Cam Campbell Interview

Transcript

Cam Campbell (00:00:01.03)
All right, hello world! I am Steel Cam and this is still The Real Resilience Talk Podcast. This is episode 78 and we are feeling great today playing the tracks by Machichi Rex. I usually use the other track, but today I just wanted to play Receipts, so that’s what it’s gonna be. All right, but, uh, as always, please, uh, understand this show is no reflection of or endorsement from any official organizations, to include The DOD, the Department of Defense, the Department of War, whatever we want to call it these days. And we may reference our experience, but we are not getting an endorsement from any of those organizations. And also, First Amendment is in full effect. So we’re going to talk about some hard subjects that need to be talked about, mainly on resilience, because I think that is— I’m biased— I think that is how we can keep moving forward. And y’all have heard my interpretation of that. But this show is inspired by the words of Dr. Maya Angelou, which is this: If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, shut up. No, she didn’t say shut up, she said change your opinion.

Cam Campbell (00:00:59.23)
All right, so starting with those words and looking at how we’re rolling forward, we got an amazing guest today on the show. Uh, Glenn Sturm is with us today. Uh, he is a man who defines resilience and has been a complete servant in his lifetime, but I’m gonna let him get into that and share that. So Mr. Glenn, thank you for being here today, sir. Thank you.

Glenn Sturm (00:01:19.18)
Well, thanks for having me, Cam. It’s, uh, you have a great show. Look forward to talk— our talk.

Cam Campbell (00:01:26.02)
I am looking forward to it as well, my friend. And, uh, thank you, uh, for, for joining and, and for just enthusiasm. And we have fun with the sound checks and had to battle traffic. We had to battle all the things, but weather and all the other things. But guess what we do? We be resilient and brilliant. And here we are, my friends, being water as usual. Like Bruce Lee said, be water, my friend. In that spirit, sir, um, Glenn, What is resilience to you, and can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Glenn Sturm (00:01:52.11)
Well, I mean, resilience is hard to define in just an abstract term. Here’s what happened to me. On January 21st, 2009, I’m at the Atlanta airport at Gate B13 getting ready to get on a plane to Raleigh, North Carolina to go give a speech. And I’m sitting there and my phone rings. Well, back in 2009, we didn’t get a lot of spam calls. So I actually said, okay, well, I’ll answer it because I’m gonna have to return the call when I get to Raleigh. And it was one of my doctors on the phone. Well, I ran marathons in those days and did triathlons and stuff. And this doctor was one of the docs I did those with. And so she said on the phone, she said, Glenn, we got the results of the biopsies back. And I said, what biopsies? And she said, the ones we did in December. I said, this is January 21st. Okay, whatever. You know, when— I don’t know about you, but when I have medical tests, if I don’t get an answer, you normally just assume everything’s okay. And I said, okay, whatever. And she said, Glenn, they, um, came back positive.

Glenn Sturm (00:02:55.18)
You got cancer. And I said, what? She said, yeah, you got cancer and we need to see you immediately. And I thought for a second. Now, the doc— I’m the only lawyer in that group that runs. They give me abuse all the time just because it’s a fun thing for doctors to do, to give lawyers a hard time. So I thought for about 30 seconds. I said, okay, who puts you up to this? It’s not a funny joke. And she said, Glenn, you have cancer. I need to see you today or tomorrow. And I said, okay, well, I mean, holy smokes. And so, you know, it was like, it was just a total shock because they’ve been doing biopsies on me for almost 9 years. And I had never heard anything about it and everything had always come back negative or no answer. So I got on the plane and flew up to University of North Carolina and got to see a Clemson-Carolina basketball game. I’d never seen an ACC basketball game, so I’ve been looking forward to that. But I just started getting quiet. I’m normally not a quiet guy. And so I was into myself, but I had to get ready for that speech.

Glenn Sturm (00:04:08.06)
So I called my wife at the time and told her what happened. She’s very smart and everything. So, you know, we got through the process. I got on a plane, flew home, and had the biopsy the next day. And she— the doc came back, says, yeah, Glenn, it is positive for cancer. We need to get you in to see an expert, but it’s going to take a while because there’s only one of those experts in Atlanta. And so the one thing I learned about cancer more than anything else is the part— the most difficult thing is waiting. For the answers. Having no answer and you’re waiting is like, why? Why should it take this long? So anyway, it gave me a chance to read. And when I’m reading, I came across a gentleman who had died from my cancer, an article he had written. And when he died, he had just published this like a week or two before he died. He had had 6 months from his notice until he died. And he said how lucky he was. Well, that was in the first few sentences of the article. I’m sitting here thinking, how can you be lucky if you’re going to die of cancer and you know it?

Glenn Sturm (00:05:11.23)
And then he goes on to explain why. He said, well, he had had friends die in Vietnam. He’d had friends die of heart attacks. He’d had friends die in car accidents. But he had time. He had time to make things right with his family, time to hug his grandchildren, time to do all those things that his friends never had the time for. So he was blessed and he was thankful. And that was really eye-opening. I didn’t know how long I had. I never asked the question. But I made a decision that day that I would never, ever let cancer define me. I said, it’s not going to define me. I’m going to celebrate life every day. And I don’t know how long I’m going to get, but every day I’m here, I’m going to try to make the world a better place. And so that’s been my mission since January 21st, 2009. And, you know, I’ve done all sorts of funny things. You know, I’ve got the wonderful thing, I try to put a smile on somebody’s face every day. And then sometimes you have to make it more challenging. So you’re on the phone with a call center person, it’s obvious they’ve had a rough day.

Glenn Sturm (00:06:28.01)
’cause you can just hear it in their voice. And then you gotta make them try to laugh. You gotta say something that they’re gonna laugh about. You know, so the only way you can do that is make fun of yourself. And see, you do things to try to make ’em laugh. And you see somebody who’s not had a great day, you do it. You go through a drive-through and you give somebody a $10 tip. I mean, which, yeah, I can afford that, a lot of people can’t. You do something that shows somebody else that you appreciate them and you respect them. So you put a smile on their face. And then occasionally you’ll run into the person that’s having a rough day. And see, they always will figure out that I’ve got cancer. I’ve been on cancer now, I’m in my 18th year of continuous treatment. I’ve had over 6,300 days of oral chemo and over 530 days of IV chemo. And so, you know, they’ll say something. I said, well, you know, there’s one thing I live by. They said, what’s that? I said, we must all give up hope for a better yesterday.

Glenn Sturm (00:07:34.19)
I can’t change my cancer diagnosis. I can change tomorrow. I can make tomorrow a better day. I can make tomorrow a better day for somebody else. And when I do that by doing something for them or putting a smile on their face, it’s proven that when you do that, your life gets more positive. So when you put a smile on somebody else’s face, you end up with a smile on your face. When you put a smile on somebody else’s face, the chemical changes in your body that you get from the enjoyment that you get from helping somebody else, it just changes things. And so the last thing I learned, and I learned this actually from my dad, who was a career Army officer and from school teachers is only you can stop you. Nobody else can stop you. So I’ll give you the example that’s the easiest one for me to give. And so dad was an Army officer, career Army officer, World War II, Korea, Vietnam. And I’m going to sidetrack this for a second. If you look at the average combat arms people who were on active duty 9/11 who stayed for 20 more years, They had 6 times the days in combat my dad had combined in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam.

Glenn Sturm (00:08:54.18)
So, the toll we have placed on today’s veterans, the young veterans, is so much higher than it has been on other people. We don’t understand that because nobody talks about it. And when you have a CIB, Combat Injuries Badge, with 2 stars, that means World War II, Korea, Vietnam in combat. Everybody talks about those guys, the greatest generation. Yeah, they are. But we had drafts back then and people didn’t see as much combat and the war didn’t last as long. But back to only you can stop you is I was at a fourth high school and I’m second weekend camp at my fourth high school. And the teacher, we had a parent-teacher conference. And my teacher told my mom and dad that she didn’t think I should go to college, I should go to trade school because I didn’t have it in me. My mom just looks at me and said, okay, you made a great first impression. She didn’t say that, but that was what she was thinking.

Cam Campbell (00:09:54.06)
Yeah, how’s it look?

Glenn Sturm (00:09:56.21)
Yeah, and my dad was like, yeah, okay, I’ll kick your ass if you do that. And so, you know, About a week later, we had a test in Florida called the Florida Senior Placement Test. It was a test you took to get into the university system in Florida. It was like the SAT. And the scores came out and I was the first kid in my high school to ever get, in the history of the high school, to ever get a perfect score. So that wonderful— But I’m not college material. Exactly. So that teacher who said that I shouldn’t be going to college, I had fun with her asking her questions. I said, did you ever— when I came back my first semester of college, I’d done very well academically. I said, did you get in the University of Florida? Oh no, you didn’t. You went to teacher school. I said, did you ever have a 4.0? And she said, um, and I said, well, no, you went to a teacher school, so they gave 4.0s away. So were you ever ranked number 1 in your class? And I said, well, guess what? I’m all 3 of those things now.

