Text to spare you the pain of my slow, Texas drawl (or increase the playback speed to 1.5x for listening in about 8 minutes; this recording is 13 minutes long in 1x speed):
OPENING
“Welcome to the Liberty Accelerator JET Show! As Armed Forces Families we sacrifice greatly every single day. Tragically, our Liberty is under attack from serious domestic threats.
Our Health is put secondary to the mission, our sense of Self is sacrificed for the team, and our Wealth is at grave risk amidst outdated approaches to finding Jobs and focusing Efforts on antiquated 1970’s era solutions for retirement savings and education.
Many are lulled into a sense of security without an escape plan, eventually getting ambushed by military transition. The Liberty Accelerator JET show exists to change the way you think about your family’s readiness.
INTRODUCTION
Hello and welcome to Episode Zero of the Liberty Accelerator JET Show.
Thanks so much for flying fast with us!
Jarrod H. Smith here cohosting with various contributors on the superhighway to Liberty and Freedom beyond uniformed service, away from the danger zone, because we all get out one day!
We’re discussing Armed Forces Family Readiness topics across the spectrum of life in preparation for far beyond the military.
I’ll never tell you what to think, but I aim to help you think critically and give you a slightly different framework through which to view this dynamic and unforgiving world.
This show contains the knowledge and guidance for intentional, informed Family Readiness from the earliest days in service, starting now.
BACKSTORY
In this series on Jobs, Efforts, and Taxes as a part of the Liberty Accelerator for Armed Forces Families, we aim to equip the servicemember and military spouse with the important information they must have right now in order to equip themselves for freefall out of uninformed service to the Nation, whenever that day arrives.
The lie is that transition is for later, and that idea isn’t taking care of those people of yours who are transitioning right now, or of yourself.
In this JET series that focuses on solving the “Transition Trap” problem plaguing and ambushing all of us in one way or many by bringing attention to three main topics: Jobs, Efforts & Taxes, JET.
Have you noticed a rise in your expenses lately while being stuck in a JOB where the wage is falling behind the prices you’re forced to pay for basic necessities in the marketplace?
Are there no longer enough hours in your day and your EFFORTS don’t seem to be giving you a leg up?
Are you certain your TAX liability is the lowest it can be?
Before we get to far into it, My name is Jarrod H. Smith, call sign #HeckYeah, and my individual journey through the transition experience prompted me to document what I observed and experienced as I approached what some call the Transition Mission.
As a senior US Navy Officer specializing in supply chain and logistics operations, I reached the O5 paygrade and have four degrees, three in the sciences and an MBA, from higher academia.
Balancing out the education, my experiences in multiple warfare areas as a staff officer includes tactical and operational level submarine warfare, naval aviation a the tactical level on a carrier workup and deployment, deployments to the sand box with the ground pounders, logistics information systems staff assignments, and operational planning expertise.
The oath of office to the Constitution necessitated I warn you all about the serious domestic threat I stumbled upon during my transition, and then communicate what I experienced throughout my Transition Battle for Liberty and Freedom beyond the rank, weapons platform, and service branch to all those coming behind me…because we all get out one day.
The information herein is abosultely applicable to the military veteran family, too…so please don’t keep it all to yourself!
Make this show the reason you’re reaching out to old colleagues who’ve left service before you. Grab a virtual coffee with them and see how they’re doing! Tell them I sent you!
We’re building a community around this movement, and I cordially invite you to participate in it. Just Engage Today…Just Do It!
Don’t wait until you’re fighting your transition battle to reach out to them and catch up…they’ll only think you’re doing so for yourself, and not for them.
Now, with the many other activities I’m engaged in, while also wrapping a bow around my military service over the next few months, I’ve realized that not everyone enjoys reading…it’s a slower way for many to consume information.
I enjoy writing, but many today seem not to care to spend the time it takes to read, and I’m looking to get this message to a much wider audience, including the busy servicemember or struggling military veteran, and their overwhelmed spouse.
