In this episode, former Green Beret Chris Lee discusses his new book ‘Legacy Forged’, designed to help people through intentional planning, identity shifts, and strategic goal setting. The conversation explores the importance of daily consistent actions, overcoming adversity, leveraging meditation and rest for heightened performance, and the practical use of AI in boosting productivity and decision-making. Listeners will gain valuable insights into transforming intentions into actions and fostering self-mastery through rigorous yet attainable protocols.
Episode Highlights:
03:42 The Importance of Progress Over Perfection
11:50 The Art of Recovery and Rest
26:38 Gratitude and Mindset Shifts
29:55 The Pursuit of Validation
31:39 Shifting Motivations
36:01 AI in Everyday Tasks
38:04 The Future of AI and Entertainment
41:34 The Importance of Adaptation
52:12 Commitment to Consistency
Chris Lee is a former Green Beret turned high-performance coach and business consultant who helps driven individuals and organizations operate at elite levels. With over a decade of service as an 18D Special Forces Medical Sergeant, Chris brings deep expertise in leadership, resilience, and decision-making under pressure. Today, he uses that experience to guide high-achievers in unlocking their full potential, strengthening their mindset, and building legacies that endure. Whether working with executives, teams, or entrepreneurs, Chris is committed to helping others lead with clarity, perform with purpose, and rise to their next level of excellence.
Connect with Chris on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/coach_chris.lee/
Purchase “Legacy Forged” here: https://www.amazon.com/Legacy-Forged-90-Day-Command-Discipline/dp/B0F844XH75
Episode Transcript:
00:32
Now, here’s your host, Marcus Aurelius Anderson. Acta Non Verba, Latin phrase that means actions, not words. If you want to know what somebody truly believes, don’t listen to their words. Instead, observe their actions. I’m Marcus Aurelius Anderson, and my guest today truly embodies that phrase. Chris Lee returns. Good friend.
01:00
He’s a former Green Beret turned high-performance coach, author, and speaker. He helps lead performers unlock purpose, execute with precision, and forge legacy through discipline, mindset shifts, and strategic growth. His work blends military grit, conscious exploration, and Christian faith into a system for unstoppable self-mastery. Now I had the honor of connecting with him a few months ago, and we’ve been able to have some consistent conversations since then. So Chris, thank you so much for being on again, brother.
01:29
Look forward to this conversation immensely. Absolutely. It’s an absolute pleasure and honor to be here. I’ve been excited about having this conversation all week. So thank you. Yeah. Something to look forward to for sure. So the last time we spoke, you were talking about your first book, Beyond the Battlefield, but I was anxious to get you back on now because you have a workbook about 14 legacy. And in my opinion, any good leadership book is essentially a workbook, but the way that you have it formatted, it really goes in and gives people these.
01:57
prompts, them these questions, gives them these ideas. So if you would, could you kind of give us an idea of what the book is, what it looks like and what was the intention behind it? Yeah. The intent behind it was I had developed a workbook for all of my clients. It was a simple PDF that I would email them and then we would navigate that together. It talks through kind of my whole philosophy with coaching, at least the big hitters, which is like identity shift.
02:28
strategic goal setting and then backwards planning. As I worked through that workbook, the original one, I was like, man, I want to make this a little more robust. And so I started tweaking it a little bit and the end result was it’s the original workbook with additional tools to include things like decision making tools like the OODA loop and Eisenhower matrix. But it also includes a 90 day planner. I think one of the
02:58
best things you can do to start shifting behavior, just to keep track of it. And so this 90 day planner worked into the workbook gives you an opportunity. It’s like every day I can start the day off with like, all right, who do I want to be? What am I grateful for? What are the things that have to get done? And then at the end of the day, it has like a debrief. All right. What did I do? Well, what needs improvement? How can I adjust for tomorrow? And if you, if you do that,
03:28
for 90 days that that kind of becomes habit. And that’s like the game changer really, when you start shifting desires into true action that then turn into habit and it’s like game over and you can go take over the world. Yeah, it’s also nice. I think there’s something magical about the 30, 60, 90 day protocols because it gives us something really definitive to sprint towards with a lot of aggression of action. It also helps us understand what’s strategic and what’s tactical.
03:58
Right. So we can have this long-term strategy, this long-term goal, one year, three years, five years. But the classic quote, right? They, people underestimate what they can accomplish in 30, 60, 90 days and overestimate what they can get done in one, three, five years. And to me, it shows them how much they can accomplish. You’re familiar with Dr. Marshall Goldsmith. I would imagine he wrote what got you here, won’t get you there, you know, coaching pro basically he’s the one that
04:27
created the environment that you and I are able to now enjoy. He has questions that he has somebody call and ask him every day and they are yes or no questions. And they are, I do my best today to find purpose? Did I do my best today to engage in environments that created better relationships? Did I do my best to be happy? Was a definitive about what my goals were. He makes them very pass or fail because they need to be. And if it’s not this just like binary idea of this or this.
04:56
He says it will be easy for him as who he is to wiggle around and justify and create these. I call them rational lies because you rationalize it. Um, and I got those from Tony Blower, but that’s what it is. So for him, if we’re very candid, many times our answers to that will be known. And so for some people that may dissuade them from being able to take this accountability in this ownership. But in my mind, a goal is only as attainable as it is specific. Yeah.
