Overcoming Physical & Emotional Challenges | Coleman Ruiz

Andrew Huberman 0:00 (uptempo music) Welcome to the Huberman Lab Podcast, where we discuss science and science-based tools for everyday life. I'm Andrew Huberman, and I'm a professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine. My guest today is Coleman Ruiz. Coleman Ruiz is a former Tier 1 Navy SEAL special operator. I think it's fair to assume that most of you have never heard of Coleman Ruiz before, and in fact, it was part of his former life job description to be largely covert, such that only his family and friends really knew what he did for a living. He is, however, now living as a civilian, and the reason I invited Coleman on this podcast was essentially to tell us his life story, which, of course, includes his time in the SEAL teams, but includes so much more that I'm certain is of value to everyone. Today, Coleman shares with you his remarkable journey from childhood through his teenage years into the military and some of the things that happened during his time in the military, which then informed his post-military civilian life and what it is to be a father, a husband, and somebody who has experienced tremendous loss at various stages of his life, as well as tremendous triumph. Indeed, if ever there was a life that could be framed within the context of the so-called hero's journey, it is the life of Coleman Ruiz. Coleman Ruiz's life is one that embodies focus and pursuit, family and friends and love, all the things that we think of in terms of having a rich life, but also one that includes many unforeseen tragedies, many unforeseen challenges, both internal and external. Coleman also shares with a rare and extraordinary degree of vulnerability the extent to which challenges in life, both external and internal, have helped shape him as a human being. What follows is a discussion that everyone, male, female, young, or old, and regardless of position in life, is sure to derive tremendous benefit from.

Andrew Huberman 1:55 Before we begin, I'd like to emphasize that this podcast is separate from my teaching and research roles at Stanford. It is, however, part of my desire and effort to bring zero-cost-to-consumer information about science and science-related tools to the general public. In keeping with that theme, I'd like to thank the sponsors of today's podcast. Our first sponsor is BetterHelp. BetterHelp offers professional therapy with a licensed therapist carried out entirely online. I've been doing therapy for over 30 years. Initially, I started therapy because, well, I was required to in order to stay in school, but eventually, I just decided to keep doing it because I found it to be very beneficial. There are essentially three things that great therapy provides. First of all, it provides a rapport with somebody that you can trust and talk about all issues with. Second of all, they can provide support in the form of emotional support or directed guidance. And third, expert therapy can provide useful insights that you wouldn't have otherwise had access to. In fact, I consider doing regular therapy as important as working out one's body in the gym or through cardiovascular exercise. And with BetterHelp, scheduling and doing therapy becomes extremely convenient. They can match you to a therapist that can provide those three things, excellent rapport, support, and insight, and they can do so on a schedule that matches yours. If you'd like to try BetterHelp, go to betterhelp.com/huberman to get 10% off your first month. Again, that's betterhelp.com/huberman. Today's episode is also brought to us by Maui Nui Venison. Maui Nui Venison is the most nutrient-dense and delicious red meat available. I've spoken before on this podcast and with several expert guests on this podcast about the fact that most of us should be seeking to get about one gram of quality protein per pound of body weight every day. Not only does that protein provide critical building blocks for things like muscle repair and synthesis, but also for overall metabolism and health. Eating enough quality protein each day is also a terrific way to stave off hunger. One of the key things, however, is to make sure that you're getting enough quality protein without ingesting excess calories. Maui Nui Venison has an extremely high-quality protein per calorie ratio such that getting one gram of protein per pound of body weight is both easy and doesn't cause you to ingest an excess of calories. Also, Maui Nui Venison is absolutely delicious. They have venison steaks, they have ground venison, and they have venison bone broth. I personally like all of those. In fact, I probably eat a Maui Nui venison burger pretty much every day, and occasionally I'll swap that for a Maui Nui steak. And if you're really on the go, they have Maui Nui venison jerky, which has 10 grams of protein per stick at just 55 calories. If you'd like to try Maui Nui venison, you can go to mauinuivenison.com/huberman to get 20% off your first order. Again, that's mauinuivenison.com/huberman. Today's episode is also brought to us by Eight Sleep. Eight Sleep makes smart mattress covers with cooling, heating, and sleep tracking capacity. Now, I've spoken many times before on this podcast about the critical need to get sleep, both enough sleep and enough quality sleep. When we do that, everything, our mental health, our physical health, performance in any sports or school, et cetera, all get better. And when we're not sleeping well or enough, all those things suffer. One of the key things to getting a great night's sleep is that your body temperature actually has to drop by about one to three degrees in order to fall and stay deeply asleep. And in order to wake up feeling refreshed, your body temperature actually has to increase by about one to three degrees. One of the best ways to ensure that happens is to control the temperature of your sleeping environment. And with Eight Sleep, it makes it very easy to do that. You program in the temperature that you want at the beginning, middle, and end of the night. You can even divide the temperature for two different people if you have two different people sleeping in the bed. And it tracks your sleep. It tells you how much slow wave sleep and rapid eye movement sleep you're getting. It really helps you dial in the correct parameters to get the best possible night's sleep for you. I've been sleeping on an Eight Sleep mattress cover for well over three years now, and it has completely transformed my sleep for the better. If you'd like to try Eight Sleep, you can go to eightsleep.com/huberman and save $150 off their Pod 3 cover. Eight Sleep currently ships in the USA, Canada, UK, select countries in the EU, and Australia. Again, that's eightsleep.com/huberman. And now for my conversation with Coleman

Andrew Huberman 6:06 Ruiz.Andrew Huberman: Coleman Ruiz, welcome.

Coleman Ruiz 6:08 Coleman Ruiz: Thank you. Very excited to see you. Andrew: It's great to have you here. I'm guessing most people are probably not familiar with Coleman Ruiz. So, let's start at the beginning. Where were you born? What was the context of your home life? And maybe let's get up to maybe elementary school, middle school, and, uh, whatever top contour or deep details you want to get into- Coleman: Yeah. Andrew: ... we're all ears. Coleman: Okay. I'll bring us up to seventh grade, 'cause I would say that was probably the first big inflection point in my life. I grew up in, I was born in New Orleans, in a suburb called East, New Orleans East we call it. And, uh, I have an older sister, two younger brothers. My dad was a welder. My mom was a dental assistant. And we had a couple of boxers in the... Dogs (laughs) . And we had a very modest, very modest upbringing. I won't over-dramatize it, but, you know, admittedly, you know, sometimes we got cheese from the lady across the street who didn't want her welfare cheese, and it was one of those. You know, I could tell my parents were fighting for every nickel. And, but it was great. I mean, my cousin grew up across the street from me. He's exactly my age. We had that... At least some of my memory, Andrew, of it was, it was very pleasant. I learned later that you forget a lot of things in your childhood that were unpleasant. But my initial memories when I started thinking about this kind of thing, and, you know, as you and I have discussed, getting professional help, and you start (laughs) to learn a little bit more about your childhood. But I remember it being very pleasant. You know, we've, you've told me about your background in skateboarding and stuff. You know, we skateboarded the neighborhood. BMX was a big thing when we were kids. It was very much a rat the streets upbringing. There was a park behind the neighborhood. We would cut through the fence and go, you know, this kind of thing. I played football and baseball, and very normal in that regard. Went to the neighborhood school, and then in sixth grade, I went to what was my high school, but it went f- it went fifth through twelfth, called Holy Cross High School in the lower Ninth Ward, which that spot is now vacated because the school... I went back after Hurricane Katrina. The whole school had to be moved, and I went there in seventh grade, and it was a hellacious start. I mean, it was detention after detention, you know, fistfight after fistfight, and damn near... Andrew: Were you the instigator of those fights? Coleman: Probably some. I definitely fell in with the wrong crowd initially in that sixth and seventh grade years, and, um, I wouldn't say it was so extreme that, like, it was complete mayhem, but I was definitely on, you know, problem situation number whatever when my parents were called in, and it was kind of the last straw type of thing. (laughs) Andrew: Mm-hmm. Coleman: And, um, I got cut from baseball. My grades were fine. I was always a pretty good student. It was just teenager shenanigans, and then I went out for wrestling. Andrew: Can, can I just, uh, pause you for a second? So on the, the violence part, um, a little bit of experience with this- Coleman: Yeah. Andrew: ... but, uh, violence can come from trying to protect others- Coleman: Yeah. Andrew: ... uh, instigating. Uh, it can come from the wildness, just trying to, you know, see what it feels like, experimentation- Coleman: Mm-hmm. Andrew: ... and any number of other things, all the way to pure sociopathy, which w- we know you- Coleman: Yeah. Andrew: ... you are not, um, and weren't. Do you recall feeling something inside that inspired this? Was it for attention? Did it feel good afterwards? Um, yeah, can you recall what, what it was about? Coleman: I think it was the wildness thing, Andrew, honestly. It wasn't... I mean, I believe... I don't have a malicious bone in my body. Like, we all have that in us, obviously. My profession later in the military, you know, I was able to activate that and I feel like I still can, and I was certainly able to in sports, which is why that seventh grade year was really pivotal. But even now, it's funny, it's even funny you ask about the wildness, because, uh, well, let me put it in movie terms. Like, one of my favorite movie scenes of all time is in the movie The Town when Ben Affleck walks in the room. Jeremy Renner is the, you know, his, his partner essentially, and he walks in the room, and he says, "We're going to hurt somebody. I can't tell you where and I can't tell you when." And he pauses, (laughs) and Jeremy Renner takes maybe a three-second pause, and he says, "Whose car are we taking?" He doesn't even ask. You know, he's just... They're just wild and excited about doing something wild. I don't promote, like, going hurt somebody, of course. Andrew: Sure. Were you the Affleck or the Renner in... Affleck, excuse me, or Renner in that? Coleman: I was, um... I, I, I feel like I was mostly the Renner. Andrew: Mm-hmm. Coleman: Put it this way. If, if you have some good idea this afternoon, like, "Let's go fucking try this," I'm good. I'm ready. And I think it's just exciting. You know, I, I, I hate rules. I hate being told what to do. It's one of the things that was so frustrating about the military. I th- the rules are in place for a reason. They're written in blood. I get all that. But we're so constrained sometimes. I think that was just all coming into fruition that seventh grade year, and I enjoyed going wild. Like, it was just fun. And frankly, we weren't... These fistfights and this trouble wasn't, like, going to get some kid. Th- those other kids wanted the wildness too, you know? Andrew: Mm-hmm. Coleman: And so... But the school didn't want that. And then I went out for wrestling that year, and I could put it all into the wrestling room, and it, it was awesome. Andrew: Before we talk about wrestling and why it was so meaningful as a channel for you, uh, a little bit of neurobiology or else I wouldn't be- Coleman: Great. Andrew: ... uh, Andrew Huberman. Uh, there's a really interesting phenomenon that one observes in both animals and humans...

