Security Halt!
Welcome to Security Halt! Podcast, the show dedicated to Veterans, Active Duty Service Members, and First Responders. Hosted by retired Green Beret Deny Caballero, this podcast dives deep into the stories of resilience, triumph, and the unique challenges faced by those who serve.
Through powerful interviews and candid discussions, Security Halt! Podcast highlights vital resources, celebrates success stories, and offers actionable tools to navigate mental health, career transitions, and personal growth.
Join us as we stand shoulder-to-shoulder, proving that even after the mission changes, the call to serve and thrive never ends.
Security Halt!
From Special Operations to Medical School: Ricky Ditzel Jr. on Leadership, Identity & the SOF to SOM Journey
What does it take for a Special Operations veteran to transition from battlefield leadership to becoming a future leader in medicine?
In this compelling episode of Security Halt!, host Deny Caballero sits down with Ricky Ditzel Jr., a former U.S. Army Special Operations Flight Paramedic with the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne) and Co founder of SOF to SOM, a nonprofit organization dedicated to guiding veterans from Special Operations Forces into the world of medicine. Through powerful storytelling and real-world insight, Ricky shares his journey of military transition, navigating medical school applications, and rediscovering identity through service in healthcare.
Together, they unpack:
- The identity crisis many veterans face after leaving elite military units
- The academic and emotional challenges of medical school as a non-traditional student
- Why mentorship and community support are critical for career development and mental wellness
- The founding of SOF to SOM and how it’s helping veterans become leaders in the healthcare system
- How military skills translate into effective healthcare leadership
This episode is an inspiring look at resilience, lifelong learning, and the power of building new purpose after the uniform comes off.
🎙️ Subscribe now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube—and don’t forget to share, rate, and review to help spread this message of healing and hope.
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Chapters
00:00 Introduction to the Journey of Healing
05:04 The Birth of SOF to SOM
10:00 Crafting the Narrative for Medical School Applications
15:04 Understanding the Medical School Pipeline
20:10 Building Partnerships with Medical Schools
25:00 Future Aspirations and Leadership in Healthcare
30:56 Transitioning from Military to Civilian Life
37:15 Overcoming Identity Crisis in Academia
54:07 Balancing Life and Medical School
57:32 Advice for Aspiring Medical Professionals
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Tik Tok: @security.halt.pod
LinkedIn: Deny Caballero
Follow Ricky on LinkedIn and support SOF to SOM today!
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ricky-ditzel/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/softosom/
Website: https://www.softosom.org/
Produced by Security Halt Media
Security Odd Podcast. Let's go. The only podcast that's purpose-built from the ground up to support you Not just you, but the wider audience, everybody. Authentic, impactful and insightful conversations that serve a purpose to help you. And the quality has gone up. It's decent. It's hosted by me, danny Caballero. It's decent, it's hosted by me, denny Caballero, ricky Ditzel.
Speaker 1:Welcome to Security Out Podcast. How's it going, man? It's going well, dude. Thanks for having me. How are you, dude? I'm doing great Moving at a million miles per hour, as usual, but I have to admit I have been stalking soft to some for years now.
Speaker 1:Admit, I have been stalking soft to some for years now.
Speaker 1:Um, I it's the warrant officer in me that sees the potential in every 18 Delta to be a PA, to be a doctor, to be a healer, and I see that we still have a shortage in so many professions and I'm like we have to get these guys on.
Speaker 1:I have to get them on just so I can have them share what they're doing and explain why medicine should be at least something you consider if you're already a warrior healer about to get out of the military. It's something that I'm so happy and so proud to see some of my friends shout out to you, brandon, that have taken that responsibility, that are in school right now and seeing him in that white coat, bro, talk about like proud brother moment of like man. You're chasing your dream, you're doing it. You're going to get out there into this world where you can actually help change and help individuals where they're living their lives, how they can be healthier. I can thrive and recover and I think that today, man, like I, need to hear not only the story of soft the song but your story and how you got involved. I sure do.
Speaker 2:No, I really appreciate it. We were hyped when we got in contact with you and our operations director, zach LeBlanc, sent the screenshot and everybody was super pumped. So thanks for making time, thanks for sending the invite to even have us on the show.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, man Like when I see guys are building something for the brothers, immediately I'm like, yes, this, this needs to be highlighted, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2:So tell us, man, what, what got you into this? Yeah, so when I was on active duty, there was to be expert disaster managers, planners and medics on the back of that aircraft so that you guys could do what you did and have a security, knowing that once you handed off your friends, your comrades, that you didn't have to question what you were doing. So I really loved that job, loved what I was doing and from years of being in the military, starting off in 82nd and then ending up at 160th, I always had great doctors I worked with, you know, and periodically they pulled me aside and said like hey, what do you think about for the future? Like someday this does end, no matter if you do it for 20, if you do it for 10 or 2 or 4, whatever. And you know, and you seem to like have an access medicine thing. So over time, just like I'm really lucky to have mentors who are like you should really think about this doctor thing. So it kind of set the seed of taking it seriously. You know I was inspired by medicine because my older brother he had a lot of brain trauma as a child, cerebral palsy and such and you know pediatric neurosurgeons did an incredible job to keep him alive, and so I've always been interested in medicine, obviously went the medic route, and then the doctor thing got taken seriously, I'd say when those active duty mentors started getting involved.
Speaker 2:So I got in 2020 um myself and if and other folks. We helped run and build the orion of florican field hospital up in new york city and we did that for a little while, did a lot of covid care. A couple of us did some covid airway teams and then from there I got into a post-bac program to finish my pre-med stuff, because I had a disaster management degree from active duty. I didn't have pre-med done. So I did this 18-month program and during that program it was like man, I had advisors, I got these medical advisors, I got people sending me deadlines like this is when you need to submit this essay. This is when you need to submit that essay. This is what the MCAT looks like. This is how you study for the MCAT. You need to submit that essay. This is what the MCAT looks like. This is how you study for the MCAT. And I was like this is this is great. You know we're paying thank you, luckily GI benefits, but this is an expensive program to have access to all of this, and without this I don't know if I'd know how to navigate the system.