05:26
And so until we have something that’s at least crystal clear and even this idea with Bruce Lee, he says, sometimes the goal is not always meant to be attained. It’s just to give a specific direction and help us better gauge where we should be going next. So I think that’s why this is such a powerful protocol that you’ve established. Yeah, yeah, I totally agree with you. And I do make one, maybe one tweak to that. I think what I advise most of my clients is over the course of a week or a month or
05:56
or even a quarter strive for 85 % or better towards your goal. And what that does is at a little bit more of the strategic level, it gets you out of the pass fail mentality because I’ve found some high achievers. They’re like, if I can’t do it perfect, I’m just not going to do it, right? And we’re not looking for perfection. We’re looking for progress always. But when you get down to the daily level,
06:24
It does become a little bit more pass fail. It’s like, did I do the thing? Yes. Cool. Check it. Uh, did I not do the thing? Okay. And then what needs to be adjusted? So I kind of blend, I guess, maybe those two philosophies together to, to ensure that one progress is being made, but also you’d not get discouraged because, uh, as I mentioned before, high achievers are like really hard on themselves. And if, and if they’re not hitting a hundred percent every time.
06:53
We tend to be our own worst critics. That makes sense. Yeah. That inhibits our capacity to make progress as opposed to perfection. And the 75 heart program by Andy Vercelli, it’s a good example. While the program itself is not easy per se, Andy is very adamant. He’s like, listen, you have these tasks that you have to get done. You have to have two 45 minute workouts. One of them must be outdoors. You have to read 10 pages. You have to drink a gallon of water.
07:20
And you had to be on some sort of diet and you have to take a progress pick. so, like you said, for a lot of people that is, uh, just this rubrics for perfection and that’s going to kill them. He said, no, are absolutely plenty of days where he is just getting his ass kicked by everything that day. And he still knows he has to do his 45 minute workout. So that means that he pulls his stationary bike out into the rain and does his 45 minutes. does it and he says, that’s not like a badge of honor. That’s just.
07:50
if I’m gonna maintain this and so again, it doesn’t have to be perfect, but if you can honestly say, I did the 45 minutes, I did the 10 minutes of reading or the 10 pages of reading, I did these things, even if they’re not perfect, that in and of itself is progression. We talk about meditation, right? I remember a concept that says meditation is the attempt at maintaining focus on your breath, losing focus, coming back to your focus and then losing it over and over again for 20 minutes.
08:20
Even that in and of itself is what Zen Master Dogan would say, that in and of itself is enlightenment. Just sitting down, the Zazen component in and of itself is an enlightenment. So when people think, oh, I’ll hit this level, oh, I’ll accomplish this goal, it’s like, that’s great. But there are other components that, like you say, in the meantime, we don’t want to add more to our ruck than we need to be able to get where we want to go. Exactly. That concept is actually something I’ve been…
08:48
wrestling with in a really good way. I don’t want to add onto my plate, but I really, and you and I, I think had this conversation like last week, but I want to find exactly where I can strip away things and where everything is pared down and it’s more than just trimming fat. It’s like, who am I to my essence and what can I focus on that will encourage growth in those areas and everything else is just noise.
09:18
So I can teach myself to eliminate it. The example you gave of, like I got to do the workout and he drags his bike out into the rain. It’s not one more thing I have to do. It’s like, no, this is who I am. I commit to this and I do it. And that’s been an interesting probably mindset shift of my meditation practice, my workouts, my…
09:47
commitment to being creative. It’s not one more thing I’m doing. It is, you that is who I am. Everything else is second to that, you know. And it’s been a nice shift because then I can focus on the things that I find truly important. in my example, it’s like mind, body, spirit, you know. How do I calm my mind? How do I harden my body? And how do I create?
10:16
in such a way that serves other people. I like to look at it, like you said, in that same way, this sort of warrior ethos mentality of how can I best become a vessel to do the things that my purpose entails? And like you said, if that means helping other people, picking them up, defending them, whatever it is, physically, emotionally, spiritually, philosophically, I need to have all of those gears and we need to be able to switch into those. And also it helps us get away from, and I know for some people it’s easy for them to say,
10:46
Okay. If I can get 21 days in and then 90 days of lock in the habit, we’ve talked about this before, but honestly it just comes to, instead of trying to force yourself into this gear or flip the switch, you just become that thing. Right. Right. And now it’s not something that you feel like, Oh, I have to get this done today. Yeah. That will set you, that will give you like a metrics specifically, but eventually in 75 hard, you just sort of go into it and then
11:14
Now that you’ve created these anchors, these, these hooks on which you can hang whatever thing you want, you say this served me. This did not, this was something that I wanted to do. Or again, as we shift our calendars in our season, in our, in whatever we’re doing, we may have that all out effort of Bush trying to get this done, launch, whatever it is. At the same time, we also build in a little bit of backstops to say, listen, I’m to give myself a little bit of opportunity to relax, to recover.
11:44
so that I can go fast again, that I can sprint harder later on. Exactly. And learning how to pause and learning the art of recovery is difficult sometimes, particularly if, I don’t know about you, but there are oftentimes where when I am sitting still, I’m overwhelmed with guilt, like I should be doing something. And the recent shift is like, no, I am.
12:13
I am doing something. am being still because it is, I think, sharpening and calming my mind simultaneously. And for me, that’s, that’s huge. And you mentioned instead of doing being, uh, the, reason thing for me has been like, I want peace and peace comes with less, not more. And actually admit amidst one of my meditations, uh, I was like, I want more peace. want more peace. And I realized that I’m striving for this thing.
12:42
I’m like coming from it at a point of lack. And I was like, no, just be peace, just be still and relax. And that was like a huge shift for me because one of my goals is to always be the calmest man in the room. And that is primarily for
13:03
When chaos shows up, it’s the ones that remain calm that are able to help most. In addition to that, think calm becomes contagious. Like if you can come in and just be still and maybe not physically still, but like people can sense that there’s a stillness about you, then they can relax and they can, they can not be on edge. And that’s, that’s kind of my goal. And, but it, comes from.