Andrew Huberman 12:09 ... which is at somewhere around adolescence-

Coleman Ruiz 12:11 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 12:12 ... when the hormone surge begins. But even before that, there's a phenomenon called dispersal.

Coleman Ruiz 12:18 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 12:18 Um, it's very different than fighting per se or sexual activity per se. It's a, it's a literal dispersal from one's home environment, or in animals, a nest, in which animals, and humans, and we're animals after all, start foraging new environments in a, in a very, as you point out, chaotic way. It's not organized. It's a little nuts. And it, um ... And biologists, and neurobiologists in particular, have observed changes in neural circuitry that, that drive this. So some of it's hormonal, but a lot of it is the brain taking all this input that one has been exposed to, sun, earth, food, others, social interactions, and starting to essentially throw the different paints, the different colors of paint together and just trying things.

Coleman Ruiz 13:03 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 13:04 Um, some kids are more, uh, prone to this than others. Uh, uh, certainly has a hormonal component. Boys and girls tend to do this differently, but they both do it. Um, and psychologists and neurobiologists see this as a fundamental shift in our underlying circuitry, so-

Coleman Ruiz 13:19 Hmm.

Andrew Huberman 13:20 ... um, just a little bit of food for thought, uh, to put what you just described in context.

Andrew Huberman 13:24 With that said, tell us about wrestling.

Coleman Ruiz 13:27 I mean, Andrew, in many ways, like I said, that was the first inflection point. It was like immediate, I mean, immediate uptake. Within a week, I knew this was my thing. Maybe, maybe the first practice. Speaker 1<|agent|><|en|>

Andrew Huberman 13:41 What do you think it was?

Coleman Ruiz 13:42 So when I was younger, my aunt and uncle, when I was like seven years old, they started taking me to road races, and I'm sure, uh, just running races, one mile and 5K races when I was really small kid.

Andrew Huberman 13:54 For you to run.

Coleman Ruiz 13:55 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 13:55 Oh.

Coleman Ruiz 13:55 To run with them. They were into the road racing thing back in the day when it was brand new, you know, the '80s. Um, I'm 48, so I was born in '75, so I was seven, you know, eight years old at the time. And I was (laughs) into like, obviously can I win this race? I just, the pain of the effort was so comfortable. And then, this is kind of silly, but like I won the PT, PT competition at like the Boy Scouts thing in Audubon Park.

Andrew Huberman 14:24 PT is physical therapy.

Coleman Ruiz 14:25 Yeah. Physical training.

Andrew Huberman 14:25 Training.

Coleman Ruiz 14:26 Physical training. (laughs)

Andrew Huberman 14:27 Physio, yeah.

Coleman Ruiz 14:27 And so I won like the whatever when I was young, in Boy, Boy Scouts or something, and, and then it just snowballed. Then I was just like the physical activity still today is ... I mean, if someone said, "What are you really in love with?" It's, it's that. And so when I walked into the wrestling room, it was so extreme compared to anything else I'd ever done, football, baseball, whatever. I never really liked any of those sports. I played them all, um, but I didn't like them. And always ... My dad wrestled in high school and college, and, um, we were, we were, you know, always rough and tumble in that regard. And I even have a couple of buddies in the teams, you know, who obviously were college wrestlers. There's a lot of wrestlers in the teams. And people would always joke about how we're so handsy, eh, you know, we're, our hands are always on each other, and that was just a thing for us. Like, I loved the close contact. I loved the fight of it. What I really love about combat sports, 'cause I boxed in high school between wrestling seasons, um, was the respect.

Andrew Huberman 15:30 Tell me more about that.

Coleman Ruiz 15:32 You just don't have ... There are some, of course, like you can see guys hyping it up and doing their thing in UFC these days, and that's totally fine, but for the most part, if you have fighters of any type, like in a setting, when they don't have to do, you know, the stuff for TV and whatnot, they respect each other because ... And they respect the effort, and because you know what it takes and you know how hard it is to face another man in the middle of a mat with no equipment and nowhere to run and no timeouts and no one to tap in. That's extreme, you know?

Andrew Huberman 16:12 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 16:12 And it may not seem like high school wrestling is extreme, but as you just mentioned, something about, you know, development, when you're 14 and you're facing another, like that's the first time ... Is someone trying to take your life? No, they're not, but it feels that way. And then you go and you put in all these hours of training, and you don't eat during the week, and you run stadiums or you run levees and, you know, f- fireman's carries and, and all of it, uh, while you're not eating and making weight and you're in the sauna and i- it's just a very tough thing to do, combat sports, and I love the respect that it engenders between the people who do it.

Andrew Huberman 16:50 Mm-hmm. I think it was Sam Sheridan who wrote A Fighter's Heart.

Coleman Ruiz 16:54 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 16:54 Uh, an excellent book.

Coleman Ruiz 16:56 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 16:56 And for anyone, male or female, any age who's interested in the human spirit, uh, I recommend A Fighter's Heart because it's about-

Coleman Ruiz 17:05 Totally.

Andrew Huberman 17:05 ... the different fight sports, but it's really about, um, the path of self-discovery-

Coleman Ruiz 17:11 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 17:12 ... that occurs in various martial arts. And as you said, like especially boxing is very gentlemanly. You touch gloves.

Coleman Ruiz 17:18 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 17:18 You start, you know, then the, you know, the bell goes off, you go to your corner, like it's ... You know, sometimes people lose it, bite off people's ears and things like that-

Coleman Ruiz 17:25 It happens, yeah.

Andrew Huberman 17:25 ... but, but for the most part, the sport is very, um, structured.

Coleman Ruiz 17:29 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 17:30 Um, as you were doing this, uh, what was happening with school?

Coleman Ruiz 17:33 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 17:34 Um, did it help, uh, your academic studies? Did it keep them more or less the same? And how did your family and your peer group view what you were doing? Were you considered, uh, strange for liking wrestling so much? I mean, you're n- dieting-

Coleman Ruiz 17:48 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 17:48 ... right? You're a young male dieting for purpose of sport and performance. You're sitting in saunas, you're running in pla- uh, wrapped in plastic bags, all this like ... I mean, uh, a good friend of ours, uh, who was also in the SEAL teams, uh, said, once said to me, he said, "You know, wrestlers are different," and I think he meant different in quotes. (laughs)

Coleman Ruiz 18:04 Yeah. I think that's true. Um, I, you know, school, my grades immediately went up, Andrew. It was like-

Andrew Huberman 18:10 Up.

Coleman Ruiz 18:10 ... oh my gosh. The discipline of all of it, my grades were always better.... in wrestling season than out of wrestling season.

Andrew Huberman 18:18 Interesting.

Coleman Ruiz 18:18 Like when I was cut loose out of the structure, then it wasn't good. And, and, and, you know, between seventh and eighth grade and all that, I didn't have any crazy shenanigans going on. I wasn't gonna get kicked out of school or whatever. I was doing normal stuff for the age. But-

Andrew Huberman 18:31 So the fights stopped.

Coleman Ruiz 18:32 Totally. Totally. 'Cause I could put it into... I could put it into the wrestling space, you know. And I think... I, I grew up, obviously, in New Orleans, and I think... You know, down there, it's baseball, football, basketball. Wrestling is not... I mean, I was lucky to wrestle in college at all, because it wasn't like Iowa was looking to recruit me. You know, they have plenty of people to recruit and they don't need any Louisiana (laughs) wrestlers. Although Daniel Cormier grew up, like, north of the lake. He was four, four years younger. I was telling this to somebody. Um, we don't know each other. I'd love to meet him. Super impressive athlete. We heard that, "Hey, there's some kid up in the North Shore," um, I think is where he grew up, "whooping everybody's ass, and his name's Daniel Cormier." And then, you know, obviously, the rest is history. But the sport is not big in Louisiana, which is all to say that we were kind of a unicorn. We had... It was very odd at my high school specifically. We had one coach, his son either national runner-up... His name was Willie Gatson. Willie's, Willie passed away. I think his son ended up at Iowa State, and within the last five or six years was either a national champ or a runner-up. Willie, when I was in eighth grade, Andrew, Willie was at my high school. Like, I have no idea how Willie Gatson ended up in New Orleans. But we ended up with this cluster of wrestlers at that time with the right coaching, and a few kids were going to junior college and coming back and wrestling in college and coming back. And there were three or four guys, I remember specifically, in eighth grade, 'cause I started, at least in the junior high ranks, I started to take off my second year. These guys would abuse me in the wrestling room. They were seniors in high school. I was 112 pounds or 132 pounds my freshman year, and they would just... In my eighth grade year, and they would just abuse me.

Andrew Huberman 20:16 Define abuse.

Coleman Ruiz 20:17 In all the legal, normal wrestling ways. Like, there's the... Wrestling gets broken up obviously by weight. You got the heavyweights on one end of the room, the lightweights on the other end of the room, and the young kids stay with the young kids for the most part. And a few of these guys would drag me down to the varsity end, and I would wrestle with the middleweights, and they would beat the shit out of me. And eventually, you get to the point where you're like, "Fuck this. I have, I had enough." You know? And that's when sort of things started to turn. But I think that wrestlers are different. In my peer group, one or two of my really good friends wrestled, but most of them played other sports. And so... But in, in every sense of the word, life got better for me because of that sport. It changed my life.

Andrew Huberman 21:03 So you wrestled all through high school.

Coleman Ruiz 21:05 Oh yeah, yep.

Andrew Huberman 21:06 At, at that point were you discovering relationships, girls? Um, were you partying? Were you a drinker? Use drugs?