Speaker 2:So at that same time a couple of people that I'm really close friends with were also studying for the medical school admissions test, for the MCAT, and we got just like most soft stuff. We got in a group chat. We started talking about how I was studying for the MCAT, they were studying for the MCAT, you know what my advisors were saying, what their advisors were saying, et cetera, and the group chat went from five dudes to 10 dudes. Then 10 dudes turned to 15 dudes and we started being like you know, kind of have something here. Here's like 15 guys from the community who all want to be doctors and we're doing interview prep, we're reading their essays, we're giving them deadlines, we're telling them when their stuff needs to be submitted, and it kind of spiraled from there. It was like if we want this to matter, if we want to be able to make an actual impact, sure we can continue the group chat model and talk about and just help each other out, but if we want to have some legitimacy, we need a file and form a 501c3.
Speaker 2:Make this a nonprofit organization, because there's no desire to do this for profit. Obviously we want to help the guys out. We don't want to charge them, we want to give it to them, so we want the nonprofit route. I'm lucky to be the chairman and co-founder of the organization. We have about five co-founders because it's that original five group chat, all volunteer organization, and we just officially turned two a couple of days ago, two years old. We did it for a whole year before we incorporated to test it out, make sure we had something here. But yeah now, so over two years now we have 40 scholars and so we refer to our folks who are in our nonprofit scholars. We've gotten about 30 of them in the medical school we have the next 10 getting ready to apply and then we'll onboard the next 10 in the next couple of months.
Speaker 2:Application cycle open for soft to some. So that's like the down and dirty, uh, my story plus the origin story of soft to some. And, um, you know, the biggest thing that really convinced me to and us to want to incorporate and I think this is probably one of the most important things was, uh, zach, zach, who you talked to, we were going over his application and in medical school. You can submit 15 resume bullets and they have to be a variety of things. Zach, we're going to apply with like eight, like eight resume bullets. And I was like man, what are you doing, dude? Like you're, you're dead in the water. So we did a, I did a study with West Virginia university. We looked at all their applicants, statistically significant. Uh, we found a statistically significant that if you had 12 or more resume bullets on your application, that you had a higher chance of getting into medical school.
Speaker 2:So, from the jump, he was already fighting, fighting the bad fight. And you know, we got on a zoom call and we went about his, um, his military career. And I was like, hey, man, you know you're 18, delta, where were you at this year? Oh, I was here. Oh, so you're on that trip? Yeah, I was on that trip. Well, didn't you? Weren't you the Delta that took care of so-and-so? Yeah, it was Okay.
Speaker 2:Where's that experience? That's one of a kind experience. Well, I don't want to sell my buddies out. Okay, I understand that. Well, you know, that's just what we're supposed to do. That's our job. Okay, you know, my team sergeant had it way worse than I did. It wasn't that crazy. Okay.
Speaker 2:Well, man, we can talk about this without talking about your buddy or selling them out. We can talk about the experience without trying to make you seem like a war hero. We can talk about the emotion you felt, the decision-making process you went through. How did you train properly to have the confidence to perform surgery by yourself as a medic? How do we talk about that so that it's believable? Because we fought that fight with academia before too. They don't believe our guys' stories. Fought that fight with academia before too. They don't believe our guys' stories. And the Zoom call turned to a three-hour meeting and so it was more of a vent session, therapy session, and then an application building session. And we turned that dude's application to 15 resume bullets and now he's a second-year medical student, accepted into an accelerated emergency medicine pathway. So that's what really convinced me that we needed to incorporate, because and we've seen it time and time again we've gotten scholars and when they build their resumes, initially eight, nine bullet points, 11 bullet points and it's the same stories. Yeah, you know it's.
Speaker 1:We often get told we often get told as Green Berets that we're, we're the, the quiet professionals. Yep, but on the outside, I think this is what every soft professional from 160th to Ranger Regiment to SEAL everybody becomes a silent professional. They don't want to talk about it when it comes across the professional frameworks of applying to a program, across the professional frameworks of applying to a program. But what you just described is exactly why you have to understand the importance of crafting the right narrative, the right resume that speaks to your skillset. Otherwise it's not only a disservice to you but it's a disservice to every other service member with your background that comes after you. Because, just like you said, some of the people in these they're looking through the applications. They don't understand that these stories are real, they don't understand the gravity, what it means to be a medical professional in combat and they just think it's Hollywood. Oh, this guy's just making it up when the reality is like.
Speaker 1:I know my 18 Deltas have done some amazing things in comp kept somebody alive to add a bullet in their frigging head at nighttime in the back of a frigging CH-47. Like that's insane. That is what our medical professionals in the soft world are able to do is some of the most magnificent. That's why I say like they. They deserve the ability to dream and dream big, like in creating this endeavor, like in your own, with your own experience. Like how daunting did it seem at first? Like, oh fuck, am I? Who am I to create this program for others like me?
Speaker 2:you know, the idea of being involved in nonprofit wasn't the daunting part. I was fortunate to be a director in a nonprofit previously for many years and I had kind of ran the education department of that nonprofit. So I had already helped folks get into medical school, pa school, business school. We've edited PhD, theses Like it was, it's, it's all, which I had no right doing. But it was like, hey man, yeah, sure We'll help you out, but um, so I had like the trust that I knew from that experience and the and the folks I worked with over there, that I could at least um, I at least had some structure, some idea.
Speaker 2:The daunting part was like if we're going to incorporate, then we're committing not to a one-year project, not to a two-year goal, and when the dopamine wears off we're going to disband this thing we're committing to. We're setting 10-year goals and then we'll reevaluate at 10 years and see where guys want to be with their position, organization. So I think that was the daunting part initially was to say this isn't just a dopamine high. We're committing to running a business and we're going to have a brand that stands for something, and here's the, here's the challenges and, um, the culture that we're going to set and the challenges we're going to face. You know we don't just take medics. I think that's uh probably uh think that's uh probably a a misconception that when you see the brand, it's it's soft medics to school medicine. Do we have ground force commanders? We have boat guys, we have um, anything. As long as you suck or used to, socom says that you are soft and you went through a selection process, you're eligible for us. That's right and you 18 bravos.
Speaker 1:I checked even you 18 bravos. We have them we have.
Speaker 2:We have ranger, you know platoon leaders who are, are, you know, majors and such. Now, and it's the same we had, we helped one, one guy you know he was a ranger captain to get into medical school and he's at a wonderful medical school. It's like to be responsible for 150, 200 rangers, like fully responsible for their lives. How do we tell that story? How do we tell them? How do we get guys like him to be vulnerable and talk about what it was like to lose a ranger and to be to be the one who was in charge of that, to be the one who was in charge of that?
