Ep 273: SERE Pipeline Deep Dive with SERE Specialist Kortney James!

all right everybody welcome back to the ones ready team room peaches who's off screen is going to be on screen there he is look at that guy speed surprise violence of action the chief shows up when he wants to show up we got a good one for you today Seer specialist Courtney James Courtney thanks for coming on what's up we wanted to bring you on just because we get a lot of seer questions so shout out to the Discord by the way if you're not liked and subscribed across all platforms what are you doing get on at cones and quitters hit us up on the Discord hit us up in the DMS if you got questions uh literally every question that we have today for our sear specialist friend came from Discord because we're not smart enough to come up with them on our own so there you go court for everybody out there can you please tell us kind of like uh you know where are you from what's your background and then you know how did you end up finding your way into the air force oh man I have a big background uh I'm from a small town called Hillyard Florida most people from my town just call it Kings fairy it's like 10 miles out of that small town one red light one caution light wasn't much there uh after graduating high school went to college uh got a degree in biology minored in Marine Biology decided that living off of Grants wasn't a thing I wanted to do anymore um followed the military life around for I don't know about 68 years and then wanted to join the Air Force a lot of my family has been in the Air Force and so um yeah wanted to join and didn't really know what I wanted to do I wanted a commission but at that time there was just not many job openings um so and I was having kind of trouble with a recruiter so I was like I'm just going to go to an enlisted recruiter try and get my foot in the door and I went in and I still talked to this recruiter today I forgot his name I have to I have to remember his name um so I can give him a shout out but I went went up to him and I was like I want to do something outdoors I don't know what I want to do but I want to do something outdoors I don't want to be indoors and he's like well you can do here and I was like that's what I'm going to do he's like hold on just a second with me you don't easy there tiger yeah there's a whole thing here yeah let me at least tell you the requirements I'm like no this is what I'm going to do and he's like yeah but they're this is a process and uh so got my foot in the door um started wrecking really early and yeah I just went off from there he told me there was going to be some teaching I wasn't honestly I wasn't really thrilled about the teaching thing um when I think about teaching I think about like elementary school and I'm like I I don't want to do that I think about Math teachers you know I think about these things and I was like this this probably not going to work so um no it worked out it worked out fine through the process so how much information did you have beforehand because I was poking around uh the the website so g.a. Mill which is a fantastic resource every time I look at it I'm like wow these guys you know these guys and GS really crushed it but how much information I know it was kind of you know SE was brought up to you and you were like oh okay that sounds cool how much research did you do before you actually started preparing and getting into the pipeline prep stuff I I I mean I did as much research as what you you can do uh my recruiter told me quite a bit I mean not many people in the past have been told hey you're going to be teaching uh he actually told me like you know this is a teaching job but it's just you know it it's got a lot of perks to it around as well and I didn't know how much teaching I really was going to do um and I wasn't super passionate about that I really wanted that team dynamic because I had always you know been on a team throughout college and so on and so forth but um yeah I I mean I listened to your podcast one's ready I listen to that that was that was helpful and then just for the pipeline typee and the and the codery and so on um but yeah I went on that website and I talked to some sear folks and yeah just did as much research as I could I didn't do a whole bunch but enough to enough to get me going it's funny that the folks we talk to some people go in completely blind and they're like I'm glad it didn't have all the all the information and some are you know like you like I did a little bit of research but I didn't want to do it and then there's always the other Spectrum where they have to know every single thing about what they're going to do yeah I had a developer that was a sear guy and he's like just honestly the biggest advice I could give you is take it one day at a time if you get too far ahead of yourself then you're not going to be focusing on that that day and that's what I tell some of the SE guys I mean I talked to a few a few girls um few females that are interested in the SE Pipeline and guys as well and then they're just like well how's life like a sear specialist and I was like well it took me years to get here so let's start let's start at the beginning right um right uh let's just take it one day at a time and don't get too far ahead of yourself and and sometimes that's very hard to do as a sear candidate is not get too far ahead of yourself nice I just want to highlight something for everybody out there because it's a highly asked question that we get you know can you get your degree and still go enlisted and people ask about the aspect War pipelines all the time and we always say yes but you're a great shining example of hey yeah absolutely you can totally get your degree and then if you decide you want to do one of these enlisted jobs and that's something that you want to do more power to you and I'm sure it's going to help you in the future I want to hit I want to hit the um the development piece of it real quick too because it's another question we get asked all the time yeah as you were going through development and your physical preparation did you ever feel like you were 100% ready to go or did you get to like where you felt like you were good and meeting your numbers and then you pressed out I never really felt like I was 100% honestly if you always felt like you're 100% then you're not ready right you need to have that a little bit of nervousness to go in a little bit of oh man is this going to be enough uh I hit my numbers like I wanted to and it took me a little while so development starting you can and they never used to have development this is kind of a new thing coming through which I it helped me in general because you can be in development from a year to two months if you want to you have to pass the past test at least two times in a row and I think they've changed it now it might be just once uh but when I went through two years ago it was I needed to pass it twice in a row to be able to even because it was it was harder when you went through that's why right no it you can now start you heard it here first you heard it here first it was harder rocks were heavier water was wetter yeah exactly water was wetter um yeah no but uh development you know you you've got some really good guys some some retired tacp and PJs uh sear guys you got you got these contractors that are just really awesome they know their [ __ ] um and they they make these workouts based on you know the requirements that you have to meet extremely intelligent guys and they just they just put you through it and um I had I had uh Eddie Ramos which was a TP guy I had Jason Craig which was a sear guy and then uh Owen Duff uh he was the EOD guy and he he helped me out a lot cuz I was struggling through the run uh it took me 4 months I was in development for 4 months and uh everything was going good it was just my run that was just kind of I'm a sprinter I'm not really a you know longdistance Runner so I was a little bit slower uh but it took me you know he he got me he got me up there Owen duffed