Coleman Ruiz 21:15 No drugs. I mean, it's New Orleans, right? It's like one of the things that was tough. I'm glad I got out of the city, frankly, because it was party time out- outside the season. Yeah, girls, girlfriends, normal stuff in that regard. Lots of drinking. Lots of ratting the streets, you know, in those days, in the '90s. Um, it was-

Andrew Huberman 21:34 But you kept it inside the lane lines-

Coleman Ruiz 21:36 Oh, totally.

Andrew Huberman 21:36 ... it sounds like. No drunk driving.

Coleman Ruiz 21:38 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 21:38 No arrests.

Coleman Ruiz 21:39 Well-

Andrew Huberman 21:39 No-

Coleman Ruiz 21:39 ... we did a little bit of that. But not- nothing crazy in that regard.

Andrew Huberman 21:42 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 21:43 I think I understood the consequences, and I really cared about my career. I really wanted to wrestle in college. My grades were excellent. My SAT scores not so much. But, um, I started winning really fast. And, you know, my last two years in high school, I was 89 and 0, and I almost won my sophomore year a- So I was runner-up in the state my sophomore year. I always joke with the, with the boys, uh... My, all my boys are way better athletes than I ever could think about being.

Andrew Huberman 22:10 Your sons?

Coleman Ruiz 22:11 Yeah, yeah.

Andrew Huberman 22:12 Right.

Coleman Ruiz 22:12 And, um... But in eighth grade, I made varsity, and it was like... Was it eighth grade? I don't... Yeah, and I lost, like, 75% (laughs) of the matches, you know. But you just grind it out, and it's how I got into the Naval Academy, which is a whole 'nother story. But...

Andrew Huberman 22:26 So let's talk about that. So you finish high school.

Coleman Ruiz 22:29 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 22:30 Uh, you head to the Naval Academy. Why the Naval Academy?

Coleman Ruiz 22:33 There's actually a crazy story behind this, which maybe we'll circle back to. But, um, the summer... Gosh, I, I had forgotten that this started in seventh grade too. The summer between my seventh and eighth grade year, my grandfather was too young to join the Navy and he wanted to go to the Naval Academy, um, during World War II. And he lied to the recruiter and he got into the Merchant Marines. His, I'm pretty sure, first cousin. My uncle and my cousins are, like, first cousins once removed. My uncle Jim Thoreau was at a family reunion in Mississippi, which we were at. And he didn't mention the Naval Academy. Family reunion ends, they all go home. And he starts sending me Naval Academy paraphernalia. I knew nothing about the military. And I just thought about it, you know. And he would send me stuff. You know, you didn't... Uh, we didn't have the internet, right? He'd send in these booklets.

Andrew Huberman 23:30 Mm-hmm. And you don't like authority.

Coleman Ruiz 23:32 No.

Andrew Huberman 23:32 So mi- Li- I have n- I've not been in the military, but I've done some work with y'all.

Coleman Ruiz 23:37 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 23:37 And, um, there's a l- there's a lot of, uh, hierarchy and authority.

Coleman Ruiz 23:41 Yeah. That's true. It, it... The truth, Andrew, is, like, it was just, it just seemed exciting. I wasn't really thinking about the implications as 18-year-olds, you know. It looked very exciting to me. And having gotten some professional help in the intervening years, what I really think was a big part of it was my parents got divorced my senior year in high school, and the family unit just blew up, right? And so it also represented an escape, you know. Get out and go get your life out of the New Orleans and just go. Just go do something.

Andrew Huberman 24:16 Were you a part of that, uh, that...... obviously you were part of the family that got divorced.

Coleman Ruiz 24:23 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 24:23 Was it chaotic? Was it, uh, controlled? You and I are the exact same age. We're both 48.

Coleman Ruiz 24:28 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 24:28 Born in '75. Um, back then it was a lot less common for, um, people being, they called them broken homes back then.

Coleman Ruiz 24:35 Yeah, that's right. (laughs)

Andrew Huberman 24:36 You know? Um, nowadays, I don't think they call it that. Everyone just cites the statistic that, you know, more than half of marriages end in, in divorce as if, uh, it, it, perhaps to normalize it. Um, but that's more than half. Um, do you recall feeling, um, distraught about that? Or was it just kind of the natural consequence of something you had observed a long time, like, "Oh, that kind of makes sense that they-"

Coleman Ruiz 24:56 No. It was a shock to me.

Andrew Huberman 24:57 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 24:58 It wasn't a shock to my older sister. Um... I just remember com- this was the thought at the time. I, this was, like, seared in my brain. "This has nothing to do with me." That wasn't, like, some sophisticated view. It was mostly, "Fuck this. I'm not dealing with this. I have my own life. They're going to have to do what they're gonna do," meaning my parents. "I'm getting the hell out of here."

Andrew Huberman 25:23 Not a bad mindset for a kid at that stage.

Coleman Ruiz 25:26 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 25:26 If it had been four years younger, that might not be the best mindset, but...

Coleman Ruiz 25:29 Right.

Andrew Huberman 25:29 As you're heading off to college, that's reasonably healthy mindset.

Coleman Ruiz 25:33 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 25:33 As opposed to getting enmeshed in the what happened and, and this and that.

Coleman Ruiz 25:37 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 25:37 Can I ask you, at, at that stage, so you're 17, 18 years old-

Coleman Ruiz 25:40 Yep.

Andrew Huberman 25:40 ... at that point. Um, were you journaling at that point?

Coleman Ruiz 25:43 No.

Andrew Huberman 25:44 No. No journaling.

Coleman Ruiz 25:45 No.

Andrew Huberman 25:45 No introspective work.

Coleman Ruiz 25:46 Zero.

Andrew Huberman 25:47 No school psychologist. N- no thinking about or talking about your feelings. It's wrestling, Naval Academy, social things, school, SATs, like, like, very standard. We're almost, like, talking, like, a superficial list of, like, what happens at the end of high school in 1992.

Coleman Ruiz 26:03 Andrew, it's a, the, the word superficial, and I carried this forward for years, which I'm sure we'll talk about (laughs) here in a second. Those binary focus areas, like, I was literally just going after them at full steam, stronger, faster, more intensity, with zero introspection, no excavation of the s- of 'cause of the psychology of anything. Just full steam ahead, like, "Let's go."

Andrew Huberman 26:31 No meditation, no breath work, no-

Coleman Ruiz 26:33 Zero.

Andrew Huberman 26:33 (laughs) Ah.

Coleman Ruiz 26:35 Which was not adaptive in the long run.

Andrew Huberman 26:38 Mm. We'll, we'll get to, uh, how that played out in the long run. But nonetheless, um, you got into the Naval Academy.

Coleman Ruiz 26:46 Didn't first.

Andrew Huberman 26:47 Okay.

Coleman Ruiz 26:47 So I applied. (laughs) I, I get, you know, my uncle's doing all the stuff. Anyway, I applied, and I didn't, I still have the letter. The, "Thanks, but no thanks. You know, you're not qualified."

Andrew Huberman 26:56 How'd that hit you?

Coleman Ruiz 26:58 At the time, it hit me kind of like everything I did, when that age when it didn't work out. Ad-admittedly, Andrew, it was, it was like, "There's got to be a way around this." Like, "Shit has to work out." But it, but it feels terrible, right? Like, it, you have a moment of, "What do we do?" And my kids have heard the story a million times. My wife was a blue chip swimming recruit for Navy. And so she was into the Naval Academy when she was at the beginning of her senior year of high school, right?

Andrew Huberman 27:30 What's a blue chip?

Coleman Ruiz 27:31 I, I mean, in my understanding, a blue chip is like you are at the very top of the list.

Andrew Huberman 27:35 Got it.

Coleman Ruiz 27:35 And the coaches put you straight into the admissions cycle saying, "Nobody else gets in until this person goes first."

Andrew Huberman 27:40 So they wanted her. They didn't want you.

Coleman Ruiz 27:42 I, not only was she a blue chip, and I was, and I got the no, um, I guess... Well, the wrestling coach called me a couple of weeks after my no, which is now in May. I'm about to graduate from high school. I'm not accepted anywhere.

Andrew Huberman 27:56 You only applied one place?

Coleman Ruiz 27:57 Actually, two, which you may bur- bust out laughing when I tell you what the other one is. Because no Internet, I got a mailer and a pamphlet from Stanford. The wrestling coach. I didn't know what Stanford was. I had no idea that the college was even prestigious. I didn't know they had a wrestling team. I filled out the application and wrote the letter thing, and I sent it into Stanford and, of course, never heard back from them. But I applied to two places, Stanford and the US Naval Academy.

Andrew Huberman 28:25 Well, for those that follow wrestling-

Coleman Ruiz 28:27 (laughs) And I didn't get into either.

Andrew Huberman 28:28 Right.

Coleman Ruiz 28:28 (laughs)

Andrew Huberman 28:28 Uh, that's a great story, and I'll just, uh, briefly mention that a few years ago, there almost wasn't a wrestling team at Stanford. They, uh, had plans to cut the wrestling team-

Coleman Ruiz 28:36 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 28:36 ... despite having a NCAA-

Coleman Ruiz 28:38 Champ.

Andrew Huberman 28:38 ... champion at Stanford. But, you know, the power of people gathering and, and, uh-

Coleman Ruiz 28:43 It's amazing.

Andrew Huberman 28:43 ... petitioning worked and, um, wrestling and a few other sports that were being cut from the curriculum, um, were spared.

Coleman Ruiz 28:51 It's amazing, yeah.

Andrew Huberman 28:52 Or rescued, as the case may be.

Coleman Ruiz 28:53 So happy to see that.

Andrew Huberman 28:54 Yeah.

Coleman Ruiz 28:54 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 28:54 So that, so it, Stanford does have a wrestling team. Uh-

Coleman Ruiz 28:57 So the coach, the coach, back to the, like, how I ended up getting in. I appreciated, my, my college coach called and he said that, "I'm recruiting. I have one more spot at the prep school," which is in Newport, Rhode Island. "I'm recruiting another kid from Pennsylvania. If he takes that spot, then I don't have anything left." And we were exploring going to prep school and stuff like that, oblique ways to get in, and he called me sometime in May, like, right around graduation and said, "Can you be in Newport in July?" That kid went to, I think he went to Lehigh. And I, I went to the prep school. So-

Andrew Huberman 29:30 In Newport, Rhode Island?