13:31
acknowledging that I can just choose peace in every moment. I don’t have to like strive for it from this place of lack, but it’s just like, just be still Chris. That’s kind of what I’ve been working on lately. Yeah. Bruce Lee has that statement. says hack away the essentials. in the Zen concept, like you’re saying, I want peace. I is ego. One is desire. So we hack those things out and now we just have peace or fulfillment. Nailed it. Yes. We’re stillness. Um, I recently had Sydney Faulkner on she’s
14:01
She was on the million dollar secret, this incredible, like she’s exploding right now. And when her episode dropped, she made a really great statement. She said, when she talks to people or works with them, she asked them, what if the next step for you was rest? The next thing that you do is rest. Right. And again, it’s a hard stop right there. Yeah. And so if the people push back and they say, well, I can’t do that. She’s like, okay, so we definitely need to rest.
14:28
But if you’re a person that says, yeah, you’re absolutely correct. I’m to build that in my schedule. That gives them that sort of homework. I remember Tim Ferris was talking to somebody and it was the same sort of concept about, you know, achievers type A’s and they were like, I have to do all these things. And the person he had on, can’t remember who it was, but they said, well, I challenge you to take a nap this afternoon at three 30. Right. Like there’s no way I can do that. said, actually you probably do need to do that. Exactly.
14:57
Two things came to mind when you mentioned that. One is a quote I read years ago, which is, everybody should meditate for 15 minutes a day. And if you don’t have time to meditate for 15 minutes a day, you should meditate for an hour. And the other thing that came to mind was there’s this old like legend. I’m not sure if it’s even real, but I choose to believe that it is. But this,
15:26
group sergeant major comes, starts walking through the company halls. And when a group sergeant major knocks on your team room door and wants to come in, you let him in and hopefully the room isn’t trashed. Right. And so he’s walking down the hall and he knocks on a random team room door. They let him in. Oh, sergeant major, come on in, have a seat. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. And he’s like, I’m wearing t-shirts and rocks right now. You know, so he comes in and he’s like,
15:53
We have to remember that they’re just normal people too, sorta. um, so he comes in and is just kind of shooting the shit with them and he’s looking up at their calendar on the, on the wall and in team rooms, the calendar is like usually like six months or a year out. So you can like see every single day. And he noticed every single day at two, 2pm, there was this training block called GBNT. And he was like, he didn’t even ask about it. He was just like, that’s good.
16:23
They’re doing consistent training every single day. And eventually he wrapped up the conversation and leaves. What he didn’t realize was GBNT stands for Green Beret Nap Time. And so every day they have it and they had a nap time scheduled. there’s one, it’s a funny story, but two, it’s interesting that, and it’s something we don’t do enough of, but intentional whitespace on the calendar, like block it off. This is for rest and recovery.
16:52
And I just thought it was cool that they scheduled their nap time every single day throughout the year. think it’s wise. Yeah. Are you familiar with J.C. Glick? He’s a former Ranger commander. The name sounds super familiar. Yeah. Yeah. He was in the 20 year war book. He really fantastic guy. I’ve had him on the show a couple of times. He was talking about when they had done an operation. It was an FTX type training. They dropped the guys into the heavily wooded area.
17:20
people were trying to push. So you’re smiling because I think you remember the story now, but that was what it was. He said that he could tell that these are Rangers and they’re pushing, but they’re not getting anywhere. So he’s like, I can either burn these guys out or I can stop. And he’s like, man, we’re going to a quarter security and we’re getting an hour shot, higher 45 minutes or whatever it was. And that allowed them to stop, detach, reset. And yeah.
17:48
If you’re tired, I mean, if you’ve been in the military, when you’re tired enough, you can go to sleep. But even if you aren’t able to hit that REM sleep, you’re able to step back and realize there’s nothing I have to do right now. I’m not shooting an as myth. I’m not covering a sector. am just giving myself this intentional rest. Nothing has to be done except for this and use that time however you see fit. again, that green brain nap time or giving ourselves this idea of 15 or 20 minutes of meditation.
18:18
in the morning, the afternoon, whatever it is, it builds bandwidth into other aspects of our day. after that time, again, everybody was much more clear about the avenue of approach. Everybody was much more intentional about how they wanted to do it. And they had come up with, you know, contingencies and that actually allowed them to arrive at the target three hours earlier than every other group. In addition to cover artillery.
18:45
Everything else it was having to catch up to where they would be. Right. And so there absolutely is a time and a necessity to allow for the recovery. When you and I were speaking in a conversation, I mentioned how my instructor, Guru Dan and Asantya Bruce Lee’s protege. He says, after you get past 35 for every one hour that you train, you need at least an hour or two after that of intentional recovery. And he says that can be mobility.
19:11
That can be a sauna. That can be a hot bath. That can be cold plunge, whatever it is. But if you look at it as such and you said to yourself, Oh, I’ve got like, you know, 15 hours of training this week. means, well, that means I have this amount of time built in as well. And then when you reflect that, that yin yang component helps you really be intentional about what that looks like, as opposed to saying, I’m just glad I got to go throw some punches or do jiu jitsu or swing a weapon. It’s like, there’s other stuff that has to be put into that too. A hundred percent.
19:41
And I think the physical component is one that we’re often aware of. We know that recovery should happen. I used to joke, people would ask, how much do you train every day? And I was like, well, nine hours, an hour in the gym and eight hours of good sleep. And so in the gym, when you’re hitting diminished returns or maybe stagnation, the first thing I ask people is, well, how’s your recovery? And they’re like, well.
