Building men is brought to you by finish the race apparel, FTR apparel.com. The creators of all things, building men, and by become stronger industries, become-stronger.com. The creators of handmade steel, maces, hammers, and other bad ass equipment. Everything that I do is focused around time. That's my number one commodity.

They can't make more of an, I can't get any more back. So if I have enough time, I can figure out how to become a good father. If I have enough time, I can figure out how to become a good husband. And so that's really been where my north star has been to make sure that I give to myself the tough. In order to set up the stage and a positive foundation for our family.

you're listening to the building men podcast with Dennis and Anthony Meralda brothers on a mission to help you become the strongest version of yourself mentally, spiritually, emotionally, and physically what's happening. Ah, that's a sigh. I know. I just had a sigh of relief was at a side of despair. What, what's the context behind your sigh?

Oh, I'm just, you know, my body's feeling it, my head. You're not you're under the weather a little bit right now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's why I do have my tea. You do. We were, we, as we were talking with the Gezi, do I didn't even realize you had tea? I just, I just said it off the top of my head. We were in the we're in the works of potentially signing another sponsor, a tea company, testosterone boosting tea company to come.

But it's definitely, it works for us right now. It's funny. Cause I was at the food store and I took a picture of it. I forgot to send it to you. And I took a picture of all the teas that were at the grocery store and every single one with the flamboyant colors and like all these flowers all over it. And then there was one that I saw that was this like.

Looking one that had like a lightning bolt on it. And my eyes were just drawn to that. I don't even know what kind of tea it was. I have no idea. I just saw that in your life. I need that lightning bolt. I mean, it was ridiculous. I'm like, clearly they're marketing to these people and I saw this other guy looking for the teas and I'm like, oh shit, that's cool.

Like another guy I want to like tap on the shoulder, like, nice. What do you, what are you going for? You know? And all of a sudden I hear the guy call up his wife and he's like, I don't know what the fuck I'm looking for here, babe. Chamomile, lavender, what the fuck? What's the difference? I'm like, ah, God, I want to be able to now that being sick, I had to a couple of times, and I have like, everybody knows I'm a big blueberry fan, but Julia got me blueberry tea and I drank it.

Like it was my fucking job. I drank so much. And I said to you, how much is too much? Like, is it is it's never, it's never too much. Never, never too much shade. So with your tea, before we get into the, into the interview, as it just the tea, do you put honey in it? Do you put, I put honey. Yesterday when I had my tea, because my throat was feeling a little weird, but normally I don't.

And usually you could find teas that are pretty good by themselves. Yeah. I had this macho and rice tea, so it had like a racy flavor to it and it was industrial tea, which is just like seven green teas essentially put into one. It's really good. So yeah, so it just depends. It depends on how I'm feeling or what macho was.

It's literally just, I'm pretty sure it's just green tea. Like it just like equivalent to seven packages of green tea as matcha tea. But I think there's more benefit. It's a matcha tea is not Randy savages brother, not the macho macho man. So before we get into, where are our guests? That it's an fucking, really interesting story.

Jamie Gruber connected me with him. And we had a conversation for about an hour on the phone and I was telling him, I wish I was recording this conversation. It's fucking tremendous. It's wild. It it's. So in line with what we're doing, but just on the other side of the, of the bars. And we'll, we'll talk about that in a second, but the set it up, I would say we've all been in this experience, thinking I remember myself in, in In high school and middle school and high school, I wasn't a troublemaker.

I'd never really gotten in trouble. I would push the limits, you know, stupid shit. But the only time I ever got the tension, believe it or not was my senior year in high school. And we had an opportunity to sign up for release time where you could go to school and the school day would end at like 1 45 or you took a study hall and your school day ended at two 30.

And I opted for that all the time because I was playing sports. So sports were right after school. So I would always, I opted for the study hall. And so first day of school, we will go to the gym. This is before any kind of digital attendance taking kind of thing. So we went to the gym and Mr. Stevenson was there and he was taking attendance.

And for some reason, the fire bell rings and everybody goes outside. So we didn't complete the attendance taking, and then it was our lunch. So then we're like, They didn't get our names down. Let's fucking roll with this. So I never went to study hall the whole fucking year. My lunch was like 45 minutes or 50 minutes.