Glenn Sturm (00:10:56.15)
I said, quit being judgmental. Don’t judge others. Try to help others. And if you make your mission to help other people, help other people find their way, teaching other people through their interests, not by just teaching rote memorization, I mean, it’ll change. You have the chance of changing a life. And if you change one life, you change the history of the world. Wow. That’s deep. Yeah. And it’s true though. And so when you work with people and put the smiles on people’s faces, and my friends and people who know me well know I do this, and they just kind of start laughing when they see me go into that mode. They, I mean, they, so basically I’m trying to help somebody else, but my friend’s there at like a lunch counter or something, and they see me go into that mode of trying to get a smile. And they start laughing. Well, guess what? Now I’m going to help two people today. Okay.

Cam Campbell (00:11:56.08)
Yeah, that’s true, because they over there laughing too.

Glenn Sturm (00:11:58.05)
Yeah, that’s right. And so the— but you see what I’m saying is, and, and, and for God’s sakes, be considerate of others.

Cam Campbell (00:12:06.11)
Yes.

Glenn Sturm (00:12:07.00)
I mean, I, I, I, I mean, the judgmental stuff drives me nuts, and so does, so does the, uh, you know, the The failure, I mean, there’s a TV ad on today about women saying, what’s a gentleman? A gentleman opens a door. Well, I’m 70 years old, and so I’m still single after that. It’s a different story, but I’ve been divorced now for my 18th year. I got served right after I got diagnosed. But that’s fine. I mean, it’s worked out wonderfully for me and for my kids. Um, when, when, you know, you’re in that tough situation, you know, you go over to a woman and you open a door for them and they say, oh, you don’t have to do that, I have a great answer for that. And you pick up the check for dinner, let’s do that. That TV commercial is, you’re not a gentleman if you don’t do these things. Well, some people don’t have the resources to do that.

Cam Campbell (00:13:05.11)
That’s facts.

Glenn Sturm (00:13:07.03)
Okay, and if you don’t have the resources, I don’t expect people to to do. But if you do have the resources— I ask the women, sometimes will object to me doing it, and I’ll say, well, I’ve got one rule. And they said, what’s that? I said, if I’m fortunate enough to see my mom again and I haven’t picked up the check and if I haven’t opened your door, she’ll give me more abuse than you could ever give me for doing it. Because my mom taught me that’s what I was supposed to do, and you don’t break mom’s rules. And things like that, but that’s a humorous way to approach it. It’s not a confrontational way to approach it. So what you try to do is you look for common ground too. And that’s the other thing people aren’t doing enough of these days. Well, my son is brilliant. Not smart, he’s brilliant. And his teacher one day said, Glenn, you know, Daniel’s smarter than I am. Daniel’s, I think, smarter than you are, no matter how smart you are. He said, and maybe he might be smarter than both of us combined. But Dan could be the most argumentative kid I’ve ever met because he was so smart and he was almost always right.

Glenn Sturm (00:14:19.07)
So we started a new rule. Instead of arguing, I said, we’re not going to talk about a subject until we find out the things about that subject we agree upon. And once we find out everything we agree upon, Okay, then we can look for our differences and try to understand our perspectives because it’s probably, it’s probably because you have information I don’t have or I have information you don’t have or maybe both those cases. But if we start with a foundation of agreement and then we go approach the issue with curiosity to find out what the other person knows that you don’t, it changes everything. And it turns it from a hostile environment to a learning environment and a curiosity environment. And if you want to create a better country, have a country of curious people. People are just inquisitive, not judgmental, just curious. I love curiosity. So I mean, I’m writing another book right now because It’s turned out that there’s something called an integrated multidisciplinary cancer team. How about that for a phrase? Also known as MDT.

Cam Campbell (00:15:33.23)
That’s a lot of syllables. I can’t spell it, but I think I’m pretty close.

Glenn Sturm (00:15:38.01)
Yeah, but think about this. An integrated multidisciplinary cancer care team. So how many people are on that team? Maybe as many as 50 people could be on it. Okay, but most people it’s like 5 or 6. But people who are getting treated by a team approach— well, it’s— there’s— that’s a good analogy. Imagine like you’re on the offensive line though, where you have to communicate with each other and you have to work together and you have to know what everybody else is going to do. Okay, there can be no drops of communication. I don’t— we had a drop, bad drop for me last year. I almost died because of it. But these teams, the people who are treated by these teams there’s a 70% reduction in the mortality rate on average. Did you hear what I just said, the number? 70%, 7-0, wow. 70% reduction on average in the mortality rate. Now, some of the cancers haven’t gotten that good. For instance, breast cancer’s only had a reduction of about 15%, and head and neck cancer’s about 16%. My case is 90% reduction. Okay, and so, so what does that mean? Well, it’s a group of people who work together and develop a consensus on treatment with the patient about how to help the patient.

Glenn Sturm (00:17:07.18)
So if you’re a silo-based approach, which basically might mean just a doctor only, there has been effectively no reduction in the mortality rates. So the question is, if you were facing a 70% reduction in the cancer rate, let’s say you were a company, a drug company, and you created a pill that was gonna reduce the average cancer rate, mortality rates to go down by 70%. How much would your company be worth? A lot. Yeah, a lot. Hundreds of billions, maybe trillion dollars. Well, these don’t, this is just people learning how to work together as a team. And a lot of cases you don’t have the resources in a community, because if you live in a town like mine, you don’t have all the resources you need. So then what if you’re the head of the hospital, what are you gonna do to make those resources available? Who are you gonna affiliate with so the resources are there? If you’re a major institution, What are you doing about it? So my next book is on this topic, and it goes through my history of cancer, that, you know, am I in my 18th year? And then for the administrators, there are 3 introductions.

Glenn Sturm (00:18:18.15)
There’s one for what the team is, the components of the team, the people. And then there’s one for the caregivers, and then there’s one for the hospital administrators. At the end of it, I’m not very polite about it. ‘Cause I said to those people, the question is whether your institution is providing this service. It isn’t, if it isn’t providing the highest quality service of a multi-dimensional cancer care team, how are you gonna fix this problem? If you can’t fix the problem, where should you send your patients? ‘Cause you shouldn’t have any more with you.

Cam Campbell (00:18:55.22)
That means what you guys are doing is not effective.

Glenn Sturm (00:18:58.00)
Right, exactly. So I wrote an introduction for the patients and it says, if your hospital isn’t doing this, where are you gonna go? Because I don’t know about you, but if I was facing with, let’s say a 50% death rate chance mortality rate, and we can reduce that by 70% on average, that means we’re gonna go to 85%. Survival rate from 50. So do you think I would— do you think I’d want to make that happen? Yeah. So the other question is, is this started— there’s a fact statement, it started in Australia and Europe, these teams, this team approach. In Germany, it’s now a statute that the team’s decision on how to treat the cancer is the process you’re going to follow. The doctor can’t do a different process without getting the team’s approval. Um, that’s how far it’s gone there. We’re well behind the curve. Uh, but you know, why haven’t we talked about this? Why hasn’t this been on the national news?

Cam Campbell (00:20:06.02)
That’s a great— that’s a great question. And, and, uh, you know, we— I love the spirit of what you’re saying, and it’s not just spirit and happy talk, folks, that he’s saying. This is literal numbers and drops and reducing the mortality rate. And it really, it just, it’s like a law of nature when it comes to especially humans, but I think in all organisms on this planet, um, we’re better together. We’re better together.

Glenn Sturm (00:20:33.05)
Well, and absolutely we are. And let me give you a little more. So the Williams-Thompson study, which came out last year, the 56,187 cancer patients, okay, it validated these statistics. Okay, I mean, the NIH has published reports on it, but there’s an interesting— I mean, I’m getting ready to write an article on it and I’m writing a book on it and there’s about 30 articles that are part of it. The National— NCI, National Cancer Institute, has said in their recommendations on the decision-making, how you make the decision, that the patient should be in the meetings where these multi— teams are in place, multidisciplinary teams are in place, that when they have a meeting, that the patient should be there. I’m not aware of a thing, should, they should be there. Because it’s your life. Don’t you think you want answers? Yeah, it’s like, in the end, you’re gonna make the decision, but how can you make the decision if you don’t know what’s going on? Yeah, so we don’t know, right? And so guess what? How many institutions are putting the patients in those? Almost none. So there’s an NCI, which is, you know, basically one of the, the most powerful organizations, says you should do this, or at least give the patient the opportunity, and almost nobody does it.

Glenn Sturm (00:22:04.14)
Why is that? Well, a lot of cases it’s because the doctors don’t want them there. I’ve read this, I’ve read the study, the, yeah, the focus groups on it. And I mean, you wouldn’t believe how much I’ve read about this stuff. The focus groups say the doctors don’t want the patients there because it might inhibit their conversations. Well, if you can’t, I mean, you can think about that. If it’s going to inhibit your conversation, how do you ever tell the patient to start with what’s going on?

Cam Campbell (00:22:30.23)
That just shows how the, the out of touch factor. Yep.

