
folding knife And they, I mean, and he's
not doing any CNC, it's all done by hand.
I mean, he's doing it on machines,
but he's, there's no CNC.
So he tells me this and I'm like,
okay, bro's going to come to my
house and teach me on my grinder.
Oh my goodness.
It was unbelievable.
And he showed up and he told me this,
he said, uh, I probably shouldn't
say this, but I'm going to say it.
You can bleep this out if you want.
He said, uh.
He said, we're only going to hollow grind.
And I'm like, okay, so I'm thinking,
I don't know how to flat grind, right?
And he's going to teach
me how to hollow grind.
And I said, well, why
don't you flat grind?
He goes, dude, flat grinding's for fags.
And I said, okay.
Now he's joking because you got
a lot of these top knife makers.
You look at Winkler knives,
they're, they're all flat ground.
There's nothing wrong with
flat grinding a knife.
But for him, he gives it this different
look because that's, that's kind
of his trademark and these crazy
grinds that he does compound grinds.
Like the other day I was
talking to him about an S grind.
Are you familiar with that?
Uh,
Travis Bader: I think so.
I got this book, um, by knife nerds
and they got this different things,
but the S grind would be a hollow grind
with a, uh, uh, convex at the end.
Would that be?
Kyle Lamb: Well, it's a hollow
grind with a, it's a flat grind
at the edge of the knife and all
it is, it's a compound grind.
So people are calling it a S grind.
I don't know why, but it's a
flat grind so that if you use a
kitchen knife, you cut through
something, then it hits the hollow.
And, and then the food
will fall away from that.
So the first couple of knives I made
for my wife, I, I hollow ground them in
a hollow ground knife is a horrendous,
it's a horrendous kitchen knife.
Everything sticks to it, you know?
Yeah.
Yeah.
So it's, I can keep it sharp
because a razor, like a razor,
they're all hollow ground.
They're hollow ground to a
zero, which is another fun one.
You don't shave.
I don't shave much either,
but making a, making a razor.
Is a, is a challenge and I actually
made one for a buddy of mine who passed
away before I was able to give it to
him and I've just sat there staring
at him at that thing because now it's,
it's like depressing to look at that
razor because he had a heart attack and
anyway, someday I'll probably finish
it and I'll give it to his brother,
but making that blade was difficult.
So the, I showed, um, I wanted
to do a hunting knife with an
S grind because meat, yeah.
On an animal is just not
quite to the kitchen yet.
So basically it's, it's a kitchen knife.
It's just the meat's
not in the kitchen yet.
And, uh, right now we have a company
we're working with that they're,
they're making a hunting knife for us.
That'll be an S grind, a compound
grind like that, a hollow, a flat
grind up for about almost a half an
inch, and then it goes to a hollow.
So that's something that
I've been working with.
There's a guy named Salem Straub.
Who is a if you haven't seen his
stuff you should look at his youtube
channel because he does unbelievable
Videos of how to make damascus.
He's a guy that does that chain link
damascus and crazy stuff And then there's
another guy up in, he's not in your neck
of the woods, but he's Canadian as well.
Vachon Knives, have you heard of him?
No.
V A C H O N.
I don't know the guy, I've never actually
held one of his knives, but he is,
he's a very good instructor from just
watching his little video clips and
he actually runs classes at his place.
And he's just north of the
border, uh, I want to say he's
like just north of New York.
I, I looked it up because I thought,
man, if I could get up there and take
a class, he'd be a fun guy to go.
He does mostly, uh, kitchen knives.
Okay.
You know, a guy that does a kitchen
knife, I think is a good guy to
learn from simply because they're
using such a thin piece of steel.
Whereas a guy that makes, you know,
like Salem Straub, he's making knives
that are, I want to say 90 or a
hundred thousands thick at the spine.
Mm.
And he's, that's why his
hollow grinds on the sides.
They're like a 30 inch um, wheel.
So he's using a platin that simulates
a 30 inch circumference wheel or not.
Okay.
What is it?
Diameter 30 inch diameter.
Um, wheel there.
So anyway, I, I went
down a rabbit hole there.
I'm sorry.
There's that ADHD thing again.
I guess I better go for
another walk, you know.
Travis Bader: There's so much
there that I'm, I'm just absorbing
and learning as you're talking.
You have the straight razors.
So I'll use a straight
razor to, uh, to tidy up.
I think the geometry is neat
because you use the back of the
knife or the razor to sharpen it,
essentially get all your angles.
So that's probably takes a little
bit of math to figure out how
you're going to build this thing.
Um, and to get your knives, I've read
that, you know, it's got to hurt, right?
If you're going to make a donation,
we don't have a set price on here,
but, uh, I wanted her hurt and it kind
of reminded me of, um, what was it?
The widow with the two mites.
If, uh, that rings a bell.
For you being a Christian and through
the, the, uh, all these, uh, rich guys
are coming in and making their donations.
And, uh, and there's
Jesus and his disciples.
And I'm like, Oh, look at how great
that guy is and how much money he left.
And this widow comes in and she's
got two, what is it, leptons,
mites, two like half pennies, a
quarter pennies, whatever they are.
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yep.
Yeah, yeah.
So, um, Uh, you got to give till it hurts.
So it's not that it's going to be
X amount, but, you know, give in a
way that is going to make, uh, uh,
it's going to be meaningful for you.
Kyle Lamb: I like that.
I like that approach.
You know, it.
It hurts different for
different people, too.
Mm hmm.
And where I live, I live in a, I
don't want to say a depressed area
because people here are all working
and they're living, they're doing fine.
The county we're in is,
is not a rich county.
So when a guy comes over and gives me
200 for one of the very first knives I
ever forged, I was ecstatic about that.
He was ecstatic about that.
And he's a guy, I mean, 200.
He's a blue collar dude.
200, that's a lot of money.
Another guy gives us a check for 10, 000.
That's actually less than
the 200 guy gave now.
I'm very thankful for the 10,
000 I'm very thankful for any
time that we get any donation.
I mean, it amazes me we had two things
happen We had a bunch of things come in
and we needed money and we're like we're
out of money So what are we gonna do?
Mm hmm before we made the decision my wife
went and checked the mail We got to check
for 10, 000 just so that's a God thing.
That's not us.
That's God saying, okay, you
used up what you got and you did.
Okay.
At least that's what I'm hoping.
He's thinking, and here's
a little bit more money.
And then the other
thing that happened was.
Throughout the year we took in money
and we spent it for the causes that you
know It might be some lady that's abused
that has now got to pay her first and
last month's rent so we're gonna pay
that so she can get out of that abuse
situation and get into a house or a little
girl needs a helmet because She has a
choice wear this helmet or have head
surgery the helmets a much less invasive
way to do it We pay for the helmet.
Well at the end of the year Melinda
does the paperwork and we were 13 cents
difference from what we took in and what
we spent Wow So that makes me a pretty
happy dude, but the universe Yeah, we went
down a rabbit hole man you and I I mean
we might be on this thing for eight hours
to get through all this information Well,
Travis Bader: I, I
wouldn't mind that touch.
I don't, and I'm conscious of your time.
I wouldn't mind touching on the
leadership aspects because you
know, you've said before, you know,
everybody wants to talk about Somalia.
There's a lot more to me than
what happened over there.
Right.
And you've got in a book that's so
highly reviewed on leadership coming
from somebody who's clearly had some
good mentors and good instructors and
been able to put this to the test.
Um, you know, as a youngster,
I remember 12 years old, I was
taught, I had to remember it.
Leadership is the art of influencing
human behavior as to accomplish a mission
in the manner so desired by the leader.
Fair enough.
It's one thing to memorize that
now, how do we affect that?
So your, your book that you've
put out speaks to leadership
from a, such a wide perspective.
And it's, it's refreshing the way
that things are put together in there.
What drove you to want to.
Make that book.
And what are some of the formative,
I think you might've already told me
one about your past teacher there,
but formative leaders that really
influenced how you, how you move forward.
Kyle Lamb: Well, so the, the way
it came about, so Somalia was a,
uh, Interesting time in my military
career and it it wasn't it was not my
defining moment You know, and I don't
really know If you said right now like
what's your defining moment in life?
I'd probably have to say when
my children were born Yeah,
because that's defined like dude.
This is for real getting
married is awesome.