20:09
I slept for four hours and I’m running on monsters right now. It’s like, well, all right, that’s probably the culprit, you know, versus tacking on an extra hour in the gym that like the recovery part is super important. But I think a lot of us that have worked out ever understand that now. But I think something that’s often overlooked is I think the same should be applied for like mental strain, you know, like when you’re, when you go in full bore a project or, or you’ve been working like
20:39
crazy all week. The mind needs time to rest as well. building in intentional recovery for the mind is huge. And it’s something that’s often overlooked because it’s like, well, I’ve just been sitting at a desk all day. It’s not like I’m doing anything. like burning up lot of calories actually in your brain. So find that time to create space on your schedule to recover.
21:08
the mind because it’s a really important tool and you don’t want to burn it out. know, there’s only so much quality cognitive time that we have in a day. I was talking to, uh, Christopher, I pronounce it as summer, but it looks like Sumner. He’s the one that was on Tim Ferris podcast. He’s created gymnastic bodies. He’s this great gymnastic coach. And he was saying how they were doing studies on people that do chess, these large tournaments. And again, like you’re saying, Oh, you’re only sitting down.
21:38
But they were burning more calories sitting there because of the cognitive load that they had. Right. Right. Like this laborious mental execution. Yeah. Then if a person had gone or done a, like a five mile rock and it’s crazy, but like you’re saying that absolutely happens. then as you’re saying, so in our mind, if I say, I’m not doing much, I’m just sitting around trying to write this book or trying to edit this or trying to create this email or create this path of whatever it is.
22:06
And then we bid ourselves up because it’s like, Oh man, I feel tired. I feel lethargic or I feel foggy or I feel overwhelmed. Yeah, you absolutely should. If you’re doing important work. So if you intentionally give yourself that space, if you intentionally say, I’m going to intellectually sprint for 45 minutes, give myself that built in 15 minutes there. That’s a protocol that I use or that I give to people because now if they can say knowing that they have an hour block 45 minutes of the attack, 15 minutes to recovery and now go into the next block.
22:36
or even half an hour, whatever it is for them. And I understand that some people may not have the luxury of blocking things out, but it’s still the cadence. It’s still this idea of a one to three protocol of work to rest, giving yourself that it’s important for sure. hundred percent. And when people come to me and say, well, I just don’t have time for whatever. My first question is then like, what can you eliminate? What, what is extra and what is noise?
23:05
That is really just wasting time, energy, bandwidth. And how can you be in to eliminate? think, I think you and I have spoken before about this, but, one of my. Tenants to my coaching philosophy is, is the or a Boris, the snake that’s eating its own tail. And, and, uh, the best interpretation that I’ve ever heard of that particular symbol is as the snake devours the portions of itself that are no longer necessary. That’s what.
23:33
gives it the strength to grow and become better. so again, actually pretty recently it’s like that, that philosophy is like, all right, where can I devour? Where can I eliminate? Not for elimination sake, not to become like an aesthetic that lives out in the woods and only has one garment or whatever. Like that’s not my intention. It’s like the intent is elimination for growth’s purpose. know, like where is the noise that I can eliminate?
24:03
in order to grow and be better. Yeah. Yeah. We’re burning off that dead wood that gives us much, much more fertile ground for that purchase as it were. Yeah. And I think that, and I see this in, um, even in lifestyles, right? I’ve got clients that are successful and now they want the car, the, the house, the apartment, whatever it is. And that’s great. And as long as they’re living within those means, it makes a lot of sense. But we’ve seen people that
24:32
Don’t understand the huge amount of freedom that living within a certain means that are comfortable to where you don’t feel like you’re losing anything or you’re having to sacrifice anything. But at the same time, when you click up financially, you don’t necessarily have to have, okay, if I’m living in a half a million dollar home now, and now I’ve increased my income, I need to go to a million dollar home. Do you? Right. Yeah. You like that car. You like that toy. That’s fantastic. I would say, why don’t you go rent one? You can rent one for a thousand dollars in the weekend.
25:02
And see what that feels like. Because now you get to have this like test run literally. And who knows if you want to go somewhere and do that. Yeah. Maybe you go to Miami, maybe you go to LA and now you’re driving that vehicle around and you get to see this is the good stuff. But there’s also trying to park this thing, trying to make sure nobody door banks this thing, the fuel, you know, all these different kinds of things that come with it. had a, a friend that was like, I bought this, you know, he’s driving this McLaren now. And, uh, he’s like,
25:33
I have 10 times more guys come up and talk to me and ask me about stuff than hot women. He’s like, and I bought the car to get hot women. He’s like, this was a complete, you know, they, bullshitted me on all of that. And again, it’s like a guy that’s like, Hey man, what do you do? Hey man, you know, and he’s in shape too. they’re like asking him about workouts and stuff. was like, so, I mean, he still has it. He has multiple vehicles, but it was, it was humorous to where it was like the whole reason I got this. That was not what I, it was a, you know, unexpected.
26:02
But it is humorous because it shows us again, there’s a lot of freedom in having that ability to know that your ends are going to meet irrespective of what’s going on with who’s in office or what the economy does or what tariffs may or may not do. Uh, you know, if you get speaking events or if you don’t, if the book sells a certain amounts or not, you’re still going to be able to do what you need to do. And that gives you the ability to really focus in and lock in on what’s important, knowing that no matter what else happens, food is still going to be there. The quality of living is still going to be there.
26:32
And that gives you the ability to, again, it’s that consistency that gives us that stability to move forward. Agreed. And something that has shifted that has helped a great deal is like when I first got out of the army and started coaching, things were slow and then things like really took off like this is awesome. And so of course I immediately started looking at all the toys I could buy, right? Whereas now it’s like, I’m no longer seeking out the toys. It’s like,
27:02
What can I be incredibly grateful for right now? Like what are all the things right now in this moment that I’m just like stoked that I get to be responsible for, you know, and it, it has shifted from like, want, I want, I want, I want to acquire, I want more of this. And it becomes like, I am so grateful for, for right now and all of this. I’m overwhelmed at how, how much I have already. Uh, and, and I am just.