um he was a T3i developer but he knew exactly you know the numbers to push and and yeah it took me 4 months and that wasn't bad cuz normally You' take take the pass test once a month is what you would do um you take it once a month you get ready you send weekly reports to your to your coach and say hey this is what I'm doing that way you know you show hey I'm invested I'm doing this stuff um on a weekly basis is when you would send those weekly reports and then they would they would look at it and adjust it from there so you know peaches we should get a T3i developer on yeah we know we know those guys we do know those guys yeah we do know those guys um anyway there's some guys there T3i guys there at uh Fairchild as well that they help with the pre-team and Team guys that are helping with um it's Coach Travis Barrett up there but he helps them uh smart guys just really intelligent oh yeah that and and they're motivated and they know that they're helping out the career field the future of the career field and and they're very unassuming because you have some of those folks that are um I mean are very decorated very decorated yes and uh like it's it's very impressive and and a lot of you know a lot of the the develop or the the folks in development they don't they just don't know because they don't know what they don't know and and they're like hey just see you know this this dude was um killing killing Bad Dudes um quite frequently during the days literally when you were in diapers yes quite literally before you were in grade school this guy was uh to use an old colloquialism putting Warheads on foreheads yeah yeah it's kind of intimidating you know you go up and and you're in these group of people you know candidates whether they're PJs tpes you know ccts you're all kind of meshed in as a group but you get this guy and who's like yeah I've been in for you know I've been a a tack PE guy for 20 years and I've done this this and this and I'm like God yeah yeah it can be a little intimidating well the I'm glad you mentioned it because the the talk about being a teacher and and you know when whenever you hear teacher you at least me I think of you know high school or Elementary or something like that you're you're a school teacher exactly but so so many so your job is specifically being a teacher and instructor um you know PJs have instructorship within their CCT does tacp does the the jtac qualification does I mean where I'm at the weapon School school it's in the name you know there's we are in the the military is in the business of training and teaching and then all the other things that come along with that it's that didn't put you off at all like you're you're all in on that yeah so so like you said that's when I first thought about it is being a teacher is like a math teacher like nobody L their math teacher their science teacher right you know just like I don't want to be that but I was like you know I'm just going to give it a chance because uh if you think about it we're all we're all teachers we're all we're all leaders and in one way or another you have to be some sort of teacher right and that can look like a lot of different things and in seir I at first I was just like I don't think I'm going to have a passion to be sear and and you lose so many so many guys throughout the process because they're like I just don't I don't know if I can do this I'm I'm I don't like the teaching thing and we lost a lot of gu because of that and when I started to get into the pipeline more and what I was teaching spoke to me and that's where I got my passion from teaching was okay these are the things these are these are some core value things like these are things that I could teach my family these are things that I could teach my my future children yep you know these are things that hey mom come over here let me show you some let me show you a trick you know it it wasn't it it didn't seem like a job it it seemed seem like hey you know let me teach you this thing and and that's something that you can just pass on to generations and generations uh you want to learn how to survive you want to learn how to build fire you want to learn you know certain things come here and I'll show you so that yeah it's pretty cool one more thing on on that whole teaching aspect of it is that um a lot of I mean one of the most terrifying things for people is public speaking I I you know I I get it you know but so many PE like that would turn people away and and you visiting a recruiter and going hey that's what I want to do it's it's teaching it's instructing it's obviously getting in front of people did you struggle with that at all because that's that's one thing that's always impressed me with the Seer career field is we take brand new Airmen and we you know we train them and the The Seer instructors train them and it's like okay there you go go teach in front of a room a room full of um you know enlisted anywhere from Airman basic all the way up to to senior ncos and then officers from lieutenants to to Majors Lieutenant Colonels you know it's uh we just throw them to the Wolves absolutely uh I tell you one thing I sucked I sucked so bad uh we all did no no instructor in the military was any good when they first started I I remember just cringing when I first started instructing cuz we would have to teach like you know your team Sergeant be like okay Aaron teach me how to do this thing I've only I've only done 500 times I'm just like oh no yeah it's uh yeah I wasn't good I wasn't good at all but you have to have confidence there was so many guys on our team that was such you know it just came naturally to them I I had to I had to work hard for it you know there was there was several times where um where I had to retach a lot of different lessons because I just thought so bad but the confidence wasn't there right the confidence wasn't there and the passion the passion to teach what you're teaching wasn't there until I I started to to develop that to grow that is that passion and once you have that passion it just starts coming naturally um a on team wasn't that great you start learning these uh teaching aspects when you go through the selection process so right after BMT you go to selection and then you start kind of doing these TNC which is just time and Circumstance that's all it stands for and these are just kind of short spontaneous little um lessons that you can teach and just kind of come off out of the blue hey you you teach something on this go now like you've got one minute to think about it I'm like so uh practice and confidence and passion and then afterwards just I I went and platformed form teached for 3 months um and you've got these senior aans you've got a1c's teaching you know Lieutenant Colonels teaching people that come from the Pentagon you know and and through this pipeline they teach you how to speak to anybody you know and and that's that's why this carefield is so great is no matter you know what our rank is we're we're taught to that level and say hey you need to be respectful you're you're going to be speaking to you know not just ncos not just enlisted but but officer as well and you need to be you know know your [ __ ] but also speak respectfully as well professionally um and I think that's what the carefield is well known for is is they instill that into us at a very very young stage in the pipeline and that's what I really liked is regardless if you sucked or not they they're like hey you need to fix this do this and then if you didn't you're cut like you're gone that's great so that was good yeah you want to know you want to know if you know something or somebody else knows something have them teach it or try and teach it that's how you truly know if you if you you truly know the material so all right so taking a I I got a little far ahead probably but taking a step back no no that was that was my me but it's four months in development and then you go to BMT um did you go to you went to like a normal BMT flight right yes or did you hit okay so you you graduate BMT