But You're bringing a
baby into this world.
You better pull your head out of
your butt and you're, you're now
responsible, not just for your wife,
you're responsible for this little girl.
And then a couple of years
later, this little boy, you know,
now life's easy because we got
grandkids and it's fire and forget.
We can get them all sugared
up and then throw them back at
mom and away we go, you know?
Yeah.
But I think Somalia did
was inspirational for me.
So as a, as a.
Soldier, there's a lot of things I learned
on the battlefield that day, good and bad.
I, I got to see good and
I got to see not so good.
And then I got to go on
with the rest of my career.
And are we going to just
continue to be not so good?
Are we going to try to be great and
be better at everything that we do?
And I'm not just talking about leadership.
I mean, if you said right now,
what, what's the very most important
thing that a soldier should learn?
It ain't leadership.
It's medical training because if you can't
medically take care of your mates on your
left and your right because if you get
up and you walk outside, you get hit by a
jeep, you got to treat them and it ain't,
you're not even a combat environment
and you got to provide first aid.
So I guess my point there is that
define me as far as I wanted to be a
better instructor for people if I'm
going to train them how to shoot.
I can go back to Somalia or
Desert Shield, Desert Storm or
my time in Iraq or whatever.
And I can talk about why I'm
teaching you this technique.
I'm not just pulling this out of my butt.
There's a reason I'm teaching
you to use this position to
think about this or whatever.
So fast forward, I met this guy.
I was at a shooting range out
in California and he's a DEA guy
named Bill Lutz, super good dude.
And I'm doing this five
day class for these.
DA guys and some FBI guys and
some law enforcement dudes.
And he keeps talking about this guy coming
in and teaching this leadership class.
And the guy he's talking about was
not respected at all in our community.
He performed very poorly in Somalia
and was not well thought of by
his guys or our unit guys either.
Okay.
I'm a positive dude.
So I'm not going to say that to this guy.
Well, it was like day four.
We're done night training.
We're driving back to the hotel.
It's one o'clock in the morning.
He starts in again.
About this dude and his
leadership and I just lost it.
I'm like, dude, the guy's a dirt bag.
Nobody appreciates him.
I don't know what you guys
see in him, but whatever.
And he's like, Oh, sorry, dude.
I didn't know I hit a, I
hit a open wound there.
And I, and I, I didn't have an open wound.
I just, I was just like, you don't
really know what you're talking about.
So I go home, everything's fine.
Probably a month later.
I got a DVD in the mail and
it just has a little note.
It's like, I'd appreciate
if you would watch this.
And it's from this guy and he sent me.
A video of this guy giving his
leadership presentation and
I'm a note, I'm a note guy.
I've got my, my book of notes always
have a book that I'm filling with
notes and I've got them all marked.
This one's not marked yet
because it hasn't been finished.
If you go to my shelf over here, my
wife marks them when I started, when
I finished each book so that if I go.
And I had this thing going on.
It was like six months ago.
She's like Roger that boom this book here,
and I'll go Yeah, oh there it is, and
I'll find it, and I'm good to go So I sit
down to watch this video and right away.
I'm like whoa There's a lie so I pull
out my notebook and I write down lie
number one Number two number three
number four and I get done with this
video, and there's 12 lies About what
happened in Somalia or about leadership
and I was pretty fired up because
I was offended by somebody Lying.
I don't know if he's trying to
make himself look good or I don't
know what's going on But the
guy was a pathetic performer.
So He's thinking of himself completely
differently than anybody else around him
Which tells me that you're completely
unaware and you're not a good leader
or a great leader If that's how you're
thinking because you should be thinking
more about your people than about
yourself so I called him up and I said
I got the video and I watched the video
and He's like, well, what do you think?
And I said, when do you want me to come
and give you a true leadership seminar?
Something to that effect, you know?
And he's like, well, when are
you, when will you be ready?
And I said, I'm ready right now.
And he goes, Whoa, Whoa, wait
a minute there, tough guy.
Cause that's how this guy talks, he
goes, wait a minute there tough guy,
what's your presentation going to be?
And I said, well, I'm just gonna,
you know, and I kinda, I was mad, you
know, and cause he's disrespecting
all the Rangers that were his guys,
he's disrespecting all the unit dudes.
And over the next six months
I put together the leadership
in the shadows seminar.
And, and it's nothing like it, it's
nothing like the book it's, it, it is
now, but at the time it was, I thought
I kind of had a seminar put together.
So this guy then ends up
hiring me to go up to teach at
the DEA and I think I did a.
I forget what the first one was, but it
was, it was some experienced leaders.
It wasn't just a bunch of chumps.
It was guys that they knew with guys
and gals that were professionals
and knew what they were doing.
And when I went up there, this
guy, Bill and another buddy of
mine, John, they, they sat there
and they, they tore me apart.
And they, when I got
done, each guy handed me.
Pages and pages of notes and I'm like
Roger that so what do you do with that?
What do you what I was inspired
because the guy was lying and I
wanted to make sure I was telling the
truth So I told the truth, but did
I tell it in an inspirational way?
Did I tell it in a, a catching way?
Did I tell it in a way that draws you
in and makes you part of the story and
makes you think like, how does this apply
in my life or in my job or whatever?
And I didn't do that.
I accomplished some of that.
So I'm like, okay, Roger that.
So I took all their notes and I completely
my wife and I redid that seminar
completely six months later I'm staying up
there in front of a group again And those
two guys are sitting in the back taking
notes and their lists got shorter And by
about the third or fourth seminar I was I
was getting just a couple of notes for the
entire seminar that they thought I should
Polish up or you know the way I should
have put this before that or whatever.
Mm hmm So because of those guys helping
me and mentoring me, and I think, I mean,
I can do as good if not a better job than
them getting up there to speak and I'm not
saying that they're not good presenters.
I'm just saying that I can hold my
own as a presenter, but as a customer,
you've got to be able to give, if
I'm going to mentor you to get up and
speak in front of people, I've got to
put on a different hat and say, okay.
I'm the customer.
What would I think and how would
I feel here and all of that?
So I start doing these leadership in the
shadows seminar all over the country and
people are hiring me And I'm doing a lot
of them for the federal law enforcement
guys and for the military and then There's
a cop down in Florida Named Matt Buscella,
and he's a former naval aviator, and
he says, uh, he called me Sparky, which
Kind of bothered me because we had a guy
on our team named Sparky who was killed
in Somalia That was his call sign was
Sparky and I never really told him that
but I'm like just kind of grates on me
because Sparky Was Earl Fillmore and
blah blah blah He goes when you gonna
write the book leadership in the shadows.
I'm like, well, you know and I kind
of Was slow rolling him because I'd
written a couple books at the time.
I wrote the the green eyes and black
rifles and then stay in the fight,
the pistol book and he, uh, one
day he called me up and he goes,
and he and I really hit it off.
And I don't know why, because we're,
we're not the same kind of person, but
he's just a, he's a super good dude.
Very good cop.
Um, great thinker reader.
He's a good, good guy calls me up and
he says, uh, you got to write this book.
And I said, well, you're going
to help me write this book.
And he goes, Well, I can't
write the book for you.
And I said, no, no, no, no.
I'm going to write the whole
book, but will you give me
honest feedback on this book?
And I didn't know what I was asking for.
When I said honest feedback, this
dude could not have been more honest.
And that's what you need if you've
got somebody that's going to help
you read a book and make sure that's
not a big pile of crap, you know?
Um, and I said, well,
what do you want for that?
I says, cause I got to pay you.
I don't want anything.
And I said, no, I'm going to pay you.
What do you want to get paid?
And he goes, when I get done,
I want two VTAC t shirts.
Perfect.
And I was like, okay, he's not
going to tell me what he wants.
Well, when we finished the project,
he called me up, he goes, I
believe you owe me two t shirts
and we sent him VTAC t shirts.
That's the only thing that man
has ever asked of me for that,
for helping me with that book.
So that's one thing.
Second thing is.
Uh, the guy that edited that book
is, uh, now the command sergeant
major in charge of 10th special
forces group, Kevin Dorsch.
And he edited the book and it was nice
to have a guy that had been an English
teacher before he came in the army,
joined the military, became an SF guy.
Now at the time he was like an E8, E8
I think when he edited my third book.
And uh, so he gave me
a good perspective too.
