How This Ex-Navy SEAL Turned A Book Into A $1M+ Empire - Jack Carr

25:16And then I'm jumping back in because I have a deadline on my novel and I'm doing that. And then I have to jump over to the podcast. How are you dealing with that context switching? Because that's really hard. Yeah, no, well, yesterday I had my call with the person I brought on to run the Hollywood side of the house. and I told them, I'm like, I need to do prioritize and execute. I need to be focused on one thing at a time and then switch to the next one. There'll be a little bit of overlap there as you're editing or coming up with generating some new ideas. But for the most part, I need to be focused on one thing at a time and then switch gears.

25:45And I know you do something cool. So you write, I think I heard on your podcast, you'd like to write a one pager and you read a one pager. I think we're, you didn't exactly explain what's on the one pager, but I imagine it's like a summary of the book. But maybe there's more to it. My goal is that it sells this many copies or it makes a reader feel like this. But you said, I do this one pager because I know that this project, I'm going to spend 18 minutes of my life and I want to make sure that I'm willing to do that. And I think that's kind of cool because running a business tends to actually probably go into three or five year cycles.

26:23But I thought it was pretty cool that writing this one pager, Amazon does this thing where they go, we're going to create this product, go ahead and write the press release now. So we know what do we want it to say in 24 or 12 months when this product is live? How do we want it to be received? What do we want to tell people it does? And then let's work backwards to creating that. And that's sort of like what you're doing. And I thought that was pretty interesting. And I try to do that with a bunch of projects in my life, whether it be like, a fitness challenge that I have or a business or whatever, like a new life event where it's like, what's the outcome going to be like this in 12 or 18 months?

27:02And do I really want to go all in on that? And I thought that was cool you do that. Yeah, I didn't know that about Amazon, but it makes total sense. So I do that. I write, it's kind of like what you'd find on the back of a paperback or in the front flap of a book, you know, something that describes it. So it's about a one pager and it's like an executive summary. And then I read it to myself and I ask myself that question, is this worth the next year, year and a half of my life? And if the question is yes, if I'm that excited about it, then I read it again and I ask myself another question. If someone's walking by Hudson News in the airport, they're pulling this off the shelf and they're to read this same thing or something similar, does this idea get them excited enough to want to spend time that they're never going to get back in these pages?

27:42So as I'm writing, I am thinking about that. That's what I'm thinking about. I'm thinking about the story. It's all about the story. It's not about what's selling. It's not about short chapters or longer chapters, what's popular. It's about none of those things. It is all about the story because you're never going to please everyone. So if you honor the story and take all your bandwidth, all your heart and soul into every single word, then you're respecting that reader or that listener today who is spending time with you that they're never going to get back. So that's how I approach it. I don't approach it from a business side, which maybe I should.

28:13Oh, what's selling? What's popular? But no, it all has to be about the story. Why not just be your own publisher at this point? You know, you have like a pretty nice direct audience. You've been on Joe Rogan a bunch of times and those get millions of views. You get millions of impressions across all these other podcasts. Why not just do your own thing at this point? Well, I like being where I am. I like the team that they have at Simon & Schuster. I like the production value of the audiobooks. I like Ray Porter who narrates, who's absolutely amazing. I like that they have regional representatives all across the country.

28:46You get these books into Target and Walmart and all that. I like that machine that's doing that because that allows me to focus solely on writing. And I don't have to worry about that other side. So I can see why someone would want to first build up a social media presence or something or an audience and then have the book knowing that a certain percentage of that audience will take the action that you want. But that wasn't my way. And that's not how I grew up. And that's not how I wanted to adapt to the new space. I want to adapt to it in a different way where I still have a publisher and there's still an art department for the cover and they're still all that.

29:18So I have that machine working there and I can solely focus on writing and then also figure out the things that maybe a large publishing company isn't so great at. So the social side of the house and the digital marketing side of the house and the podcasts and all of that. So I think it's a very good partnership as far as a business goes for me. Everybody's going to have a different way. We had this guy on the pod and we've had him a few times. His name is Scott Galloway. Scott Galloway is a successful entrepreneur, but he also is an author and kind of a thought leader. I don't know what you would describe him as, but he's a wonderful speaker.