and then you go to selection what was like how did that look well going to BMT was a little bit harder they don't necessarily forer for me they didn't necessarily set a time side set time aside words uh to they're hard I know you you go through the development you're you're on top you're here you're ready and then they tell you hey you're going to be going to BMT for like 2 and 1/2 months you're going to lose a lot um and that was true like I lost a lot only because we didn't get that time for sear in particular we didn't get that time to to work out more to run more so on and so forth but I went through CO as well um so that didn't help but being a female flight they just didn't set that time aside so I just had to request to my MTI hey like can I go down there and do some Pull-Ups going of go down there you know and and run a little bit more as long as you had your buddy little system um you could go down there and do some more so that's probably something um to be aware of is like if you're going through you may have to request a little bit of that time and then obviously the situps are different the push-ups are different everything is different so asking hey can I do a little bit extra to do the sit-ups and the push-ups that I actually need to do in the in the pull-ups um can I do those on my own time so that to be aware of right after BMT went straight to selection uh right over across the street to Chapman um and yeah still still three- week long course uh week one is on Bas week two is is base and then week three is is the field portion uh still focusing a lot on time management is where they really see hey does this kid have some time management skills I sucked at time management really I did I was a perfectionist I needed to have everything right and that that led to a lot of sleepless nights uh me I was okay with it because that's just where I wanted to be but a lot of a lot of guys were just like yeah I can get this done in like a few hours and I'm good and I'm just like man how did you do can you teach me how to do that uh time management attention to detail was a really big one and just learning how to that's where they teach you how to take notes specifically cuz they want you to to all be the same and be organized but yeah that was pretty much how the selection was going I'm on a tangent sorry you're not on a tangent if you see if you see us looking down we're taking notes yeah it's the point of the podcast no yeah we totally oftentimes we bring guests on and then we zone out when they talk that's how you make a good podcast no problem I wanted to ask you some questions about selection there because you you really hit on it and we had already decided that we were going to ask you this question beforehand but you're awesome which is how you got there first but how much did you depend on your team in those times because like you've alluded to were losing people people were failing events people were doing better or worse like you said that you felt behind and you had to ask some teammates for help how important was that team aspect when you're going through selection I'm glad you asked that question because a lot of guys you know they they look at these career Fields like any carefield they'll they look at them very you know they're glorified right in in some way or another do some cool stuff like I want to do the cool stuff and they don't realize that they're going in thinking that they can just do it on their own and you can't you absolutely can't regardless how how high your ego is and how independent you think you are you will not make it if you do not depend on your team and I will tell you that right now how many times I had to depend on my team and I wasn't I mean I was not the best sear candidate by far there was so many guys that were so much better than than me that I could list off of my team that I'm just like that dude was good right but regardless if you're the best or you know you're you're you're just making it you have to depend on other other people that team Dynamic is so so important and we were taught that through the pipeline hey you're going to have to depend on each other and if I'm if I'm sucking at something this guy's doing really good at it go to that guy and figure out figure out what he's doing you know say hey teach me how to do this because that's the only way you're going to make it together one you have to you have to instill that trust right so the crap you go through when you hit Fair child is a whole another level than selection you if you don't have trust if you don't have communication you know and I'm speaking like this is a [Laughter] marriage as you're going to get yeah is to the Air Force is to the Air Force you might as well be married baby um if you don't trust your guys to your left and right and I'm sure this is the same as any any pipeline um if you don't trust those guys you're going to be left by yourself and that's going to be 10 times harder uh so that team Dynamic is so it's so crucial so crucial and when you get to Fairchild and I'm kind of going a little bit ahead um they coaches and Cadre know how to distill in instill that in you and and I'm sure you guys know that you you've got your um your glorious uh workouts that you do and your and your uh smoke sessions that you do that that might last three or four hours depending on how small of a screw up that you've done so in those moments you're relying hey dude it's all right you got it like whether it's just pushing each other along or like hey can you help me out on this I don't know how you just did that Stitch and I need you to tell me how you did it like what is an attention step again like so and some people are naturally going to orient to that stuff a little bit faster it's just the way that teams go some people you see them pick it up right away I remember I went through the pipeline with a kid named Chris Chris was perfect at everything the first time he did it and it was literally to the point like Chris how did you figure out how to do this he's like I don't know I just I just picked it up so I want to talk timeline a little bit so you got out of selection congrats we crushed it and then you're getting ready to make the move from San Antonio up to Spokane up to the sear Mecca what did that what did that timeline look like how much time did you spend kind of in between that move to fairell okay so I'll go back a little bit in selection they've got iterations right they have when I went through Alpha through Echo and that Alpha through Echo would all transition up there at different times of course but they would all eventually go up to pre-team and stay on pre-team now I think they've changed that a little bit now um I was at Alpha um iteration but I think they do it from 01 to 10 now so depending on what your class cycle is going to be because in Fairchild you have two class Cycles a year a winner class which is the best class I'm just kidding um obviously got it's got to be hard you know what I mean went through a winter class I was tougher than you obviously and then you have a summer class so I was 2202 which is a winter class O2 was always a winter class um but I think in selection they have that 01 to 10 so you could be like 2401 and 2402 all the way to 10 so for me when I graduated that alfit iteration I I stayed I stayed Schoolhouse there selection for like six weeks it took them a little while to get us up to Fairchild and I caution guys that that point they think that they have completely you know they're they're high here they're like oh I got selected I'm I'm this you know I'm this badass now yeah check yourself because you can still get kicked out by doing some stupid stuff over there and there's been a lot of people that's done some stupid stuff there and then has just got kicked out of the the entire pipeline they never make it up to Fair child so check yourself after go up to Fairchild um and then you're on pre-team is what they call it so that's where uh Coach Travis Barrett up there you're you're treated like a professional