So, I’m converting all the writing I’ve done over the past two years into audio for wider distribution.
And bare with me, as I’m scripting these early episodes to ensure I don’t miss any aspect of the message.
My goal is to ensure listeners are equipped for all the aerial acrobats we’ll be performing in the fast-moving fighter JET-like episodes later, where we’ll dive deep into each topic area and really challenge all of the limited ideas you’ve been fed over years, or perhaps decades.
These topics are critically important to your family liberty and freedom beyond uniformed service. I make claim because I’ve experienced it myself, personally and professionally.
But I didn’t realize that until my 19th year in the military, and that put me at a great disadvantage.
The government offered transition solutions didn’t offer me the insights, either…I had to find it on my own, stumbling upon the right mentors with the truth at, fortunately, the right time in my journey.
Early on, however, we’re riding in a jumbo jet. We can’t get off that jumbo plane just yet. I’m going to have to fly slow, as though I’m talking to myself from two years ago as a brand new Navy Commander…who had no idea where the next two years would lead.
The keys to success in your listening to this series, and then during transition preparations, are:
be willing to sacrifice things that others aren’t willing to sacrifice (necessities over niceties, including your forgetting about the mainstream ideas around transition, and in your life in general; in effect, forget Netflix and engage with me here, and spend your time doing what I’m saying to do in each episode),
be able to manage people, especially at home, but in the work environment, too;
be able to identify tradeoffs between solutions to problems. On the personal side, it’s alignment (matching values and principles to the way you live); on the professional side, how do you process issues or challenges?;
lastly, listen carefully to the words I’ve chosen to use throughout this JET ride. They matter tremendously.
So, why a JET, you’re asking?
Well, let’s use an analogy for military service. And fighter JETs are cool, aren’t they?
We all enjoy the Black Knights and Blue Angels air shows, right? A display of American Firepower. Mojovating, I like to say!
Ooohhhrahhh, right?
When the servicemember joined the military, they very likely boarded an airplane, you see.
And it’s highly likely they borded a jumbo jet, one that doesn’t maneuver like those fighters do. Early on this JET show will be more like riding in a C-5 Super Galaxy, the largest strategic airlifter in the United States Air Force.
It carries more cargo farther distances than any other aircraft and can haul twice as much cargo as any other airlifter. With a payload of Six Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles (MRAPs) - those are huge, by the way, or up to five helicopters, it lifts off with a maximum weight of 381 tons.
If the C-5 isn’t your flavor, imagine the C-17 Globemaster III, then, carrying 265 tons with four jet engines of extreme comlexity and highly engineered components. My trip into the desert both times were on massive jumbo jets. Amazing machines.
Personally, I boarded a commercial airliner in route to Washington, D.C. in the fall of 2002 to interview with the four-star admiral of Naval Nuclear Power, referred to as Naval Reactors, at the Navy Yard. I was excited to join the U.S. submarine force and do my part defending the Constitution after the 9/11 terrorist attacks a year earlier.
So, the makeup of a JET engine is a great analogy for this Liberty Accelerator JET series.
Just like the DoD Machine, this jumbo jet moves slow, but carries a lot of weight a very long way, and is hard to maneuver. Just like commercial airline planes, it has rules that must be obeyed.
And we all know what the rules on airplanes are.
They exist to protect the plane, other passengers, and, lastly, ourselves. Our seat(s) on the plane are like our assigned MOS…our Jobs.
And few have a parachute, it seems, for when Uncle Sam decides to kick us out of the hatch.
Just like on the commercial planes today, there are rules we must abide by.
We’re conditioned to rank and file for the benefit of Uncle Sam and Lady Liberty.
So we’re in this job and putting for tremendous Effort and Energy.
Even still, it’s not up to you when your time to get out of the plane comes…whether it’s in the air or on the ground.
And recall, the military machine, it doesn’t stop. So for the sake of this analogy, let’s assume the jumbojet is always in flight…aerial refueling makes that possible.