29:52And his new crusade right now is on young men and how young men are kind of getting forgotten a bit. If you look at suicide rates, depression rates, if you look at education, young men are getting left behind a bit. And I felt that. And I remember I was going through a period in my late 20s where I had a little bit of success, but I was like, I still, like, I now have a young family. And I was like, I need, I want to learn a little bit more about what it means to be a man. And so I went through this, this like reading, like I read all these like man books, like teach me to become a man, I guess.

30:28And so I noticed that I would read your books and I felt like I was being inspired to be a more high integrity man and which James Reese is. what books have you read that sort of like got you on that path of being this sort of, I don't know, like teacher of young men, because that's kind of like what you've become a little bit. Yeah. And it's interesting. Now when I go to book signings, like I said, first book came out in 2018. So now somebody read that book when they were 15, 16, 17, 18. Now they're a few years into their time in uniform in the military or law enforcement or whatever else. So now I have people coming up to me and saying, I was inspired to join the military.

31:05I was inspired to get into law enforcement. I was inspired to do this because of your books. And I knew that was a possibility, but I didn't really dwell on it. But the last book tour, or maybe we were alone before, was the first time where that really started happening. But it happened naturally for me. So I didn't get to a certain age and say, what book should I read in order to? It was just, I was constantly reading as a student of warfare. And one book that stands out as my most gifted book, it's called Once an Eagle by Anton Meyer. And it's written in 1968, and it's historical fiction. And it follows two people from right before World War I up to Vietnam.

31:39They don't call it Vietnam in the book. They call it something else, but that's what it is. One of them is an officer and one of them gets a battlefield commission on the battlefield in World War I. And then you have the interwar years, you have World War II, and it goes, like I said, up to Vietnam. But the guy who is the, he's a politician in uniform. He's the officer. He's always just a little bit ahead of this guy, Sam Damon, who is, who's the, he's like the leader of men that you would want to be as you read this book. And so I would gift this book to people who are starting their career in the profession of arms.

32:10And there's a reason it's called the profession of arms, not the career of arms. And I would write a letter and I would put it in the front cover. And that's one that they could read before they started reading. And it would kind of set the tone why I'm giving them this book. And then I would say in that letter, but there's another letter at the back and that is sealed. And you have to work your way through this book and it's pretty thick. So you can use it as a blunt impact weapon or as a doorstop if you need to. So it's dual use technology. and at the end then that's my take on what you just read and i don't want them to read it beforehand because i don't want to pollute their reading experience with my interpretation so it gives them incentive to get to the end to get to read that last letter and setting the tone with the first one so that's my most gifted book but it really is a is a book about leadership and uh and so that's why i would give it to these to these guys but through that context of historical fiction so it reads like a thriller but you're learning about history at the same time but it's really all about leadership.

33:03All right, let's take a quick break because I got to tell you a story. Let me tell you about the first time I tried to run payroll for my team. I was using a traditional bank and you know the type. It's got a janky interface. It's built like a 2002 tax form and it was open only during business hours. And I hit send and it froze. They flagged the transaction. They locked my account. They put me on hold for 45 minutes. And then they told me I got to visit my local branch. And that was the day I started looking for a new banking solution. After asking a few founders what they were using, I found out about Mercury.

33:28And so now my payroll is two clicks. I can wire money. I can pay invoices. I can reimburse the team all from one clean dashboard. That's why I use it for all of my companies. And so do 200 ,000 other startup founders. And so if you're looking to level up your banking, head to Mercury.com and apply in minutes. Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services are provided through Choice Financial Group, Column 8, and Evolve Bank & Trust members FDIC. Well, you have this, I mean, you had a career where you sort of, you had a rite of passage. So you went to the military, you experienced some crazy stuff.