athlete I'll tell you that uh that's where Coach Travis is what we call him um he focuses on basically focuses on um see pretty much lifting mechanics you focus on lifting mechanics you focus on correcting imbalances and then focusing on longev longevity what you need before you hit team if you're underweight like I was trying to get you you know as as heavy as you can get but in a in a um in an athletic standpoint right in a in a healthy standpoint because you've got 15 phases on team I believe there's 15 phases there's a lot of phases like 13 to 15 phases on team and you lose lose I mean some guys will lose from 10 to 25 to 30 pounds a phase sometimes depending on the phase y yeah can you guys hear me okay because my headphones just died no you sound great got you I was not prepared sorry um yeah get your [ __ ] go to station one you failed this station I worked out with him as a good excuse um so yeah so pre-team since I was an outfit iteration that first iteration I was on pre-team for 6 months which for me was good because I needed I needed to prepare I needed a lot more to prepare you think that the workouts at selection are hard you go to Fairchild and there I'm telling you it's a different game your workouts are are two to three hours long and that is built pre-team is built to break you down and build you back up for team and you're constantly being broken down every single time and we knew this because we were just like man I don't want to do this [ __ ] today they're gonna it's gonna be two three hours of just you know if somebody didn't throw up or somebody didn't pass out in a workout it was it was it was rare it was very TR brought a weak yeah brought that weak sauce that's what you should it's because you didn't respect his workouts that's what you should tell us I I went to a a conference um earlier and peaches and I talked about this conference and I uh spoke I spoke to um to a lot of people about my third day being up at Fairchild it was on my third day and we were doing we were doing 400 meter Sprints and I mean I was pretty ready I was I was I was pretty good by that point I was maybe sitting at like a and this is not a great score but I was sitting at like a 1015 1020 mile and a half and we needed to have it under 11 and under and I was like hey that's good for me I'm hitting it that's good we're doing these 400 meter Sprints we're at the eighth ninth one and I am hacking I'm like I come to the Cadre and at that time was Sergeant Pendleton and he was a a great great pre-team Cadre um really got our team to mesh very very well and that's what pre- team is all about is getting getting all the guys to rely on each other um to to Sol ify everyone together before teen because you're not going to make it on teen if you can't make a bond like an unbreakable bond is what they're trying to make right the Cadre is trying to make an unbreakable bond with you on pre-team before you hit team so you're successful so I'm on my third day we're hitting these Sprints and I go I was like I can't do this anymore I can't I can't breathe I'm about to pass out and Sergeant Pendleton looks at me he's like Amon James it's funny how you think you have a choice and I'm like huh yeah it's it's called the Air Force not the air friends Courtney huh and that's when it hit me I'm like okay so went back ran until I passed out and the sear Medics came to me and was like just give her a second she'll come back and but that was great because he saw my limits and then I saw my limits and I'm like okay I I need to push these limits a little bit more and that's what made us great was yeah you don't have a choice go up there and do it the IP doesn't have a choice so do it I don't care I don't care so absolutely you know what you could have used during that time you probably could have used some hoist that would have been really helpful for you at that time of Max effort it hydrates better than water you can go to ones ready.com and check out drink hoy.com use our code at checkout no big deal and that's what we call an organic adre in your- face peaches yeah you got me on that one I was like where where are we going with that where are we going with I got it I was I was yeah the ho is good the ho is good it's one of the only three DOD approved beverages used for rehydration it hydrates 110% better than water that's a real thing thank you go to drink hoy.com use code one's ready to checkout I like the dragon fruit it's obviously the best flavor um so I want to talk about pre-team and I want to talk about kind of the Dynamics of team and again I'm I'm going to put a plug out there uh G here.a Mill has has a great list of attributes for successful SE uh Seer specialist candidates all kinds of stuff so go check that out but you got on his on a pre-team and you had to spend about six months so those times are always going to vary but it's a question that we get often is how long am I going to spend on pre-team and then when team starts how many how many folks did you start with on team um so yeah you're right on pre-team it really depends that Alpha class I was six months Echo could be a month or two so that Echo class sometimes could be pushed to another cycle if they don't get all their prerequisites done and I'm going back a little bit and I'll hit team in just a second um but what to know about pre-team is you have to get all your prerequisites done you first have to go through the three we SE course as a sear candidate right because why would you not go through something that you're going to be teaching so you go through that course and then you go through um an indoctrination course which is it's like selection on steroids that indoctrination course um which is another kind of kick in the gut uh you lose another a lot of a lot of good people again there whether it be through medical reasons or Integrity reasons you lose a lot of people through there uh you get on team and we in particularly so classes have have had higher um higher numbers in general because they've just needed more people uh but the attrition rate overall I would say is still very very high so starting from development all the way through The Apprentice course which is just on team is still extremely high throughout the entire thing I would still probably say it's like 90% now on team gotten a lot better I mean you've seen articles that have said I don't know the attrition rate has has lowered a lot more on team but people don't realize how many people have been lost throughout the process um which is a lot so we get on team I think we started with like 60 maybe 60 sometimes it's more because people get like I said people are like all over the place they get pushed onto different Cycles they have a medical thing that they need to to figure out and they're they're pushed to you know or they've got to have their their PT a little bit better it really just depends um they'll be on pre-team for maybe a maybe a year depending on um but I would say maybe 60 and then we graduated with um 44 we graduated with 44 so okay and you mentioned it earlier there's you know the 15 phases I'm not going to expect you to like walk through every single one of them but I know a l just couple of questions just about The Apprentice course in general is you know how long is it and then what were the phases that you struggled with the most oh uh The Apprentice course is five and a half months long can we just round that up six months sounds great six months six months sounds way better I can't you can give me the training days you can tell me however it is that you want this is your podcast you do whatever you want technically it's five and a half months um I like to call it six months because that's just what it it felt like it just felt like an eternity uh The Apprentice course is going to be about 6 months long and then you have your 13 to 15 phases you have five critical phases throughout those that you have to pass one the first course that you typically will go through is your CSS which is your um your core survival skills is what is what