Glenn Sturm (00:22:35.03)
Well, and so let’s go a bit. You could get further. So why isn’t it on TV? Well, who’s the biggest advertiser? One of the, well, I don’t know if the biggest, but let’s say one of the very biggest advertisers in the country. It’s the pharmaceutical companies.

Cam Campbell (00:22:50.05)
That’s exactly true.

Glenn Sturm (00:22:52.09)
Who’s next? Maybe it’s the insurance companies. Okay, well, the insurance companies, I mean, think about me. I’ve been on chemo for 18 years, 6,000 days, 6,300 days plus, and all the IV. 55 surgeries. Okay. They don’t like me because I’ve lived too long. If, if we’re not as successful, I would have died quicker. Well, I mean, they’ll never say that, but the bottom line is the actuaries will tell you that there’s a certain duration people should last. Well, if this system is so much better, it means people are gonna be on chemo longer, but they’re gonna have a high quality of life.

Cam Campbell (00:23:31.00)
That’s more money, right?

Glenn Sturm (00:23:32.09)
That’s more money. Yep. A lot more money. And so, I mean, there are all sorts of constituencies that I don’t know for sure that they’re fighting this, but it doesn’t make any sense. There are people who’ve written articles that say it’s not accurate and they’ve been totally debunked. So, I mean, my first book was Cancer Set Me Free, and that goes to the resilience thing.

Cam Campbell (00:23:56.05)
That’s the first book.

Glenn Sturm (00:23:58.06)
My first book I wrote. Yeah. Yeah, because basically, I— folks, yeah. And so what happened was I was a big-time lawyer, you know, chairman of major law firm, corporate department, major law firm, then on the compensation committee, basically one of the guys that ran the firm. And I had to stop because, you know, we were doing billion-dollar transactions and the insurance companies were scared to death I’d screw something up. So, you know, so I had to stop practicing. Well, guess what? It did set me free. So now I’m a pretty good astrophotographer going all over the world shooting eclipses and writing books and playing a decent round of golf. Another thing else, but I’m living a long time. And you’re free.

Cam Campbell (00:24:45.22)
You’re free from the constraints of the rat race.

Glenn Sturm (00:24:50.08)
Exactly. That’s amazing.

Cam Campbell (00:24:51.05)
So yeah, I get the title now. I was like, oh, the title at first was like, hold on. Yeah, I got to, there’s got to be some more context.

Glenn Sturm (00:24:56.13)
Yeah, and so I’ve got these little green bands on me. I don’t know if you can see these things, but those things, they all say, “Celebrate life in lymphoma.” And on the inside of it, my son had seen the bands and he’s a lot younger than his two older sisters, but he has always made money and had money. He’s a bright little kid. On the inside of it says, you can’t even see it, but he made 15,000 of them. It says, “For my dad, DJS.” And that’s his initials. And he sent them to all the cancer centers who treat my kind of cancer. So, you know, it’s, how do you not celebrate that? I mean, my grandson, you know, I’m moving to be closer to him. Because we just, you know, he’s the center of the universe for me. And if I can make his life better, it’s fine. But, you know, it’s just one thing after another. What you do is to try to help others. And so there’s a young lady who you probably need to meet. She got diagnosed with brain cancer at the age of 19, has a boatload of surgeries, and she started the Brain Cancer Foundation.

Glenn Sturm (00:26:14.08)
And so at their next big meeting they’re having, which is got a fundraiser, there’s a 4-foot by 6-foot picture that I took climbing the mountains in Italy that she fell in love with. So I only sell one copy of any picture, but 100% of the revenue goes to support children’s health or something like her business that she’s put together, her foundation. I made a promise that I would do that with my talent. And, you know, it’s turned out to make me smile because I go there and tell the story and then see somebody write a ridiculous check for a photograph. Now, it’s the only copy that’ll ever be available, which makes it unique. But the real purpose of it is helping somebody else, which makes your life more fulfilling. So the fun part about it is at the very end of the thing when I’ve signed the picture at the end, I signed the back of it. That’s a different story. And I look at the person and said, do you want me to put one of one on the back of it? This is one of one issue images. So it’s the only one.

Glenn Sturm (00:27:22.22)
And they always get this big smile on their face. And I said, you can put it on there if you want to, but I’ll do it too. But even if you put it on, I’ll initial it. And so, I mean, it’s just a way of giving back. And so it’s something we’ve lost part of the art of recognizing how blessed we all are. So I live in this fairly wealthy city, to put it politely, but it’s got too many rich people.

Cam Campbell (00:27:54.23)
And call it like it is.

Glenn Sturm (00:27:58.04)
Yeah, well, and some of them have, you know, they think their lives are terrible or something. And they’ll complain about the United States or something. And then I finally look at them. I said, well, you know, they know I’m military. And I said, would you like to go on a trip, on a military trip with me? And they know that sometimes I’m able to arrange a carrier trip where we take people out to get them indoctrinated to military. They land on an aircraft carrier during workups. Then you get a cat shot and you take off. And so they think they’re thinking that, and you know, they’ll say, well, where are we going? I said, let me work it out and everything else. So we’ll get about a week to 10 days before we go. And they said, Glenn, we really want to know where we’re going. I said, well, we’re going to go to Mogadishu, Somalia.

Cam Campbell (00:28:54.17)
And they look at you and say, huh? I said, well, you think this country is so shitty. Well, I just wanted to show you someplace that really is.

Glenn Sturm (00:28:56.07)
That’s real And for some reason they didn’t want to do that. Okay. So, I mean, I don’t know what the current statistics are, but everybody in the United States, everybody who’s born here is blessed. Now, some are blessed a whole lot more than others, but we’re all blessed. And here’s the other thing is one of the things we found out at an institution, research institute that I’m involved with, is if you look at the inner city kids, their IQs are normalized the same as the kids in the nice areas. And the problem is, is they don’t have the opportunities or the parent leadership that they need. So, so the thing that we have a program called Science Saturdays where we bring smart kids— kids in any K can come, but we’re able to identify the smart kids at very early ages. And my theory has always been, and You know, theories are a lot of times wrong, so I’m going to say this could be wrong, but the, the kids who get into the gangs and become leaders of the gangs are the smart ones. That is true.

Cam Campbell (00:30:00.21)
Yes, that is very true.

Glenn Sturm (00:30:02.19)
So, but if you get those smart kids and you show them what they can do with science, you might change their track. And if you just change one track, you’ve changed the world. You change one kid.

Cam Campbell (00:30:15.11)
She said that You say you change one person’s life, you could change the whole world.

Glenn Sturm (00:30:20.09)
That is cool.

Cam Campbell (00:30:21.12)
Isn’t that true? That is.

Glenn Sturm (00:30:25.01)
And if you worry about that, you’re worrying about others and how to take care of others. Yes. And that changes your life because you’re, you know, you’re going to be successful all the time? No. But you’ll be more successful than others. I mean, I have a family that’s helped me because of my cancer. The father’s helped me out just volunteering. I pay him when he comes to help me on something. But the other night we had dinner and he’s got a, they’ve got a 12-year-old daughter. I never met her before, or about 3 weeks ago. And so one of the things I’m big about is we’re trying to figure out how to do this, is helping kids find scholarship money to go to school. Because I went to college on an ROTC scholarship. They paid tuition, books, everything. And I did well on the graduate exams. So I had a fellowship and they already paid for my master’s degree when I was on active duty. And then the GI Bill paid for law school. So basically my entire education was paid for by the government. And those scholarships are still available. But this young lady—

Cam Campbell (00:31:29.06)
Still available.

Glenn Sturm (00:31:29.18)
She is—

Cam Campbell (00:31:30.08)
Still available.

Glenn Sturm (00:31:31.14)
Oh, absolutely. And please, yeah, please do it. And by the way, most of the people who have them today are not going on active duty. Other than for their initial training because the military is smaller. But this young lady is a 4-point student and Spanish is a new language— I mean, English is a new language for her. And she’s still a 4-point student, works her tail off in school, and her mom and dad don’t have any money. And they’re worried about how she’s going to pay for college. So I just sat there and said, your college is taken care of. I’m paying for it. So now you got to get the grades. Yeah, you have to get the grades that you’re capable of getting. But your dad has been so good to me and helped me so much for the past 20 years that the least I can do is pay for your college. But you’ve got to earn it. I know your mom and dad will make sure you earn it because they’re not going to ask you to pay for something that’s wasting money. So go get it. And so I said, don’t tell anybody about this because that’s beautiful.

Glenn Sturm (00:32:38.12)
Yeah, don’t tell anybody, but you can get into Harvard, you’re going. Now, I mean, the thing is though, is her family doesn’t have really any income. She gets into Harvard, she’s going to get full scholarships, but then there’s the money that it takes to live while you’re going to a school like that. And that’s a lot. So But so I may not be around when she goes, but it’s, I mean, with the lawyers tomorrow and it’ll be in my trust tomorrow that that’s taken care of. And, you know, again, change a life and you change the world.