Speaker 2:Um, you know these, the art of storytelling is so important in any, in any career endeavor, but for our community, um, especially it's. How can we humbly tell these stories so that the individual doesn't feel like they're selling anybody out they're not, you know, playing a character, they're not lying but that they also get the message across so that the person reading the paperwork can understand it, because understanding the military is so complicated. So you know, there's folks in the military to understand the military. There's people in soft that don't know about their soft units. So how can I get a civilian academic to one have any idea what the military is, to understand special forces, because they think everything's special forces. So then add on Ranger or civil affairs or boat guy or whatever, and then get them to have the right image in their head as they're reading this four sentence bullet point in this person's application, so that it matters and that's a good challenge.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's important to understand that we often think of this path to medical school as just being about chemistry, bio and checking the blocks for all these pre-requirements. But the truth is, within all this application is you're right there's storytelling, there's telling a bunch of people that you may not meet face-to to face ever who you are, what you've done and how to sell that, and I think that speaks to what a lot of us have a hard time dealing with on the outside. How do I convey to somebody what I did? I just lived it for a majority of people, yeah, I just lived it for 10, 15 years, 20 years. But how do I put this into actual words?
Speaker 1:That can be a benefit to me in a resume, in an application, and that's where I think more guys need something like this, a program that provides them not only the framework for applying but the understanding that you have to sell yourself. That's something that we never had to do. It's all about performance metrics of like I got to do these pushups, I got to do, I got to drag this thing and then I got to be really good at doing my, my, my job as a team guy or a boat guy or somebody in civil affairs, like that's, that's how I get to sell myself on the outside. No, you have to speak to what you've done and you have to articulate it and that's a challenge, man. And when you're coaching these individuals, how has that been Like seeing them like get to the point where they're like kicking confidently? Because it's everybody, it's not just that E7 guy, like you said, it's a major captain officers that arguably, I would say, have the hardest time selling themselves, because they're always selling the mission and the men.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, they, they, they struggle a lot, um, it's awesome to see the breakthrough happen, is always super exciting to see the writing improve, to see the walls come down a little bit, to see these dudes open up about stuff they've never talked about, um, and then they're willing to put some of it on application or to see them really. The other thing, too, is showing that they're more than just the title of the job they did in the military. So you know a lot of our guys. When they write their personal statements, we want them to tell their story to medicine and not just tell the war story, and so it's really a privilege to read a lot of these guys' real stories and not just their military stories. So what's the whole thing look like? That's probably my favorite part is really learning who these guys are beyond the color of their hat, um, and you know that that's been a really incredible experience so, yeah, and going back to that, the impossible dream of going to medical school like we.
Speaker 1:We see it on er, we see it on every. It seems like every every other year there's a new TV show depicting what it's like to be a doctor. But it's not as sexy as it seems. Before you even get there, there's a lot of work. And explain to us what that pipeline really looks like for you know the basic guy that maybe all he has if he's lucky, if he's been working a little bit, all he has is that bachelor's degree, like what does? That pipeline look like so traditionally.
Speaker 2:And now a lot of medical schools don't require prerequisites. A lot of them will require um, they call them competencies. So the gateway, the gateway right now is still the medical school admissions test, which is the mcat, and you can think about the mcat like the. The academic version for medical school is the 12 mile rock march and the challenge is that the good dude system can't apply when there's an MCAT and a GPA and there's statistics that really prove it. The higher that MCAT score is, the higher that GPA is, the higher your percentage of getting into medical school is, and it just is what it is. So that pipeline looks like writing a personal statement, having your MCAT score complete, or MCAT complete with your score back, having all your transcripts, a couple letters of recommendation, usually from a physician, and then like a science faculty member, to talk about your skill set in science and how you were as a person. And then you have to fill out the common application. So if you're going to MD schools so allopathic schools, there's one application, unless it's Texas, texas has their own application system. And then if it's doctor of osteopathic medicine, do school, then they have their own application system. So application is pretty similar across the board Personal statement with work and activities experiences, which is that resume I was referring to. Then, after that, medical schools will send you their secondary applications and that could be anywhere from three to 10 essays per school that you're writing. So it's a lot of writing. It's a brutal process.
Speaker 2:Studying for the MCAT. You should take around six months to do it. Four to six months to study for that mcat. You haven't done a science class in a long time. It should probably take longer than four months to study for the mcat. Um, and yeah, that's, that's the gate. The mcat is what keeps people out for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and when you look at the mcat, there's the soon. If you just google mcat, you're gonna get a lot of hits for sites that prep you for the MCAT for a lot of money for a lot of money a fucking money to $3,000 just for like the the basic plan. But if you want a one on one coach, we'll get you in there for 5000. It's like, it's insane. It's ridiculous, it is insane.
Speaker 2:And the application cycles like uh, it's insane, it's ridiculous and I don't think the application cycle is like 10 g's man all in all, like application cost plus prep, plus secondary applic essays, because the secondaries usually cost a hundred dollars of submission and does the jill cover any of that?
Speaker 1:does it cover?
Speaker 2:for the application. No, um, you can get fee assistance program if you're under a certain amount of income. Usually our folks who are applying an active duty uh, qualify for that because of reasons. But so they'll qualify for those fee assistance programs and you can waive your application fee and your secondary application costs.
Speaker 1:But the mcat, no, that test, I think, is 350, so they're just a sit for the test, if I remember correctly and then do you guys do actual um, do you guys guide the applicants to the process and provide the tutoring, or to provide the assistance to secure tutoring from a you know third party?
Speaker 2:yeah, we do all the above. So we have a partner that is a really good testing company that we have a discount for. So we right now we buy, we do a needs based assessment. So, folks, because folks come with us at all different levels of their prep, so some folks just want the question bank from UWorld, so we'll buy them that UWorld question bank. Some folks want one-on-one tutoring, so we'll buy them that you world question bank. Some folks want one-on-one tutoring, so we'll buy them so many hours of one-on-one tutoring. And then others want the whole package because they really need the help, so we'll get them the you world, the one-on-one tutoring and the test prep service where they go to like a um, they have assignments at home and then they're like a weekly group session and then that also comes with other practice tests and and so we we try to spend right now on average, three to $5,000 a person.