27:32
unbelievably grateful for it. And that has actually taken a great deal of pressure off that I didn’t even realize I was carrying. Because it’s interesting when you’re approaching life with this subconscious sense that you aren’t enough yet and you need more things or more stuff to feel fulfilled. But when you let go of that and you’re just grateful for what you have, it’s like, wow, I’m
28:00
much lighter now and things feel better and then when those those opportunities show up and you happen to be able to buy a McLaren like yeah, why not you could take it or leave it But but like this sense of gratitude is has really shifted My my mindset but also helped a great deal with with this like load that I had been carrying around, you know Yeah, and
28:26
something I’d offer people if they are wanting to make a big purchase. I’m not telling people to not try to endeavor to be worth more. Um, so to speak, because for a lot of people that physical presence is a reminder, it’s a driver for them. Right. But I would say this, if you can’t buy it three times, you can’t afford it once. And then if you are in that position where you can try to maneuver things and now you can acquire this thing, again, there’s nothing wrong with great things, but I would say, you what,
28:56
If you’re able to maybe do it now, why don’t you say, I’ll see where I, what I feel like in six months or a year. Right. Allow your subconscious to sort of process that, to look forward to it, to anticipate it, to see what that’s going to feel like, to look forward to what that’s going to be when you acquire it. And then again, even within that, you could do this test run and say, I’m going to rent this vehicle or whatever this is, or this environment or whatever that is. And you may find that.
29:25
you’re actually seeking the emotion that that evokes more so than the actual physical object or what that represents to you, what that means to you. And then once you’ve acquired it again, we have the hedonic treadmill effect where we just want the next thing, the bigger thing, the best, whatever it is. And again, there’s nothing wrong with that, but I’m saying that as you’re pointing out, if you can’t be grateful and really satisfied and happy with where you are now, doesn’t matter what you have, doesn’t matter how many comments you have on your bank account or in your business.
29:55
All you’re going to do is continually exceed your ability to appreciate what you have because you can’t appreciate what you have this very moment. Exactly. And, and for me, some of that pursuit of the toys and the extras was an attempt to.
30:15
prove that I was of value externally. Like, Hey, look, look, look at the thing I achieved or look at the thing I was able to buy because I had this achievement. Everybody look and it, and it was a, interesting, like external driver. And you and I may have actually talked about this, but I, I uploaded into chat, you BT. was like, Hey, tell me my blind spots.
30:42
Uh, was, was actually a pretty long prompt, but the gist of it was like, where am I? What am I missing? Tell me, tell me a blind spot or give me a hard truth that I need to hear. And, uh, what it spit back to me, it was like, Hey, Chris, you’re, you’re like pretty high speed and highly motivated and you achieve a lot, but it seems you’re achieving it for the validation. You’re trying to earn validation from others or, and, or you’re trying to earn redemption.
31:12
in the eyes of others, stop doing that. That’s what I said. And I thought for a minute, I was like, man, that’s right. I was so wrapped up in how others perceive me and whether or not they perceive me as valuable. That I was losing sight that like I have innate value because I exist. Right. And I had this conversation with my clients on a group call not long after that chat GPT prompt. And it was
31:40
What is the motivation for the pursuit of excellence? And for me, admittedly, it was because I want other people to see what I was able to do. And now it has shifted to, I just love life so much. I still want to pursue excellence. Because there could be a tendency, but like when I say like, don’t do things to be perceived as valuable in the eyes of others.
32:09
It could lead to like, well, then I just won’t do anything. No. Uh, if you, if you actually love life and you love this opportunity that we have to exist, uh, right here, right now, you, you should pursue excellence in all things, because like, this is your one shot. It’s not a, it’s not a dress rehearsal. Right. And so, and so the motivation has shifted in my head too of, of like, if other people see me, hopefully it.
32:39
It motivates them to pursue things, but that’s not the intent anymore. It’s like, just, I love life. I want to go do things. Like write books. If nobody buys them, that’s okay. I still want to put my thoughts on paper, you know, because that’s something that I want to do because I’m motivated to do that from an internal source as opposed to an external source. Yeah. And so.
33:07
For me, I’ve got this kind of old school mentality about AI and Chagy BT and there’s that part of me that’s afraid that if I use it, it will take my voice or change some of that for me almost like these ideas about people that had their pictures taken by tribes thinking it would take their soul. Can you explain to people that may not be familiar with Chagy BT how to get started, what that would look like? Is there a specific app or something that you use and then how do you program in such a way to allow it to serve you?
33:37
as opposed to allowing it to negatively influence what you’re wanting to create. Yeah. That’s a great question. Full disclosure. I always say please and thank you when I’m using chat GPT, because when the, when the machines rise up, can sky that I want them to remember Chris Lee was very polite. was, he was very cordial. Yeah. I’m under the opinion that AI is just going to change the world, whether we like it or not in the same way that internet did.
34:06
There were plenty of folks that thought the internet was just a fad and it wouldn’t catch on. I think we’re kind of at that same threshold with AI. If you’re not on board with it, that’s totally fine, but be prepared to be left behind. Okay, so that’s my little disclaimer. I’m not sponsored or anything like that. I use chat GPT because I want to sharpen my mind.
34:35
And so I often use it as, as like a brainstorming tool. Uh, I don’t want to outsource my thinking to it. I want it to challenge my thinking. so the prompts that I give it are, act like a business consultant or something. Um, here’s this idea, find the blind spots, find the weak points that need to be strengthened. There is a tendency and so you have to catch this. If you do use like open AI’s chat, GPT platform, it learns from you.