Coleman Ruiz 29:31 Yeah, in Newport for a year, and, um-

Andrew Huberman 29:33 I've been there. It's a nice place.

Coleman Ruiz 29:34 Yeah, it's great.

Andrew Huberman 29:34 Yeah.

Coleman Ruiz 29:35 And so you wrestle for a y- I mean, you do school. You know, you're, you're in, the West Point has a prep school, and Colorado Springs has a prep school. And so we joked that my wife was first person in our class accepted, and I was last. Which is highly possible, actually.

Coleman Ruiz 29:51 (laughs)

Andrew Huberman 29:51 I'd like to take a brief break and acknowledge our sponsor, AG1. By now, most of you have heard me tell my story about how I've been taking AG1 once or twice a day every day since 2012. And indeed, that's true. I started taking AG1, and I still take AG1 once or twice a day because it gives me vitamins and minerals that I might not be getting enough of from whole foods that I eat, as well as adaptogens and micronutrients. Those adaptogens and micronutrients are really critical because even though I strive to eat most of my foods from unprocessed or minimally processed whole foods, it's often hard to do so, especially when I'm traveling and especially when I'm busy. So by drinking a packet of AG1 in the morning and oftentimes also again in the afternoon or evening, I'm ensuring that I'm getting everything I need. I'm covering all of my foundational nutritional needs.And I, like so many other people that take AG1 regularly, just report feeling better. And that shouldn't be surprising because it supports gut health, and of course, gut health supports immune system health and brain health, and it's supporting a ton of different cellular and organ processes that all interact with one another. So while certain supplements are really directed towards one specific outcome, like sleeping better or being more alert, AG1 really is foundational nutritional support. It's really designed to support all of the systems of your brain and body that relate to mental health and physical health. If you'd like to try AG1, you can go to drinkag1.com/huberman to claim a special offer. They'll give you five free travel packs with your order, plus a year supply of vitamin D3 K2. Again, that's drinkag1.com/huberman.

Andrew Huberman 31:22 So, you're in Newport.

Coleman Ruiz 31:25 (laughs)

Andrew Huberman 31:25 Does that have a, a portal to-

Coleman Ruiz 31:27 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 31:27 ... the Naval Academy? Is that there-

Coleman Ruiz 31:28 Yeah, if you graduate prep school, you're, you're straight into the Naval Academy.

Andrew Huberman 31:31 Oh.

Coleman Ruiz 31:31 Like, they fully expect you to be there the next year.

Andrew Huberman 31:33 When junior year rolled around-

Coleman Ruiz 31:35 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 31:35 ... um, and senior year rolled around, of high school, didn't anyone pull you aside and say, "Hey, you might want to, like, apply to a few other places?" Uh, "You might want to consider what you do if this doesn't work out?" What did they assume you were gonna do? They just, head into the city of New Orleans and, um, bus tables?

Coleman Ruiz 31:54 Zero guidance, Andrew, really. Like, from my high school and, I think, the ecosystem I was in, like people just didn't really know how to do that, you know, how to apply to schools. I mean, my parents obviously helped when I applied to the Naval Academy, but when I (laughs) , when I look at the system that kids go through now to go, you know, their process to find the best college experience, I never had one conversation with a guidance counselor about what to do. I just didn't. I mean, I just got very lucky. A few people, my, my high school wrestling coach intervened, I think, at some point, and called the Naval Academy to speak to the coach to say, "You should give this kid a chance." But he didn't, they didn't know who he was, you know?

Andrew Huberman 32:37 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 32:38 I'm so lucky and so fortunate that I ended up where I ended up. It's, it's why I took it so seriously. Like, the focus with which I applied my time in high school, it, the, I took that to 10X degree when I got to Newport because I knew this was my chance.

Andrew Huberman 32:58 There's something magical to that. I can relate to that. So, uh, so you're in Newport.

Coleman Ruiz 33:02 Yep.

Andrew Huberman 33:03 And describe what a day was like. Is it all wrestling? You're taking general education classes like one does in the, in the first two years of university?

Coleman Ruiz 33:11 Yep. So the way, the way the prep school is set up for the Naval Academy is they're basically teaching you the first semester of the Naval Academy. So you take calculus, physics, chemistry, I think you take an English class, et cetera. And, um, you go through, like, a pretty hellacious first couple of weeks 'cause you're away from the flagpole-

Andrew Huberman 33:30 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 33:30 ... where no one can hear you scream. You know, you're up in Newport, you're not in Annapolis where everyone's watching. And you do a couple hellacious weeks for an 18-year-old who's never been in the military before. And you-

Andrew Huberman 33:39 So you're in the military-

Coleman Ruiz 33:40 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 33:40 ... technically, if you go to this school?

Coleman Ruiz 33:41 You're actually enlisted in the Navy.

Andrew Huberman 33:43 Okay. So they-

Coleman Ruiz 33:44 So, 'cause they have to have a place for you.

Andrew Huberman 33:44 So they own you, to some extent.

Coleman Ruiz 33:46 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 33:46 Yeah.

Coleman Ruiz 33:46 Yeah, they do.

Andrew Huberman 33:47 Okay.

Coleman Ruiz 33:48 And then you do...

Andrew Huberman 33:49 You're wearing uniforms-

Coleman Ruiz 33:50 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 33:50 ... you're jogging in the morning.

Coleman Ruiz 33:51 Yep.

Andrew Huberman 33:51 You're doing salutes and marching and-

Coleman Ruiz 33:54 Yep, the whole nine. Yep. And you have four more-

Andrew Huberman 33:54 They're bugling, they're doing taps in the evening.

Coleman Ruiz 33:56 Yep. All of it.

Andrew Huberman 33:57 Got it.

Coleman Ruiz 33:58 Yep. And you live, there's 300 people at the prep school. It's distributed basically amongst folks coming from the fleet, so guys who did four or five years in the military somewhere and they're coming into the Naval Academy from the fleet, and then athletes and then sort of a mixture of other folks who need a little extra school, right? And so, and then you do a full school year. You're competing. It's basically a red shirt year that's not a red shirt year. I competed up and down the East Coast against, you know, all the other prep schools and you finish that year in May, and then, you know, you're done with the prep s- The prep year is fine. It's a little bit of a, a shock when you're 18, but it's fine.

Andrew Huberman 34:34 Always been curious about these military schools and the people that go to them and what happens to people there. Uh, did you have any sense of patriotism prior to arriving at this prep school, and did that sense of patriotism, you know, I'm talking, like, love of country, uh, u-understanding the, the history of our country and its position in the, in the international landscape, are you thinking about that stuff? Are they feeding you that? Or is it really, like, wrestling, get through the march, shower up, go to the next thing? Is it, is it very, like, plug and chug?

Coleman Ruiz 35:04 No, no. The, the feeding of... And I really appreciated this. The feeding of those concepts starts when you get there. But I was deer in the headlights, Andrew. Like, I didn't think about my life in this way at all when I was headed there. I mean, what, what you get very early, because the school s- very quickly starts to bring really high-level accomplished people, colonels, admirals, whatever, generals, to expose you to those people. I do remember sitting there the, within weeks, like, "This is way bigger than I thought it was," in terms of how serious this situation is (laughs) , you know, um, and how serious this ecosystem of people take this, because I didn't have... My dad wasn't an admiral, he was a welder in New Orleans, you know? I didn't understand the bigness of it.

Andrew Huberman 35:58 One of the reasons I ask this is that various times throughout my life I've had this experience of, like, seeing people close to me doing incredible work.

Coleman Ruiz 36:05 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 36:05 You know, like when I was a postdoc at Stanford I had Nobel Prize, s- was given that o- one week to the guy n- next door to me.

Coleman Ruiz 36:11 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 36:12 So you see him in the morning and, like, you're hearing it on the radio and, uh, obviously I didn't have that kind of, um, stature or talent in science, I think I'm a good scientist but, um, good enough to, you know, get tenure at Stanford but then there, there are levels within the game.

Coleman Ruiz 36:25 Yeah, yeah.

Andrew Huberman 36:25 But there is something very special to the experience of having people close to you physically and in the same-

Coleman Ruiz 36:31 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 36:31 ... ecosystem as you described it achieving amazing things, and I also saw this in skateboarding. I mean, there were a lot of-... uh, let's just say, uh, failures, uh, to, uh, integrate with normal life. But there are also some guys that I grew up with who started companies and set-

Coleman Ruiz 36:47 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 36:47 ... world records and, you know, had their pro models. And then if you zoom out from that and you go, "Wait, I'm in this community."

Coleman Ruiz 36:53 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 36:53 It changes one's self-view about what's possible.

Coleman Ruiz 36:56 Totally.

Andrew Huberman 36:56 So, I think that's what you're describing. And I think it's such an important thing for people to experience at some point, even if the goal isn't to be at kind of world scale, you know, for people to realize that the town they grew up in, the family they grew up in, that context can expand.

Coleman Ruiz 37:11 Yes.

Andrew Huberman 37:11 And so, do you recall being at this prep school and kind of third-personing yourself and thinking like, "Well, I'm Coleman Ruiz. I'm from New Orleans. I went from this to this to this," the way you've been describing it. "And I'm here." And th- they were like, "I'm around some incredibly impressive people, and I'm here." Like, once you make that recognition that you're there, the- the- a whole bunch of things can open up.

Coleman Ruiz 37:33 No. I actually came at it from the opposite way, and this has been a hard thing for me my whole life, and I have to watch out for this perspective, is I felt like every day I had to wake up and earn my place there. I was never good enough for myself ever. So next day up is a restart to prove myself again on whatever standard I'm picking that day (laughs) , right? Looking back on it, I realize it was somewhat arbitrary because it was just day by day. I didn't think, "I'm Coleman Ruiz. I- I made it here. Look, I'm part of this eco-" I- I was afraid, like when Mike Tyson talks about being afraid every time. I was afraid every day. And I fought for, like, a position in this place every day. Now, that was adaptive in some regard, right?

Andrew Huberman 38:27 Mm-hmm, very.