And then I had a study hall or before, so I want to have it like an hour and 50 minutes of lunch every day for my whole senior year. So we would go to taco bell. We would go to the mall, we could do whatever the fuck we wanted in the middle of the day. Then at the very end of the school year, we were getting ready for graduation and we're getting ready for the lineup and they're going through the fucking rosters.

And none of us, it was me like my friend, Gary, my friend, Greg, my friend, Fred, we were off to the sudden lake, what are you doing here? Like, well, we have study hall. They're like, you weren't here all year. And so they're like, you guys are suspended, you're all suspended out of school. And I went to the principal.

I was like, listen, I get it. W you know what we did wasn't right. But also you lost track of five, 18 year olds for the last hundred 80 fucking school to really say that I did. And they were like, One of the tension. So he got out with one to 10. I'm like my whole career. I had one detention, but as I'm setting the story up, I always wondered, like, what would I do if my freedom was taken away, as I was in that hour detention, my freedom was taken away.

It will not compare to the 17,000 hours of behind bars that are, that are guests. Travis Richie has Travis Richie is convicted life podcast host. He's an entrepreneur and motivational speaker. He created a program called accomplished ventures and where he works with, with people that were incarcerated, helping them to become returned citizens after the fact.

He's a great dude, Travis, welcome to the podcast. My man. Great to have you here. Great to be here, gentlemen. Thanks for the opportunity. So I'm not going to say that I served hard to. I'm not going to say that my, my experience in detention, for me, it was hard. I mean, I, I think I, you know, there was a girl, I was really interested at a time and I didn't go get to go to her house.

You learn a lot about yourself. The struggle is real. So obviously it's not in the same level as people wouldn't compare the two, but I, I, we need to hear a little bit of a backstory. We, you and I talked on the phone for about an hour and I would be doing a disservice to the building men audience, not giving you an opportunity, just to share a little bit about your backstory to bring us up to speed with how you, you started this venture.

So give us a little bit about that back story, Travis. Yeah. I'll give you just a, just a brief overview. We can dive into it at any point maybe later. So you know, I, I much like you, you know, kind of screwed around with friends, you know, didn't, I wouldn't, I wouldn't consider us like a troubled teens. You know, we, we did dumb things in the parking lot.

You know, we, we, we, we stole. Lizards from circle K you know, like as they will blow in the wind, but like, you know, we weren't out jacking cars and, you know, you know, pushing old ladies carts over, you know, we were just boys and, and so, you know, grew up on the east coast kind of in that rough and tumble environment.

And as, as I grew up, you know, I really had this affinity towards numbers and math. And so I really knew that I wanted to do something in the financial sector and, you know, was, was fortunate enough to do so, you know, went to college and got a degree and, you know, did all the, all the quote unquote right things and found myself at the age of 25, kind of living the dream, you know, married to, you know, my best friend, you know, fantastic individual, beautiful woman and running a hedge fund and had millions of dollars under management.

We had a $10 million fund that was registered with the federal government and the sec. And it was about the time when the whole world collapsed, you know, the old great recession. And I had a small fund in, in a real estate fund and we'd raised just a little bit over $3 million for that fund. And it was 2006 and we closed that down in 2007.

So it was open for about eight or nine months and unbeknownst to me and and the people that were around me, the state of Arizona does not recognize federal securities laws. And they require you to register your securities with the state of Arizona, kind of a, an, a wild, wild west cowboy type state.

And so in the state of Arizona actually indicted me for what they term transactions of an unregistered securities dealer, or salesman big, long word. And we fought that case for six and a half years. And I got to the point where I was just absolutely exhausted mentally, physically, emotionally, financially, spiritually, you name it.

You know, you're going through this, this time, you're walking into the courtroom. Every 90 days, you don't have any answers. You're doling out money left and right for legal fees. And at the same time, you know, my wife and I, we're still building a life. You know, she's finishing her school, you know, she wants to start a family.