Speaker 2:There's other goals that we have and we need a lot of help with funding to make it there. But we want to pay for things like childcare, why these guys are studying. We want to have a grant fund so when folks need to go to a conference and say their school is not funding them to go to that conference for professional development. They can reach out to us and we can pay for those fees, whether it's a hotel, the conference for you or the flight or all the above, if we have enough money. But right now we focus a lot of our effort in getting them in the end of the program. So three to five thousand on just the pre-med part, yeah, yeah and that's.
Speaker 1:That's a lot of money. Yeah, oh man, yeah.
Speaker 2:Shocking to me. That's nuts, doesn't stop either.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so fundraising is constantly ongoing.
Speaker 2:Fundraising is constantly ongoing. Yeah, if anybody out there wants to support, sponsor these scholars, let us know. Yeah, let us know.
Speaker 1:When it comes to the academia side of the house, have you been able to forge partnerships with some of the schools and have they seen the benefit of allowing our service members and men and women to? You know, not only apply Obviously, certainly we don't want somebody to make it easier, but see benefit of having individuals coming through from this background.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's been, that's been incredibly exciting. So that was probably my biggest goal when we started soft asam initially was like, can we be that non-profit that has partnerships with major universities that give our guys an inner, give our guys interviews? And we've, we've achieved that with a lot of schools, both mt and do um. A couple of them we don't have breast release rights so I can't disclose those ones, but the rest we do have media agreements with. So, like Hofstra University, zucker and Donald Zucker and Barbara School of Medicine out in Long Island, great medical school, top 20 medical school we have an interview agreement with them that because we have our own selection assessment program at Soft Asound that our guys go through before they get brought on as scholars and then our pipeline exists to get them successful. They set the parameters for us of what their school wants and then if our scholars achieve such goals then they can have an interview with that school. And so we have that with several schools, all different rankings and all over the country, and it's just continuing to grow. And I got to tell you those conversations were easier than you thought but it's because we brought, it's because of all the prep work we do beforehand to validate these folks and verify who they are, and then we tell them the value that they bring to their campuses.
Speaker 2:Like we're we're a little strict right now. We don't take everybody, you know, so you have to apply to soft some. And we have a assessment selection program that is proprietary and it's very objective, it's extremely objective Then then gets reviewed by operational psychs to make sure that it remains objective and they give us feedback on it. Yes, and so it's. It's being. It gets tweaked as necessary and we have a team that is trained to deliver this assessment. So it's not, it's not just anybody who's available that day, we have a whole team that's read onto this little program and, um, the the feedback is very objective. And so then you become a scholar. Then we put in all the work. Plus, to apply you have to have you know character witness. You have to tell us who's referencing you from the community. We contact those people from the community, we ask other folks about you.
Speaker 2:So what we're looking for is, you know, we're not just trying to make doctors. What we're really trying to do here is really enhance the American healthcare system, and there's a lot of issues in the American healthcare system from a leadership perspective. So how do I find the best leaders possible from our community that want to get into the American healthcare system and do something about it? Whether that's practicing a rural clinic, being the best pediatrician, you can be going into policy work. Whatever your goal is, we don't care OBGYN, we'll support any of those goals, but you have to agree to us that you're going to give back to our organization by mentoring the next generation and then by being impactful on the medical campuses that you go to. And so when we talk to the universities, that's the commitment we give to them is that the people that have these linkage programs, if they activate and they use it and they come to your school, they're committing to being a leader on your campus in a number of ways, and that's been really awesome to see Right now, four of our I think four or five of our scholars are class presidents for their medical schools.
Speaker 2:We have folks who have started military interest groups. We have folks who have led free healthcare clinics, wilderness medicine trips. You know they're doing exactly what you expect them to do. They get to the campus, they see something, they identify it, they get to work and they make an impact. We have folks around the admissions committees at medical schools. Now, you know advocating for veterans all veterans. You know softness on, while we're niche and we focus on our guys, our advocacy side is for all veterans in medical school. So, um, the data from veterans in med school is horrible. It's less than 0.01 percent across the nation. Most medical schools accept one veteran per cycle. Um, it was only. It's almost statistically better to say you're not a veteran when you're applying, based on that data, um, but I don't think you should hide it. I think you should put it out there damn ricky.
Speaker 1:You're playing for the chest. My man like this.
Speaker 2:Oh that's the goal that's. That's what we do. Are you sure you want? To agree because this seems a lot like by with and through a lot with them through the model baby flood, it, get it in there.
Speaker 1:Shadow governments.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's uniquely a beautiful thing that I've seen within our soft guys that are getting involved in the space in the non-profit world. They're not just trying. The mission statement at first can seem very simplistic, but when you take a peek behind the curtains it's deeper. There's a big move to make it a very complex and self-feeding mechanism to help others and continue to grow it to help others. And it's yeah, it's like having little, little underground and support cell structures are like yeah, these guys aren't just going in there to be students, they're going to be leaders, they're going to talk about veteran issues, they're going to talk about being a good individual, help promote good ideas and change the way things are being done, and that's ultimately going to lead to change within our healthcare administration system, exactly Because we see it everywhere where there there aren't enough veterans.
Speaker 1:We see it within our government, we see in the local community who are better for having veteran voices in these places and like it's now, it's the time, now it's the freaking time to start. If you can help, if you can be part of this initiative, get involved, don't get scared. Even if it's just simple as donating, getting involved and by providing resources, like yeah, that's huge Like in your own journey looking at where you started with this, like where do you see it growing?
Speaker 2:Oh man, where I see, saw this on growing. I have some thoughts Um one. One thing that really excites me is when you close your eyes and you think about 10 years from now. If we stay at 10 per cycle, it's 100 new soft physicians in 10 years. There's no network that exists right now, tight-knit network that you can access. 100 soft physicians across all different specialties know where they're at in the world and know what universities they work at. I think that is really powerful and it's really powerful for patients. I think it's really powerful for guys who want to become doctors, other types of medical professions. But what really excites me is that when Soft Asam is built more and we have our physician network established, what we can give back to the community at large, whether our guy, because we have folks who are going to practice active duty, we have folks in the reserves and the guards still are going to practice that way and we have folks who are full civilian. So when you know, I you know, I'm sure someone in south asam will be an obgyn one day and there's going to be a veteran who, his wife, is going through something and they're going to call who they trust, first to have the ability for them to reach out to us, and then we can pair them with somebody from the community who gets it and, as in that specialty of choice, I think it's really really exciting.