34:01And I imagine it's like, I imagine there's some times where it's like, I just grew up really fast. And now I officially feel like a man. Women a little bit have, you know, they have a physical thing where it's like, you're now a woman. Men don't typically have that, at least not now. In some cultures they do, where they're like, you know, I like to read about the Spartans and they're like, all right, now you go off in the wilderness and you do this thing you come back you're a man you know the Jewish culture has a bar mitzvah and bat mitzvah so there's a little bit of a you're a man now but we don't really have that in America for like most men and the reason why and I always felt that was lacking I'm like I don't have this like I didn't I didn't there wasn't this like beginning middle and end of a journey where it's like I've come out and I'm now an adult and so I think that's why i like reading your stuff because it's like i'm living vicariously through the through through james reese and i experienced this like heartache and this like evolution and it's like i now feel weirdly more manly i mean as as cringe as that sounds but it's like you know they say you're the average of the five people you spend with most i think i'm the average of like the last year's worth of reading i've done do you know what i'm saying so it's like i'm getting a little bit of a right of passage a little bit through like your work if that's if that makes sense.

35:18Well, yes. And that's why it's so important. I think for our kids, especially who they follow now in this world, because you have those five people you're spending the most time with how it can be virtual. It's not that person on the playground, or as you get older, someone you're in a, that's a mentor type relationship or in an internship or something like that. A lot of these people are the people that they're following. So that's why it's so important for you to follow. But yeah, for most of human history, there was exactly that. There was a rite of passage and it was there for a reason. It was a reason.

35:45The reason was so that that you could prove to the tribe, to the community, that you could add value. Because if you didn't, then, well, your tribe's not going to last for very much longer. So with these trials, there were these teachings, mentorships, and then you'd have this trial that you would go through to prove that you were a valued member of the tribe. And then that's slowly started to go away, but mostly in the 19th, 20th century, because it was still around before that. But today, it is almost entirely lacking, which is why I think so many people feel lost because it's not institutionalized into our society, but it's in our DNA because I think that there's a reason that it was around from the beginning of time up until the time we got so comfortable where we didn't have to have it.

36:28And that was so that we could survive as a species, so your tribe could survive. But that's why I think young men, whether they know it or not, are drawn towards, typically in this country, it's marine bootcamp. Like that's the one that most people think of, but it's also - Yeah, you see these things where it's like rich guys spending like 15 grand for a weekend and a little bit of it's like dude that's fucking lame uh but on the other side i'm like i understand why you want that and uh you got to get it how you can get it i guess yeah they missed it when they should have done it or when another culture a thousand years ago would have had it as part of this process to bring people into the tribe but we don't have it so people find it later and they're like oh geez i missed that part and then they start reading these books and they're like oh that's what i was missing that's why i felt this draw at a certain age that I didn't listen to.

37:13Like listen to that calling, like the hero's journey, heed the call. And so yeah, Marine Bootcamp or it's Army Special Forces Q course, Navy SEALs, it's called BUDS training, but something that allows you to go through this trial and tribulation, allows you to test yourself and then prove to the group that you're worthy of joining the ranks. And I think if you don't do that in one way, shape or form, it doesn't have to be military. But if you don't do that, then I think that's why people feel so lost these days. Geno. Yeah, look, I get those things. maybe i'll do them just don't post any pictures of me online doing it because that way that would i would need another uh rite of passage to get through the ridicule that i would receive or posting uh we're obsessed i uh there's in the comfort crisis i'm obsessed with this idea they had um it was called misoji have you and we talked about a bunch here on this pod but have you heard of misoji it's basically like this idea of uh it stems from this japanese guy who this japanese myth of like he goes to like i think he goes to like hell or something to find his wife who has been kidnapped and he goes to this massive journey where he gets dirty and grimy and he's finally saves his wife he brings her back he washes himself off in this waterfall and he's now a new man because of the hardship that he went through and uh the miso it was i think his name was misoji and so a lot of people now what they're doing is they're doing these like really hard things physical things.