I'm still running the business. You know, it's like, I've got one foot in and one foot out. And it's we, we, we thought about it. We talked about it. We prayed about it and said, you know, we're going to leave this up to the judge. And, and it's hard to really put the listeners in that moment, unless you've really, really been in some deep waters.

If you've really been in some dark places to where you say, you know what, whatever's coming after this can't be as bad as what this is. And that's where we got to, we were on the floor of the living room one night and said, you know what, we're going to leave this up. So call my attorney had that conversation.

And in 2012, January and literally 16 days from today will be a decade. Wow. Yeah. And the judge got in front of the judge and her words were very specific. They pierced me and she said, I'm going to make an example out of you. Wow. And she sentenced me to two years in the Arizona department of corrections.

I, and I could feel the, as you were saying that what the audience might feel when you, when you recognize there's only one way through this and that's through it, that's it. But then hearing the words, I'm going to make an example out of you, whatever follows that. It's not going to be good news for you.

So before I want to pause the story there, because. When we talked, you also gave me a little bit with your backstory, as far as you were raised, pretty much in a single parent family by your mom, because that's also an interesting dynamic in this story as well, which is why you mentioned maybe you were a little bit more on the radar in, in Arizona because of the, of the story with your father.

So bring us up to speed a little bit in that respect as well, with your dynamics with your parents growing up. Yeah, big time. So when what happened was, you know, my dad growing up, my dad was, was an entrepreneur. You know, it was a very intelligent individual and had a number of very successful businesses, both big and small.

But his, his biggest problem was the man that stared back at him every morning when he brushed his. And, and so pops got addicted to heroin right around the fifth grade. And, and so he, he became, you know, a, an out of control monster growing up. He was heavily involved in organized crime of, of all levels.

You know, and, and as you're little, you know, you, you hear different stories, you know, as you grow up, you see different things, you know, and he came home with duffel bags of money, you know, you'd look and find out what the syringes were. You know, you started to kind of piece things together, but at the time, you know, you're 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 years old, you know, you're, you, you don't really want to believe that the individual who is your dad is this is this model.

Right. And so I would see it kind of in, in short spurts, in glimpses. And so for example, you know, at at pop Warner football games you know, it, it, it was not a Saturday would go by where he wouldn't come out of the bleachers, you know, flip the Rolex off and just start beating another coach to death in the middle of the field.

You know, he was an incredibly violent individual, some of it based on, you know, his past his childhood, but a lot of it based on, you know, the addictions that he was fighting in his day to day, my dad is a very large man you know, was, was a bodybuilder and, you know, very, very, very strong. And so it was an interesting dichotomy.

I would go to school. And at this time you guys probably remember you had to two programs, you had the dare program. And then you have the great program. I don't know if you guys have that, but back east, you know, we had the great, you know, gang resistance and education and, and they, they show these pictures, they pull these photos out, you know, you'd have like officer friendly up there and he'd pull this photo out of some like long hair, no T math looking, you know, degenerate and he'd say, okay, boys and girls, like, this is a drug addict that you need to be aware of.

And I'm in the audience. Like, no, it's not, my dad's got, you know, shaved head. My dad's incredibly in shape. My dad's got no tattoos. My dad's tan. He's got blue. Like that's not a drug addict. Like, I don't know what you guys are talking about. Like my dad who moves a lot of drugs around the country. That's not what he looks like.

So, you know, it, it was, it was, it was an interesting upbringing and it got to the point where the addictions and, and the crime just became so involved and so heavy that my mom chose to leave. And it was, it was a good choice for her. And for us as kids, I'll be at a, you know, a very difficult choice after, you know, 20 plus years, you know, trying to, to make this individual and this family work.

And so, you know, my, my, my mom took us on the path of, you know, spirituality and righteousness and, and then my dad just further delve into his negative behaviors. And so my dad was the vice-president of the hell's angels. And as a result, got entangled in some very deep and ugly stuff. With the federal government and had a shootout with the Mongols in Loughlin and, you know, was, was on the wrong side of that video camera, those video campus.