Speaker 2:The other thing in the future that I'm excited about is take that hundred number again. Multiply that by an average 10 years of experience. Call it 10 years of soft experience. You have a thousand years of leadership experience. What can we do with healthcare leadership training with that?
Speaker 2:Because there's really no good healthcare leadership out there. It's not part of any pipeline. You go to medical school there's no. There's no BLC, alc, seal training this you know. There's no leadership development courses. You get to residency there's no leadership development courses. You get to residency, there's no leadership development courses within your residency. It's mirror the activity above you or decide that you didn't like. Yet you didn't like the way it was done to you, so you try and change it. So can we take our network and years and years of experience and and create something that would be a leadership pipeline for uh, for healthcare executives or physicians in general? Um, it's kind of kind of endless, but that's, those are two of our. Our biggest goals right now is that 10 year plan of having a hundred new soft physicians, seeing where they're at in the world and being able to harness that capability, uh, and to give back to the country and to our and to our service members.
Speaker 1:Yeah, contin. And to our service members yeah, continued service. Man, that's something that never gets talked about at TAP. This should be something that's provided as a resource and a path for your future, and it's a crime. It's a crime that we're not talking about this and promoting this program in TAP. And I know for a fact that there's a need for it.
Speaker 1:In my own friend group I have guys right now that are in medical school because somebody simply believed in them and watching them go through the process without soft to some, like, yeah, it was difficult.
Speaker 1:Like I've seen friends that struggled and like, man, this is incredibly hard, it's difficult, but they find one or two people that can walk them through and you know they bounce around, they find their path.
Speaker 1:If we streamline the process, if we put them in a room and a chat with Ricky and give them like the no bullshit step one to completion process and maybe a PowerPoint, like we're used to showing them how they can achieve their dream. Like, how many more guys can we get through the system? Can we get in there? Because, man, like I have seen some of the most remarkable individuals from that medical background go on to do great things, but it wasn't their calling and that's a shame. That is a true shame that I don't want anybody to something in front of them when they're going through a transition program. Have you guys been able to integrate or talk with anybody at a base or be able to put your yourselves within, like the, the, at least at the group level, for them to be like hey, when you got, it's got 18 deltas or anybody within the background, or getting out, like let them know about this program getting out like let them know about this program.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we have um our stuff's over at the sock and refresher course right now oh nice, yeah, which is really awesome.
Speaker 2:And then, uh, we have a sock and cadre who, like, tells all the new sock and students about us every time you like improv them, which is really cool. Um, so shout out to him. But so, sock, and this has been a big hit. Um, we have a couple of the units with their internal transition pipelines where our, our stuff is at, like our brochures and such. Uh, we haven't been able to hit, we haven't tried to hit like tap directly. Maybe that's something we should target. Just have brochures and stuff there, why not? Um, but uh, yeah, it's mostly unit internal right now. And then the soccum schoolhouse.
Speaker 2:Uh, the other thing I want to shout out, besides soft to Psalm, is it would be wrong of me not to mention service to schools, who's doing incredible work in this space too. You know, um, service schools helped me out when I was applying, just to be able to talk to veterans. So, uh, one thing we do, just like some of the courses, is we'll never send you away empty-handed. So if you're not selected to be a Soft Asam scholar, you're not just going to be like, hey, good luck, buddy, we're going to arm you with tools to be successful, we're still going to give you documentation for how to execute. And then we always refer our guys to services schools. And the reason is because service school does a beautiful Slack chat for medical. You get in that Slack and it is an open market, um, mentorship thing. So they don't do any financial funding right now from my understanding. But if you go on services schools and you're like, hey, I need someone to review my personal statement, you'll get 50 different dudes and and uh, ready to read your personal statement, give you feedback on your medical school application. So, um, we're big fans of what they do. I'm grateful for the help they gave me. But, um, yeah, if, if you don't get selected for us, we'll always get back.
Speaker 2:And on your point about powerpoints we, we tried several models in in the beginning. It was like do we get one-on-one meetings? Do we do this? And our um, our vice chairman, justin harrison, was like I'm to create a start here document. I've guaranteed, if I just create one document, these guys will take it and execute. Dude, that was a game changer. We, we, we onboard these guys. We say here's the link for the start here document and follow it from top to bottom. And then X and rock and roll dude and these guys fricking execute man. It's like the whiteboard, it's like the whiteboard, it's like the whiteboard man.
Speaker 1:It's crazy I uh, when I started my own entrepreneurial endeavors I didn't know everything can come at you so fast. When you decide you're like I'm gonna, I'm gonna lean into this, I'm gonna try to make it happen, and um, the first thing I did was get like several whiteboards to like whiteboard out what I wanted to do. Then that's like that's fall back on magic, fall back on your strength, like, look, I get it. We made fun of powerpoint, we made fun of having all these documents. But sometimes you need that linear path of like check the box, move down. Did you succeed here? Yes, move down to this. Something go wrong. Go back to this step. Like it. Go, use the tools you already have.
Speaker 1:Like we forget that we have everything like and you know, when you're chasing this impossible dream, reflect back on every other impossible dream that you already conquered, like becoming a medic in 160th. Like that's not fucking easy.
Speaker 1:Like going in through seal training, going through buds through BUDS, going through RIT Not easy. None of this shit was easy, no. So why won't you at least believe in yourself to go to medical school? At least play around with the idea, at least look at what it would take. Maybe some of the limiting factors will be too much. Brick and mortar schools can be a big thing for people when they're already out and they relocated to an area. But look, search, look for every other option. That's one of the things I talked to for a couple of friends. Like, oh, there's not one, there's not a school that I'd want to go to. It's nearby. Are you sure? Have you Googled? Just Google it. See what's around, see what's available, what you'd be, do you want to live in?
Speaker 2:fayetteville? Yeah, yeah, probably not. Did you want that green hat? You did, was it worth it? Hell yeah, yeah, exactly like.
Speaker 1:Uh, it's temporary yeah, it's one of those things like you just have to sit down and do the core analysis, figure it out, like it. You'll be surprised, you'll walk through the process. You'll be. You'll be surprised, you'll walk through the process. You'll be. You'll be pleasantly surprised when you realize that if you game bit, if you just go through and do what you already did on your detachment, on your team for planning, and walk through because it's, it's a dream man, start living the dream when you realize that I'm really passionate about this, take the actual steps. If you're already like, really passionate about this, take the actual steps. If you're already like you're already in the washington area how you can literally walk out, throw, throw a stick and hit a medical school, like there's a few right there yeah, be willing to dream and we yeah, we've.