38:35So for example, the guy who made it popular, he'd be like, today, we're going to get our paddleboard and we're going to paddle to this island that's 15 miles out. And then we're going to paddle back. And there's basically two rules, which is one, you have to only have a 50 % chance of succeeding. And number two, don't die. And so I'm training for my misogy right now, which is a 50 mile race. But I got like obsessed with this idea of like a misogy of like having this like really hard concept. And I would like went to this whole like phase where I was reading you and, and all about all this stuff.

39:07Have you ever heard of the, the Masoji? You know, I feel like I shouldn't have because I read the comfort crisis, but I read it a couple of years ago now when it first came out at Michael Easter on the podcast. But yeah, I don't feel that anymore because I feel like I did that already. I'm like, Oh, this looks exhausting. I think I feel like I've done that most of my life. So now it's really all about writing, having each book better than the last. That's always my goal, which is why the last book I finished is always my favorite up to this point. Anyway, I don't know It'll always be that way, but that's how it is thus far because I do feel like I'm improving with each book, improving as an author, as a writer, and that's what I owe the audience.

39:42So yeah, but I understand it. I understand that draw to do something difficult to test yourself. I certainly understand it. You kind of have this, even though I would stereotype you as like a tough guy, you have this weird, not weird, but you have this, I don't know how to describe it, almost spiritual way about you where I remember you told the story about how before or maybe when you were writing the first book, you were like, Chris Pratt is the guy. I need to get him to do this. And lo and behold, after a handful of years, he calls you and he was like, hey, your book's awesome. I would love to turn this into a show and maybe I'll star in it, whatever.

40:22Do you believe in these weird type of spiritual manifestation type of things of if you want it bad enough, things come true? Because it seems like it's happened a few times in your life where you've called your shot when it seemed ridiculous at the time. Yeah. It seems like, but it's more than just calling it or manifesting it, sitting down and visualizing it. When you think about some thinking about how they're going to make that a serve in tennis or an extra kick point soccer or whatever, that's very tactical. You can watch videos and you can manifest it and think of it. The strategic one, and obviously that tactical level requires work, but the strategic level one also requires work.

41:05But it's not that one thing, like that one foot placement or that way you're going to throw the ball, whatever it might be. So I think there's a spiritual side to it, which I think there's a spiritual side to everything that connects us. But it's more the work. And it's not going to happen without putting in the work. That's the thing. It might not happen if you put in the work. That's possible too. but it's certainly not going to happen if you don't. So as I'm starting to write this thing, as a child of the eighties, it's very natural for me to think about who's going to star in the fell, who's going to star on the TV show.

41:36And at the time I was like, Oh, I saw Chris Pratt transform from this guy who played Andy Dwyer on Parks and Rec, funny, a little overweight. And then I saw his transformation in Zero Dark Thirty to a seal. And so I said, this is a guy who needs a role like this. He needs it for his career. And so I'm thinking this in December of 2014. and so I'm like Chris Pratt will play the main character. He'll play James Reese. He needs it for his career. And then who do I want to direct? Antoine Fuqua. I love Antoine Fuqua. Training Day and Cheers to the Sun and all this. And he's the guy. That's who I want to direct this thing.

42:07And then I just go about writing. I have no connection to Hollywood, no connection to publishing. And you haven't even published the first one at this point? No, no. I haven't published the first one. No idea how I'm going to get it to a publisher, but I'm not thinking about any of those things. No social media presence, no Facebook. Did you tell your friends that you wanted this to happen? Um, no. In the SEAL teams, you wanted to keep anything about writing close to the vest. But like, would you tell your wife or whatever, like he'll talk, you're like, hey, would it be neat one day if Chris Pratt was James Reese?

42:35Yeah, yeah. No, I told people, like my wife, she's known I wanted to be a SEAL and write with each other since we're 18 years old. So she's been on this journey for the entire time. But how it manifested, I guess, is a way that I never would have expected is that I called And I called him a friend who I serve with in the SEAL teams who calls me in November of 2017. So six, seven months before the book even comes out. And he calls me and says, Hey, do you remember me? Because I hadn't talked to him in about five years. And he said, I said, Yes, of course, I remember you. He said, Do you remember what you did for me in the SEAL teams?