So now that that's all
done, everything's ready.
I'm like, I have a manuscript
that I feel is very good.
Well, what's the last check?
Well, I hand it to my
wife, and I go, here it is.
And I had it in this big binder.
And she takes it, and
she starts reading it.
Over, you know, a day or day and a half
or whatever, she hands it back to me.
She goes, there you go.
I think you got a little work to do.
And I go, cause, so this is your baby.
Like you've been working on this for
a few years and you get very emotional
about your attachment to this project
and how much work you've put into it.
And you don't want to start over.
And.
And honestly, what she told me, I
had like five chapters in the book.
She had X'd the entire chapter, not a
word, not a paragraph, the entire chapter.
She goes, you need to
rewrite this chapter.
And I'm like, well, let, and she goes,
I'm going to tell you the subject and
you're going to rewrite the chapter.
You're not going to look
at any of your notes.
You're not going to look in this book.
You're going to rewrite that chapter.
And I was like, okay, can
you give me some guidance?
Like what's Why is that?
And she goes, I can tell that
you were either tired or in a bad
mood when you wrote that chapter.
And she goes, you're a positive person and
you want this to be a positive experience
because ultimately, you want people
to take something good away from it.
You don't need them to take anything bad.
Who cares is bad stuff.
There's everybody can point out the bad.
What can we do?
That's good.
Let's move on with the positive and
be better at the end of the day.
Wow.
I rewrote those five chapters and those
five chapters were 5, 000 percent better
than the original chapters that I wrote.
So since then, she's become kind of my
go to first cut on some of this stuff.
And right now I'm actually, I've
just about got another book finished
and it's war stories from the Bible.
Right.
That's going to ask you that one.
Yeah, I've rewritten some not rewritten.
I'm writing them as I don't know what
you would call it It's it's historical
fiction because we don't know exactly
what happened when Jail drove a
tent peg through a guy's temple.
I've never done that I don't know what
that's like But I'm gonna venture to
guess that when you got a wooden mallet
and you got a wooden tent peg That's not
an easy task, but that old gal did it.
Yeah, she, she did it.
So what did she think about
what led her to do that?
And then what did she feel after it?
And what did, you know, what did the
old guy that come in there and he wanted
some water and she gave him some milk
and he fell asleep and she pinned his
head to the ground with a tent peg.
Okay.
That's a story I want to hear, or
like Ehud, the assassin that, and
you'll like this one, Ehud, are you
familiar with him who made the dagger?
He, he made this.
Yeah.
He went in and killed King Aglon.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
He made it.
It's like 18 inches long.
He, he took it in there and
he killed, you know, he killed
King Aglon with this dagger.
And the things that I learned from
that was I wrote this story and
everything and my buddy reads it and
he's a preacher and the other guy was
a missionary and he goes, you said
he tested it on a pig and I'm like,
yeah, and he goes, bro, he was a Jew.
He would have never touched
a pig and I was like, man, I
never even thought about that.
And then the other guy says, good point.
So how did he make this?
He, you said he forged this steel.
They didn't have steel.
No, they didn't have steel.
So that at the most they
would have had bronze.
So how do you make bronze?
Well, I had to research like,
how do you take tin and copper
and melt them and pour it?
You know, it's not a big thing
that's going to be forged, but it's
something that you're going to pour
and then you're going to file and,
and polish and do all this stuff.
So I had to research how to do that.
And then I told the story of how he.
Made a form, beat the form down with a
hammer, laid this dagger in there with
some dust so that when he opened the
box back up there was a form of the
dagger and then he closed it back up and
then he poured the the molten bronze in
there and made this bronze dagger and
then he went in and killed this king
and that's the story I want to read.
That it never got told completely
in the Bible because if the Bible
went as in depth as I've went with
each one of these stories, the Bible
would be, you know, 500 times longer.
And, uh, the goal with this book is
to inspire people to believe, to have
faith, and also to maybe dig a little
bit deeper and go read the Bible.
Because there's some great stories.
I'm a warrior, I'm a military guy, so
I'm a Old Testament dude, cause there's a
lot of good killin in the Old Testament.
Um, Smiting, I guess they call it
smiting, you know, uh, but I did include
some, some New Testament stuff too.
I've got Paul the Apostle in there and,
and some of these people, you're going
to say like, how do you get a war story
out of Paul the Apostle, but then when
you realize that What he went through as
an apostle, you know, being made blind
and then recovering from that and then
following Jesus and this the whole his
whole life was more of a Battle than a
lot of those guys that we look at as these
great warriors from the Bible When he
was tortured, you know, do you know what?
So when they gave him the they beat him
with rods or if you're familiar with
that Do you know what a fascist is?
So they had a, they had a, a
thing now, now picture like a,
uh, picture like a bearded ax.
Let's just, cause you
can picture that, right?
So picture a bearded ax, but around
the handle of the bearded ax,
they've taken these birch rods.
And they have put a bundle
of those around this handle.
And this guy that stands there to give
the beating, he's the guy that holds this.
And when it's time for this guy to
get beat, they take Paul and they take
his buddy and they lay him over these
rocks and they're stripped naked.
And he pulls out the first rod and he
starts to beat him until that breaks.
And then he gets the next rod and he
beats until that breaks and they give him
his, you know, whatever number of lashes
they're gonna, they're gonna give him.
Um, Man, that's a that's a stud.
That's better than Johnny Rambo that can
sit there and take that beating And then
the thing that was interesting about
that is he was a roman citizen So at
any time he could have said hey, bro I'm
a roman citizen and they couldn't have
done that to him But what did he do?
He knew that his buddy
was going to get beat.
So he took the same beating As
his buddy was going to take, and
at any point he could have been a
sissy, like I would have been and
said, Whoa, Whoa, I'm an American.
You can't do that.
Whoa, I'm Canadian.
Or, you know what I'm saying?
Sure.
You know, I could, like, I
would have said, Hey, right on.
Hey, you know, you're about to, you're
about to beat a Canadian over here.
You know, don't you know, I'm a Canadian.
Hey.
You know, and they would have had to stop.
So anyway, that's, yeah, that's,
that's how those stories go.
I want guys to be inspired and I, I,
this is going to sound kind of weird, I
guess to say, but we only need to sell
one of those books and actually sell it.
We need, we need one of the
right people to read that book.
That's all we need.
Mm.
You know what I'm saying?
Like, it doesn't matter.
It, it, it, um, I'll, I'll use
your podcast as an example.
I was doing a, a podcast and my
buddy said, well, how many downloads
do you get on your podcast?
And I told him, he's like, huh, we're
getting like, you know, a hundred
And I said, yeah, but you just told me
a story about one of those guys that
listened to your podcast, um, decided not
to kill himself because of your podcast.
You see the impact that you can have one
person one person listens to that podcast
and they don't take their life I would
chalk that up as a successful podcast,
you know the other side of and I don't
want to get too overly Religious here,
but everybody worries about their number
of followers like on Instagram and face
plant and all this stuff Jesus had 12.
Mm hmm.
And it look where it went from there.
So I, I've had to kind of step back
from this book a little bit because we
actually had a book agent for a while and
he was trying to shop it around and book
people don't want another Christian book.
You know, they wanted me to write my
story like about being a soldier and
being in the unit and doing all this.
And I'm like, no, that's,
that's never getting written.
This is the book.
Well, you know, and it's
like, nope, nevermind.
And the guy was a great guy.
It wasn't his fault.
It was the people he was
trying to sell the book to.
He was doing a great job.
But at the end my wife and I were like, we
just, we're just gonna do this like we did
the previous books and it'll be on Amazon.
It'll be on our website.
It'll be available.
And we just need that one guy.
We need that one young soldier to pick
it up and read it and realize that
There's a different way, you know, so.
I really
Travis Bader: like that.
You know, my ADHD entrepreneur
hat goes on with each one of
those stories that's in there.
So you've got a, that
dagger that's 18 inches.
That's about a cubit, I
think, in length bronze.
You had, what was that other device
that you said was, uh, yeah, the fasces.
Yep.
What if you made one of each of these
weapons and had it as a, um, sort of
like the auction items or something to
go along with the stories that, that I
wonder if that'd be an interesting way
to be able to promote, raise awareness
and also raise, uh, uh, money for the,
for the nonprofit, for what you're doing.