35:04
And so it will be friendly with you. And after a while, it could potentially become just a feedback loop. You give it an idea and it’s like, dude, that’s the greatest idea in the world. You should totally run with that. Um, which feels great, but I don’t always believe that. So, uh, I periodically will say, Hey, I need you to push back. Uh, if something actually doesn’t make sense, because you are the accumulation of all of human knowledge on the internet. Like.
35:34
You have the capability to see whether or not this is actually a good idea. If it’s dumb, tell me where it’s dumb so we can adjust. and, and so that’s how I use it. Like I’ll jam ideas with it, like, and, and have it give me some feedback. And I’m like, well, I don’t know how I feel about that. Refine this a little bit or, Hey, that’s actually a good idea. I never even thought of that. Let me see how that would be implemented in my life. Additionally, and you and I have spoken about this too.
36:04
I wanted to, because I understand that AI is moving forward, whether we like it or not, I thought it would be important to become actually pretty good at it. And so I dumped prompt into chat GPT like, Hey, I want to become an expert using this platform. Be my coach, act like an AI coach and give me a training program that I can follow to teach me how to do prompts and how to interact with you better.
36:34
Uh, and, and so I followed that and it’s actually helped a great deal. And there’s, I mean, you’re familiar with Eisenhower matrix, which is like the four squares. so, so for me, like quadrant three, which is like urgent, not important things that can be delegated. I delegate a lot to chat GPT like, Hey, jam up this email for me because like hate emails anyway, but, like, if it can
37:01
If he can spit something out in 15 seconds, it would have taken me an hour. It just saved me an hour. Why wouldn’t I do that? And then of course I go through and make sure it doesn’t sound dumb. And it actually sounds like me. But there’s, for me, there’s no point in the tasks that are, how do I put this? Essentially below my pay grade. Why wouldn’t I outsource this?
37:26
Like I would outsource it to an assistant or something like that. And ChadGBT is just like an assistant to me. jam that email or here are these two business proposals, analyze them, find the pros and cons of both, compare them, tell me what you think would be the best decision moving forward. And sometimes I agree with ChadGBT and sometimes I don’t. And what’s great is it never gets offended.
37:54
Like if I never take its advice, it doesn’t care. It’s a computer, right? So that’s kind of my thoughts on using AI and that type of thing. So I know people that were really on board with this, like literally when it first came out. Something that just came out recently was there are short films that are being created now via VO3. Have you seen those? Yeah, they are unreal. It’s insanity. And these are things that never happened. They were just…
38:22
verbal prompts given to this and it creates this car chase, this pyramid scene and like all these incredible things that never occurred. And one of the people I spoke to, he’s, uh, he uses it to make content for social media and you know, he was come talking to me about it and he’s very much in this, he likes to step into the new things. And I was just saying, you know, I’m afraid that it would, you know, hinder or influence my voice. said,
38:52
He says, that is possible. says, I’m not going to say that’s not. He says, but what, what it’s done for him is it’s helped him amplify and help them better like get clarity on where to go. So he could put in a bunch of his content from any platform and just say, this is my voice. This is what I talk about. Right up content that I would write. And he said at the beginning it was John, but he taught it and he honed it and he
39:20
works with it and all of a sudden now this thing is literally doing the things for him. Um, and he says for what he wants to do is exactly what he likes. I had another friend that was doing this about six months ago, and this was when with chap, GBT, there were still things that were not correct. So they would, he would ask him about something. They would say this is in this and it was markedly false. And so he would say, actually, that’s not true. I pushed back against it and it was a,
39:50
No, you’re correct upon further examination. This is in this. So there was a lot of that sort of pushback, but from what I understand now, the way these things are happening, how this stuff is evolving as you’re saying. It’s getting better and it’s, the learning curve is getting smaller and smaller. It reminds me of when there was still that old school iron sites versus red dot mentality. Right. And the truth is, I think this is a good example of that. You need both. Yeah.
40:18
I need to be able to use the iron sides. If I pick up an old weapon or I need to be able to use the included, you know, very small site that you would have liked on in 14 or an old M 16. Right. But I also need to be able to, to use this red dot effectively. And at the end of the day, it all comes down to these, both of these make me a better marksman. Both of these make me better in combat effectiveness. So again, if I’m creating something, if I’m writing something, if I’m writing a keynote or if I’m writing a
40:48
Again, for any sort of PowerPoint, a lot of that stuff can almost be dictated into these things. Now, I think I told you, I have a client that is a lawyer and he has seven lawyers that work for him and he’s going to be down to two by the end of next year. And those two are simply going to be programming and reflecting into the AI components because he asked AI a question about his specific area of expertise in the states that he practiced. And it found something that his other lawyers did not know. And that’s when he was like, okay.
41:16
I have to be aware of this thing so that because it’s going to be competing against people that will use that. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And people will get it irritated. Like, well, those guys just lost their job to AI. Unfortunately. Yeah, that is unfortunate. Um, but, but you’re right. The people that choose not to use AI or only stick to the iron sites, um, eventually they will just be left behind by the folks that are willing to evolve and adapt. Uh, and
41:46
If you’re not willing to adapt, that’s totally okay. But, but there’ll probably be consequences, right? Um, you mentioned the, like the, the new video AI, it’s like creating movies and stuff. And I was listening to Tim Poole talk about that and, and the capabilities that will, will be around in like a year. Somebody, some young kid in college could write a screenplay and dump it into this thing and it’ll produce a full length movie.
42:16
you know, eventually, and he never had to pay any actors or production team or whatever. It’s just like, and it’s there. And so it’s going to, it’s going to change how we do entertainment. That’s already changing how we do work. Um, and, and this is my thought. It’s like, this point until the machine derives, uh, AI, it’s amoral. It has no morals. It’s not good or bad in the same way that a brick is not good or bad.