43:06And I was like, No. And he said, Well, you're the only person when I said I was getting out leaving the teams, you're the only person that sat me down at your office, talked about transitioning out of the military, introduced me to people in the private sector, followed up with me said asked if you could do anything else. And I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said I've never forgotten it. And I always wanted to thank you. And I said, no problem. How's it going? And he said, it's going great.

43:25But I heard through the grave, finally, you have a book coming out. And I said, yeah, it's coming out in a few months. It's called The Terminal List. I can send you a copy if you want to check it out. And he said, I'd like that, but I'd like to give it to a friend of mine also. And I'm like, yeah, who's that? He's like, well, it's my best friend. It's Chris Pratt. I was like, oh, well, that's very convenient for me because I pictured him playing this role all these years ago. And so he gave it to Chris. Chris read it in December of 2017. and then he called me the first week in 2018 and wanted to option it.

43:50At the same time, another friend, unbeknownst to me, had given a copy to Antoine Fuqua. They met at a speaking event and he gave a copy to Antoine Fuqua, Antoine read it, and he wanted to option it. And Chris and Antoine knew each other from Magnificent Seven, so then they called and worked it out. Now we have the terminal list on Amazon Prime. How does that feel to be not a nobody, but just a guy, just a guy making these ridiculous predictions? and they're they come true yeah well i mean it wouldn't have happened if obviously if i hadn't um so i always really cared about people in the teams and my focus was always on on the guys and helping them whether they're staying in or getting out and i did notice that a lot of other people especially officers didn't do that if you said you were getting out they only cared about you if you were in the seal teams and that just wasn't wasn't me um so if i hadn't helped jared out and at the time i didn't think anything would ever come back around that wasn't the reason i I did it, obviously.

44:44But it did. Came back around and now I'm flying out to Budapest in about a week to go film out there. They're on set right now. Jared's a writer and a producer and an actor and a technical advisor on set right now. Jared Shaw gave Chris the book. And this is the second season. And we have another one coming up here with the second book with Chris in it that should start filming in 2025. You never know until it's actually all completed and ready and actually up there on the screens. So I try to manage those expectations. But yeah, so now we're off to the races and then there's other Hollywood projects and multiple books and now the nonfiction.

45:18And I have a strategic plan that I've written out just by being a student of all this my whole life, but not with the intent of being a student, more so just like I said, from the fan perspective. it. But I have a strategic plan with all these things that I want to build because essentially those goals that I wanted was to serve my country, need a form as a SEAL, do the best job I could, be the best leader, be the best operator I possibly could, then write a novel, have it be a number one New York Times bestseller and get it up on the screen. So those things are done. And now it's just about doing all those things better and continuing to grow in a way that's real and authentic and adds value to people's lives and allows me to do what I love to do.

45:52And then also allows me to hit my mission. So my mission is taking care of my family. my passion is writing. I wanted to combine those things for purpose going forward as I left the CLT because I saw so many people not know what they wanted to do or think that they knew. And then all of a sudden step into it and realize this wasn't really what they wanted after all. Do you think you, have you hit the, you know, I sold my company, my first company when I was 31 and that's where I hit, that's where I hit the financial where it was like on paper, I never need to work again because my income from my stock portfolio can pay for a really great life forever.

46:27Of course, I still want to work forever because I enjoy it. Have you been able to cross that threshold to where financially you're like, I can breathe because as working for the government, you're not rolling in it, but I imagine you are now. Have you been able to cross that threshold? Yeah, not yet. Not yet, but I'm on the cusp, but not quite there yet. And getting closer, but a lot of this has been invested back in. So I think a lot of people probably would have held on and not done boxes when you can't afford it. Put it all on your credit card early on. Is that what you're doing? Those boxes were?