Coleman Ruiz 38:28 Because to me it was, "Let's go." Like, today's another new day, and it's 100% all in, full go. I hope everybody's ready.

Andrew Huberman 38:39 Did you ever recall falling asleep at night and thinking like, "Well, like-"

Coleman Ruiz 38:43 "I had a good day."

Andrew Huberman 38:44 "... I had a good day."

Coleman Ruiz 38:45 Nope.

Andrew Huberman 38:45 Or, or, "I'm scared," you know, "They're gonna discover I can't keep up-"

Coleman Ruiz 38:50 Totally.

Andrew Huberman 38:50 ... or, "I can't keep up."

Coleman Ruiz 38:51 All the time.

Andrew Huberman 38:52 So a lot of fear. I mean-

Coleman Ruiz 38:53 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 38:54 Yeah, a lot of fear.

Coleman Ruiz 38:54 All the time. And, and some of it I do bel- I, I, I genuinely know and believe now, Andrew, that it was well-intentioned. Like, I wanted to do a good job for the group, whatever group I was in, my platoon, my squad in the case of the prep school. And, you know, that first experience, I, (laughs) I mean, w- I, I was talking about this with, with my wife the other day, just 'cause stories come up. You know, we had a 25th reunion at the Naval Academy and this kind of thing. And, um, I was a really good runner for my group in high school, like the people I was around. I ran cross country when I was younger and, anyway, I did, I suppose I'm going the other dir- I, I sort of did have some level of confidence in my ability. Then I got there, and like all these college cross country runners are, like my son is now, just crushing me. And I think, uh, sadly, because it was just sort of in me, that fed my fear. Like, "Shit, I thought I was better than this. Clearly I suck. I have to get to their level." So, um, I did have a very well-intentioned excitement around, "Just do a good job with the people you're around." There's something fun to that and wild, you know, as we spoke about. Um, but I was operating out of fear for decades.

Andrew Huberman 40:08 But there was a "I need to get to their level" statement in there. It wasn't, "I can't keep up. I better find a different path."

Coleman Ruiz 40:15 No, no, no. No. I knew I could, I knew I could get to their level with enough work, you know?

Andrew Huberman 40:22 Was that something that your, your father or your mother or both had instilled in you that, that-

Coleman Ruiz 40:26 Oh, for sure.

Andrew Huberman 40:27 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 40:28 Yeah. And my high school wrestling coach was, um, let's call it maybe from the old school.

Andrew Huberman 40:34 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 40:35 If you worked hard enough, you could, you could, you could get there, you know?

Andrew Huberman 40:38 So this is the essence of growth mindset long before-

Coleman Ruiz 40:40 100%.

Andrew Huberman 40:40 ... Carol Dweck coined the ph- the phrase-

Coleman Ruiz 40:42 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 40:42 ... growth mindset.

Coleman Ruiz 40:43 Yeah. When I first read that book-

Andrew Huberman 40:43 It's there, "I'm not there yet."

Coleman Ruiz 40:44 When I first read her book, I'm like, "Wouldn't people teach us this shit when we were kids?"

Andrew Huberman 40:50 Yeah.

Coleman Ruiz 40:50 You know?

Andrew Huberman 40:50 Well, some of us got it, some of us didn't. And it can be very context dependent, right? I mean, I think that's one of the more important and often overlooked aspects of Carol's work and Ali Crum's work is that we can develop growth mindset in one domain of life, but then another domain of life we get, you know, kicked in the teeth once and we're like, "I can't do that. There's a carve-out where I can't function." Some people do that, some people don't.

Coleman Ruiz 41:11 Yeah, that's interesting.

Andrew Huberman 41:12 And, um, and we don't u- understand enough about it, um, to understand, you know, whether or not it's a global circuit, you know? And it's, uh, there's a lot of context. But, okay, so you're, you're hanging in there at least. You're surrounded by some very impressive people. There's a lot of structure.

Coleman Ruiz 41:27 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 41:27 So, so we're a long way from the pre-wrestling days when it was-

Coleman Ruiz 41:31 Oh, yeah.

Andrew Huberman 41:31 Yeah. Th- this is the opposite of chaos.

Coleman Ruiz 41:34 Totally.

Andrew Huberman 41:35 This is structure.

Coleman Ruiz 41:36 Yeah. You're told what to do every five minutes more or less.

Andrew Huberman 41:38 Mm-hmm. And this is, um, scary feelings. Fear is a scary feeling.

Coleman Ruiz 41:43 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 41:43 Uh, but you're channeling it... And you said the unit of the day became important. It's like, "What can I do today?"

Coleman Ruiz 41:49 Yes.

Andrew Huberman 41:50 You're not thinking about the week.

Coleman Ruiz 41:51 No.

Andrew Huberman 41:51 You're not thinking about the season. You're not thinking about becoming some war hero or something down the line. You're just 24 hours and-

Coleman Ruiz 41:59 Do the next day.

Andrew Huberman 42:00 Yeah. How was your self-care at that point, or is that built into the system?

Coleman Ruiz 42:03 It's not built into the system, and it was zero. I mean, it really was, Andrew. Like, it was the old school... We were not doing anything sophisticated back then.

Andrew Huberman 42:15 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 42:16 I mean, there's no... We stretched.

Andrew Huberman 42:19 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 42:20 And, uh, in the grand scheme of things, this is gonna sound weird because there still is a lot of, you know, primal nature to combat sports, but in the grand scheme of things, we were probably on the upper end of sophisticated. Like, wrestlers jump rope, they stretch, they do aerobics, you know. Um-... been in a sauna since 1993. You know, it's like, not purposeful, not for, to cut weight in a garbage bag, but there is some level of, some level of balancing out your training, you know? Wrestlers like to swim in the, like, during the season, because you're getting out of that hot room. Like, you end up (laughs) accidentally-

Andrew Huberman 42:59 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 42:59 ... doing some of these things, but there was no self-care.

Andrew Huberman 43:02 So, you eventually go to the Naval Academy.

Coleman Ruiz 43:05 Mm-hmm, '94.

Andrew Huberman 43:06 The actual Naval Academy. And that's where you met your wife?

Coleman Ruiz 43:09 Yep, nine, in '96, my sophomore year.

Andrew Huberman 43:12 Okay. So when you get there, what, what's different than the prep school?

Coleman Ruiz 43:15 First of all, it's big in the macro, not just geographically big, or footprint, square footage-wise, it's big. The concept is big, you know? (laughs) Like, the superintendent of the school was a three-star admiral. You hear about his career, you know, you're 19 years old, you meet... So, there's two incredibly important people in my life at, in those early years at the Naval Academy. A guy named Doug Zembiec, who's dead now, who most people of my service time will know who he is. Um, when I was on my recruiting trip to the Naval Academy, and I was in high school, this is complete accident. Doug was a sophomore. We call them youngsters at the Naval Academy. He was a sophomore, and we're the same weight class. So Coach matched us up because it was my recruiting visit. And my first, this is back to being wild, literally my first night on the grounds of the Naval Academy, I'm sleeping on Doug Zembiec's floor of his, of his room, with his other two roommates. And sometime around 3:00 or 4:00 AM, I get woken up. It's like a bomb goes off. There's a bomb, didn't go off, but there's 12 other gorillas in the room, all wrestlers, maybe one or two other guys. And Doug is hustling... I don't know any of these people, Andrew. (laughs) Like, I just met Doug the previous evening. We just flew into town. He wakes me up. He's hustling me to get my shoes on. A- again, I'm just this high school kid. And then within two to three minutes, all 15 of these gorillas bolt out of the room, and Doug grabs me and I'm just tr- following them, right? So we race out of Bancroft Hall, it's maybe 4:00 in the morning, 3:30, 4:00 in the morning. We race out of Bancroft Hall, the barracks, we run across the parking lot into Lejeune Hall. In Lejeune Hall is the swimming facility and the wrestling room. That's it. That's the only thing that's in there, right? The doors, we run up to Lejeune Hall, the doors of Lejeune Hall are "locked" with a chain on the outside, and one of our... Uh, Doug pulls on the chain so that the door is open enough at the top that the 142-pounder can climb up and, like, get inside that little gap in the doors and run over and open one of the doors that isn't chained.

Andrew Huberman 45:43 This is what you'll later do professionally.

Coleman Ruiz 45:45 I still have... Exactly. And what I, frankly, did as a kid, like back in the day. And so I'm terrified, 'cause I don't know what's coming, you know? And so-

Andrew Huberman 45:53 You, you don't bother to ask, "What are we doing?"

Coleman Ruiz 45:55 There's no time. There's just no time. Like, these guys are, to me, they're full-blown war heroes. They're not, they're college kids, but I'm 17, they're 21? All these wrestlers, I'm hoping I'm gonna come here and be their teammate, you know? We run into Lejeune Hall, go to the second story. We climb up the utility ladder where public works goes to get in the ceiling above the white foamy ceiling tile things. So we're now on the catwalk where the HVAC guys would be working. And I'm starting to get a sense of what's coming. We go a couple feet down the catwalk, everyone stops. Someone reaches over the catwalk and pulls one chalky ceiling tile out. So now you can look over the edge of the catwalk and see right through the ceiling into the diving well. Remember, the diving well has a 10-meter platform, and then we're another, I don't wanna over-exaggerate this, we have to be another 20 feet into the ceiling.

Andrew Huberman 47:00 So you're above the diving board, what most people call the div-

Coleman Ruiz 47:03 Oh, we're way above the diving board.

Andrew Huberman 47:04 Okay.

Coleman Ruiz 47:04 We're five feet above the ceiling, which is 20 feet above the 10-meter.

Andrew Huberman 47:08 Got it.

Coleman Ruiz 47:08 Right? (laughs) And so, um, and now I've realized what's happening, and two or three wrestlers, they, they sort, you climb over the catwalk, get, you know, backwards, get your hands all the way down, and then very lower yourself in a reverse pull-up so you don't kick the ceiling tile. And three or four guys go, and you can hear them hit the water after what is a terrifyingly long time when you're, you know, my age and scared.

Andrew Huberman 47:36 And this is in the dark?