42:46
It’s how you use it. You can smash windows with a brick or you can build hospitals, you know? And so figuring out how you want to use AI, if you choose to do so, it’s like, that that’s kind of the key component. Like who are you? And what is your character, your morals? And how do you want to use this tool to change the world? Good or bad? It’s kind of, it’s kind of your choice, you know? Yeah.
43:13
I’m in Tim Ferriss’s, he has a Facebook group for people that a few years ago, he tried to transition from free to just pay pay walls for his podcast. And if you paid for it, he remembered that he took the money that you gave him and gave you twice that amount back. And then he created this group because these were people that would have put him in the game. Right. Yeah. And he put a post two months ago, and this is before it hit anything else. He’s like, AI is here and it shows this video.
43:43
of him and it’s him speaking and it is completely seamless and it’s and it’s him trying to sell you Bitcoin.
43:54
And he says, by the way, this is not me.
43:59
Because he is so omnipresent and AI has been able to see his facsimile in all these different capacities and it has his voice and it has, and they’ve done the same thing with Joe Rogan as well. So the reality is probably you and I, they can probably do that for us now, perhaps from this podcast. So I’m not saying, you know, to be afraid and live in your, in a hidey hole and get offline, but I am saying that that is where technology is going. And so again,
44:28
I fought red dot for a long time because I was like, Oh, this thing’s not going to be very strong, blah, blah, blah. Then I go to a training course and I’m the only guy there that’s got the old school sites. Um, I see guys, you know, doing one hand of reloads, they’re reloading off of their boot or off their belt from the optic. And I was like, man, this thing is actually stronger than the iron sites were. The thing wasn’t going to come off. If you’ve got the old Glock with the plastic sites, that site’s going to bust on you before this red dot will. And I maintained it zero and the battery life was incredible.
44:58
And that’s when I was like, okay. So the, idea is be aware of what it can do for you. Don’t become dependent upon it, but also understand that again, the enemy will be using it. So to speak, the people you’re competing against will be using it and your intention will still matter. So for a lot of the people that are trying to do this now where they’re
45:21
I don’t want to say it’s nefarious, but again, a lot of people online, they’d love to create the illusion of being more than what they are because it’s online. Right. And that’s fine. But understanding as you were saying, if we can still program it morally, ethically with our ethos, and then conduct ourselves in the way that we need to as a human being around human beings to do the correct human thing, then it’s literally again, just this tool that we can use. And as opposed to saying, I don’t want to use this automobile, this thing.
45:50
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I’m going to walk there. It’s like, you can’t, but it is convenient and it’s becoming, it’s the future now, but it will actually just be every day. Like you said, six months, a year or two years from now. So why not get on board, at least explore it. What I actually like about the AI and how people are using it to, know, Tim Ferriss selling Bitcoin or whatever. It now forces me to use my critical thinking and like, is this real? There it is.
46:19
Let me go do some research. As opposed to just believing everything that’s now presented to me, I am forced and hopefully everyone’s forced to then question and say, is this actually what he said or is this actually what he’s doing? I think for too long, people just believe whatever they see on the internet and I’m not entirely sure that’s a healthy way to approach life.
46:49
It’s like trust, but verify, know, like ensure that.
46:56
One, does that make sense that you’re what you’re seeing? And two, if it, if you’re questioning it, like, yeah, go do some research, figure out if that’s actually what took place. Um, and hopefully, hopefully with that mindset, people just get smarter and become more informed truly and not just grabbing sound bites and holding onto them. And that becomes like their, their whole mentality and philosophy. Yeah. Let me remember these three sounds up.
47:25
soundbites so I can regurgitate them in this interaction I have with somebody. then if somebody has music deeper, have nothing. But yeah, I absolutely agree. And then so for this new workbook that you have, I know that it goes hand in hand with Beyond the Battlefield as well, but who is it directed to? Who is the listener or the person that’s consuming it? And then what are they going to get out of it? Why?
47:53
Why is this an important book for them to improve themselves as a leader or as a warrior or a human? Yeah. Good question. The workbook, it’s intentionally only available in hardcover on Amazon. Primarily because, like I said, I tried to make it a little bit more robust. So it’s like a textbook almost. And so if you were going to take the step to purchase it.
48:23
You now have like this beefy thing that you get to set on your bookshelf or on your, on your dinner table. It’s like, all right, this is my commitment. Like I can feel it. I can feel the weight of it. Um, that was kind of intentional. It was like, this is substantial. You’ve, you’ve taken the first step to purchase it. Commit to it. You know, it’s right here in front of you. Um, it’s so who is it geared towards? It’s geared towards people that are either.
48:53
maybe at a crossroads in life and they’re like, what path do I take? What kind of man or woman do I want to be? Or maybe they’re further along in their career and they’re like, I’ve checked all the boxes and I achieved the promotions, but I’m not feeling fulfilled. It’s for those people too. It’s like, this gives you clear direction. It’s like beyond the battlefield. It has quite a few exercises throughout.
49:22
that you’re able to do at the end of each chapter, which is fun. And I want to encourage people to do those exercises. The workbook is similar exercises, but also tools to help regulate when you’re in stressful situations, like breathing techniques, how to get into flow state. We talked about the OODA loop or the Eisenhower matrix. It’s like decision-making tools. But then I think the…
49:51
The real meat of it is the planner. It’s like 90 days of intentionally structuring your day. And then every seven days, it gives like a after action review for the week. And then every 30 days, it’s like a month review. And so it gives you both the opportunity to plan ahead, but also reflect what has worked well, what hasn’t, how can I adjust? Because the goal is like constant improvement.