47:03Everything. So everything's going back in. How do I get this podcast going? How do I do a video for this book that looks like a movie that's better than any author has ever made before to promote a book? Okay. How do I do that? Well, I invest because it costs money to do that. So I invested a lot back in to grow. You can't get the publisher to pay for that? No, but I think people think that the publisher pays for these things. I would have thought that. Yeah. And I think some other people now, because now I see other authors doing something similar. And I got one from Meat Eater the other day.

47:34You talked about those. And it came from the problem. From Meat Eater. He has a new cookbook out. And it came a couple of days ago. And so I'm going to be on my father's day gear guide just to do my part and help him out a tiny bit. But it certainly came from the publisher. So I think maybe other publishers also think my publisher pays for these things. But it's really just me out of pocket as a business. My hope for you, and this probably doesn't align with your one, so I don't know if it's going to happen. But what I want as a fan is I want to see Jack Carr become the new meat eater. I want to see a lifestyle media company all around your shtick.

48:13And I know I told you about Churnin. So Churnin is a company that invests in meat eater or things like it. So brands that have a strong affinity with different lifestyles, and then they eventually make more content and sell stuff. And hopefully, and they've done it a bunch, they create really big businesses that are awesome for you as an owner because you make money, but also awesome as me as a consumer because now I have more James Reese, Terminalist, Jack Carr stuff in my life. That's my hope for you is that one day you take that path because I am being selfish, but it would be cool for you as well, maybe, if it aligns with your values.

48:51Thank you. Yeah, as long as there's a way to do it where it still remains authentic and real to that person who's trusting me with their time or their money, then yeah. So I think things are going in that direction. That's certainly a possibility. Last question. Which books or resources that are a little bit less known that taught you most about the storytelling or creative process that I can go and read. Yeah. So those, those for sure, the one on Stephen King on writing series of books by Stephen Frostfield that all really talk about same thing, but going to different nuances as far as, uh, uh, overcoming resistance, doing the work, putting in the time, becoming a professional.

49:29So those, uh, ones, another one's called the successful novelist by David Murrell, who created Rambo with first blood back in 1972. Uh, where's that one? Uh, and then the heroes, The Hero's Journey Through Hero with a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell. And that one right there influenced Star Wars. And once you read that book or watch a series of interviews that he did on PBS back in 1988 with Bill Moyers of the power of myth, you realize how similar these stories are across cultures and why they resonated from the beginning of time. Because some of these stories, these myths were really created to pass on lessons, lessons of the hunt, lessons of warfare.

50:05So the next generation doesn't have to learn those same lessons in blood and that tribe, that community can grow and not just survive, hopefully, but thrive. You're the man. I appreciate you doing this. Your books have not only been fun, but they've changed me a little bit as a man, as a husband, as a father, as a citizen of America. You've done amazing stuff and I wish nothing but amazing success for you and your family. So thank you for all this. This is awesome. Oh man, I appreciate that. And then thank you for the podcast. I'm so glad I discovered it because I'm going to be taking notes going forward on how to scale things and how to do things a little better because no matter what I'm doing in life, I always want to do it a little better the next time.

50:46I always want to adapt and be more effective and efficient with what I'm doing. So thank you for what you do as well. I appreciate you. And that's the pod. I feel like I can rule the world. I know I could be what I want to. I put my all in it like no days off. On the road, let's travel, never looking back.

51:08Hey, let's take a quick break because there's a quote that I love I want to read you. It's that we shape our tools and thereafter they shape us. And as an entrepreneur, if you're using a bank that was built in the 90s, you're operating like you're in the 90s. And trust me, I've been there. Clunky portals, random holds on your money,$50 wire fees, and then being told, please visit your local branch. Well, that's why I switched to a different type of banking solution, Mercury. It turns your financial chores into a smooth workflow. You can do wires, invoices, cards, reimbursements, two clicks, and I'm done.

51:39If you're already using Mercury, respect. If you're still using one of the old big banks, I got questions for you. So go visit Mercury.com and give it a test drive. Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services are provided through Choice Financial Group, Column N8, and Evolve Bank & Trust members, FDIC.