Just not that you had
Kyle Lamb: to.
You're making me, you're, you're trying
to make me do a lot of work, bro.
That's a lot of work.
Not that you
Travis Bader: don't already have
a lot of things on your plate.
Kyle Lamb: Yeah, so you know it's funny
you say that because Jason Knight is a
Christian as well and he said he wants to
get together with me and we want to make
And I'm like, that's the perfect,
you know, that's kind of down
the road that you said there.
Um, the other thing, and I don't know
if I'm supposed to say this or not,
maybe I'll get in trouble for this,
but, um, every chapter is going to
have a special picture that goes with
the chapter and it will be of the
dagger, the hammer, the tent peg.
It'll be, it'll be a specific
thing from that chapter.
And what's really cool about that
is, it's my wife figuring out
what that is, and then it's my
son in law doing all the artwork.
So it's, it's, it's, it's a
family thing here, you know?
And, um, he's my son in law, so
of course I gotta be a little mean
to him every now and again because
he's married to my daughter.
But he's a stellar dude, also a Christian,
and he's, he grew up in Argentina.
Now he's American, but, you know, a
super dad to my grandkids and everything
and it's, it's been, it's fun.
He gets super motivated.
He, he writes as well and he's
a spectacular artist, but his
writing is, is stellar as well.
Um, but he writes like,
uh, what would you call it?
Uh, like fantasy thriller type stuff.
So like on another planet or,
you know, stuff like that.
And I've read, I read one of
the books that he just wrote.
That he hasn't, he hasn't, uh, got it
published yet, but it's very, very good.
It's not really my kind of book,
but it was, it really drew me in.
So it's, it's nice to have an artist
like that, that can take a picture.
Or read my picture and
then draw it, you know?
Travis Bader: You've mentioned your
wife numerous times through here, and
she sounds like, like, oh, I can refer
to my wife as a force multiplier.
Um, would you have these books out if
it wasn't for your wife, would you have?
Have you heard of the term, uh,
doubling and it's an ADHD sort of thing.
I'm just curious.
This is my own personal curiosity
here, but I've got all these ideas
and energy and things I want to do.
And sometimes I just need
somebody beside me while I do it.
And they, they call this doubling.
Like my wife will come in and every
once in a while, I'll bounce an idea
off or I'll ask for help on certain
little things here and there, but.
Basically I'm then doing the project.
If I've got to write something,
I'm not a good writer.
It takes me a lot of
work to write something.
And I've played around with just blog
posts and short story, short things.
Right.
Um, but I don't get off the ground
unless I got, got her beside me for
at least to get this thing rolling.
Do you do anything like that?
Kyle Lamb: Is that a similar?
Yeah, kind of like the writing.
I'm a self starter on the writing.
I love to write and I feel
like I'm a decent writer.
Recently I started writing
some poetry and my poetry's.
As my wife says, she goes, I was
going to read something the other day
and my wife goes, just be advised.
His stuff's a little bit
dark and it's, it's honest.
So it's some of it's dark because
inside my brain or my heart sometimes
it's a little bit shadowy there, you
know, but yeah, I, my writing is, is
sometimes she's got to push me like, Hey,
you need to get back on that project.
Roger that.
But what she does is
she runs our business.
Um, make sure that, you know, products
are going out the door out of our
warehouse because everything that we
sell ships out from our warehouse.
Um, comes up with, you know, like
you're wasting time on this project.
What are you doing?
And I've said, I'm an, I'm not a
numbers guy, but I'm a goal guy.
And if I look at it, I'm like, why
did I put all my time into this?
And it didn't produce anything.
Well, if it's not for the betterment of
humankind or anything like that, sure.
Why am I wasting my time with this other
company that is we've, we've made nothing.
And over here, there's
this little silent company.
That's just crushing it.
And i'm not giving them any love so she's
the one that kind of keeps me like you
need to get away from this company And
go to these guys because they're actually
producing Um, then the other side of that
is i'm a goal person So I set a goal You
know, like maybe i'll set a fiscal goal
like we need to do this much business or
make this much money And not because I'm
a money hungry person, but money does
allow you to have a little bit of freedom.
And if we have enough income or we have
enough money in the bank, it allows me
to start thinking of working on some of
the projects that mean more to me than
standing on the range doing up drills with
a bunch of students, which I love that.
And I love to be an instructor,
but if I do that every day, I don't
have the energy to write this book.
I don't have the energy to do another
product or whatever it might be.
So I've set some lofty goals and because
of my wife we've attained those goals.
Um, yeah, I feel bad for people that don't
have a good partner in crime like that.
Um, we're lucky and, and, and
not a lot of people that are
married have, are evenly yoked.
And by evenly yoked, I don't just mean.
Working or being on the same
team, but my wife is spiritually,
mentally, physically, everything.
We are, we are yoked together.
She is.
Absolutely.
The only person on this planet that
100 percent has my back, you know, and
if things go bad, yeah, things go bad.
You see in the, in this industry,
whether it's firearms or fishing or
whatever it is, somebody does something,
people will turn their back on that
individual in a, in a heartbeat.
without even knowing the circumstances.
So I know that she's always
going to be there with me.
So that's, you know, we've
been married now 36 years.
Um, that's a long time.
That's a really long, we were
married before I joined the army.
We got married a couple of weeks before
I left for the military and somehow we
made it through all that and strong woman.
Yeah.
She's super strong.
She's way stronger than
I'll ever be, you know?
So yeah, I guess we are doubling.
We're doing something.
It's, it works because.
You know, and she, she gets, she sits
here and watches when I'm reading
something or she's giving me feedback
on a project and I'm kind of like giving
her the eye and it's not that I'm upset.
It's this, that I'm trying to soak this
all in and trying to understand what
she's talking about, because sometimes
we're on different sheets of music and
it's just, she's got to hang in there and
explain it more so that I finally get it.
Um, I'm going to give
you one quick example.
So.
She told me one day we were
at my daughter's house.
She said I have this great
idea for a chapter in your your
Bible book And I'm like, okay.
Yeah, I'm ready.
What's the what's the idea?
She goes the angels roared and
I'm like, okay, tell me about it.
She's like, yeah, well like When Jesus was
crucified the angels roared and I'm like,
I can't see it.
I don't I don't get it Mm hmm.
I just don't get it so I didn't get
it for like a year and a half and then
one day man, I got it and Now as a
storyteller, she's not a storyteller.
I'm the storyteller.
So imagine if you were the Archangel
and these, all these angels and,
and, and what are you doing?
You're seeing everything that's going
on and you're, you're working with
Jesus and you're, you're watching
this joker and you're like, no,
this, we can't let this happen.
And you bring all these guys
together and you say, listen, army
of angels, we're going to go there
and we're going to protect Jesus
because he's, he's the man, you know?
And, uh, Jesus is, is beat and he
starts walking through the streets
on the way to get crucified.
And he locks eyes with Michael
and he tells him through that
stare, this got to happen.
So you think about this, you think
about your best friend or your wife
or your child, or your, if you're a
military guy like me, your commander,
your sergeant major, you're going to go
there and you're going to stand there.
And watch them be executed.
Think of what's going through
their hearts as these angels.
So when when Jesus
finally died They roared.
Very powerful.
Is it?
Yeah.
Sadness, anger.
What is it?
You know, frustration.
Yeah.
They don't know.
They don't know what it is.
But when Jesus died, the world went dark.
The earth shook.
And what happened in the
temple, the curtain was ripped
from the top to the bottom.
That's when that really sunk into
me because as a Christian, I should
have understood that I should
have understood what that meant.
I didn't understand what that meant till
like a year and a half ago, the curtain
ripped from the top to the bottom because
now you don't have to separate those
artifacts and this special area from us.
Jesus died for our sins.
We have direct access.
We don't have to, we don't have to go
through, you know, like I said, we don't
have to go through the box of goodies
and we don't have to go and kill a bunch
of animals that Moses was told to do.
We don't have to do that because
that's what happened on that day.
So, and I'm not trying to make
people out there get all crazy
about, Oh, this guy's a weirdo.
He's thinking, no, you don't,
I'm telling you a story.
You can take it or leave it, but
I'm going to tell it in a way that
you're going to be like, Whoa.
And at the end of it,
you're going to be thinking.
Man, I might need to check in on
this Jesus, bro, and see what, you
know, see what this guy's all about.