they call it or the older Ser guys would call it fam so if you hear guys call it fam it's it's CSS um and that is another kick in the gut uh especially going through a a winter class that was that was rough I don't give off a lot of body heat so I struggled a lot I struggled to get my assignments done still time management task saturation that's where you learn um you know sleep how you how you function with sleep deprivation and food deprivation that's kind of where you get an all-encompassing and you lose a lot of people through CSS through that first phase um it it only just gets harder and harder and there's no really smooth transition to tell you the truth it just kind of it just kind of kicks you and you're just in it um that was that was a hard phase for me that's where I started to get uh a little bit of frostnip because some of the some of the um gear just wasn't fitting me right um that next phase which is also a critical phase is your navigation phase and that was also in a in a winter class so that was that was also rough for me that was the first time where I thought I was going to quit I didn't feel like I I wanted to quit in CSS um but in in my navigational phase I I did um my toes were hurting really bad they were going to medically take me out of that phase and um I looked at the sear medic and I was like I'll haunt you for the rest of your life if you take me out I was like I've lost a lot and sacrificed a lot to be here I don't want to I don't want to go so I'm not gonna say any names but they kept me in which is good um but yeah I got I got frostbite for sure uh that's what I struggled with a lot is staying warm and and kudos to the guys that you know I I had to Buddy up with and Tents and stuff because if it wasn't for their body heat I I wouldn't have survived no no way would I survived by myself um because I I had to rely on other guys body heat to to keep me alive um and so kudos to to the guys on my team but yeah I I wanted to quit I saw I saw a guy really good guy was going to be a super great sear specialist you could just tell like this guy's gonna be good and and I remember we uh we had just a spontaneous uh firecraft and I had forgotten all my [ __ ] I had only had my axe so it was going to be just an Axe firecraft and it sucked uh because I I was like I I don't know what I'm going to do I I was at the low of the low um and I had lost I had lost all of it right there and that was where I realized you know hey this is probably going to be it for me I I saw one guy quit and he was a great guy we were all the way down in a valley and he was walking up the hill going to talk to the codre telling him that he didn't want to make it and now it's harder to quit now in the middle of a phase um they normally codr will make you go through that phase first and then let you kind of decide after that phase is done because sometimes it's just kind of in the moment you're very emotional you're like I'm quit and I'm done and and it's a little bit harder to quit now in in a phase it's not hard to quit but in the middle of a phase when you're on team it's a little bit harder to quit they'll kind of push you a little bit more and then if you're still really wanting to then you can this guy seemed to really want to quit for a while uh maybe because of I think family reasons and I saw him walk up that hill and I was like I think I'm going to follow him I think I'm going to follow him and I I finally just took a second and I'm like man this sucks uh I'm cold I'm wet I don't have any of my gear I'm GNA fail this firecraft because I don't have any of my stuff um and I just want to get out of here I'm not comfortable I'm not comfortable right and how many times you would have had to walk all the way up that hill though exactly you could have at least stay yeah do we go through things and we're just not comfortable right so I look to the guy at my left and I look to the guy at my right and I'm like I just need to take a little bit of a p a perspective and I look to the guy on my left and I see that he's struggling too and I'm like well [ __ ] like I'm not the only one why am I being so selfish right I'm not the only one here everybody else with me and I remember I'm like well [ __ ] we're in all this together everybody's doing this together we're struggling together you know I'm not the only one that's cold so suffer in silence and just get get it done you know you're good so I I hit that I really hit that where I just like I don't want to do this anymore if you don't hit that then then you're doing something wrong then something something's wrong if you don't if you don't hit that at least once and think about it and be like I don't like it so there's nav I don't want to get off on a tangent and then um let's see next one is going to be um ITB which is instructional techniques base portion that's where your teaching really it Dives in um that's another core phase which I struggle in for the teaching cuz I had to retach a lot of different things cuz that confidence wasn't there that passion that I was teaching for wasn't there I was really focused on I'm stressed I need to hit this I need to do good at this the the heart wasn't really in it that's why I feel like I didn't do as well I was just focusing on I need to pass it right I just need to survive I'm in survival mode so another phase is going to be um ITF that's where you have a full day you get these uh field flight guys what they call pack carriers and you can go into the field flights and you get an A perspective of what a full day would be like teaching students at the schoolhouse at least so you have a a full day that you have to prepare um you have to um what's the words um um organize you have to organize your entire day however you want to do it based off of the location based off of how many students you have um based off of your route what are you going to hit first are you going to talk about water first what are your you know your your um what are your priorities what are the basic needs that you have to hit in this situation so uh that's another phase that you have to pass and we lost I think uh maybe one or two guys in that phase and that was in a later phase we probably hit maybe four months at that phase and you're still losing guys like that's can you imagine doing let's say a year and a half a year and a half of training in the pipeline and you this is a job interview people don't realize that the entire two years that I did this was a job interview the entire time there is no guarantee that you're going to hit the end so if you don't hit the end of that Apprentice course you're done and these guys realize that like they went through the entire thing and two months before graduation they were cut so sucks to suck I don't know what to tell you yourself like it it hurts yeah that's the thing about pipelin yeah like that was a great Candace Owens quote by the way fantastic life sucks get a helmet I don't know what to tell you I'm too pregnant for this great job C but people people don't realize that stress and we try to communicate that as much as possible like the pipelines it's the most fun that you'll ever do you know for the PJ pipeline you're jumping out of planes you're learning how to dive and for the controllers you're calling in air strikes and you're actually talking to talking to people on a plane and they do you know what you ask them to do but it's evaluation every single day and it mentally weighs on you like you go in every single day and you're like hey if I'm not on my game today this could all be for nothing yes yeah I think that's very very important um je uh let's see we talked about ITF and then you have en which is your evasion and Escape phase that that was probably that was my second hardest phase maybe it was my first I don't know um that that was rough it was cold and then it was rough trying to to give an overall review of it it's it's where you have to evade you have to escape and evade Cadre you have to escape and evade uh whether it's a local Patrol in the area like