And so pops went up the river and, you know, for a very long time for forever. And that really did not help my case in the state of Arizona. As you could imagine. You know, my dad was on the radar for quite some time based on his actions, based on the individuals that he hung around with. And when it got to to, to be my turn in front of that, judge, you know, over the years that we had fought this, we had heard these different undertones from different judges, different prosecutors that were thrown off the case because of, you know, the misdeeds that they did or misconduct they had towards us.

And it became so clear to me that this was a vendetta, that this was a personal agenda, you know, and everybody that I spoke to, everybody that I had a conversation with, you know, whether it was legal you know, a lawyer or a friend, you know, they're like this just doesn't add up. And it on in terms of why you're being prosecuted this hard, you know, when you looked at the case in general, there was a couple sexy points.

You know, I was very. I had a lot of money under management and you know, my, my family reputation definitely proceeded me. And so when you start to paint those pictures together, as they love to do on, you know, news channel 10, you know, they don't paint you in the greatest of light. They're not going to say that, you know, this is a young man who did everything the right way.

It was really how the tiger by the tail and made a misstep. That's not the story that they paint. They paint the story that, you know, you come from an organized crime background. You come from a, you know, a very, very, very salacious father who, you know, has been all over the news. Who's done some very horrible, nasty things, and this is just you following in his footsteps.

And before you go too far in too deep, we're going to slap you in the mouth. And we're going to let you know that we're still in. That's the narrative that they tell. Yeah. And first thing, before I even get into the, the father figure role, who knew that the hell's angels had a, you know, a democratic system of president vice president Mary.

Yeah, yeah. Treasurer. Yeah, they've got a whole, they've got a whole set up. Yeah. Sergeant of arms, all of it. It's wild, crazy. Never at it. Can't do it. That was going on. So real quick with your father then, you know, you mentioned you were seeing all of these things, the toxic part, that, that role of a father figure that was real negative in nature.

So where did you develop your sense of masculinity from, as you were growing up? Was there a mentor, was there a coach or did you just figure it out by watching TV? W w how did you develop that sense of self around your message? Dali, so many areas. So growing up, you know, my dad had a lot of really interesting one-liners that didn't make sense to you.

You know, I, I tell some funny stories, like we'd be driving to school and you know, I'm nine years old, right? You're, you're, I'm little to be driving to school and he'd say, Hey, just so you know, don't ever threaten anybody. What are you talking about? Right. I'm in the front seat, you know, they used to let kids ride in the front seat, you know, back in the eighties.

Right. And I'm in the front seat. I'd be like, what is this guy talking about? And he'd say, just so you know, if you threaten somebody and you don't follow through, then you've become a coward. And if you threaten somebody and they get a jump on you, then you're behind the eight ball. So if you have an issue with somebody, you walk up and you sock them in the fucking mouth, you don't threaten anybody.

You don't tell anybody that you're coming, but you come with a vengeance. All right. I'm going to grab my sack lunch we're out of here. And so there was a lot of his stories that now, you know, now that fast forward, you know, that I'm, I'm a father that I look back and I'm like, okay, there was definitely some validity here.

There was definitely some truth here, especially in today's world. You know, I have a 10 year old going now with bullying and I tell him that all the time, Hey, you see this kid right here. You see this kid? Let's talk, talk, talk. Yap, yap, yap, talk, talk, talk. It's usually like the fat kid like that. Kid's just insecure.

That kid is just very unsure of himself. So he's never the one that you're going to have to worry about on the football field or the lacrosse field, or he's never going to be the one that attacks you. He's going to say some really mean and nasty things, but he's never going to come and shoot this. And so like, that's where I would start to pick up like, okay, so this is what my dad actually should have said, you know, but in like a lot of his stupors in his anger, he would just, you know, rattle off some crazy shit.

So a portion of my masculinity came from there. You know, my dad was very, very conscious that we were, we were dabblers, you know, we able to go and, you know, we didn't, we weren't reliant upon anybody to put food on our table. And so he was very masculine in that capacity. From a spiritual perspective.

I had I, I, and still to this day I had, and I have a role model. His name is Quaid Nelson. And from a spiritual perspective, he's been in my life and my family's life, you know, since we were born, I'm still married to the same woman to this day, you know, 30 years later you know, raise two beautiful children, two grandchildren.