And that's, once again,
that's that one person.
We need them to read that
story and, and, uh, yeah, and
some of it's pretty gruesome.
Um, there's a guy, Benaiah, who's
probably the baddest dude in the Bible.
He's way badder than King David
because he was out, he was
doing the work of King David.
Um, and then there's other people
that are, are interesting, like
Rahab, the prostitute in Jericho,
who happens to be the great, great,
great, great grandmother of King David.
Mmm.
And she was a strumpet.
Right.
Travis Bader: See, my rec I was just going
to say my recollection of the, uh, of all
of that, it's not nearly as good as yours.
I, um, been, uh, uh, grew up going
through the Catholic school system
and, uh, elementary and high schools
and the rest, but, uh, it'll be,
it'll be very interesting to read
your take and those stories on that.
Cause that'll, uh, uh, there's, there's
some stories there that I've completely
Kyle Lamb: forgotten too.
Yeah.
And that's the thing we've all read.
I mean, I've, I've read the
Bible from front to rear.
I did that too, cause
I'd never done it before.
And I read it and I was like, I didn't
even, I don't remember this story.
What is this?
And you know, like Esther and
Mordecai, that's a great story.
That's in, in this book, Jael with the
tent peg and Deborah, who was a very
strong woman that all happened at the
same time when Deborah and Barak met.
And he's like, I'm not going
into battle without you.
That doesn't mean she was a warrior.
That means that she was somebody that they
needed for her, her direct line to God.
So.
You can't, you know, I'm not trying
to make something out to be something.
It's not like I had, uh, one
of the things my wife read it.
She's like, uh, no, Barack would not
have touched her and she would not have
touched him because at that point in
the world, a man didn't touch a woman
and a woman didn't, you know, that's
how it was or the way their hair was
done or, or any of this kind of stuff.
And then when you think about, um, Esther
and Mordecai, that this Jewish gal gets
taken in to be the wife of King Xerxes.
You know, she goes through the process
and she gets selected from hundreds of
other virgins to be the She must have
been something special to be selected by
Xerxes to be You know, that woman, and
then what she ended up doing, it's, you
know, she's like the behind the scenes
guerrilla warfare lady on the inside,
while Mordecai is doing his thing.
And by the way, if you really want to
stump people, the next time you order a
Starbucks coffee and they ask you what
your name is, just tell them Mordecai.
And you will see some crazy
spellings of Mordecai.
Travis Bader: Well, being very conscious
of your time and being a note guy
as well, I got all these different
things that I'd love to chat about.
Kyle Lamb: But let's chat.
I am in no hurry.
So you tell me what
you want to talk about.
Travis Bader: Okay.
Well, there's a question that, um, you
talk about the shadows and you're clearly
passionate about making sure that you
can help other people, um, both in a
leadership capacity, as well as a, um,
uh, spiritual and mental wellbeing.
Positivity is a very, um.
Important thing for you, as it is for
me, how do you deal with the shadows
or what advice would you give somebody
else that you have learned through your
experiences that they might be able
to apply to their own dark thoughts?
Kyle Lamb: Oh my goodness.
Looks like it's time for me to go.
Yeah.
So here's what I want.
The first thing that I would say is.
Everybody has that.
Everybody.
I don't care who you are.
Everybody, unless you're completely
brain dead, you, people have
things that they have to deal
with and how we get through that.
Everybody handles it differently.
So I'm going to, I'm
going to address this.
Maybe a little different than you might
expect I hang around with a lot of law
enforcement and military guys And they
have a lot of struggles because of things
they did do didn't do will do should
have done You know I'm saying there's
a lot of I should have done this should
have done that at this point or I did
this and I did that and that was the
wrong decision or I did this and I did
that it's right But I killed somebody
or I maimed somebody or I I Should have
ran out there and grabbed this guy and
saved him or I should have you know
There's a lot of that going on and as
they talk about this You know they get
together with their buddies and they're,
they're, they're going down memory lane.
Give me a, fill up a, give
me a shot of liquor here.
So they take that shot of liquor
and they, they drink a depressant.
And you think a depressant is going to
help you get through a time like that?
Like you think alcohol is going to
give you some sort of right answer?
I'm not going to buy that, okay?
So one of the first things I tell
guys is, why are you drinking?
If you want to go out, if you can go
out and have a beer with your buddies,
that's not what I'm talking about.
Or you work hard all day and
you want to go have a beer or
whatever your drink happens to be.
But for me, it's got to be none of that.
Because there's nothing, there's
not one thing that I get out of
alcohol that is positive in my life.
It's not going to make my wife happy.
It's not going to make me a better person.
It's not going to make me feel better
the next day when I'm on the range.
It's not going to make me healthier.
None of that.
So that's one of the quickest ways
I believe to deal with a shadow is
not give in and, and drink that.
So, so how do you, how do you not drink?
Well, it's going to sound
crazy, but just don't do it.
You want to talk about a more impressive
person, the person that steps up and says,
I'm going to do what everybody else does,
or the person that goes, no, I'm good.
You don't have to say you don't drink,
but I usually just say, no, I'm good.
I don't drink.
And people are like, Whoa, what
do you mean you don't drink?
It's not weird, bro.
I don't drink.
You don't know if I'm not doing that
because I was an alcoholic, if I'm
not doing that because you don't
know, it's none of your business.
I don't drink, period.
That's it.
So if we can get a young guy or young
gal out there that is struggling,
just to stop that one thing, then
that, and I've seen this happen with
hundreds of people in both directions.
Drugs and alcohol and kill
themselves, get off drugs and
alcohol and be a vibrant, beautiful
human being that's helping people.
You know what I'm saying?
And I, and I haven't even talked about
the religious part of it, because
that's, that's something that some guys
will say, well, I'm very spiritual.
Okay.
What does that mean for me?
Spiritual is I'm, I get to talk to
my best friend who's Jesus and I
can, we can have this discussion.
And that's part of it too, because as
my buddy says, my buddy, Johnny dog
cone, he's an old fella from Utah.
I grew up, he he's I grew up in South
Dakota and he was this guy that he's just
a character and we've become good friends.
He really helped my mom when my dad
passed away and him and his wife helped
him and now his wife passed away.
And he told me one day, he said, uh,
when his wife was struggling with her.
She had had a really bad stroke.
He said, uh, yeah, sometimes I got to
just stare at a rock and you know And
sometimes I got to talk to Howard and
I'm like talk to Howard who's Howard and
he goes boy Don't you read the Bible?
And I said, yeah, I've read the Bible.
He goes says right in the Bible Howard
be thy name It struck me that here's
a guy who at the time was probably
78 years old because he's like 81 or
82 right now Um, when he struggled,
he didn't call me, he called somebody
else and had that conversation.
So whatever your spirituality is
and you want to avoid that darkness,
then, you know, be able to do that.
The other thing I'm going
to say is there's nothing
wrong with a little darkness.
I really believe there's not because
I believe that in this, let's go
back to what Jordan Peterson said.
The only people that truly can
be good people are those that
have the ability to do evil.
Yet they chose not to do it.
They know how to use a sword, and
they carry it every day, but they
They choose to keep it in the sheath.
And that's, you know, I have
these, I have thoughts and I look
at things and how would I attack
this and how would I do that?
You know, and so those are, there's
some dark thoughts, but I'm on
the, I'm on the side of the good.
So at least currently I am.
Some other people may say that I'm not.
And then on the other,
the other part of it is.
Um, there is a guy that was my team
leader in Somalia, John Hale, and
he is one of the greatest leaders I
ever worked with, worked for, and I
still have the utmost respect for him.
And I'm not going to go down the
rabbit hole, but I'm just going to
say this, John took his own life.
And that makes me really sad.
That doesn't make him less of a man.
It doesn't make him less of a great.
leader.
It shouldn't diminish any of that.
He, he felt like he needed to do
that to relieve those around him
of the struggles he was having.
That's, that's how he felt.
And I, you know, I've
talked to his brothers.
His brother was kind of pissed at
me and we had this conversation.
He really changed my mind about how
I would view what John had done.
So, okay, that happens.
Well, he was a team leader in
Somalia a couple months ago.
Another one of our team
leaders in Somalia.
killed himself and the only
other team leader for that
troop He got killed in Somalia.