Speaker 2:We've helped guys stay in the state because of, you know, spousal issues, child issues, and we help them communicate with the schools. Like I know, you can't give preference. However, I really can't leave this state and here's my reasons why. And we don't think we can do that and we and we don't. We assume the medical schools won't respond to that, but the typical applicant to medical school is young and single, so they don't usually have to deal with it. But when they have someone who comes to them professionally and says, hey, my spouse does x, y and z, we have stability. I have a child, they're in daycare here. What do I need to do? To be at your university and I'm going to commit and we've had some good results with that um, they really respect it. So you know, and if you want to, if you need to be region specific, just got to give higher stats. That's your limb. Fact is just work really hard in that MCAT. The MCAT will open that door. For you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Enrique, I want to bounce back to you and your personal journey right now, Just reflecting like we can get lost when we pivot into the civilian world.
Speaker 2:Did you find yourself struggling with that identity and that purpose and if you did, did soft to some and building this kind of give you that identity and purpose back? Um, when I first got on April, it was basically like being on deployment all over again. So I thought I was out of the military and I thought I had figured my stuff out and I was sadly mistaken. So you know, we're running this field hospital. It's all soft folks. I'm living out of a hotel in a backpack, very normal circumstance. We're working 20 hours a day. It was awesome. Then I do this airway team thing no-transcript. It crumbled bad and basically what happened was I was so used to the effort that I put in paying off and I wasn't used to doing poorly. It had been a long time since I had done something poorly. Like, okay, you need me to rock 12 miles, you want me to do it in sub three? Okay, let me get in, I'll get it sub 230. I'll get sub 240. You need me to run five miles? I'll get it under sub 35. You need me to be the best medic? I'll study anybody that needs to study and I'll come in super prepared. Right, we have these mentalities and when we can do that and succeed. We create that loop.
Speaker 2:When I got to columbia, you know, my highest science I'd ever taken was in high school back. That had to be like seven years, eight years well, 10 years before I went to columbia, or eight years was marine biology, right? So, like I thought I understood science. You know I did this soccer medic stuff. I thought I could do science. Well then I'm in physics one at Columbia and my professor is the director of CERN and I'm like, and he and his first briefing is like hey, I expect you to get a 50% on my exams. That would be considered an average and be a good score if you got a 50. And my brain could not wrap around like getting a 50 on something and I was like I'm not gonna get a fucking 50. Pardon my language. I'm like I'm gonna crush. I'll study 12 hours a day. So you know I did. I had, you know I was doing the 50 on, 10 off model. I would study for 50 minutes, take 10 minute break. And I did that. And next thing, I know I'm doing that like 10 hours a day and I'm getting crushed. Academically, you know I'm getting like the exams would be like 16 questions and I'd be getting like four correct instead of eight correct. I'd be getting five questions out of 16. And that being like a C or a B sometimes, by the way, too, like the curve was so crazy. And so I'd be in physics, one, chem, one calculus.
Speaker 2:I was taking four classes at a time because I had to for GI Bill and the fraud feeling set in real fast. You know, I went from being a well-known. You know, I know that sounds really egotistical, but I went from being like a decently well-known medic, had a good reputation and doing well medically, and now I'm like doing really quote, unquote bad at Columbia. I'm holding like a three, three, three, four at the time and I was expecting to be like a three, seven, five guy and that that was a big identity crisis that I started to feel like a fraud. I remember that being like the loop that was in my head Like you're a fucking fraud, dude. Like you were supposed to get out, you're supposed to crush and then you're going to become a doctor. You know, fill the prophecy man. Like do what you were expected to do and no, dude, that was bad.
Speaker 2:I was in Manhattan, didn't have a lot of friends, um, it just was really bad. I was doing really bad academically, so definitely went through the identity crisis thing, started to be like who the hell am I? Type thing. Um, am I even going to get into medical school at this point? You were supposed to be the guy which doesn't exist, um, and just ended up having to get real honest with the homies and how to create almost like a they call it, you know, you call it like a safety team. Like you get a, you get a group chat of the homies you trust and you start getting honest and you say, hey, man, I don't feel good today, don't know why, but I'm okay, and then that's all that's it. And so I started. We started doing that with like two of my good friends and that helped a ton.
Speaker 2:And then just talking to people you really trust and being like, hey, dude, you might just not be the scientific academic. Are you working really hard? Yes, are you meeting with TAs? Yes, I was. Are you going to teaching hours with the professors? I was. Were you meeting with the professors privately? If you need help, I did that a few times when I needed to. Okay, so you're doing everything you can to do really well and you're just not doing better than your classmates who are extremely gifted and you need to respect that they're extremely gifted. And now that kind of started to flip. The mindset was to really appreciate my classmates for the hard work they put in when they were very young and that they were there for a purpose. They were there to be scientists. Man, most of them weren't there to, you know, do a quick pre-med and balance.
Speaker 1:They were trying to, like you know, solve gravity and shit these kids are wicked, wicked, smart and fucking wicked smart trying to go to interstellar type space dude.
Speaker 2:One of my teenagers was like 23 years old and he was like studying gravity at a very high level. He went to like science high school. These are very smart guys and I'm meeting one-on-one with him and I still can't solve the equation. Like it sucked so that that physics really messed me up for a while. And then I found out what I was good at Like somehow was decent at calculus, and I ended up being really good at organic chemistry and a lot of people aren't good at organic chemistry, so that was a big W for me. So once I got through that first two semesters at Columbia, dude, I mean I was tore up. I was like lock jaw every day from grinding so bad at night, like it was. It was a disaster. I wasn't working out, because why would I keep working out? It's only like nature's antidepressant, something we did every single day for 10 years. But hey, let me just drop that off the planet.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know.
Speaker 2:I want to pause on that because we don't fucking.
Speaker 1:I don't even listen to the shit that I put out, I don't.
Speaker 1:I am absolutely stressed to the fucking max and I worked the last two, three days till like 2, 3 am. You think I have time for the gym? I tell myself and you tell yourself the same thing and you have to get out of that mindset because, oh, I'll do it, I'll do it, do it, prioritize your health, because everything you just shared, ricky, that's something that's so intimately fresh in my mind and so many of the people listening at home can can sit there and realize that they've gone through that themselves. They've been challenged, they've been hit in the face as soon as they got out, like I'm not the best at everything, and then you continue to grind, continue to grind, continue to grind, but you don't give yourself enough grace to realize, okay, maybe the equation isn't that I need to work harder. Maybe the equation is I need to give myself grace and go do the thing that I need, which is the gym, which is, terry, if you're listening, I missed yesterday and the day before, but I'm going after going back to the gym.