Cam Campbell (00:33:10.21)
And I mean, that young lady, you might be enabling the next president of one day to lead us to better, you know, and you just never know the, what reminds me of what you’re doing is the quote of Jim Carrey, and I have it tattooed on my forearm to remind myself of it. But he said in one of his commencement speeches, he said, “The effect you have on others is the most valuable currency there is.” And in that, in what you’ve shared just so far in this conversation, you are a rich man where it counts, Glenn.

Glenn Sturm (00:33:42.11)
Well, that’s a story. My mom’s brother asked her if I was rich or if I was wealthy, and my mom said, “He’s wealthy.” Says it has nothing to do with money.

Cam Campbell (00:33:53.21)
That’s facts. Yeah. Rich, wealthy. I’ll right-click it for some more synonyms. In the spirit of the effect you have on others, you, you, you, you got Fort Knox.

Glenn Sturm (00:34:04.05)
Well, I mean, I mean, you know, we all can do better, but we can all do better at it every day and, um, every day. And so, I mean, I’ve got, I’ve got my first novel was supposed to come out this month and I’ve stopped it. Because I finished writing it, but I’ve stopped it because I’ve got to get this book out on multidisciplinary cancer care teams out, because this is going to save lives. Um, let me see if I got it here. Well, this is the working title, but it’s called A New Hope of Urgency.

Cam Campbell (00:34:37.05)
I love it.

Glenn Sturm (00:34:38.19)
The New Hope. Yeah, The New Hope: The Compelling Promise of Multidisciplinary Cancer Care Teams. And we’re looking for it to come out April 1st and not be a fool for writing it. But no, it’s— not be a fool for writing it. Yeah. So I mean, it’s just stunning, the math. I mean, it’s my type of cancer. It was originally minus 70%. My daughter was told when I got diagnosed that, um, I was gonna have 2 and a half years, and I’m in my 18th year now. When I was a lawyer, I did big deals. And so when you do a big deal, you have to have a team of lawyers. You need tax lawyers, you need probably litigators, you need antitrust lawyers, you know, all these people. When I got started, I needed a team. And so And so what happened was my primary physician, it was a rough period in my life. My dog died, my mentor died, my dad was close to death, and I got served with divorce papers. So my guy said, Glenn, you need to get a psychiatrist. So I got a psychiatrist, which I think is probably the second most important doctor for anybody with cancer because— and that comes my golden— she likes to be petted, pet sometimes.

Glenn Sturm (00:36:16.00)
But yeah, and I got two of them here, so. But what happens is everybody who has cancer is afflicted with something called cancer fatigue syndrome. You’re tired all the time. Well, mine was worse than that. I was falling asleep in the middle of the day. And so I got diagnosed with narcolepsy. Well, they gave me a pill that gave me energy back. You were military, right, Cam? Is that— I’ve gotten that impression. Were you in the military ever?

Cam Campbell (00:36:45.08)
Yes, yes. And I wanted to tell you this. Thank you for your service and for your family’s service. Yeah, United States Marine Corps. Hoorah. 23 years.

Glenn Sturm (00:36:54.11)
Okay. I have 37 years commissioned service.

Cam Campbell (00:36:58.01)
So the through line of your life is just service.

Glenn Sturm (00:37:01.14)
I just—

Cam Campbell (00:37:01.20)
I got to say that. And what, you know, I talked about the Jim Carrey quote, but But the, you know, I ask sometimes people, I ask them in this, you know, I do public speaking, I say, who wants to be happy? Who wants to be successful? And you know, they raise their hands and I say, well, listen to this. And Dr. Viktor Frankl said, he said, happiness and success can’t be pursued, they must ensue. And they only do so as the unintended side effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause or to a person other than oneself. So it’s just, that’s where the happiness and success lies that everyone’s chasing so much of.

Glenn Sturm (00:37:36.12)
So my, my, my, okay, you’re going to love this. Okay. This is my second book, Warriors Hate War. Warriors Hate War.

Cam Campbell (00:37:46.19)
Yeah.

Glenn Sturm (00:37:48.03)
And it is how since World War II, we’ve lost every war that we’ve been involved in except for one. And that was General Powell and the Powell Doctrine.

Cam Campbell (00:37:59.18)
The Powell Doctrine. Hit them all. Hit them up.

Glenn Sturm (00:38:02.09)
Yes. Yeah. And, and so General Powell, you know, why can’t we learn? But, but he was a servant leader. So I’ll give you a General Powell story. So during the Gulf War, when he had been promoted to Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, he came to visit FORSCOM headquarters. And I was a reserve officer, but I was there and I was a bag toter that day. I was a field grade officer, but when you got multiple four stars in the hallway, you’re the bag toter. I mean, it’s like, You understand?

Cam Campbell (00:38:28.12)
Or go get the coffee or the food for the meeting.

Glenn Sturm (00:38:30.17)
Whatever. Right. Whatever is needed. So, yes, sir. So this young African-American buck sergeant opens the door to the hallway and he steps in front of two four stars, three three stars, and a bunch of field grade officers. And the guy just stopped like, oh my gosh, it’s the worst thing that could ever happen to a buck sergeant. And General Powell, who had been the FORSCOM commander, said, I don’t remember the kid’s name and I should. General Powell stopped and said, Sergeant so-and-so, how’s your wife Martha doing? Did she get good treatment? And then those days we’d give the generals a 3×5 card with everybody’s name on it and who they were going to see, their wife’s name, the kids’ names. Powell didn’t have any of that. He knew the sergeant’s name. He knew the wife’s name. He knew the 3 sons’ names. And he knew that the eldest son was a good football player. And he said, how did he do? And that had— yeah, he was a servant leader. He was the definition. He was the commander of FORSCOM, which is a, you know, it’s a headquarters building, but, you know, he’s got 1,000 people there.

Glenn Sturm (00:39:44.06)
Yes, he knew, he knew that sergeant had had a— his wife had had a major medical problem, and he knew who she was. He was checking up on it. He said, you know, running into you saved me from having my deputy go find you. And I mean, you have to know, Powell was, yeah, he was a great intellect and a great leader. And that’s what you hope. That’s what you hope. Yeah, and mine too. I wish he’d been president, but—

Cam Campbell (00:40:19.06)
Same.

Glenn Sturm (00:40:19.17)
But yeah, so I mean, the thing is, how do you have a guy like that? I mean, but it’s called servant leadership. When you’re at that level, you know, I always said, my last few jobs, my job is to make sure that every unit has everything they need to be successful, right? Whether it’s, you know, whether it’s, you know, parts for the front axle on a Humvee, which were breaking all the time at one point. And hopefully this is not an issue, whether it was a better commander or a better command sergeant major. You assess all the time, and then you have to assess yourself to see if you’re the right person for the job you’re doing. And if you’re not, tell your boss you’re not. I mean, and I mean, that’s very simplistic, but it really isn’t. That’s what it’s about. Because once your troops know they can trust you— so my dad used to say a line that I didn’t get until I did his eulogy. He always reminded me, he pounded this in my head. He said, Glenn, if you’re late for the line of departure, people die. And I thought that was a literal thing.

Glenn Sturm (00:41:33.08)
If you’re late for the line of departure, people die, because they will. But the statement was a lot deeper than that. It’s about trust. As your adjacent commanders on both sides, if you’re late for the line of departure, you’re exposing both of them. You’re exposing their flanks. Not only your people are going to die, but their people are going to die. And if they don’t trust you, the whole system breaks. That line that he, I mean, if he said it, you know, 1,000 times, he said it 10,000 times when I was growing up. If you’re late for the line of departure, people die. You know, when I wrote the eulogy, I said, you know, Dad, I can’t believe it took me this long to learn what you were meaning. But, you know, it’s just, it’s so special. It really is. Yeah, my dad started out as a private and retired as an 06.

Cam Campbell (00:42:30.10)
Mustang.

Glenn Sturm (00:42:32.00)
Absolutely. Commanded a company in World War II, and during the Battle of the Bulge, battalion headquarters wiped out, and he as a first lieutenant became a battalion commander. So he was a senior officer in the battalion. He was very blessed. And, um, you know, and, and okay, here’s the funniest story ever though. I, I was asked to take over a company that had failed, a regimental headquarters company. Failed this IG inspection twice. And the regimental commander asked me to take it over. I said, sir, can I think about this tonight? Because I want to talk to my wife and stuff. Because I just had no deficiencies noted at IG, which you’re never supposed to do, by the way. You’re supposed to have something wrong.

Cam Campbell (00:43:16.06)
Something. Maybe not a fire alarm, but something.

Glenn Sturm (00:43:18.18)
Yeah, but the IG told me to not ever do it again. And so I came back the next day, and you’ll understand this. I hope we have military vets around on the call watching this. We’ll understand it. And the next morning I said to the regimental commander, I’ll do it under this condition. He says, what’s that? So when you have, when you have commanders call, it’s battalion commanders and me and nobody else. The XO can’t be there. Command Sergeant Major can’t be there. Unless he’s specifically invited separately, but it is a commanders-only meeting. And the regimental commander looks at me just kind of, what in the hell are you doing? And then he said, Glenn, what you’re doing is you’re becoming the center of all information for the regimental staff. I said, yes, sir, because if I’m the center of the information, if those staff officers don’t cooperate with me, I’m getting ready for the IG, I’m not going to share information with them. But if we work together, I’ll be their best ally. And he looked at me and he said, LT, that’s the smartest thing I’ve ever heard a lieutenant say. How in the hell did you come up with that?