So of all the three team
leaders in one of the troops,
all three of them are now dead.
One, because he was killed by
the bad guys and on a mortar
attack after the 3rd of October.
And two guys, because
they took their own lives.
So when that happened, I called up Another
one of the guys who is, and I'm not going
to tell you his name, but I called him
up because he's was very good friends
with the last guy that killed himself.
And I said, man, just thinking
about, you know, and he goes,
let me tell you something.
If you ever hear that I killed
myself, you better call the
cops and start an investigation.
He goes, because dudes like you and me
are not going to do something like that.
And when he said that, he gave
me ownership like crap, because
I've had some dark thoughts.
But I can't do that because
other people are depending on me.
We can't, we, we, we can't do that.
If you want to keep leading, keep leading.
You have dark thoughts.
That's fine.
Why?
Tell me what you're fixing
by killing yourself.
Tell me what you're
fixing by doing something.
I don't know what it would be.
I mean, if you want to.
Go out with a bang.
I got better ways for you to do it than
to, you know, to, to hurt yourself.
Um, so I guess, I don't know.
I, I, uh,
I don't know.
It's, it's a, it's, it's kind of, it's a
tricky one, you know, I wrote a, I wrote
a poem kind of about that and it, uh,
it was at a kind of a very rough
time I was having and at that
point, maybe not at that point.
Within six months of that, I realized
a lot of things that were causing it,
and I just took those out of my life.
And the things that were causing it
for me were going down memory lane.
I can tell the story in
a clinical environment.
When I get up and do a leadership
seminar, I'm doing a seminar.
I'm still very emotionally invested
in that seminar, but I'm not with
the people I was there with and going
and Listen to this and then alcohol
is involved and all that stuff.
And when I had this bad experience it
was right after one of those reunions
and we went back to, um, we actually
went back because some of the guys were
getting upgraded some of their awards.
We had got upgraded previously.
I got upgraded to a Silver Star like six
months before that and then we went back
and some guys were getting upgraded to the
Distinguished Service Cross and it just,
man it really, it it It really hit me and
we left before the ceremony even started.
I just left.
And then I was like, why did I leave?
I'm a terrible person.
It's not like I can go back and redo
this because it's never happening again.
And I started beating myself up for that.
And then finally, I'm
like, what am I doing?
If it's if I'm not made a better
person by going to that reunion,
you know, I'll give you an example.
And you were never in the military, right?
No.
Okay.
So let's, let's go back to
your high school reunion.
Let's say that, and I've never
been to a high school reunion.
So if you went to a high school
reunion, why would you go?
If you would go because you want
to see your friends and have a good
time, man, I'd say you should go.
If you want to go just to see
if you're better than everybody
else, you shouldn't go.
I agree.
If you want to go to
make fun of other people.
You shouldn't go if you're gonna
go there and it's gonna bring back
memories that were bad Maybe you were
that kid that was beat up or who knows?
Then don't go don't if it's not
gonna make you a better person.
Don't be part of that You know, that's
difficult because a lot of people are
pushing us in directions and you don't
need to go don't go Don't don't let
anybody tell you to go and hurt yourself
and I'm not talking about like physically
I'm talking like mentally I had to realize
that too, like with my family, not my
immediate family, cause my immediate
family is five star awesome, but some
of my other family, I realized like
every time, every time I'm going to talk
to them, I have to reach out to them.
They never reach out to me.
And then when I get done, I always feel
like I've done something wrong, man.
I feel so much better.
I haven't talked to any
of those people in years.
And I'm the better for it.
So that doesn't mean they're bad
people because I think they're good
people, but we're not good together.
So I'm just not going to do it.
So that's, that's what
I, that's my advice.
I, that's my advice.
And I'll tell you one more thing.
And I've said this in some other podcasts
and other, other interviews I've done.
If you get up in the morning and you
think about somebody other than yourself,
you're probably going to have a good day.
So what does that mean?
You get out of bed.
And you stretch out a little
bit, go for a walk or work to
the gym or whatever you do.
And then you just think about,
how can I help somebody else out?
And I'm not talking about money.
I'm not talking about going
and doing their track, you
know, dumping their trash.
I mean, you could do any of that
stuff if you need to do that, but it
might be as simple as reaching out
to one of your friends and saying,
Hey man, I'm just thinking about you.
Hey, man, wanted to see how
you're doing everything.
How's the family doing?
You may not think that's gonna help
you I know it's gonna help them But at
the end of the day that's gonna also
fill your cup up and if you'll start
thinking about other people and having a
mission You know, I think that military
guys suffer because they don't have
a mission anymore they were they had
just as many dark devils living inside
their heart before and But they're able
to focus on a mission with a group of
people and accomplish that mission.
Well, what's your mission now?
You have a mission
you're all over the map.
I mean, bro, you're you're doing all
kinds of crazy stuff I'm doing all
kinds of crazy stuff Why do I do that?
because if I don't do that then I get
inside my own head again and I start
having I do bad things when i'm when
i'm not busy when i'm not focused on a
project whether it's writing a book And I
was going to say, one of the things we're
about to do, Dirty Cephalion, there's
some guys that do this podcast and they
They invited me to come on and talk about
some of the books I've been reading and
the first stack of books that I'm Gonna
talk about is about Rogers Rangers and
and that's exciting to me so now I'm
putting my energy into making sure I
got all my data correct or at least I
can tell the story and Talk about these
different books and then we've we've
actually put a new thing on our website
under podcasts So people can click on that
go there and see this recommended book
list click on the books and immediately
go to Amazon to buy the books and Which
I mean, we're going to get a little
tiny portion of that, but you're going
to get the book for the same price.
If you're going to buy it, just
go on there and buy it that way.
We're also doing a section
on there for equipment.
So this, we literally just started this
process a few weeks ago and it's now live.
So if you see the podcast
thing, you can click on that.
It might actually say.
Um, blog beside that now too,
but I know it says podcast.
You click on that.
It'll go on there.
And man, I'm excited.
That's a new thing that I've got
to do this next week on Tuesday.
I've got to get going.
I've got to have my notes and be squared
away and do this presentation for these
guys and, and make yourself uncomfortable.
If you get uncomfortable, you won't
have time to worry about the dark side.
Cause you'll be worried about the
light side, you know, just trying
to do things and get it done.
But anyway, so I'll, uh,
what's your next question?
Well, man, you got some time.
If I answered that one good enough.
Travis Bader: Yeah, you did.
You did.
And well, the other one
was what, what gets you up?
What gets you motivated?
And it, part of that's got to be all
these different projects that you have.
Kyle Lamb: Yeah.
Every day it's something different.
And I I'd say that you,
you got to have a mission.
So you call it a project and I call
it a mission like my mission is to
finish these five daggers I'm working
on and I've got these two integrals.
I'm working on I got a couple of tomahawks
I'm working on and that's a lot of stuff.
But once again, I'm I used to say I'm
a scatological thinker But then I found
out that scatological actually means the
study of poop and that's not exactly what
I intended for that to mean So my brain is
going in all these different directions.
I've got to have a different
project or a different mission.
So right now my mission is that
podcast to get that done next week.
Um, the mission after that then is
I leave to go shoot a NRL Hunter
match in Alabama, a long range match.
Um, my mission after that is I head to
Florida to jump out of planes for a couple
of days to get recertified so that I can
go jump into Normandy, France in June.
So, so you see, I have a lot
of things that are going on.
If you would have said, go right before
Thanksgiving, what are you focusing on?
Well, I'm focusing on setting
up blinds when my grandson comes
here, we can hunt deer together.
And my wife was right there with me.
We're setting up game cameras and trying
to figure out where these deer are at.
And then Thanksgiving rolls in
and he kills this awesome buck.
I mean, that was my mission.
Like we got to get this dude to kill.
I never thought he'd kill a buck.
I thought he'd kill a doe.
So we were, he kills this buck and we go
find it ran like 50 yards and he goes,
grandpa, we got to cut his head off.
And I'm like, Denver, we're
going to harvest the meat.
And, but you know, I'm like, he goes,
yeah, yeah, I know all that, but we
got to cut his head off because I
got to hang his head on the wall.
And I went, we never talked about that.
My wife and I were like, this is crazy.
We never talked about it because
we always thought he'd shoot a doe.
Well now he shot a buck.
He still wants the meat.