Speaker 2:That's my trainer man.
Speaker 1:You're right, when you prioritize yourself, when you prioritize yourself and you actually look at the way you can. Okay, I can study a little bit more, but I need to go to the gym. I need, I need to eat. One meal a day is not going to cut it. Not drinking water is not going to cut it. And when we think about medical school and what we've been shown stereotypically is exactly what you described the guy that burns him, the guy or girl that burns themselves out to the point where they're almost fucking dead, and you're never going to succeed in life like that, like and yeah, I'm speaking to myself, so I can listen to this episode when I publish it, because I need it to be reaffirmed in my head yeah, dude, you know medicine, so is business, but medicine's infinite and, um, you know.
Speaker 2:That's another thing we talked a lot about, our scholars, about. So anybody listening, I don't care if you're trying to be a doctor or you're trying to be the next Zuckerberg or whatever the hell it is, or MBA, don't care, you can study forever, you can work forever and still there's a limit. There's a limit to everything. And the other thing that we really suck at is we're so used to a workout being so structured and almost perfect that we'd rather just not. We would see a window of five to 10 minutes. And this is me, this is me and we.
Speaker 2:We have to do this a lot in medical school. You have to accept a 10 minute workout window. Sometimes do that 10 minutes of pushupsairmaster, jump rope, weighted jump rope, any flavor. That 10 minutes will be exponent in your mental health like a crazy exponent in your mental health and your performance and your relationships, and the list goes on. And that's really hard for us to accept because we're so used to having these really great workout programs, putting an hour and a half into it, having the supplements matching and doing the right thing and like, hey, you could just you look like you were spying on me, Ricky.
Speaker 2:I feel like you've been spying on myself and and the non-profit yeah all of our guys have gone through it and it's so funny because they don't want to admit.
Speaker 2:They don't admit it and it's finally like one of our guys will like bring up in the chat and that in our signal chat and be like, hey, um, I've been doing like three days a week of 15 minutes stair master and I kind of hate myself. And then everybody will be like, yo, I've been doing treadmill walks. While I do my videos, I, you know, I get on the concept row bike and I watch my uh, you know, I do my flash cards and then you get all the guys finally admitting to being like, oh, it's cool, it's okay. So then me being the data nerd, I come back and I go hey, man, here's studies like here's like andy galpin's podcast episode on it. Here's his. The neuroscientist who's really smart no, we're allison. Brager is one of our board members sleep neuroscientists. Yeah, you know about her, she's amazing. Here's allison's screenshot. Like three days a week, this level of intensity will do this for cognition and health. You know, four days a week at this level intensity will do this and it's not a lot, it is so small.
Speaker 1:Send that to me, ricky. I need that.
Speaker 2:I got you Finn Like white matter, density improvement, cognition, what the ceiling is. It is so little effort but we're so used to going for the power, clean max. You know muscle ups, the CrossFit competition stuff. The sled pulls with a rock on it, doesn't. It doesn't have to be all that at this stage of your life.
Speaker 1:Yeah, at this stage, dude, you're speaking and I freely admit I have failed this week. I have absolutely failed and it's those reminders that, like dude, you're chasing. You're obsessed with this dream and you want to launch it and you want it to be successful. So, of course, you are fucking staying up till two, three in the morning and everything tells you that the moment that you wake up, you got to go straight into it. Dude, just the greatest thing I did for myself today was start my day off and at least doing my prayer, drinking my coffee and not diet, not diving right back in, because you can start creating this loop. And anybody listening, like if you're going to go into medical school or chase an entrepreneurial endeavor, you're going to have those days where you got to stay up late. I'm not going to say you can't and that you shouldn't. It's your dream, it's your passion, you got to do it.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:What Ricky just said is so fucking true, and it's a personal check and I am so grateful that God sent you today to remind me. Appreciate that. If you got 15 minutes, don't just say, well, fuck, I can't get my, because that's instantly what I will do I'm behind, I'm behind the gun, I can't, I can't eat, I can't drink water, I can't even get my workout in. You got 15 minutes. You got 15 minutes so you can listen to a voice memo, read emails where you're doing the treadmill, where you're doing the bike, where you're doing a row machine, prioritize yourself, like you, or, if you have a wife or have a little one, figure out a way to make it happen. And you will have to do it when you take on this impossible dream of becoming a doctor.
Speaker 2:That's just the truth you're gonna have to, and it might not be five days a week, man, it might be three, it might be two, but it's so worth it. It's, it's going to make such impact. You know, one thing that's as um inspired me is you know? So I want to go into neurosurgery. The neurosurgeons that I had, yeah, hell yeah, dude, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2:A lot of the neurosurgeons that mentor me, the residents they work obscene hours, we all know this. They all, like have a really good workout schedule and it was like very eyeopening to me and I was like man, you know, that person just was on call. They're an intern, so they got to the office for like three, 30 in the morning, 4am. They got off at eight, um, or they just got off call and it's 6am and they're going for like a little two mile run, like if that dude can come off of that and hit a two mile run, all right, I mean, you know I need to shift my mindset a little bit. Okay, it's not a max, they're not, they're probably not running a perfect pace, man, but they got it in, they got that, they flushed it out. Um, steve Viola, master chief, steve, something really great when we were in the field hospital together. Every time we onboard someone, there's plenty of oxygen, there's no one shooting at you, uh. Yet we treat everything like it is.
Speaker 2:And you know that was a big lesson learned from my columbia professor, my organic chemistry professor, karen phillips. When I first met with her, she had the humility to say no, what'd you do before you came to columbia? Like you must have had some different job. You look a little older. And I was like you was like no, I was this military guy, I was a medic. And she's like do you ever deploy? And I was like, yeah, I was overseas a couple of times. And then she was like so you did it for eight years, so that that must've been like a lot of life and death situations. I was like yeah, yeah, she's like so you're always planning for life and death. It's just a worksheet, it's just a practice test. Why don't you sit on your couch and just work through a problem, look up the answer, see what you did wrong, keep it casual. Maybe take one practice exam like it's the real deal, and I take that example and you can apply that to all of our sectors.