they'll take they'll take you know police guys they'll take tracking guys they'll take uh tracking dogs um they'll take all these guys and they'll put them together and they'll try and find you something that the enemy would probably do right um and if you get caught you have a lot of consequences so resistance training really plays a role into that um I struggled with that a lot really really heavy um did well sucked at evading in my group great at resisting uh that's where it led me to resistance training which was great but um that was a rough phase for me mentally mentally was a was a was a a rough stage um yeah I don't know apparently so because because I could see you as you're as you're sitting here looking at it I could see it in your eyes just recounting everything you're like 100% oh boy just just haunting dude man yeah [Music] um yeah it takes you back I mean you think about yeah you think about these things and it and it definitely takes you back and you're like man this was tough but how tough would it be for someone who is actually captured right it'd be 10 times worse so it's like I I I didn't really go through stuff but man it does and you you think about it it does haunt you um but I'm glad the the training was great um really puts into perspective of what could happen um and you get to see what kind of grit you have you you really do get to see what kind of grit you have and it's really that's where I realized that it was a lot more mental than so so much physical but it really is more mental than anything and if if you if you can't if you can't get it together up here you're you're probably you're probably not going to not going to make it so so I've mentioned it a couple times and I just wanted to to kind of ask you a question kind of pull that thread a little bit so the attributes of a successful Seer specialist candidate you can find them over at goseer af.mil um but there's a whole bunch of things in here right and you just said you know one of them kind of keyed me in was grit you know grit that work ethic they have a bunch of stuff listed here everything from you know ownership of Errors intelligence is in the cogni uh cognitive function area you have to have high level problem solving and multitasking what are some of those what are some of the most important attributes you leaned on during these times we talked about your hard phases we talked about your you know your great take on perspective and really not getting caught up in moments you know that's a high emotional intelligence or an EQ sort of U function what are some of those attributes that you saw from those successful Seer candidat that you're like they got it um I think you have to humble yourself uh I know I'm not GNA I'm not g to um call him out by name but there was there was a guy on my team uh he was a a previous NFL player he was already high like he's done it he's he's done the stuff and he's really good at the physical stuff just crushed everything was great a little bit older guy and um he's just great at everything naturally you know uh but he had to Humble himself at some point and and it was great to see that growth because we saw that in all of us not just him but but we saw that in all of us that we had to Humble ourselves and say hey I need help too you know um even the best guys on our team they needed help as well so humbling yourself is I think really really key you talked about intelligence I really like that attribute only because in this job is continued education and that's one of the reasons why I went for it is because I love continued education and I love to continue to get that exponential amount of knowledge and that's why I love this career field is intelligence is very very key there can be a lot of sear guys that make it through the course that could be greyman or it could be you know maybe maybe the best guy maybe the average guy but if you don't keep up with current events if you don't better yourself and learn the things that you need to learn you're not going to be a good sear specialist you can be in the career field and still not be a good SE specialist only because you're not doing the [ __ ] that you need to do in order to pass that along because what is the ultimate goal we're not the the important ones right I didn't join this career field to be the hero I wanted to teach the heroes like I want to make sure that the other guy can be the hero right so in this career field I think having that attribute of of that intelligence of that continued education and and always doing that this is a 247 job this isn't this doesn't stop when you graduate like hey I got this Beret and I'm a sear guy now I'm cool no like go out there continue to hone your skills and and don't lose you know don't lose these these skills if you don't do them and continueing that I think is very very important obviously Integrity is going to be you know pretty pretty high up there as well because we lost a guys we lost a lot of guys due to Integrity like you had you had one guy that was in uh CSS and fam he's stealing from the Cadre refrigerator because he wanted food because he couldn't take it anymore he literally couldn't take it anymore so he stole the cod's food and then got kicked off for it what a bold move though I mean if you're gonna if you're gonna go hard in the if you're gonna go hard in the paint you might as well steal from the coder steal from the at least he's not stealing from you guys I steal from the C not you guys he did so we had we had a bear box and we had inventory and he was stealing our food as well so oh see see that's messed that's messed up there go um anyway so yeah integrity and obviously that grit um I talk about like being stubborn you know having a little bit of that grit but to a certain level like an intellectual level of stubbornness not just like that child childish stubbornness um but just saying no you're not going to beat me screw you I have these guys I have you know I have my brothers to my side we have this and sometimes it kind of does feel like us against the Cadre and if it doesn't feel like that then then maybe you're doing something wrong cuz sometimes it should feel like that as like hey it it it it it solidifies that Bond a little bit more and you're like okay we're going to get together and we're going to figure this out um so that grit to just don't don't quit and I'll um if you guys want I have like a a notepad that I I started on pre-team because I needed I needed something mentally to write down and I wrote down that and that was like two years ago now that I wrote it down and in this conference that I went to I had read it out and I was like man I didn't realize I still had this in my notebook and I lifted it up and I was like this looks like [ __ ] but it's still some really good notes and there was just a few key aspects in there of you know what it helped for me to get through so if you want I'll read those out um and then and crit I'll have to think of some more but just just being okay not being comfortable like you just have to be okay with that um and being okay being broken down because you because you ultimately are they are building you into a machine You're Building you into a machine um to be professional uh to make sure that well if we give up then we're going to give up on you know our the people that really need us the most is is trying to give that information to um high risk of isolation um and if we give up during team during pre-team during any of the pipeline then yeah it shows you don't you're not cut out for it so yeah for sure you definitely have to be comfortable being uncomfortable that's you know you I mean that's the name of the pipeline really and mental fortitude yeah yeah and and also understanding that anything that the Cadre say to you or make you go through it's not personal I mean I guess it is in some way but they're not trying to weed you out they they're trying to see what you're made of and if you'll stick with it if you happen to quit you quit but they're going to uphold a standard and