Coleman Ruiz 47:37 Oh, yeah. No one's supposed to be in there. Um, and then one of the guys looks over. When you're a recruit, you're called a drag. And they're like, "Drag, you're up." And I'm lowering myself, Andrew, and I kick the adjacent ceiling tile, and it hits the dive tank and it turns into pancake batter and goes to the bottom of the pool.

Andrew Huberman 47:59 Oh, my.

Coleman Ruiz 48:00 And one of my teammates is like, "You motherfucker." One of my future teammates, you know? He's going nuts. I drop. I live. And this is back to Doug. I come up. Doug clearly goes behind me, but I don't hear him. And one or two guys are going nuts. "You high school piece of shit." Like, "You're gonna go down in the 15 feet and pick it all up." And Doug comes up and he just blasts everybody. "He's our responsibility. This is not his fault. We brought him here." Like, just totally backs me up. And then the rest of the visit happens. I end up there. Doug's now a senior, I'm a freshman.

Andrew Huberman 48:45 And...

Coleman Ruiz 48:47 ...he's just a legend. He was an All-American, and to this day, Andrew, you need to hear this loud and clear. Like, for all the people you and I both know and the people I've been around, no other human in my life have I met with his physical and mental toughness. Not even close. The guy was born in the wrong century, is the way I describe him. And he was, like, my mentor and he was my guy, you know? And, uh, he was killed in '07.

Andrew Huberman 49:20 Mm-hmm. Marine?

Coleman Ruiz 49:21 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 49:22 Yeah. We'll-

Coleman Ruiz 49:22 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 49:22 ...we'll talk about Doug. Uh, you've written about him.

Coleman Ruiz 49:24 Yeah. He's-

Andrew Huberman 49:25 And, uh-

Coleman Ruiz 49:25 ...unbelievable.

Andrew Huberman 49:25 ...so I feel like I know him a little bit-

Coleman Ruiz 49:27 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 49:27 ...thanks to you. We'll get around to that, uh, for sure. I think people are getting a sense of where we're headed-

Coleman Ruiz 49:32 So that's the-

Andrew Huberman 49:33 Uh-

Coleman Ruiz 49:33 That, to answer your question about, like, that-

Andrew Huberman 49:36 Yeah.

Coleman Ruiz 49:36 ...the bigness of the Naval Academy, that's how it started for me. Like, everything was just on steroids. You know?

Andrew Huberman 49:41 Uh-huh.

Coleman Ruiz 49:41 All these kind of people.

Andrew Huberman 49:43 Mm-hmm. I get the impression, at least up until now, that you're kinda just- you just go with what's right in front of you.

Coleman Ruiz 49:51 100%.

Andrew Huberman 49:51 Like, there- there isn't a lot of pause and reflect. Although, your rudder's-

Coleman Ruiz 49:57 Certainly not at this stage.

Andrew Huberman 49:57 ...your rudder is not haphazard. It's not random.

Coleman Ruiz 50:02 No.

Andrew Huberman 50:02 Well, yeah, I can say right now you and I are as similar as I- you know, we may be in certain re- respects. Like, th- we're very different in this way. Like, there isn't a- a- there isn't a- like, a foraging. You know, in biology, we call them random walks.

Coleman Ruiz 50:15 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 50:15 You know, a lot of- a lot of organization that comes out of biology is through random walks, like animal or human. Like, uh, finds a node and moves, and-

Coleman Ruiz 50:22 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 50:22 ...and life is like this. Steve Jobs talked about not being able to connect the dots-

Coleman Ruiz 50:25 Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 50:26 ...except in retrospect, and I-

Coleman Ruiz 50:27 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 50:27 ...and I subscribe to that. And his life was a bit of a random walk, but that we're guided by some central beam of- of uniqueness. Uh, Robert Greene was- when he was on the podcast-

Coleman Ruiz 50:36 Mm-hmm. Oh, he's great.

Andrew Huberman 50:36 ...talks about that. Y- your beam is- is, um, more narrow, it seems.

Coleman Ruiz 50:41 Very narrow.

Andrew Huberman 50:41 And the propeller behind that beam is, uh, high RPM.

Coleman Ruiz 50:46 Yes.

Andrew Huberman 50:46 That's very clear. And is it- what I'm not hearing here is, like, um, "Yeah, you know, at one point I paused and wondered whether or not I wanted to, you know, be here wrestling in the Naval Academy," or- or even l- like, what I might do when I get out. "Am I gonna work for an investment firm? What am I gonna do?" Your re- your horizon seems to be about 24 hours at that point.

Coleman Ruiz 51:08 Yeah. I hope not anymore, but at that point-

Andrew Huberman 51:10 No, at that point. At that point.

Coleman Ruiz 51:11 ...oh, absolutely. I mean, and-

Andrew Huberman 51:11 I mean, I'm no psychologist, but-

Coleman Ruiz 51:13 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 51:13 ...but, um, but it just seems like y- you're, uh, it's not like you're playing checkers, but you're- you're optimizing for a fairly, um, short horizon.

Coleman Ruiz 51:25 There's no question that's right. And the other part that was probably the most important to me, Andrew, was the- the person or the group.

Andrew Huberman 51:33 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 51:34 Because... This is gonna sound very arrogant, but when I got to... I'm going to this prep school. I'm going to the Naval Academy. I think on day one I'm gonna literally meet the cream of the crop in the country, and that was not the case, and it was not the case at the Naval Academy, and frankly it wasn't the case in the teams either. Like, I'm not saying I'm better than anybody, but I thought every single person when I got to the Naval Academy was gonna be entirely focused on whatever our mission was and I didn't even (laughs) know what my mission was there, right? I just knew I was gonna be told what right looks like. And Doug, not only did I meet him in high school and have the- the luck of having him as a teammate and a mentor, for me, he is what right looked like. So a focused beam and a propeller running at high P- RPM with the right, you know, quote-unquote swim buddy, so to speak, was literally all I cared about. That was it. Everything else was white noise.

Andrew Huberman 52:29 Were there other interests at the time? I mean, presumably you listened to music every once in a while, but-

Coleman Ruiz 52:34 I mean, I would... Whatever.

Narrator 52:35 Nothing.

Andrew Huberman 52:35 But didn't fall in love with it, didn't feel the need to pursue anything else, learn an instrument, do anything else. It was... It was a-

Coleman Ruiz 52:42 That was it.

Andrew Huberman 52:43 It was that- that narrow beam.

Andrew Huberman 52:45 So, you met your wife in '96?

Coleman Ruiz 52:48 Mm-hmm. Sophomore year at the Naval Academy. Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 52:50 Mm-hmm. Uh, and was she as driven? Is she as driven? I mean, she's obviously a very talented swimmer, and presumably works hard as well. Um, it's kind of interesting. I didn't, um, realize until a few years ago that the both of you are, you know, military.

Coleman Ruiz 53:07 Yeah. She... Definitely just different. Different driven, way smarter, way more... You know, it's obviously not one-to-one for men and women, but way more successful by gradient standards. She's in the Navy Hall of Fame. She was Patriot League Swimming Champ. She was on Junior National Triathlon Team when she was 20, I think. Um, really talented in every regard. Um, ninth in our class, I think. First female graduate, number one female graduate our class.

Andrew Huberman 53:41 Tell me more about that. How's that- how's that work?

Coleman Ruiz 53:43 You have a... I don't even know exactly (laughs) how the grading... Well, first of all her grades are- her l- academic success is just remarkable.

Andrew Huberman 53:50 Uh-huh.

Coleman Ruiz 53:51 And then you get a military grade and you get a physical grade, not for your athletics I don't think, but it's like your PRT scores, which is your Physical Readiness Test, all this military stuff you do. You get this other cluster of a grade that goes along with your academic grades, and she was number nine in the class and the first female graduate based on that cluster of grading. And, I mean, she's an amazing person.

Andrew Huberman 54:17 Was her success in academics and swimming, was that part of what drew you to her? Uh, uh, no?

Coleman Ruiz 54:23 No. No, I- she was just nice and, you know... I- I didn't really care about the achievement. It doesn't... (laughs) It certainly sounds like I care about (laughs) achievement 'cause of the narrow focus-

Andrew Huberman 54:33 Yeah.

Coleman Ruiz 54:33 ...but it- it wasn't really that. You know, she was just really normal-

Andrew Huberman 54:38 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 54:38 ...in a group of a lot of abnormal people, frankly. Like, there's some kooks at these schools, you know? Um, and I'm probably in that category. I don't know, but everybody's just really different there.... you have this athlete group. You ha- I mean, you know, Andrew. I mean, you, you went to Stanford. I mean, some of the... You know, the group of Naval Academy and West Point, like, these schools who produce, like, the Rhodes Scholar level person, like that cluster of group, like at Navy. I remember s- they were super impressive. I mean, and then there's the rest of us, like, doing our best, getting pretty good grades and stuff. But there is very different groups inside, you know, the school.

Andrew Huberman 55:17 Yeah. Yeah, I look to some of my colleagues, like a former guest on this podcast, Ali Krum.

Coleman Ruiz 55:20 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 55:21 You know, she's incredible scientist, was a Division I gymnast, and, uh, is a licensed clinical psychologist.

Coleman Ruiz 55:29 Yep (laughs) .

Andrew Huberman 55:30 Also maintains a, a, a healthy relationship with-

Coleman Ruiz 55:32 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 55:33 ... with children in the home.

Coleman Ruiz 55:34 They're, amazing.

Andrew Huberman 55:34 Like, I just go, "Who are these people?"

Coleman Ruiz 55:36 (laughs)

Andrew Huberman 55:36 You know, it's... I mean, the... You know, every once in a while we talk about the, the person with the quote-unquote "extra gear." You know, like some people just seem to have that extra gear and I don't want to take anything away from Ali or anyone else's, um, incredible work ethic that goes with what people perceive as an extra gear. Who knows if they have an extra gear or not? Uh, I always just want to know what their parents did. (laughs)

Coleman Ruiz 55:55 Right. Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 55:56 And it turns out Ali's parents, I hope I have this right, uh, but recollection of this is that, um, her mother ran a theater group and her father was a martial arts teacher.

Coleman Ruiz 56:06 Okay.

Andrew Huberman 56:07 So, you know, there's nothing that speaks to academics per se.