He still wants all that and
be respectful of the animal.
But he looks in my office and he sees all
these animals hanging on the wall and he's
like, I kind of like grandpa's office.
I want one of those hanging in my house.
In my room.
So we got, you know, I'm getting
the, the, uh, European done there.
So he can have that and keep
that for the rest of his life.
Cause I mean, everybody I've ever talked
to, everybody remembers the first deer
they killed, they may not remember the
fifth or the 10th or the 20th, but that
first deer, they're going to remember.
So that gun now it's his, that AR
15 that he killed that deer with.
That's going to be his.
So for me, that's what
gets me up every day.
Something different.
And I
Travis Bader: like that, you know,
for me having, like you say, a
mission, a project, something that
I'm working towards the progressive
realization of a worthy ideal.
What do I think is worthy?
But there's also a
cycle that I find, okay.
I get to a certain point in something.
I've got it.
I've got it understood.
What's the next thing?
What's the next thing?
Um, are you able to stop and just
not require that next mission?
Are you able to, in my.
Cause I, I'm positive that you are
appreciative for everything you have
and you're appreciative for, for
where you're at, but it comes back to
like, there's a saying Rockefeller,
he was talked to by a reporter.
It's like, man, you got so much money.
How much do you need?
He's like, Oh, just 1 more.
Right.
For him, that was the process.
That was what he lived for.
Is there a common theme or trend
to all of your missions that you
have lead to an overarching, um,
I guess North star that would.
See you constantly moving towards
something without having the
feeling of, okay, I've done it.
Now what?
Kyle Lamb: Yeah, I don't, I don't.
So first of all, I don't
have any bucket lists.
I don't have a bucket list cause I've
done everything I've ever wanted to do.
And I never had a bucket list to
begin with because I just said, Oh,
either I said, or my wife said it.
My wife said, why don't you
try this special forces thing?
Well, I don't know if I can do it.
And she goes, well, you
never know until you try.
So I did it.
Well, then I went to the unit and
then I did this and then I did that.
Well.
I just know I'm completely here.
Let me ask you this question.
Maybe this will answer it better for
you My brother in law got cancer and
for he had the it was his third time
on cancer and they they told me had
six months to live He ended live in
like two years, but he still passed
away So my wife and I were sitting
here one day and I said man, can you
imagine you're given six months to live?
I mean, what would you do and
I'm asking you this question.
Mm hmm.
What would you do?
If you had six months left to live,
Travis Bader: are we going
to go to the dark side?
Kyle Lamb: Well, I just
want you to think about it.
I want the people out there to
think like, what would you do?
You know what my wife said?
She said, I'm already doing it.
And you know what I said to
myself, I said, I'm not doing it.
That's that him die and change my life
because you should live every day.
Like you got six months left to live.
If I die tomorrow, I'm completely happy.
You probably are too, but why do we
why I don't know that if you go around
every day thinking You're scared of
dying and actually this is my son asked
me this one time We were we were out
at Fort Lewis, Washington, and I just
got called back to the unit I'm we're
going and We had a hot tub out back of
our we lived on this river and we'd get
up in the morning and hit that hot Tub
and then we would we hit the river hit
the hot tub and then we were plunging
before plunging was cool You know and
he goes Dad, aren't you afraid of dying?
Because I was going to go back and
go right to Iraq and be a troop
sergeant major and lead guys in combat.
He goes, aren't you afraid of dying?
And I, I looked at him and I
didn't even think about it.
I said, no, I'm afraid of not living.
So, no, I got, I, I changed.
I've changed my complete
thought process and that's what
I think everybody should do.
I don't care what your age is.
If you had six months to
live, what would you do?
Does that mean you would
just blow all your money?
Okay.
That's not what I'm talking about.
What I'm talking about is like, what, what
would you, who would you want to spend
the last six months of your life with?
Then you better daggum do that right now.
You know what I'm saying?
Is that six months for me?
Yeah.
It's, it's family.
Yeah.
I mean my.
Yeah, my family, that's, that's it.
There's, there's, there's a few
people I want to be with too.
But my, my, my, my focus would be my
wife, my grandkids, and then my children.
If you don't have grandkids, you may
not understand that, but grandkids are
a special, they're a special thing.
So that's the, that's the thing that
really changed my outlook on, I don't
know, I didn't know how we got on
that question, but that that's been,
man, that's been a big thing to me.
Yeah.
Because I don't know what
I was living for before.
I mean, I was thinking maybe it
was the money or maybe it was the
fame or the, I mean, I don't know.
There's no, what am I trying to do?
Well, I just, now it's, it's simple.
I want to spend more time with
my wife and I'm doing that.
We're traveling more together.
We're doing stuff.
Um, I've backed off on
my training schedule.
Now there's certain things, you know,
if you don't have enough money in the
bank to pay your bills, then you better
dig them, get out there and work hard.
But when you're done working, go
home to your family, go home to
the people that love you and are
there supporting you every day.
You know, and that's the other thing too.
One thing I really, come to me one
day, I was asked to speak in a church.
And I was like, man, I
don't know about this.
I'm gonna get struck by lightning.
And as I was speaking, something come to
me and I said, my son is an awesome dude.
Why would I treat my son
Less better than I would a
complete stranger on the street.
You better pull your head out of your
butt, and that's your son, that's
your daughter, that's your wife,
that's your kids, your grand, whoever.
That's your mom, your dad, or whoever.
If you do not put them on a
pedestal, there's something wrong
with you because that person on
the street could, could care less.
They might like you right now, but
once, like I said before, if you
do something bad, they're going to
completely throw you under the bus,
whereas your family's going to stick
with you through thick and through thin.
And so Yeah.
Your kids, you want 'em to be
the best, but treat them with
respect and, and ad admiration,
and they're gonna return the favor.
And you know, when you're, I'm 56 years
old and I can tell you without a shadow
of a doubt, both my children love me.
So if you can say that, and I can,
obviously, I say that back to them.
Mm-Hmm.
, if you can say that, then you're,
then you're doing the right thing.
If, if, if there's a question, then
you better get it right because.
They're more important than any person
you're going to meet on the street.
I don't care how important that person is.
So
Travis Bader: familiarity will breed
complacency and people become close and
familiar with their family and they're
like, Oh, they'll be here tomorrow.
And, you know, there's a reason
why my children have never seen
some of my family members, right.
There's, um, like you say, I'm
going to pass podcast guests.
He says, you know, sometimes
it's time to just pull the weeds.
Is it bringing you
positivity into your life?
Right.
And then we use, um, every day
we remind ourselves the most
important thing, most important
resource that we have is our time.
The only thing that makes that
important is death, that's what
gives life value because now
you have a finite amount of it.
How are we spending that time?
And.
It's that level of being present for
those that you care about is, I think,
the biggest gift that you can give
yourself and that you can give them.
So I'm, I'm a hundred percent
on board with what you're
Kyle Lamb: saying there.
I have a question too.
I was thinking about that.
You said something there and I want it.
I wanted to ask this when you said
it before, but I want to ask it now.
Earlier, earlier, you made
that statement on leadership.
Travis Bader: I was in a army
cadet program here in Canada
and it did a lot for me.
Um, I was going down a path
that, um, wasn't positive.
There's a reason why I got kicked
out of a number of schools and.
Uh, it was, I was going in a direction
that, uh, was just going to end up
in jail probably in the longterm, not
because I was doing bad things, but I
was, uh, oppositional in my thinking,
uh, I didn't fit in with the, um, uh,
the established structure and the school
system, and you got into the army cadet
program and a lot of those traits were,
um, We're looked upon fondly, right?
Not, not necessarily being
oppositional, but being able to think
outside, find creative solutions in
order to, uh, to get the job done.
So, um, uh, gave me a sense of
community and purpose and structure
that, uh, I think was very important.
Kyle Lamb: Yeah.
And that's what I found was when I joined
the military, I found my tribe, right.
And, you know, some people
say we all have to get along.
I, I, I couldn't disagree with that more.
I don't think we have to all get along.
I think what we have to do is
we have to be with the people
that are part of our tribe.
That has nothing to do with
what country you're from.
It has nothing to do with the
color of your skin or, or your
religion or anything like that.
It has to do with being
part of that tribe.
And if people don't understand my
tribe, they're not part of my tribe.