they're you you said it they're trying to build you and that's you know so they're they're building their replacement is really what they're doing um so fast forward a little bit what was you know you graduate you get your Beret what was that kind of first year as an instructor like for you so that first year you're still training I mean just because you get that Beret doesn't mean you're a sear specialist right and I didn't know that a lot of people don't know that when you get that Beret you're not a Ser specialist you still have to be certified into what you're going to teach and that's the greatest thing about it we have these afis we have you know these um um these guidelines that you have to meet in order to actually teach what you're going to teach so you have a lot of different a lot of different phases you can go into you have water you have uh the field flights you have resistance training um uh you've got parachuting you know you have those four different areas that you can go into and they used to just send you straight to the field flights and and then you would stay there for two three years get your CRM and then um and then you could go to either a different flight or you could go to a different matcom um but now they have guys sending straight out to different mcoms which is a little scary right to different bases like right when they get off team me I was sent straight to resistance training so you go to you know that that that flight and then you have to certify on what you're going to teach and it took me I don't know like I would say six to eight months to certify um and then so that's what it looked like for me that first year was just certifying hey I need to I need to teach this this this and this and at a certain level and if I don't you know and I'm evaluated on that and so you're evaluated on your role play if you go up to you have academics as well you're evaluated on you know um on your seven steps that you do that you are taught in selection you have a seven-step lesson and you're taught on those seven steps and you're taught on ice and you're taught on you know your rapport with your students um so certifying after graduating you certify and then also after graduating to hit that um to hit that level three I believe you graduate as a level three and to get that level five you have to go to Airborne for a month and then you go to Arctic training which is up at um Barrow Alaska the locals call it UT akic uh but you go up there uh for a little over a week and then yeah that was that was another rough story um which I think my I think my phase that I went through to Arctic training is on uh airport Alaska it's on the Smithsonian Channel they're actually starting to to bring it out they had like a a news crew come out a documentary they wanted to do a documentary they normally do it on like airports like small airports um but yeah you could check that you could check that out that'd be cool there's some Team guys on there for sure but yeah that's a little bit of what it looks like is just certifying and the field flat guys will probably have the longest certification is they most guys would take up to a year to certify so okay well I mean that's you know then that's not uncommon ac across you know Air Force afsc's I mean just for one the concept of hey you're always training okay you graduate you get your bra you get your three level whatever you're you're always training you're never done I mean even at even once you you get to the the higher ranks you're still training you're still exactly trying to improve uh um so that's that's not different for anybody else out there but um let's see Aaron what do you got based off of I want I know I know that you're still like you've been in for three years now four years at this point and you're still on your first kind of assignment correct did that go through are you talking yeah yeah yeah I've been in I've been in for more than three years Courtney so that was not directed at me my bad I had a I had a lapse I had a lapse up here I'm I do have one good nice I do have one question for you so H how much input do you have you mentioned the different phases right so you mentioned that you can go to a different mcom I know that we're having brand new you know three L seers show up at the two series units and show up at our qss and show up to other osss which is Operational Support squadrons um trying to limit my acronym use but how much input do you have into that process because I it's seir and one of the my favorite stereotypes about seir is everybody immediately wants to go to parachuting like everybody wants to be a jump master and go oh yeah oh yeah oh 100% 100% see see your guys at an rqs you know what they do they play jumps that's what they do no kidding um but how much how much input do you have into that process or is it meritocracy based how do you decide who goes where out of The Apprentice course and onto your first assignment uh so first to answer your question peaches is I've been in uh let's see three years will be this February will be three years so I haven't been in very long um so I uh this is still my first assignment which is at Fairchild so I stayed at the schoolhouse um and went straight to resistance training and then I don't really have much to say on um how that process really looks because it's ever changing um it it's so flexible and really they're trying to get numbers at some point and then now they're starting to bring it down um to where they've they've hit those numbers they've hit those quotas and then they're they're starting to bring that down a little bit more but I would say this last class half of them went to a different mcom and then half of them stayed at Fairchild typically that that's just not very traditional of how they used to do it like I said they would stay and they would hone their skills as an instructor they would learn um all these different all these different uh areas and then they would go out so for example you know um being pretty valuable on knowing policy and Doctrine for resistance training like that is something super key you know nobody really cares about the role play right because the schoolhouse is great for roleplay but you go to a different matcom and you don't really do roleplay it's that policy and Doctrine what can you teach about that policy and Doctrine to you know a a guy that might be high risk of isolation uh so that's what I had just went through was that three months um and that's kind of new as well uh because we were at resistance training and then academics is separate from that um and they're like okay well how can we be better here and then how can we make you guys more valuable well let's just have you guys augment go up there for three months and then you're supporting a low man shop as well uh because these guys can be stuck there for two years at a time and they work over the weekend their day office Tuesday Wednesday and these guys have been here for two years at a time you have you know an NCO there that have been there for a while as well and that kind of takes a toll on you and especially a family as well so we're trying to rotate through so like I said everything is Ever Changing uh this next class it might be different maybe not a lot of people might go out to different match coms uh depending on you know the numbers that they're looking for uh they might all stay here they might all go to the field flights and I know um the field flights are kind of hurting right now they've taken a lot of people from RT and would go there and and if you certify at RT Maybe you can ask to go to to go to water if you certify at Water you can ask to go to parachuting so it's it's really just a rotating you know um a rotating cycle that's really the only kind of input that I would have on it is that it's not the same ever it it changes where are you most excited about going to next what do you want to do for your career as your next step uh at first I wanted to go to water uh because I I was obviously I worked in Marine Biology I had