50:21
Um, I think it was Tim Ferriss that talked about, you, if you improve by 1 % every single day for a year, you are 37 times better than when you first started. Now imagine that over the course of five years, you’re like a whole new species. Like, but it takes intentionality and it takes a little bit of commitment. Uh, and that, and that was kind of the intent behind the workbook. It’s like, it’s, it’s beefy, it’s heavy, cumbersome.
50:51
sticking in my back pocket, you know, I want it to be substantial for you. So you commit to. Yeah, there there’s a physical intention to open the book, to put it somewhere where you’re going to be able to actually do what you need to with it. And again, I think that people who are in the military are familiar with AARs, but an AAR is only as good as the the people running it. So lots of times.
51:20
I’m sure we’ve all been in bad ARs where we look at it and we go, you guys suck, this was shit, you guys are horrible, everybody’s dead, do it again. You know, and you’re sleep-dead and you haven’t got any food and you’re just like, okay. But again, it is a very powerful tool. the, again, just like AI or just like our red dot versus iron sights, it’s a powerful tool if it is applied correctly. A tool is only as good as a person using it. A philosophy is only as good as a person that is CICU. The book is only as good as the person who’s willing to put in the time.
51:49
put a lot of robust, insightful things into this book. So now it’s time for people to work through the book, to work on themselves, to do the work. And now instead of it being this thing that is so, sometimes it’s too daunting because there’s so much, or sometimes it’s so ambiguous, it’s impossible to know if you’re making progress. And your book kind of bridges the gap between those two. Yeah. Yeah. The intent was to show one progress is possible.
52:18
And two, after 90 days, you now have a great deal of data on yourself. And you can use that to structure your next 90 days. And ultimately that’s how we grow. Life changes occasionally happen in those big, like, oh my moments. But more often it’s through daily consistent action, those little tiny things that are moving me a little bit forward.
52:47
Same with like working out. If you work out once a month, you’re probably not going to see a whole lot of progress. You might be sore after that one workout. but ultimately in order to grow the way you want to grow or to be healthier, the way you want to be healthier, it requires like a little bit every single day. And in that consistency is what I’m trying to help jumpstart people with, with the workbook specifically. Um, because
53:17
Consistency is tricky when it’s not habit yet, you know, and hopefully by the end of the night days it becomes habit. then they.
53:28
Habits are great if you’ve done them right because when a healthy action has become habit, it is now autopilot, which means it’s no longer taking up mental bandwidth. You don’t have to think about it. It’s just like, this is who I am now, which now frees up the mental space to tackle real problems. You and I have spoken about kind like the, every day we begin with like a bucket of willpower.
53:56
And as the day progresses, like that willpower diminishes, you know, um, if you can implement, um, habits, it doesn’t, it doesn’t really detract from the, from the willpower juice at the end of the day, because it’s autopilot. And now you’ve got all of this resource left to actually tackle big decisions moving forward. Yeah. It decreases the perception of effort. Right. Exactly. And for everybody that’s listening, listen, you already have a routine.
54:25
I already have a morning routine, whether you’re aware of it or not. Now, is it cutting snooze five times and eating junk food on the way to work, hoping you’ll get there in time? That’s probably not going to set you up to win. Right. And also like you’re saying these, these small, these smaller things, right? I talk to people and say, how often are you distracted by social media? Right. And I’m like, let’s be nice and say it’s only half an hour. So over five days, if you have a work week, so to speak, that’s two and a half hours a week.
54:56
Over two weeks, five in a month, that’s 10 hours over a year. That’s 120 hours where you were losing focus and not working to execute towards where you need to. And so that’s pretty damning. Yeah. However, if we flip it and say, okay, if I could take that area where I’m not being efficient and I could apply it towards this singular thing, or even two things for 15 minutes at a time right now, I’m.
55:24
Deploying 60 to 120 hours intentionally towards this thing. And again, it could be meditation. could be anything, but it shows the significance of what is a seemingly insignificant act that we do all the time that we’re not even aware of. But we’ve grown callous to. And if you can take that sort of intention and pay attention towards it and direct it in a way that’s actually going to serve you with a skillset, with a workbook, with a routine.
55:54
then all of a sudden now that becomes a force multiplier. And again, the perception of effort drops off significantly. Yeah, exactly. Nailed it. then so Amazon is where we can get these. Where else can we find out more about what you’re doing about beyond the battlefield about the new book is called Forging Legacy. Legacy Forged. Legacy Forged. Beautiful. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, both of both my books are currently on Amazon. I’ll give you the links if I haven’t given them already. Sure. Put them in the show notes. Yeah. If you want to hear more.
56:23
me talk about life. I’m on social media, unfortunately. But no, I’m on Instagram and TikTok. It’s coach.chris.lee. And there’s also some other things that will be coming out in the future that he’s working towards, which I think if nothing else, even if you’re not purchasing the books, go subscribe to his YouTube channel. I mean, his LinkedIn. I’m sorry.
56:51
Instagram as well, all these things that he has working on it. And he’s got great content. He has a great program. He has a great group. And then I think that you’re going to get, there’s so many people out there that are trying to.
57:06
As we’ve said before, portray themselves to be something that they’re not. But I have found that you and a handful of other people that I’ve met, well actually there’s quite a few of them out there, once you kind of start looking for them, that are actually giving quality, giving something consistent. They’re not trying to promise you the moon and sell you, you know, a bill of goods that’s not going to help you get where you need to go. And frankly, we need more of that today. And then when you have a person like Chris who is capable of doing work on himself,
57:36
is not afraid to employ chat GBT here and there to keep himself and other people honest, then you literally had this like 360 dimensions to get a complete dimension of what you need. So I appreciate you. Thank you for your time, my friend. My pleasure. It’s always a, always a great conversation with you. So thank you. Thank you for listening to this episode of Acta Non Verba.