Glenn Sturm (00:44:30.16)
I said, I called my dad last night. So, I mean, he just looked at me and said, so you got a consultant now, huh? I said, yes, sir. And I’ll use him every chance I can get. But no, it was— but the thing is, is you use the resources you’ve got to get the best results and, and identify resources because people want to help you because it makes them feel better. But don’t be afraid to ask for help.

Cam Campbell (00:44:56.22)
Y’all heard that? Don’t be afraid to ask for help. Like, help people help you. As well-intentioned and as well-equipped as some people are to help, um, they don’t read minds. It’s a really hard thing. So you have to identify and speak out. People do want to help you. It feels sometimes that nobody cares, but there are people that want to be there. They just don’t know what they don’t know. So help them know that.

Glenn Sturm (00:45:20.06)
So what— so you’re a Marine. I’ll give you one more story. During Gulf Two, there’s an E-6 Marine reservist. Who I call Radar, who works at the infusion center at Yale. And he solves every problem. He is Radar. I mean, he’s the real thing. Every problem there is, he can solve it. So have you ever heard of Spider Nylund? General Spider Nylund in the Marine Corps? 4-star? Yes. Yeah. Okay.

Cam Campbell (00:45:50.23)
I’ve heard that name.

Glenn Sturm (00:45:51.11)
Yes. Well, he works at this institution. I was the chairman of it for a while. And I got a hold of, uh, General Nile, and I said, Spider, can I have your coin please? So what are you going to do with it? I said, I’m going to give it to an E-6 who’s getting ready to be deployed. And I said, he’s the best E-6 I’ve ever seen. I said, he’s unbelievable. He is radar. He’s really radar, and he shouldn’t be wasted. But that’s a Marine Corps issue. But if he has the Vice Commandant of the Marine Corps air coin in his wallet, that will get some attention. And he said, what’s his name? I gave it to Spire. Spire sent me the coin. Well, Radar uses that coin to win bets at bars. And he says it’s the best thing anybody’s ever given him is this guy got a coin. But what happened was when he was over there, He got snagged by some people, and because he was the problem solver, he came back as a gunny, and he should have, and he got hurt over there. But he’s a special, special person, and to a person like that, you don’t think they need any help.

Glenn Sturm (00:47:08.23)
But guess what? We all need help at times.

Cam Campbell (00:47:13.10)
Yes, we do.

Glenn Sturm (00:47:13.23)
And handing him that coin was a big deal. And the people at Yale, last fall I had a spine surgery. I had a tumor on my L3 root nerve. And so I couldn’t be there around Christmas, but every year, I guess it’s been 15 years now that I’ve framed and signed a picture for every employee, starting with the janitors up who are in infusion. Everybody matters. They’re all important. They’re all critical, but they all get a signed picture from me. So next week I’m doing that. I’m giving the signed pictures to everybody because they’re all wondering where I’ve been. Yeah. Is he still alive? Yeah. Well, yeah, the reports of my demise have been greatly exaggerated. So I’m going to be back there next on the 11th and give them the pictures. I’m framing 100 of them this year. And signing them, and they love it. The best day— that it’s a pain, sometimes a pain in the rear end because it’s a lot of work, but the best days every year I’m at chemo is when I run into one of those people who work there and they pull out their phone and they show me a picture of the pictures hanging over their sofa or in their dining room, and they got 10 of those pictures up.

Glenn Sturm (00:48:36.10)
and they’re smiling, and it makes me smile like you can’t ever believe. But it— but if you, if you have an idea of service, the people who are taking care of you, you have to take care of.

Cam Campbell (00:48:50.11)
And as you know, yeah, well, I mean, I had to re-emphasize it for the audience. Yeah, take care of people that take care of you.

Glenn Sturm (00:49:01.09)
Well, yeah, but it goes further. I mean, and you It’s in the military, you’re trained as a leader. In order to take care of other people, you got to take care of yourself.

Cam Campbell (00:49:10.12)
Okay.

Glenn Sturm (00:49:10.14)
And so when you’re a cancer patient and you have all these surgeries and stuff, what can you do to take care of yourself? You listen for nuggets. Okay. And so I’ll give you a nugget. So this woman was this brand new nurse I had. She’s older age, came in and was talking. And she said, Glenn, I understand you’re military, military background. Yeah. So my dad was too. I never met him. I said, what do you mean you never met him? He said, he was killed during the Battle of the Bulge. I said, really? I’m sitting here thinking, well, my dad was there. He said, he was a battalion commander. He got killed. So I didn’t say anything. I went home that night, got back to Jackson, got my computer out, and there’s something called the Green Book. It’s the US Army history of World War II. And I found a copy of the book in brand new condition of the Battle of the Bulge, and I ordered it and it was delivered. And it turned out that when her dad was killed, my dad became the battalion commander. So I, I, I, what I did was I, you know, put a flag on it, on the book, and then I did research about her dad.

Glenn Sturm (00:50:20.19)
Her dad was a real hero. I didn’t know how much she knew about him. But the next time I was there, she was my infusion nurse, and I gave her the book back, and I gave her all these records I was able to identify of her dad as a hero. Well, she was in her late 60s when I did this, and, you know, her son was probably 25 or 27. And the next month when I saw her, she said, Glenn, we cried, my son and I, have read everything you’ve given us and it spurned us to do more research about my dad so we know him. And so his only grandson knows him. And that was a nugget. They gave me a nugget of something. And what did it cost me? A couple hours of time and $43. Well, I pay $1,300 for every plane ticket I get to go there. I can afford $43 for a book. But listening to people and identifying things that they don’t even know they want, okay? Like a smile. We were joking a few minutes ago about something. We were both laughing. Well, it makes us both feel better.

Glenn Sturm (00:51:40.02)
It’s medicine. It’s medicine. And then, you know, and we’ve got all these guys in harm’s way and gals in harm’s way. Right now potentially in harm’s way over the Middle East. Um, most Americans today have no clue of what they’re going through, but, but more importantly, they don’t know what their families are going through. Yes, and so the ripple effect is real. It is. So what, what can we all do to help? Okay, and so, I mean, it’s— there are all sorts of things we can do to help. And just think about it. I mean, if there’s reserve units in your neighborhood, who’s notifying people if they got activated? Okay. Hopefully it all calms down and nobody, we don’t have a bunch of shooting going on. But if it does, you know, who’s going to take care of the families? Now, because of Tunnel for Tower and other organizations like that, we’ve done a good job of helping with People have done a good job helping with people, but there’s always something else you can do. And it doesn’t have to be a lot. If nothing else, I mean, people always say thank you to me for my service.

Glenn Sturm (00:52:53.18)
And I say, don’t thank me. Thank the kids who’ve spent 6 times the number of days my dad did in combat. I mean, my service, yeah, I spent the time, I did it right, but my college got paid for, My master’s got paid for, my law school got paid for. That’s the reason I stayed, and I felt I owed our country for what they did for me. Yes.

Cam Campbell (00:53:16.11)
Yes.

Glenn Sturm (00:53:17.02)
Okay. So it was me paying back. Now, I wasn’t contractually obligated, but there’s right and wrong. Okay. And they wanted me to stay, so I stayed. And so it’s a process of doing that. And we’re all so busy. When do we take the time to think about these things? You know, when do we take the time? None of us do it enough. And, you know, we all can do better.

Cam Campbell (00:53:43.12)
It’s more than thoughts and prayers and hanging yellow ribbons. It’s more than that. That matters too. And thank you for those. But yes, to think about that young man, that young woman. I mean, my oldest that was born when I was in OIF too, she is now a United States Marine and she’s forward deployed. And yeah, it’s real, the ripple effect. And, you know, it’s a whole new generation.

Glenn Sturm (00:54:04.13)
Well, in Jackson, Wyoming, one of the 13 guys who died when we were evacuating that little airfield was from here. And there’s a rock at the end of High School Road, which High School Road dead ends to the main highway. And there’s a rock and it used to be graffitied all the time. It’s not anymore. It’s got his name and it’s painted regularly with a heart on it. And it’s a permanent memorial to that young man’s service. Well, people who aren’t from here, um, don’t get that, you know. And some people have painted over it who weren’t from here, who didn’t know it. It was quickly fixed.

Cam Campbell (00:54:46.21)
Yes.

Glenn Sturm (00:54:47.03)
Okay, because that’s not for him as much as it is for his mom and dad and his brothers and sisters and his classmates.

Cam Campbell (00:54:56.12)
Solid, solid point. and facts. Yes. Yes.