all my dive shs besides I think rescue and then um I really wanted to go to dive school really bad and I still want to and probably when I get back from this TDY um that I'm on right now because I'm here at weapon school um uh I'll probably go back and start augmenting start doing dive PT and then see if I can go to go to dive school but uh water would be really cool but another matcom like would be would be awesome for me because I feel like I've I've been here I've been you know an instructor here for um over a year now I've certified in inrt I know policy and Doctrine um so I think you know that could help I could actually instead of just saying here are the slides I could say no this is actually policy and Doctrine and this is what they teach and this is what you need to do uh so I feel very very confident in that level um to be able to go to a different mcom and say hey this is a [ __ ] that you need to know um but yeah that can be expanded all the time right uh so if you're not augmenting I would say this to to se candidates after you graduate if you're not augmenting at other field flights um well not just at field flights but at other flights then you're doing something wrong so nice well Court I want to say thanks for coming on we always end with an advice piece here so if you could if you could talk and I I heard you earlier you said that you're you know engaging with other Seer candidates that are thinking about coming in if you could give somebody some advice so they could put that in their back pocket to get him through the two years of training it takes to be a sear specialist and beond what would you tell them this is where I bring out my notebook and you see that it's really old very old don't throw that away either it's the only thing that I will tell you as somebody that's been in a little bit longer than you have save those notebooks fill that fill that notebook up put it on a shelf somewhere go back and read it occasionally you'd be surprised how smart you are in retrospect I will tell you you will have a lot of right in the rain notebooks on a shelf after your entire Pipeline and my advice is just to go through those and and read them again or even rewrite them uh okay advice for um for any sear candidates going through this is what helped me going through the pipeline hope it can help you guys uh my number one was just don't quit just don't quit it's super simple um I had to write it down to for it to get through my brain and that's fine uh remember your own why they will tell you to have a why hopefully in development or or in selection and say you need to have a why what that means is you need to have something strong enough to get you through training because if you don't if you say I just want to be a cool guy that's not going to cut it you need to have a strong enough why a strong enough enough passion as to why you're there to get you to continue because you're going to hit those those plateaus you're going to hit that wall and then you're going to be like you know that time where I was in nav and I wanted to quit I had to remember why I was there why am I doing this because I thought of that a lot I don't get paid enough to do this crap like why am I doing this you know so remember your own why and it doesn't your why can change my why changed a lot um throughout the pipeline and that's perfectly fine they're all still my why I just kind of you know changed a little bit as they went be confident I struggled with that at the beginning um and if you if you act like you know what you're talking about it looks good so just kind of fake it till you make it and that's perfectly fine until you build up that confidence and that's what the pipeline is meant for is to build that confidence up um make small goals um like I said earlier at the beginning of the podcast don't don't look too far ahead because you get distracted and then you know something's going to happen in that day and then you're like oh what's the next phase going to look like what's our career going to look like you know what's Fairchild going to look like when I haven't even made it to selection yet um so take it one day at a time and make very very small goals whether that be you know hey how am I going to make it to the next hour how am I going to get this assignment done so on and so forth and then you are more than your physical capabilities I had to remember this because you know I I felt like I was very weak through through you know workouts you know I was still very strong and still you know was very very capable um but I felt like earning the respect of the other guys took me a little while and I didn't realize that it took me until I don't know maybe eating an eyeball out of a rabbit one guy told me that I earned his respect doing that or or um or pushing a 500 lb sled you know one day earning the respect of that or just you know going through a nav phase with just the same amount of of gear and and weight that those guys had and I was trudging through five six feet of snow the same thing they were so remember that you're more than your physical capabilities because it's really a lot of mental I'm almost done I promise imagine yourself already achieving your goal that's something that really helped me I had had this journal um and I had had inside of that journal it had the entire year planned out and I said this is what I'm going to do I'm going to hit selection I'm going to hit you know Fair child I'm going to hit this not really trying to get ahead of myself but looking at the bigger picture um not getting lost in that picture and then I would have like a little vision board in that journal I just already imagined myself this is what I was going to do this is what I want so imagine yourself already doing it and then um know that you're good enough regardless you're going to mess up that's inevitable thank things are going to happen you're going to suck a lot you may suck seven days in a row but you are good enough regardless if you're there you have the grit you have you know what you need to do to be there you've made it this far um you're enough and just know that and then continue to help and guide others I just had to that's where my passion came from is helping and guiding others and then remember that Comfort is a silent killer that helped me a lot is because um if I was comfortable there was something there was something wrong so fantastic you crushed it absolutely crush it Courtney thanks for coming on we really appreciate it for everybody that's out there that thinks they want to try this crazy thing out for uh for Air Force Seer go over and check g.f. Mill it's a great resource for everything that you could possibly need need to use you know where to find us at ones ready.com make sure you're following liking subscribing just go ahead and caress that sub subscribe button and turn your notifications on we'd appreciate it the Subscribe button does it just caress it just give it a little little something just give it a little hey how you doing um courton do you have any socials you want to put out or anywhere that they can contact you if they want to or you want to just use us as your uh easy button uh I can just use you guys I mean I've got Instagram I've got Facebook and if people really want to look me up they can they can find me fantastic well thanks again for coming on we appreciate you everybody else train hard thanks for having me he

Channel: Ones Ready

Views: 7,508

Keywords: sere specialist air force, united states air force, sere specialist, sere specialist training, sere specialist day in the life, sere specialist pipeline, sere specialist interview, sere specialist graduation, sere specialist selection (sss) course, sere specialist podcast, sere specialist training pipeline, sere specialist ones ready, sere specialist air force pipeline, becoming a sere specialist, female sere specialist, air force special warfare, afspecwar, air force special op

Id: 2L43BxandUw

Length: 70min 31sec (4231 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 04 2023