So, when your time on the plane runs out, will your efforts (and energy) be completely and totally focused on obeying the rules in coach without any thought of what happens when Uncle Sam boots you out of the hatch?
What will the free fall fee like?
So we’ll end this introductory episode with these questions, framing up what’s to come in the next half dozen episodes as we unpack the topics of Jobs, Efforts, and Taxes and begin to frame our perspectives for getting out of the jumbojet and into the fighter jet.
Will the strain and heavy demands of military service jobs leave your Armed Forces Family without optionality at the end of your military service life? Or are you a miltiary veteran who’s already realized you began preparing way too late?
Will all that effort spent being ready for the little-m missions at each staff and operational assignment result in your family being ambushed on the biggest big-M mission of your military service journey, Transition?
Will the tax of transition leave you equipped with the Liberty and Freedom you’ve been led to believe you’ve defended, and that you deserve?
To set up Episode 1 on jobs, recall this year, 2022, in our first paycheck, we in the military service branches were extended a 2.7% pay raise for the year…for all 12 months.
Do you realize that the last reported Consumer Price Index, referred to as inflation, was 6.7%...and that’s a monthly calculation from the previous year’s calculation.
It woefully understates the real cost pressures because it excludes true food costs, energy, and housing.
So, to conclude, the acronym JET in the context of this series is an acronym for Jobs, Efforts, and Taxes.
That’s it. We’re going to start out in the jumbo jet, and then bounce back and forth between a tremendously sized cargo plane and fighter jets as we navigate the series episodes and podcast seasons.
JET forms the structure around which I’ll share my insights about what’s commonly, and incorrectly, referred to as “military transition” because the military, it doesn’t transition…people do. And the military is not us, just like we are not the military.
The military is composed of complex systems in the form of equipment and people.
We’re part of the military, not the totality of it…and it will go on without us, without a care in the world.
On this JET show we’ll offer an alternative and contrarian view for your Armed Forces Family as you navigate your military service journey, and as importantly, intentionally and informatively plan for the inevitable last day on active duty, and the fight you’ll engage in during your Battle for Liberty and Freedom Beyond uniformed service.
Remeber, Just Engage Today an old colleague, and then let us know in the comments how that chat went!
To Your Liberty,
#HeckYeah
Liberty Accelerator Resources Guide List
CALL TO ACTION
My biggest goal is to equip the Armed Forces Family with all I wish’d I’d known 15-20 years ago, while also sharing that there is a literal army of other people ahead of you, and a bunch coming behind you, and peers taking the same journey today, many fighting their own battles having not intentionally, informatively prepared for this eventuality, military transition, well ahead of time.
I want you not only to get smart and strategically prepare for your inevitable transition, but to take care of your people, and not be the senior leader with this secret.
Prompt others you care about and are leading to turn their attention toward intentional, informed Armed Forces Family Readiness that also prepares them for the Transition Mission and Liberty Battle, and begin planning from the earliest days in service.
Because if we’re ready for transition, then we’re ready for any mission Uncle Sam orders us on during military service.
We can win this biggest Mission, Transition, with a team, just like every other mission we ever worked up and deployed on.
Sign up for my substack Infoletter for free: Knowledge Bombs for Military Family Readiness and get my book, Avoiding Each & Every Military Veteran’s DIS-Advantage: How To Overcome the LIEs a Military Family Believes to Get Our Freedom Back on Amazon until Memorial Day 2022, then available much more widely thereafter.
CLOSING
Thank you so much for listening!
Please be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss a single episode. Be sure to check out the shows specific website and my center of gravity jarrodhsmith.com for appropriate disclaimers and terms of service.
Remember my opinions and those of guests are ours alone and don’t necessarily reflect the views of and employers we work for. For legal, tax, or other special area of interest please visit a licensed professional.
Kindly ask you punch that like button and share with a colleague or friend from your past duty assignments, and I’m sure they’ll be happy to hear from you! We’ll see you next time on the Liberty Accelerator JET…Just Engage Today.
To Your Liberty,
#HeckYeah
Share this post