Glenn Sturm (00:55:00.22)
He’ll be remembered as long as that’s taken care of. And, you know, you don’t leave anybody behind. But think about all the people who have been left behind mentally and with disabilities. So last year— 4 years ago, excuse me, 3 years ago, I ran into a very senior person from the VA. And they asked me, Are you getting all your VA benefits? I said, I’m getting none. And they said, why? I said, well, the military lost my records. And they said, Glenn, give me your name, your last 4, and I’ll guarantee we’ll find them within 24 hours. I said, there’s no way in hell. And this person looked at me and said, Glenn, I can make that happen. I said, there’s no doubt in my mind you can make that happen. But what about my troops? What about my soldiers who’ve been waiting for 5 years to get something approved or reviewed? That’s absolutely effing unacceptable that you could do it for me, but you can’t do it for them. I will never take a dime until they’re taken care of. And I mean, it just— it’s still— I still got her business card in my wallet, okay?

Glenn Sturm (00:56:14.09)
Because it still irritates me when I see it. And because, I mean, if they can do it for me, they can do it for anybody. They just haven’t made it a priority. You betcha. Yeah, well, I mean, but, well, it matters. But the thing is, is you don’t do it for credit. You don’t do that for credit. You just do it because it’s right.

Cam Campbell (00:56:35.21)
Like you say, yeah, you do it, it was right.

Glenn Sturm (00:56:37.09)
Yeah. And, you know, therefore, for the grace of God goes I. I mean, I might not have gotten that ROTC scholarship. I might have gotten drafted as an E-1 and gone to Vietnam and gotten shot up or messed up because of some other things. Okay, well, I was blessed because I got the scholarship. I mean, if we ever stop thinking that way as leaders or as citizens of our country, something’s really off. And I’m afraid that it’s more today about how much money you’ve made or what can you do for me, or the old acronym, WIFIN, what’s in it for me? No, it’s not. So if you just take care of others, guess what? They’re going to take care of you. And when you have somebody who’s— and we’ve had somebody who’s helped me for 20 years because I can’t— sometimes I have a problem with some things. And I mean, after spine surgery, I had problems. He carried my firewood in for my fires. Okay, well, it doesn’t change my life to say to his daughter, your college is taken care of, you don’t got to worry about it no more. She’s going to go to med school.

Glenn Sturm (00:57:49.22)
I said, med school’s taken care of, it doesn’t matter.

Cam Campbell (00:57:52.23)
Yeah.

Glenn Sturm (00:57:53.13)
And my, and my kids will celebrate that because they know how much they’ve helped. And if I hadn’t done it, how could I look at myself in the mirror?

Cam Campbell (00:58:03.08)
Because you could have. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s legacy. That’s legacy. I think Pericles, I’m paraphrasing, but it was like that, you know, it’s not what’s inscribed on statues, it’s what’s inscribed on the lives of others. And that is a true example right there.

Glenn Sturm (00:58:17.21)
Well, you’re talking like a Marine NCO. No, you are. I mean, I respect the Marines. I mean, So, are you— have you ever heard of an Air Force colonel named Boyd?

Cam Campbell (00:58:31.04)
Yeah, OODA loop. Yeah, observe, orient, decide, act.

Glenn Sturm (00:58:35.00)
Okay, at his funeral, do you know what happened? The Air Force hated him. He was so brilliant, but he didn’t have a college degree. He was a physicist without a college degree. So when he died, there was an Air Force— I mean, I don’t know if this is true or not, but this is the rumor, right? There was an Air Force Lieutenant Colonel was there. He was an 06, right? You’re supposed to have somebody equal or higher rank. And there was an Air Force Lieutenant Colonel with a 3 or 7 person, you know, not 1 in 7, but it was like less than that honor guard to fire the rounds. Commandant of the Marine Corps was there with a vice and the Marine Corps band and a company of Marines for his funeral.

Cam Campbell (00:59:18.18)
That’s what I’m talking about. Yes. Yeah, he’s definitely had an impact on the Marine Corps for sure.

Glenn Sturm (00:59:23.19)
He changed the Marine Corps completely. He just, he made it incredibly strong. I mean, did you see the Commandant on the 250th birthday, his speech that he made? I’ll say this right now.

Cam Campbell (00:59:39.22)
I love that man. I admire that. You talking about General Smith and he is absolutely amazing and one of the most genuine humans I’ve ever met. You talking about servant leader? I mean, this man. Yeah. You know what, when we talk about suicide prevention, which is, you know, a big passion of mine, one of the things he said, and it alluded to what you said earlier, is that he released a video. Number one, Sergeant Major Ruiz had said, “Marines, we love you.” I’ve never heard a senior leader say that before, because love is why we die for each other. And that’s exactly what the Commandant reinforced on that. And he went on to say that, “Give us a chance first, Marines. If the sun’s coming up tomorrow, then there’s a reason to have hope.” and it is. And if it’s not, then we got way bigger problems than whatever our current things is. But that is a genuine man. Genuine.

Glenn Sturm (01:00:25.05)
What a leader. I listened to his speech. I just stumbled across it. And it’s just absolutely astounding what he’s done. And I mean, so give you an example. I mean, when the Marines did away with their tanks, I thought it was one of the dumbest things. Well, I thought it was the dumbest thing I’d ever heard of. And then I saw what the Ukrainians did to the Russians with, you know, a Javelin and two additional, you know, ballistics. They had an electric bicycle, two electric bicycles, two guys, a Javelin launcher, and three rounds. And they took out 80% of the Russian tanks with the Javelin electric bikes.

Cam Campbell (01:01:14.14)
That’s that human dimension. That’s, that’s the real— it’s not about the people, it’s all about the people. That will, that will overpower technology.

Glenn Sturm (01:01:22.20)
Well, so the thing about— I’m sitting here saying, when I saw that, I said, okay, who’s the dumbass? Pardon me, who’s the dumb guy?

Cam Campbell (01:01:29.07)
Now, First Amendment, First Amendment’s in full effect, Glenn.

Glenn Sturm (01:01:32.20)
Yeah, well, it’s me because I thought the Marines were nuts about getting rid of their tanks. And just what the Ukrainians proved to us If a bicycle can take out, you know, the Russian armor, I mean, now it’s evolved since then with the drones and stuff, but at the beginning of the war, if it wasn’t for the Javelins and electric bikes, you know, they’d have been overrun.

Cam Campbell (01:01:57.08)
Look at that will. Look at that will of human beings fighting for a cause together, together.

Glenn Sturm (01:02:04.01)
And the thing about it is most people don’t talk about this, but Mrs. Trump, Melania, has talked about it a lot, the 20,000 to 40,000 children who’ve been stolen by the Russians. How do we ever, ever not hold the Russians accountable for that? That’s a leadership issue.

Cam Campbell (01:02:25.13)
That’s absolutely disgusting. Disgusting. And, you know, it’s just— and I love— I don’t know, I’m gonna definitely read the book that you wrote about Warriors Hate War. But, you know, I feel like sometimes when I look back on, you know, the two campaigns and being in service there, you know, during Global War on Terrorism, that like there’s no real winner in wars. We all lose something or we lose ourselves. And just because, you know, you can’t see certain wounds There’s so many wounds unseen, and what you just described are wounds that are going to be unseen and felt for generations, potentially. And that is just a tragedy.

Glenn Sturm (01:03:07.04)
I mean, war crimes are war crimes. I mean, I mean, that—

Cam Campbell (01:03:10.01)
yeah, that’s right. That’s right.

Glenn Sturm (01:03:11.18)
I mean, and that’s a war crime, period. I mean, I mean, stealing children, I mean, you know, it won’t be much longer where some of those kids are placed into the military, in the Russian military. Can you imagine that? I mean, I mean, I don’t know. It’s just sad. I mean, it’s— and where’s our leadership? Where’s our leadership?

Cam Campbell (01:03:32.15)
So it’s got to be accountability. It’s got to be accountability on both sides. You know, accountability pendulum swings, and you know this from being the leader that you are. It’s doing the things of what you did to thank that staff, to hold them accountable in a positive way, to take care of that young staff sergeant that was crushing it, that eventually was a gunny. That’s the positive side. The other side is, well, hey, you know, why are people difficult, whether on whatever level? Because they’re allowed to be.

Glenn Sturm (01:04:00.16)
Well, let me give you the only you can stop you secondary half.

Cam Campbell (01:04:03.14)
Yes, yes, please. Yes.

Glenn Sturm (01:04:05.05)
So the first half is you don’t let it— don’t let anybody else stop you. The second half is, okay, you know what you can do, but the second part is this: when you’re put into an ethical situation where you’re told to do something that’s wrong, or asked to do something that’s wrong, only you can stop you, okay? Yes. You have to say, I’m not going to do that. And that’s the reason I love the phrase so much. Only you can stop you. People think there’s a limiting, people trying to limit you. Yes. And sometimes you have to limit yourself because what you’re being asked to do is wrong. And So it’s a very powerful thought and it’s a thought we need to spend more time with because as leaders, as our political parties need to think about is, you know, when we’re asking our troops, you know, our Marines to go into a tough situation, you know, are you willing to send your son there or your daughter?

Cam Campbell (01:05:09.09)
Thank you. Thank you. Not the neighbor’s kid, but yours.