Because I'm going to meet a guy
that's a Muslim and he's going
to become one of my best friends.
And I, and he's going to change my heart
because I used to hate all Muslims and
now I, I don't because of that one dude,
or I'm going to meet a guy that's, um,
a Canadian guy, JTF2 guy or whatever.
And we're going to become very good
friends because we were from the same
tribe and we, we sound different.
We look different, you know, but
we're absolutely from the same
tribe and you never know where
you're going to meet those people.
And the other thing in order to meet those
people from the same tribe, you kind of
got to tell people what your tribe is.
Otherwise, they don't know.
So a lot of times if I say something
and I get the weird look, I'm
like, I know you're not part of my
tribe and there's no reason that we
need to carry on any conversation.
Because I'm not trying to win you over.
You're either with me or against me.
There's no gray area.
Um, so either you're on the
team or you're off the team.
And if you're off the team,
I'll, I, you're, I'm done
Travis Bader: with you.
So you don't have to be a part of it.
My thought process, my life,
Kyle Lamb: the only, probably
the only people that I would say
that doesn't apply to as kids.
I mean, all kids are on the team
until they get kicked off, you
know, they're going to, they're
going to make that choice.
But when you see a little kid,
a little kid is you, you know,
we've got to take care of them.
And I think that's one of the
struggles that a lot of us are
having right now is we're seeing.
Our children, you know, the biggest
failure we have in America, and I
don't know about Canada, but in America
the biggest failure is the family.
So the fathers are not being fathers, and
if the fathers would step up and be dads,
all the trouble that we have from the
bottom to the top would go away because
we would take care of our families.
We wouldn't look for welfare.
We wouldn't look for any
of the state to do that.
The church and the family would do that.
The dad would stay present with his kids.
The kids would then not go to be
delinquents because their dad would be
there to discipline them and to praise
them and to make them a better human
being and then they would go on to
have families and do the same thing.
Yet now what we're seeing is we're
saying that Dad's a mom and mom's a dad
and this guy's the dude and then he's
a mother and then it's like These kids
are completely Confused and then we're
saying it's more stressful for a lady
to have to leave her state to go get
an abortion in another state it's like
That poor lady, the struggle she had
to murder her child, I feel so bad that
she had to struggle to drive four hours
out of her state to murder her baby.
You know what I'm saying?
Like, are you serious?
This is the family's gone.
And if we don't get that back, and
I don't, I think it's going to take
something way more significant.
I know you're Canada.
You guys had the truckers, you know, the
truckers are doing a thing down here now.
Travis Bader: I heard
something about that.
What is that about?
Kyle Lamb: Well, they're going
to do something in Texas and,
and they're all getting together.
And I think that, uh, it'll be really
interesting to see what happens.
Cause up there with, uh, um,
what's your president's name?
Uh, Hitler.
Trudeau there.
Yeah.
Hitler.
Well, you know what he did was
criminal first of all, but it was
like if Canadians don't just stand
up and say Enough of this crap.
Well in America if we're not doing that
either we deserve exactly what we get
But if these right if these guys all
go to Texas and they stop this illegal
border stuff going on We could quite
possibly I don't want to see the civil
war that people have talked about.
I mean, I don't, you know, I was going
to lie to you there for a minute.
I was going to say, I don't want to
see that, but part of me would like
to see, let's get this sorted out
a little bit here because you're
saying it's, it's okay for illegals.
Come on.
We want immigrants to come
in our country all the time.
We want that.
We don't want people to do it illegally.
Right.
And there's a process for it.
Yeah.
My grandpa and grandma on both sides.
They were immigrants.
So I'm the second generation American.
I'm really glad that they immigrated
here and I'm glad they did it legally.
So I don't know.
Anyway, you break,
Travis Bader: you break down that value
structure and you don't uphold it.
And.
People who would otherwise
uphold a value structure say,
well, why are we doing this?
The breakdown of the family unit, the
breakdown of the value structures.
And I don't think it's, um, you
know, you, you look at social media
and regular media and what people
are being fed on a daily basis.
You can see a very drastic change
in the way that people think.
And interestingly enough too,
though, uh, As that pendulum swings
further and further away, it's going
to reach a point where it starts
causing people to shake their heads.
The amount of people like yourself,
they're talking about faith and
religion and their value systems, uh,
whether it's faith based or not, um,
is, it's happening a heck of a lot
more now than it was 10 years ago.
And I think it's because people
are seeing the need to have a
shared value system that we can all
sing off of the same song sheet.
That's where the military is fantastic.
And that's where I think mandatory
conscription is a fantastic thing.
Everyone has had at least a shared
adversity and they've got a shared
experience and some pride in what they do.
And they're working together
off of the same song sheet.
You dilute that too much and you're
going to run into the inevitable
problems that we're seeing right
Kyle Lamb: now.
Yeah.
So I walk into a supermarket.
And we've got conscription or
whatever you want to call it,
mandatory service or whatever.
Um, conscription is kind of a rough word.
Yes.
You know, it really is.
But so we have mandatory service
and that doesn't mean that
you got to be in the army.
It doesn't mean that it means
that you have to, to serve your
country for two years or whatever.
So I walk in the local
supermarket and I see a guy there.
And I walk up to him and I don't
care what color he is, and I don't
care what language he speaks.
He's in America.
And I say, who'd you serve with?
Immediately we have a bond because
both of us served our country.
And if, if we had mandatory service,
we would, uh, We would have that bond
with each other like you just said
because now when I see guys that are
military I mean, I immediately have a
bond with him I had a guy that I met
this kid and he said He goes I'm a
veteran or his mom said he's a veteran.
I was like, oh you're veteran.
Where'd you serve?
What outfit were you with and he was
a marine and I was like, oh, yeah
cool So I started talking to him and
I end up listening to him talk for 15
minutes, you know, and he's telling me
all kinds of stories and everything's
going great, you know, and his mom's
over there and she's kind of getting
teary eyed and, uh, get done talking.
I'm like, all right, whatever.
So I go off to my thing and
the mom says, excuse me, sir.
I was like, yeah, she goes,
I've never seen my son.
He's never talked to my husband
or me about any of that stuff.
And I said, why?
I said, why should he?
I'm a veteran.
He's a veteran.
We're the same.
So he's speaking to me.
We're.
That's it.
Don't, don't, it's not bad.
It's just fine.
He's there's, there's
nothing wrong with that.
I'm not going to go talk about hunting
or fishing to somebody that doesn't
hunt or fish unless I'm trying to
convince them they should or, you
know, they should hunt or fish.
You know, I want to try to
attract people to do that.
I want to try to attract people to
build knives and to do, I don't care
what you do, make something, you know,
make something other than a meme.
I mean, Something worthwhile.
Yeah, make something out of wood
with your hands or I don't care what
it is, you know, so it's fantastic
Travis Bader: Well, why don't
we look at wrapping it up here?
There's like I say, we could
probably go on talking all day.
You've imparted a heck
of a lot of value to me.
I trust to the audience as well.
Kyle, thank you so much
for being on the Silvercore
Kyle Lamb: podcast.
Yeah.
Thanks for having me.
This has been.
And I'm not just saying this.
This has been one of the best
podcasts I've been on in a while
because we didn't just focus on
1993 or, you know, Iraq or whatever.
We got to talk about the stuff that
really matters because that other
stuff is just, that's just a job.
It was an adventure, a job or
whatever, but man, life is about
all these other really important
things that we talked about.
And I'm glad you're on the
same sheet of music with me.
You never looked at me like, man, this
guy is from outer space, you know,
so, uh, yeah, find your tribe, dude.
You know, might be a, some
crazy Canuck up there.
It might be a Muslim guy from Egypt.
Yeah.
I met this guy from Egypt
on the shooting range.
I didn't know he's from Egypt.
I thought he was a Mexican.
And I'm like.
Oh, he's Egyptian.
Well, I speak colloquial Egyptian Arabic.
So I started rapping Arabic and he's
like you speak Very good Egyptian Arabic
and now he and I are very very good
friends and he has changed my heart so
open up open up to those people that are
a part of your tribe and let them come
in and Man, it's going to be amazing.
And then get up tomorrow and
do something for somebody else
and it's going to be awesome.
All right.
Last thing I'm going to say, God
bless Canada and God bless America.
I love the message.
Thank you.