Speaker 2:I think we really go out a lot of things like it's almost life and death, and I think that's where a lot of the lack of grace comes from. I think it's not. A lot of it is demanding excellence of ourselves. But what is the root cause of that demand of excellence? It was if I don't study today, my friend can die in the battlefield. If I don't work out today, I might not be able to carry Steve James, bobby, whoever, off the battlefield. If I don't stretch, then I might tear my ACL, get off the helo. I'm a liability combat. I'm a liability combat. I'm a liability. So we need to drop a little bit of that. When we get out, hold that edge, demand the excellence, but when life and death can be life and death, let it be, and when it's not, there's no reason to burn yourself on that. And that's a really hard thing to come to and that's taken a lot of years. So I don't, like I said, I agree with you.
Speaker 2:Sometimes you got to work till 3am. You're chasing your dream. You want to be an entrepreneur, you're. It's a. That's a competition. Business is a competition. It's the super bowl every day. Baby Um, you want to be a doctor. There's a. It's. It's pretty crappy at a lot of times, but when it's, when it doesn't have to be, don't let it be. And then no one's shooting at you and there's a lot of oxygen. You're not doing suffocation drills in the pool anymore. It's not Sears school, right. And what Sears tell you do your utmost. So some days 10 minutes is your utmost man, and then the next day maybe you do have the hour.
Speaker 1:Get after it. It's true, man, and I think what, who, who really needs to hear this. It's not just our guys out there, transitioning, going into endeavor, the people that are going to be following this ridiculous, impossible dream to become doctors, like you have to understand, this is not a sprint, it's a marathon, it's a. You're going to be in this endeavor for a while. It's going to be. You have to figure out how to have a life, and that's why I don't think a lot of people are showing and I've I've looked and dove into influencer world when it comes to, like, medical students, and there's a few people that show, but not a lot.
Speaker 1:It's, of all, data. Focus is all what you need to do for schools, like there's not enough people saying like you got to live a life. You have to understand that this is going to be your life, just like deployment was your life. Like you, you can just wake up magically. It was going to be over. You're going to learn how to embrace it and adapt to it. And, before we close out, I want to, I want you to give some advice to those that are listening, that are now like, okay, this is going to be my thing. I'm going to dive into this, like, what are some real structural advice for, like how to approach this impossible dream? What are some things that you can give somebody like? Like we just talked about the health aspect, the fitness aspect, but there's so much more that we can dive into and certainly give us, like your, your top 10, if you will.
Speaker 2:Yeah, sure, sure. So on your journey to become a doctor, no matter what stage you're at, I think the first thing is to understand that you're committing to lifelong learning. You're going to be a medical student at one phase, a resident at the next phase, and then a fellow possibly, and then attending. And once you're in attending, you're responsible and the data is always changing. The science is always updating. The science is always updating, so you always have to be reading and learning. So establish a habit of learning how to be up on the science and starting to read and challenge yourself that, even though you know. If for the medics out there something we learned, some things we learned at sockham, don't let of Other things you do need to let go of. Um my other, the other part, another piece of advice, especially for the SACIMs out there is we were great proceduralists, we were very good at performing procedures. We are terrible at being diagnosticians. So while you're going through medical school, really learn to open your aperture, because that's what the doctors are doing better than us. When someone comes in with a knee complaint, you know soccers will take a pride of like. Oh, you know, the doctor thought it was this, but it was obviously an ACL and it's like, yeah, it was obviously an ACL to you because that's all we know about. They know about 15 different diagnoses and how to work through it. So open your aperture.
Speaker 2:And the other thing is general advice on this journey is you need a support system, you need friends and it's a part of your life. Don't let it be the whole life. So don't ruin your spousal relationship, your relationship with your children. Figure out a way to get everybody involved in the journey. Nutrition is key. Sleep is key. One more hour of sleep, from five to six hours, is more important than one more hour of studying, from nine to 10 hours of studying. Cut the studying, have that routine, stick to your routine and maximize all the other aspects of your life. Have a day that you do whatever you love.
Speaker 2:Um, you know, I had a friend. They took exams autonomously from friday to monday. They could take in that window and he was married with two children. So monday to friday he was switched on. He had an agreement with his spouse to be switched on. He'd go out to the bar friday evening with the, with his homies, and then saturday, sunday, monday he was always with his wife and kids. So, like you. Just have you gotta do medicine our way. It might not look like your 23 year old classmates way um and lean on those kids because they're damn smart and they can help you out.
Speaker 1:So that's my advice. Hell yeah, man, dude ricky, if uh people want to apply to soft, to song, where can they go?
Speaker 2:they go to our website, uh, wwwsoftto songorg. That's where our donation is. Uh, if anybody ever wants to talk about sponsoring us or becoming partners with us, if you're a company out there, um, you can email me. It's my first name, last name, at softasomorg, so rickyditzel softasomorg. Um, would love to help out. You can hit us up on all the socials, dm us if you have questions. And, yeah, look forward to meeting new folks and hopefully talking to some more businesses that want to partner with our mission. We can support their mission.
Speaker 1:Heck yeah. And if you guys pause right now, go to episode description, you'll see all those links in that email list right there. Ricky, I can't thank you enough for being here, for helping build something that is absolutely needed and vital to helping our amazing medical professionals in the military, in the soft world, get out there and get after it and start dreaming big again, because there's no higher calling than being of service to others. And who's out there doing that? Doctors.
Speaker 1:So if you're out there thinking and pondering what you'll do when you get out, when you're an 18 Delta or medical professional in the soft world. Give this a shot, think about it. It's certainly going to be challenging, it's certainly going to be difficult, but you're no stranger to difficulty and selection processes. So this is built for you. It's for you If you have it within you, if it's your passion and it's your calling. If not, go find something else. But if you think it could be what would make you happy and the rest of your life and you certainly want to make a shitload of money and be that annoying guy with a nice bugatti because you're now a fucking facial reconstruction surgeon then, uh, please apply to soft to some today, because I want to live vicariously through you on on instagram our oldest scholar is 44.
Speaker 2:So don't tell me the age is a problem.
Speaker 1:Holy shit, there you go. It's not too late, everybody, you can do it. Not too late, you can do it, dirkie. Thanks again for coming on and to everybody listening. Thank you for tuning in. We'll see you all next time. Until then, take care, no-transcript. If you're still listening, the episode's over. Yeah, there's no more Tune in tomorrow or next week, thank you.