Glenn Sturm (01:05:12.10)
Yep. Period. That’s the way it goes. And if you’re not, then why are you letting other people do it? Okay. And General Smith, I mean, I’m not familiar with him. I know a lot of four stars, but General Smith, I was just taken aback by his presentation.

Cam Campbell (01:05:34.01)
He and Sergeant Major Ruiz are the best Commandant and Sergeant Major of the Marine Corps that I’ve had. And General Neller too. But there’s so many greats. But yes, General Smith is amazing.

Glenn Sturm (01:05:43.14)
Well, it’s just, I mean, there’s some fun. One day when we’re not, there’s no recordings, I’ll tell you some fun stories about my interactions.

Cam Campbell (01:05:54.14)
I would love to hear them.

Glenn Sturm (01:05:56.01)
Because I mean, I was around a long time. I was around a long time and I was there to help and, you know, but I wasn’t gonna let anybody tell me what to do that I didn’t think was right. And I had enough political influence. Yeah, but I had enough political influence that I could stop people for doing the wrong things.

Cam Campbell (01:06:16.11)
And sometimes that is the key to everything, is don’t allow it.

Glenn Sturm (01:06:21.16)
Yeah, well, it’s like the most— people don’t know what the most powerful two ranks in the Army are. I don’t know if it’s probably the same in Marines. Is a full bird colonel who’s not going to be promoted. They know they’re not gonna be promoted, and they’re that senior, which means they got power, and they know where a lot of bodies are buried. And a regiment in the Army, it’s a regimental or higher command sergeant major who knows they’re getting ready to retire. Okay, you don’t mess with those people. And when they say no, that’s true, you listen to them. And the problem we get is when we stop listening to those people. As a commander, you know, at a higher level, if an 06 tells you this is not doable— now some guys are retired in place. I’m not talking about those. I’m talking about the real warriors, the warrior ethos. And they say, sir, that’s the wrong thing to do. And these are the reasons. You got to listen.

Cam Campbell (01:07:21.03)
Yeah, most definitely.

Glenn Sturm (01:07:23.18)
And so it’s like your NCOs. I mean, I was trained by some great NCOs. My dad’s Old Sergeant Major trained me when I was young. He taught me how to—

Cam Campbell (01:07:35.03)
So your dad’s Old Sergeant Major helped train you when you were a junior officer?

Glenn Sturm (01:07:39.20)
No, no, when I was a kid. He taught me how to drive a Jeep. Oh, you were a kid?

Cam Campbell (01:07:43.02)
Oh, I got you, I got you, I got you.

Glenn Sturm (01:07:45.03)
But no, he taught me how to— He knew I was going to be an officer because my dad kind of destined that, I think. I’ve always wondered if my dad had any impact on the draft lottery. I’m joking. But the Sergeant Major was training me about stuff. And it’s astounding when you look at people who are concerned about the status, not the results. And when you find those people, you get rid of them.

Cam Campbell (01:08:18.11)
Yeah, because you know what? It’s the through line of also the subject of the cancer treatment and the mortality rates. It’s not about your intentions, ladies and gentlemen. It’s not about your efforts. It is about the effect. And what is the effect? What is the end state? And, uh, we lose sight of that. And I think you just put it in such beautiful words so simply that the status and not the results. Congratulations on your new parking spot, but what are you gonna do with it, leader?

Glenn Sturm (01:08:44.12)
Yeah. Well, it’s the, what I love is the, is, is the guys who take those signs down. Yes.

Cam Campbell (01:08:51.10)
Yes. Or hand it out to others.

Glenn Sturm (01:08:53.00)
Yeah.

Cam Campbell (01:08:53.12)
I mean, I had, I had a, I had a good position at one point and I would always pick a young, uh, young Marine that was crushing in one of the sections in the building, and I would give them that parking spot because I was like, I’ll just get more PT by walking from, you know, I’m not that special, you know what I mean?

Glenn Sturm (01:09:07.15)
And the older we get, the more we need. So yeah, we got to move it.

Cam Campbell (01:09:11.10)
Body in motion, stay in motion. You know that. You know that.

Glenn Sturm (01:09:13.23)
Absolutely. Yes. So it’s, but, you know, you know, it’s, we could talk forever, I think. But the The things that I talk, you know, you talked about and the tragedy of the suicides is something that is just hard to comprehend. Now, the PTSD program, are you familiar with the Blue Angel Foundation? Have you ever heard about it?

Cam Campbell (01:09:43.12)
I’m not fully acquainted, but I’ve heard of it.

Glenn Sturm (01:09:46.04)
Well, they raise money every year for PTSD training and they are extraordinarily successful. And they’re a great group of people. It’s the foundation. It’s not the active people. It’s the retired guys, the former members of the Blue Angels. And it’s all service. If you look at their most recent thing that I looked at, said that basically 100% of their money goes to actually to doing service, not overhead. So it’s one of the most efficient foundations. And so they’re leaders in addressing PTSD. And my hat’s off to them. So at least they’ve got a couple Marines in that organization normally. They, the C-130 pilots are always Marines and they’ve got one F-18 driver probably. But it’s a great organization for that. But the thing is, how can we not have enough money to help those who have served and who are wounded either physically or mentally? I don’t understand it. And so I don’t either.

Cam Campbell (01:10:55.18)
I don’t either.

Glenn Sturm (01:10:57.16)
But if you go to look what Tunnels for Towers has done, which is just a great organization and a great person leading it. Well, where’s our leader who’s running there now? When Rick Shinseki, who was the chief of staff of the Army, got fired by Rumsfeld for saying we needed 500,000 troops to win the war, Second Gulf War, which we did, but he was right. But he became the head of the VA. And why wasn’t he successful at getting the money that we needed to help the vets? I mean, what percentage of the vets have PTSD? Combat vets, it’s a large percentage. And it’s not just the infantry, other guys. I mean, in Vietnam, Vietnam, the truck drivers had the highest mortality rate. I mean, arguably driving convoys.

Cam Campbell (01:11:51.11)
No, in OIF and OEF, like, yeah, convoys is one of the scariest things you can ever be on.

Glenn Sturm (01:11:58.04)
Yeah.

Cam Campbell (01:11:58.22)
Because of the weaponry and the, you know, and the insurgent weapons.

Glenn Sturm (01:12:01.18)
You’re a target.

Cam Campbell (01:12:02.09)
Of, you know, IED.

Glenn Sturm (01:12:03.23)
Yes, you’re a target.

Cam Campbell (01:12:04.17)
Yes, exactly.

Glenn Sturm (01:12:05.22)
And so it’s like the medevac pilots. They fly into a hot LZ and they’re hovering every time. Every time. That’s right. And so I’ve always joked with some Medal of Honor winners that every guy who is a medevac or woman who is a medevac pilot deserves the medal because every time they did something, it was above and beyond. Hands down. So every time.

Cam Campbell (01:12:28.00)
That was just a Tuesday. Yeah.

Glenn Sturm (01:12:30.10)
Yeah, it was Tuesday. One of my friends, his first tour, over there, he didn’t take a round in his bird one time. And the second year, second tour he was there, he was shot down his first day. Wow. It’s just— that’s the randomness of it.

Cam Campbell (01:12:47.01)
That’s the— and that’s the anxieties. And that’s the— that’s how that trauma envelops itself inside of you and just permeates every part of you because you’re always on high alert because it can happen at any second. So, yeah.

Glenn Sturm (01:12:59.23)
Yeah. You live in that state. Exactly. And so it’s like, why do some guys misbehave the way they do when they’re in the tier 1 levels? And that’s because they’re in that state. They don’t know when they’re going to be called, but they know when they’re called, they’re going to be immediately in a really bad situation. And so, I mean, we’ve got to do better. We’ve got to do better.

Cam Campbell (01:13:27.23)
We may never be perfect on the subject. I had a commander, he was my retiring officer when I retired, and his name is Colonel Brandon. He’s one of the greatest men I’ve ever met. And he said it one time, I was working with suicide prevention and he came to a meeting that I had, I held, it was all voluntary and it was about resilience and then sharing the resources because we just don’t know. It’s not that we don’t have resources, it’s that sometimes we have overlap and we just Pick one, right? And so he said this, he said, um, he said, we’ll never be perfect on this subject, but we can damn sure be better. And that just— when you have a commander come in front of everyone and say that, um, that we must be better, and it takes all of us, uh, to see a full bird, which, you know, their schedule, uh, to take the time for this like offshoot, you know, huddle— I called it resilience huddle, uh, it really inspired to— because if the Colonel’s got time to be there, why aren’t you here?

Glenn Sturm (01:14:23.18)
Right. Well, there’s something else I learned that I don’t talk about in this context very often, and that is celebrating your mistakes. Okay. As an officer, okay, as an officer, when you’re in front of your troops, they’ve known when you’ve made a mistake. Okay. And the NCOs at least know it every time. So if you announce your mistake and you celebrate it, and you ask the question, is there anything else that I should have done differently to achieve a better outcome? That’s not a statement from weakness. That’s a statement from strength.

Cam Campbell (01:15:02.20)
Yes, it is.