Coleman Ruiz 56:10 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 56:11 And, and I find that really important to me and to highlight because I think people hearing this conversation and hear about people like Ali and other examples like that, they think, "Oh, yeah, you gotta come from an academic family to end up at a, at a top tier institution or, or to win a Nobel Prize." And in fact, there, there are so many exceptions to that. Or you have to, um, be a natural athlete-

Coleman Ruiz 56:32 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 56:33 ... um, or be born with some, some genetic gift, or, or, or some extra gear as it were, in order to succeed. But I think so much of success is the thing that you seem to operationalize really quickly, which is, um, to really focus on that 24-hour horizon, and where one has seen failure to just keep going. I mean, a big part of it is just to keep going, but also to make sure that you're continuing to go, um, in a direction that is adaptive and functional. Because imagine had you not found wrestling and you had gotten into some, you know, some group where the, the, the metrics of success were around, you know, dealing weed or doing something, which back then was highly illegal, now is very varying levels of legality. But you know, where the, where the points came back for effort in domains of life that could take you down into the gutter. And, and you see this, so I'm, I'm convinced that the work ethic is, is the fundamental piece, but there has to be that rudder.

Coleman Ruiz 57:31 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 57:31 And the rudder has to be pointed in the right direction. So along those lines, you, you meet Bridget.

Coleman Ruiz 57:35 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 57:36 And was it instantaneous?

Coleman Ruiz 57:38 No. We kinda had a friendship first, I felt like, at least. We've discussed this. I mean, I instantaneously enjoyed her company. So I met Bridget in February of sophomore year. I was on... The campus of the Naval Academy is called the Yard. I was on the Yard all winter because the wrestling season is in the shittiest time ever, right? It crosses over the holidays. You have to make weight during Thanksgiving. You have to make weight (laughs) during Christmas. We were on campus on the Yard, and it was easily waist-deep snow. And we were doing two-a-day practices. Everybody else is home on vacation. That winter, I considered leaving, and thank goodness for no cell phones and stuff because I didn't know how to leave. (laughs) You know? It was like-

Andrew Huberman 58:22 You considered leaving, like, leaving the Naval Acada-

Coleman Ruiz 58:23 Leaving the Navy. Like, I was just... But it didn't have anything to do with the Naval Academy really. It had everything to do with that moment. I was miserable. Like, I was making... I wrestled 190 my freshman year, and Doug graduated. He was the 177-pounder. So sophomore year, I dropped into his spot. I went down to 177. Fighting weight for me is, like, 193. But, you know, back then, Andrew, I'm lifting a lot. I was 210 to 215 in the off season and I cut to 177 sophomore year. And I was just generally miserable. And, um, if it was easy to leave, I probably would've. And then I met Bridget in February and I was like, "Fuck it. I'll stay. She's better than this place anyway." (laughs)

Andrew Huberman 59:09 I, having followed my high school girlfriend off to college and not gone to college when I got there, I just lived in the parking lot outside her dorm room. I, I can relate. You know, there's a, uh... I probably wouldn't be sitting here today-

Coleman Ruiz 59:20 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 59:20 ... were it not for, for Eleni.

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Andrew Huberman 1:00:52 at what point did you decide you wanted to aim for the SEAL teams?

Coleman Ruiz 1:00:57 It's a great question. I mean, things, uh, you know, as compared to, I had a gunnery sergeant in the Marine Corps at prep school who I thought... These are back to the first people you meet in this environment, Gunny Flynn. And he was great. Like, he was super hard on us, but I obviously kind of loved that. And I thought I was going to go into the Marine Corps, and Doug wanted to go into the Marine Corps. I'm a freshman at the Naval Academy, he's my wrestling partner. Doug could literally tell me to jump off of a building, and as long as he came with me, I'd do it, no problem, and enjoy it all the way down. Doug was going into the Marine Corps. I thought I was going to go into the Marine Corps. And I did a summer training in Quantico between freshman and sophomore year. And it was okay. It was good, but I didn't love it. And I met a couple other guys who were going to compete for spots in the SEAL teams who were years ahead of me. But to answer your question, junior year, you get, you can sign up and say, "I want to start competing for a billet." We had 16 spots in my class. I think there's 32 spots these days. You know, the force has grown since 9/11 obviously, and, um, and I, I want to say maybe 150 or so people, they put you through this weekend, overnight, two-day hell, two-day things at Navy. Some people quit, I don't know how many go to what we used to call mini BUD/S in the summer between junior and senior year. You go out to Coronado and BUD/S instructors, they still have it, it's called something different. Um, you spend two weeks at the BUD/S compound, they run you through a mini program. And so-

Andrew Huberman 1:02:32 Describe BUD/S for the, uh, some-

Coleman Ruiz 1:02:34 Oh, sorry. Yeah. Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:02:34 ... some folks listening to this won't know-

Coleman Ruiz 1:02:35 So-

Andrew Huberman 1:02:35 ... won't know the acronym.

Coleman Ruiz 1:02:36 The acronym is Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL School. That's our school in Coronado. Um-

Andrew Huberman 1:02:41 It's a screening process for who gets in, who doesn't.

Coleman Ruiz 1:02:43 Yeah. And when you're at, when you're at the Naval Academy, it's obviously different than guys coming into the enlisted ranks. You have this pool of people, 150-ish guys say they want to go sometime junior year. They run you through this weekend, pretty hard, at Navy 'cause we have SEALs stationed at the Naval Academy. And then, I'm just gonna guess, that goes from 150 to 80. Maybe 80 guys go to the summer program in Coronado when you're still, you know, a midshipman at the Naval Academy. I've never... Maybe people have quit mini BUD/S, I don't know. But I don't know if I really saw anybody quit the two weeks we're out in Coronado. And then you get, you know, graded on your performance and stuff. And then you come back for senior year and you go through a series of interviews with a bunch of SEALs who come out and do interviews, and you don't really know what you're doing. And then they select down, I don't want to, again, overdo it, but it's probably seven, I don't know, maybe 50 or 60 qualified guys. They select you down to 16. And so to answer your question about when I got interested was, when I knew I didn't want to go in the Marine Corps, I never, ever had the Top Gun fever thing. I wasn't interested in flying. I just wasn't interested in anything else but something super physical, and that seemed like the best, the next best thing. And because I grew up in New Orleans and spent a lot of time in the water, that wasn't intimidating. That screens a lot of people out, obviously. Yeah. And got selected in the group of 16 and was at BUD/S after graduation, you know, a couple months after graduation.

Andrew Huberman 1:04:20 There's been a lot put out into the world around BUD/S, you know, people have seen the log carrying-

Coleman Ruiz 1:04:25 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 1:04:25 ... and the boat carrying, and the screaming, and the set- set, screaming of the, the, uh, instructors-

Coleman Ruiz 1:04:30 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:04:30 ... and the, and the running and the, you know, clasped arms in the, in the water, and Hell Week, no sleep, and on and on. It's obviously tough. It, it culls 85% of the people that go out there thinking that they are the, the absolute last person who would ever quit, ring the bell, so to speak. Um,

Andrew Huberman 1:04:52 you obviously got through. Uh, a while back, you mentioned to me three things that you think predict whether or not somebody's gonna get through BUD/S. And, um, before you tell us what these are, I just will just, uh, tell people that yes, of course, you made it through BUD/S successfully and went into the teams, um, very successful career in the teams. But you've also been a BUD/S instructor, so you've been on the, on the, um, on the other side of the equation too. What are those three things?

Coleman Ruiz 1:05:20 Yeah. This was, as you know, this was very anecdotal, but it lined up. We, when I was back there in '05 as an instructor, Andrew, I feel like, we're not scientists, right? But I feel like we tried every correlating data pull that we could pull from pull-ups to run times, to you name it, to regions of the country that people grow up near water. At least back then, nothing correlated. And so I was a first phase OIC, officer in charge. And so our team in first phase, we can talk about what that is in detail if you want to, but first phase is in charge of Hell Week, you know, Hell Week's in the first two months of training. And a couple of the guys said, "All this bullshit about this can get you through, that can get you through, I bet that every single person we talk to out here on the grinder has one of these three things: they were a varsity athlete in high school or college, their parents are divorced, or they got suspended from school. I guarantee it." And we would walk around the grinder and ask. And I mean, you know, this isn't gonna pass an independent review board, but it's gotta be 90 to 95%.

Andrew Huberman 1:06:29 So that's incredible because, you know, so much has been made of BUD/S and Hell Week.

Coleman Ruiz 1:06:34 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:06:34 And just to just fill in a few of the blanks for those that aren't familiar, Hell Week is what? It's, uh, five nights, no sleep. You get an hour or a couple minutes on, on one day-

Coleman Ruiz 1:06:43 Wednesday and Thursday.

Andrew Huberman 1:06:43 ... but you're basically in constant movement for about a week.

Coleman Ruiz 1:06:46 You are.

Andrew Huberman 1:06:46 And that's when most people-

Coleman Ruiz 1:06:48 It's true.

Andrew Huberman 1:06:48 ... voluntarily ring the bell. Okay?

Coleman Ruiz 1:06:50 And most of them do it before Wednesday.

Andrew Huberman 1:06:52 Okay. And I know it's got chaotic components, guns going off, blasts.

Coleman Ruiz 1:06:56 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 1:06:56 It's got hard work, boring components, people...... the, the people trying to make it through who have no sense of how long a run is gonna last or what's gonna happen. And you hear all this stuff like, okay, you just don't quit, or you just go meal to meal. But what you just described is really interesting. Uh, let's break those three things down, because, um, playing a varsity sport has certain elements, um, having divorced parents has certain elements, and getting suspended in school has certain elements. Let's start with divorced parents first.

Coleman Ruiz 1:07:33 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:07:33 'Cause varsity sport, I think we can probably just quickly say, okay, there's structure. You have to listen to somebody. You have to be able to push yourself. You have to have some level of physical competence and mental-

Coleman Ruiz 1:07:42 Coachable.

Andrew Huberman 1:07:43 ... coachable, mental confidence to work with others.

Coleman Ruiz 1:07:44 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:07:45 So there's something there, right? Um, and you presumably have to go through junior varsity to get there, so there's some oomph and required, um, in any event. Um, but the divorced parents piece is, is, was surprising to me.