Glenn Sturm (01:15:03.18)
And it’s inspiring because we all make them every day. And if you go back and read, you know, once it’s over, it’s over. But, but you have to learn from your mistakes. So if you celebrate your mistakes and you accept responsibility for your mistakes, General Mattis, when they were doing the Fallujah case study, what I was told, again, I was not there, but it was being done in DC and he came in from the pond, across the pond, and he heard about this case study going on and he went there and he briefed the study team about all the mistakes he made. In the room was a former company commander and former battalion commander from his division while he was there. And he asked the following question: those are the mistakes I know I made. What mistakes did I make that I haven’t addressed? General Mattis. Wow. Yes. Okay. But, but the point was he said, we’re trying to make, identify every problem we had and what we could have done differently. If I don’t say it’s okay to criticize me, okay, you know, what am I doing? So in the Navy, what you do is every trap is graded.

Glenn Sturm (01:16:19.19)
It doesn’t matter who you are, your traps are graded. Well, we don’t do that in the other services. Does that make sense? The aviation does it on the carriers. So, you know, we should all be grading ourselves and And then asking our NCOs and our troops, what can I do better? It’s one of the things I think that Pete’s doing a good job with. I mean, he could do other things better, but his going out and running PT with the troops. Yesterday, he gave a speech at the 101st where he said, they almost smoked me. They tried their best to smoke me that morning in PT. And he said, oorah, and he said they came close. But when was the last time we had a Secretary of War, Secretary of Defense, whatever, who would actually do that? And he said, he sits down with the troops after PT from the lowest level up to get the pictures of what’s really going on. That’s the reason why the troops like him so much, because he listens and they know he cares. And they know he’s a former officer. Now, he wasn’t a senior officer. He didn’t go to charm school.

Glenn Sturm (01:17:30.21)
I wish he had, because it’s not what you say, it’s what you don’t say that gets you in trouble sometimes. And that’s something they teach you at charm school. But he is a breath of fresh air as a leader in that regard, because he cares about the E-1s and E-2s. And for a long time, it’s been a long time since we’ve had somebody in that role that they cared. It’s been a long time since we had somebody like Mattis.

Cam Campbell (01:18:00.15)
Well, we need people to care. And, you know, Marine Corps has a slogan, you know, be firm, be fair, but it’s also about being there and caring. And, you know, what is the old adage? I’ve heard it, you know, Pat Summitt, I’ve heard it from many sources, but, you know, nobody really cares how much you know until they know how much you care. So it goes great lengths. It really does. And I just want to tell you thank you for your continued service and for the— service is not just in uniform, service is not just, you know, when you were practicing law. It goes onwards to the young lady that you’re willing to help out and help her reach her full potential. It goes on to the little things like the nurse and what the validation and the sense of just connection for that grandson that never knew, you know, and it goes a long way. So I just, as a fellow human, as a fellow warrior, a fellow humble warrior, I really want to tell you thank you, Glenn. Thank you for what you’re continuing to do.

Glenn Sturm (01:19:02.00)
Well, the one thing, there is one misconception about me, even though as a lawyer, I was never a JAG. Uh, I asked him, no, I wouldn’t do that. It was like, if I was going to be there, I wanted to do something So they do. Yeah. So, um, I love it. Yeah. But anyway, there’s, there’s, yeah, thank you, and thank you for your show. And okay, one of the things I, I insist on adding at the end: if there’s ever anything I can do for you, please let me know. If there’s ever anything I can do for you, let me know, because I’ll be an honor to help.

Cam Campbell (01:19:37.13)
I’m grateful for that, and I’ve learned through my time of life, I’m never too proud to not ask for help. I’ve been there and it usually doesn’t go well. Y’all heard that right. It’s nothing wrong with asking for help and reaching out to resources. So I appreciate that. And any way that Cam can help Glenn and, and help you help others, well, that’s a win-win for the human, the human team that we are, because it’s one team, one fight. I stole that from, uh, actually Colin Powell’s book. Uh, it worked for me. I’ve been saying it for years. One team, one fight. A lot of times I say one One Team, One Ugly-Ass Fight, because that’s what it is. But we like it. We all we got.

Glenn Sturm (01:20:12.08)
If you drop, if you drop me a note with an address, I’ll send you a signed copy of that Warriors Hate War. And then if you want additional copies to give people who you’re helping serve with the resilience issue, just tell me how many you need. They’ll be there quickly.

Cam Campbell (01:20:31.07)
I appreciate it. I’m going to do the same for you because, you know, I wrote a book called Thank You Warriors that 100% of the profits go towards veteran service organizations. So I’m going to get that return address. And I’m gonna send you some, and you can distribute them however you like to, sir. Thank you. Thank you sincerely.

Glenn Sturm (01:20:45.05)
Thank you.

Cam Campbell (01:20:45.19)
I do always ask one question. Yes, always. One team, like it or not, we all we got. That’s what I say. Um, I, I do always ask every guest, uh, as, as we close, um, and, and please, Glenn, if you feel like you want to come back, I would love to have more conversations with you. Sincerely, I say that, and you are always welcome if you ever want to bring up and, and say that new book’s coming out this day and anything you want, man. You’re always welcome here, sir. But I want to ask you, because the veteran suicide, because active duty suicide, reserve, it doesn’t matter, warriors, our nation right now, it is a, it is a plague. And, um, it, it’s terrible. If someone right now was listening to this and they were contemplating death by suicide and you had the opportunity, Glenn, to say something to them, what would you say, my friend?

Glenn Sturm (01:21:30.23)
First thing I say, where are you? I’ll be there. I’m gonna be there immediately. And The first thing I’m going to do when I get there is I’m going to hug them, and, uh, and I’m going to say, there but for the grace of God goes I. And then let’s just, let’s just talk. Let’s just talk and know that I will always be there. Know that I can— I just said it, I always ask what can I do to help, but I will always be there to help. And you know something, every one of your comrades I will be there too. I mean, you’re, you know, the guys in your, you know, people, we fight wars for the people that are in foxholes, not for the politician. And that’s it. And one of the things that happens when people get out of the military, they lose that closeness.

Cam Campbell (01:22:21.01)
Yes.

Glenn Sturm (01:22:22.10)
And so where are you? I will be there. Okay. And if you’re someplace I’m not, I guarantee you I know somebody who can be there within an hour, and they will be there until I get there.

Cam Campbell (01:22:34.04)
Y’all heard that. But he’s not a mind reader.

Glenn Sturm (01:22:37.11)
Where are you? Just tell me where you are. That’s it. No, where are you? I mean, come on, dude. I mean, we’ve all had bad times, okay? It’s like when my dad died, he was, you know, my best friend, and, and, uh, I had to do his eulogy, and we had to, we had to change his, uh, ribbons in his uniform because he would never wear a Purple Heart because that was the award that people got when he failed. And so I had to read— Command Sergeant Major Army was there and he gave me the revised— he was well known for this, for his ribbons. And we had to open his casket up and change his ribbons. And then I did the eulogy. And I said in the eulogy, if I’m half the man that my dad was, I’ll be a success because I’ve never been tried the way he was. So, so what we always need to remember is that the people who have really been tried have a harder time every day, but that doesn’t mean that— that doesn’t mean that they’re stronger than you are or that you’re weaker than they are.

Cam Campbell (01:23:53.17)
They may need you. They need you. They may need you. Wow, that is so powerful. That is so powerful. I, again, I just say thank you, Glenn. Um, you talk about nuggets, you talk about dropping gems, you’ve dropped them all over here, and I just thank you for, for sharing them with, with us. And time is a, is a, is a very— it’s the one currency we spend every day. We don’t know our remaining balance. So for you to give that precious gift of time to, to me and to any listener out there. Again, thank you. Yeah, I love it. Yeah, I know this one. T-I-M-E. That’s it, that’s it, that’s it, that’s it. That’s right. Not because of compliance, but because of respect, love, and loyalty. And that’s, that’s resilience. Yes, yes. Lynn, thank you so much. And, uh, I will def— yeah. Oh, I ain’t no sir no more. I will do that. I don’t want to publicly say it now because some people don’t like me that listen to the show, so I’ll send it to you. You gotta laugh. And it don’t— leadership ain’t always popular, but it is what it is.

Cam Campbell (01:24:55.08)
Thank you for your service, and thank you for your continued service. You— hey, and I’ll tell you this, you are a light in this world. Keep shining. And sometimes what is to give light must endure burning, in the words of Dr. Viktor Frankl. But I thank you for sharing your light with us. It is a privilege. Ladies and gentlemen, people of the world, the outer space, anybody’s listening. It could be extraterrestrials listening to me right now. And if you are, thank you for listening. I appreciate you tuning in. Remember, this show is not monetized. We have no ads, so this show is sponsored by nobody, baby. Yeah, that’s right, that’s Keith Sweat. Cam can’t sing, but I can record a podcast. Thank you to Glenn. Thank you to anybody out there serving. Remember, do not be too proud to reach out for support. People want to help you. One team, one ugly fight, this thing called life. Much love, world. Thank you again, Glenn. Make good choices. Take care of each other.