Coleman Ruiz 1:07:58 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:07:58 Still is. What... You have divorced parents.

Coleman Ruiz 1:08:01 Yep.

Andrew Huberman 1:08:01 So do I. Divorces occur for any number of different reasons. What in the world do you think is the, uh, the consequence of or the... of a divorced household that would predict so well, at least in this back of the envelope measurement that you made-

Coleman Ruiz 1:08:18 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:08:18 ... but as an instructor, that people would get through this excruciatingly difficult period of time?

Coleman Ruiz 1:08:24 For me, it was one thing specifically. I felt like I was alone if I didn't have the team. So, I don't know what it would be for other people, but I was like, "If I don't have this team, then what team do I have?" So, I'm not leaving. You could crank up the cold and misery as high as you fucking want, but I'm not leaving.

Andrew Huberman 1:08:50 Mm-hmm. Yeah, that hits deep. Um, I didn't do BUD/S. I didn't even know what the SEAL teams were.

Coleman Ruiz 1:08:56 (laughs)

Andrew Huberman 1:08:56 But, uh, I certainly know the, the feeling of, um, looking outside of the household for, uh, a sense of family and belonging.

Coleman Ruiz 1:09:04 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:09:05 And the feeling that, like, I'd much rather... like, from, almost from a place of joy, like, I'd much rather die for these people, hopefully not with these people, but much rather die trying to save others and to do well in that than to quit.

Coleman Ruiz 1:09:21 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:09:21 Yeah. That's, that's a powerful thing that you just, uh, sh- uh, shined light on. I don't think, of the hundreds of interviews with team guys, ex-team guys, BUD/S instructors, et cetera that are out there, I don't think anyone's ever highlighted that.

Coleman Ruiz 1:09:34 And I don't think I was aware of it then, Andrew, but I just... you know, again, it's in, it's in retrospect.

Andrew Huberman 1:09:38 Mm-hmm. Well, the retrospect is, uh, in large part what we're here for.

Coleman Ruiz 1:09:42 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:09:42 Um, to go a little deeper on that, I think that, uh, a lotta people have challenging homes. Their parents aren't necessarily divorced, and we're talk- talking of course about, um, trying to understand the, the human spirit. Uh, certainly not accomplishments per se, but the human spirit. So, I think that a lot of people, especially nowadays, they look to their home life, and if, you know, God willing, they had a great home life, that is the base. It's like the, it's like the touchstone for them that-

Coleman Ruiz 1:10:12 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:10:12 ... they can return to. But for a lot of people, even people who go home for the holidays or who touch in with their parents, whether or not they're divorced or not, th- they don't feel like that family unit is really a, a solid thing. Maybe they're in a place, I see this a lot of, where, like, they're the parent. They had to grow up taking care of the parents.

Coleman Ruiz 1:10:29 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 1:10:30 I see that a lot-

Coleman Ruiz 1:10:30 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 1:10:31 ... on both the male side and the female side. I see that. Um, so you're saying that one strong predictor of getting through is a feeling of people want... essentially making it their, like, almost like biological identity-

Coleman Ruiz 1:10:47 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 1:10:47 ... to get through.

Coleman Ruiz 1:10:48 It was certainly the case for me. I mean, when I got... A- and again, I don't really like to overdo these things because it tends to feed the mythos a little. But when I got to BUD/S, Andrew, like I h- I... When I got to the Naval Academy, I had a very strong sense of, "This is my chance." And, you know, you develop over the years and you spend time thinking about this and having mentors. When I got there, that was very much my first time of, "You better bring the nastiest shit on the planet, because I'm not leaving here." Like, it's just not... I'm not... I'm just not going, you know? And there's a Navy bit to it too. Like, I didn't want to do anything else in the Navy. (laughs) So back to fear, I was afraid I would get stuck doing a job I didn't like. But there's some... People are not wrong, you know, about BUD/S. There's some very difficult days where you do start to wonder, like, "Is this really worth it?" And I, and that I never once thought about quitting. It never crossed my mind, because I just had these other things that I really had to do for myself and my life, or else I felt like I was gonna have nothing. And so, again, I don't think operating out of fear is particularly adaptive. But sometimes it... you know, the bit in your teeth is useful.

Andrew Huberman 1:12:09 Yeah, certainly in my own life, I could say, you know, getting real scared about... being 19 and essentially realizing I'm not good at anything.

Coleman Ruiz 1:12:17 (laughs)

Andrew Huberman 1:12:18 I'm not good at anything. And I was terrible at a lot of things, and some of those things were taking me down a dangerous path, that that was... the fear... the... I'm grateful for the fear piece.

Coleman Ruiz 1:12:25 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 1:12:26 It, it w- it, it scruffed me. And, uh, let's talk about the suspended in school-

Coleman Ruiz 1:12:32 Yep.

Andrew Huberman 1:12:33 ... um, piece. Uh, first of all, that implies getting caught.

Coleman Ruiz 1:12:36 Yes.

Andrew Huberman 1:12:36 (laughs)

Coleman Ruiz 1:12:37 Got it.

Andrew Huberman 1:12:37 Uh, not just misbehaving, but getting caught. Um, you know, what do you think that's about? So we're really talking about a sense of rebellion against authority or the system that one finds themselves in.

Coleman Ruiz 1:12:48 Which is super important for our line of work. Like, for me, again, I can only speak for myself. For me, it was the wild fuck-you factor. Like, you have to... there's just a nasty reality of the work we had to do. You know, I was in from '98 until 2011.

Andrew Huberman 1:13:04 In the SEAL teams.

Coleman Ruiz 1:13:05 In the SEAL teams-

Andrew Huberman 1:13:06 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 1:13:06 ... from '98 until 2011. Everybody knows what was happening between 9/11 and then. Um, it's not that it didn't stop happening. I know... you know, from my own experience, from '03 through-... 2010 was extremely intense and, um, obviously the military has rules and we need rules, and you follow the laws of armed conflict and you follow the rules of engagement. There's no question about that, ever. Um, but the shit that happens to you out in the field for real does not follow any pattern. And so, if you are a complete, you know, non-suspended from school rule follower, I'm not saying you won't be successful, I'm sure plenty of people are, but in our line of work if you ask people, most of them had a weird streak as they were coming up. Like they have a little bit of a, a side-eye when somebody tells them, "This is how stuff is." Like, hmm, maybe it's like that, but you don't know that. And where it really became clear for me, Andrew, was like at every stage in your development you're still looking for what right looks like, and when I was a ... I'm now a Naval Academy graduate, not that that means anything special, but I'm smart enough, I'm now in my 20s. I'm at BUD/S and I have this recollection later, like you, you people are always telling stories about the teams, and when you're a new student at BUD/S, you're, you kind of believe everything the instructors tell you because it's pretty impressive shit. And then you find out later when you, when I checked into SEAL Team 3 and you actually start to understand the arc of the job, it's like all these guys were telling training stories. Those weren't real combat stories. Those ... They, they never said that that was a story from training. And so my point is like, what, what you ... I hope guys are getting it now, but what we didn't get a lot of was the real story in a sense, meaning, I will say definitively my first combat deployment was '03 when we invaded Iraq. I was a platoon commander when we invaded Iraq, and I remember within a week of being in that situation thinking not one single instructor had the experience to mentor and coach me on this. Not one. And so you have to go back to that wild suspended fuck-you factor mindset. Like, all your silly rules about how the military works, none of that shit's happening out here. Right? All this other stuff is happening that doesn't have anything to do with your training manuals except for the things you don't violate, which is to your best of your ability. Stuff happens, but the rules of engagement and laws of armed conflict. Everything else is a toss-up. The tactics aren't. That's not a toss-up, but you know what I mean. Like, the environment is, it completely chaotic.

Andrew Huberman 1:16:06 It's a new sport.

Coleman Ruiz 1:16:07 It's a brand new sport that no one coached you on.

Andrew Huberman 1:16:10 And th- and it's high-risk/high-consequence for you and your teammates, but also for the other side.

Coleman Ruiz 1:16:17 I mean, every 15 seconds is a new consequential decision.

Andrew Huberman 1:16:22 Mm-hmm. Yeah, 'cause you obviously don't want to kill civilians on the other side either.

Coleman Ruiz 1:16:27 Of course not.

Andrew Huberman 1:16:28 Right.

Coleman Ruiz 1:16:28 Yeah.

Andrew Huberman 1:16:30 So you obviously get through BUD/S. You probably weren't surprised given your mindset. Probably weren't surprised.

Coleman Ruiz 1:16:37 No. No. I wasn't surprised.

Andrew Huberman 1:16:39 Mm-hmm.

Coleman Ruiz 1:16:39 At this point, I'm maybe building a little self-confidence (laughs) and don't just operate out of fear.

Andrew Huberman 1:16:43 Mm-hmm. But happy.

Coleman Ruiz 1:16:45 Mm-hmm.

Andrew Huberman 1:16:45 Presumably.

Coleman Ruiz 1:16:45 Oh, yeah. Yep.

Andrew Huberman 1:16:46 And let's ... I feel obligated to ask. Well, I'm just curious to ask that you, you know, you've been in a system of military for a long time. Is there a, a bigger, um, pull of patriotism there or that's just ... It's there, but are, I mean, are you thinking about country or are you thinking about team? Are you thinking about the day?

Coleman Ruiz 1:17:07 Well, y- yeah. I mean, at this point, you know, I'm fully indoctrinated in a sense. You know, the Naval Academy really does give you a sense of, again, bigness when you meet people from World War II and Vietnam, and, you know, an amazing guy which, you know, we can cover later, I don't ... I, I wasn't around when he was coming up, but Colonel John Ripley is the guy who won the Navy Cross in Vietnam. Um, the book, The, The Bridge at Dong Ha is about him. He knew my ... This is back to the ... I was ... My uncle Jim who introduced ... He and my uncle Jim were buddies, and I met him. He's since passed away. I met Colonel Ripley when I was a plebe at the Naval Academy. Um, I work with one of his sons now, friend, teammate, mentor. He's a great guy. Um, Colonel Ripley, he's a legend. Like, this guy's a Navy Cross winner. Should've won the Congressional Medal of Honor by all accounts. If you read the buch- the, the book, The Bridge at Dong Ha, you, you are gonna have