And he's really been that even keeled individual that I can go to from a father figure perspective and get a different perspective in life. And I got from my. When your name is when your name is Quaid Nelson, you have no other choice, but to be that father figure role, I mean, I'm just, that's, that's the name I would give to the character of the movie that's going to, I'm going to go to for advice, his name is Quate Nelson.

It sounds like Arnold Schwartzenegger well, and to give you a little background, you're absolutely right. You know, Quaids probably six, four, two hundred and sixty pounds and he wears cowboy boots. So yeah, you're, you're absolutely right. And, you know, he, he drives a, an earth mover, you know, at the, at the comb, at the gold mine, you know, and like, yeah, that's the guy, you know?

And, and so it, it he's been, you know, kinda my, my spiritual guidance on that point, because I didn't have anything in terms of a father figure that I could point to and say, Hey, this is a good idea, you know, that I should emulate. But what I did know was that if I had enough time that I could figure anything.

And that's where my wife and I have gone. And our relationship with our family is everything that I do is focused around time. That's my number one, commodity. They can't make more of an, I can't get any more back. So if I have enough time, I could figure out how to become a good father. If I have enough time, I can figure out how to become a good husband.

And so that's really been where my north star has been to make sure that I've given myself the time in order to set up the stage in a positive foundation for our family. Did, did you find that you ever wanted to go down that path, that your father went down? Like, did you ever feel this like inkling to be like, man, that's bad ass, like, look at all this stuff he's doing.

Cause that's what I wanted to. Yeah, always. Yeah. Yeah. You know, it's a real, it's confusing when I say this, you know, I speak to a lot of youth groups and I say this to them all the time. It's a very confusing state, you know, when you're 10, 11, 12 years old, when. This monster who's living with you, you want to make sure that he doesn't come back into your house.

Like you're scared to death of him. Right. You're so nervous. You're so worried that he's going to come back, but at the same time as your dad, and it's just a weirdest dichotomy to try to figure out. And so yeah, to your, to your question. Absolutely. Because growing up, you know, it wasn't, it, I didn't have any problems as long as he was around because he was psychotic, you know, he would, he would do things that would ensure that the family was safe, legal, illegal, right.

And wrong. Didn't matter. I mean, and, and he was notorious for it. And so, yeah, I, all the time, you know, I, I can remember many, many, many times, you know, I would be 15, 16 years old, 17 years old, 18 years old, you know, driving him and his friends around, you know, with, with duffel bags, full of guns and ammunition and money, you know, going from one place to another, because I was the clean kid, you know, I was, I never did drugs because of what I saw.

You know, I knew that I would keep my nose out of trouble because I didn't want to go down that path. But at the same time, I wanted to be close to it. There was something regardless of how, you know, spiritual or religious or whatever it might be. There's something that we all have, whether it's an HBO documentary or Showtime series, there's something that's very interesting and intriguing about being a neighborhood.

Before we get into picking the story back up again. I want to just comment on the sit in the front seat when you were nine years old, it just brought me back to, it was the wild, wild west in cars. You remember laying in the back of the stage, we had a station wagon sit in the back of a station while, or even in a pickup truck.

You could be in the back of a pickup truck. Our old man had a work van, and I remember there'd be. We'd go out for batting practice for the baseball team. And you have eight kids sitting on paint cans, or draw costs in the back of a van and he'd take a turn and we'd fucking fly all over the place that led wall concussions left and right.

We had, it was, but it made it. That's what we did. You just fucking, you sat on the pink bucket or, or the drop cloth and let's go strap it in and strap it up. So, so now we're back in. So now this, this judge basically says, I'm going to make an example out of you. You said you had this feeling of, oh shit. Oh shit.

This is fucking real right now. What, what, what was the initial sentence that you got from the judge two years? She said, I remind you to two years in the department of corrections. And, and was that, did you serve the full two years? I did not. No, no. I got very lucky. So Arizona had a I still has an 85% good time.

So if you get two years, you'll do 85%, which is like, what 18 months? And are 21 months. Sorry. And then I think I got 90 days because of some you know, good time drug counseling, whatever it might've been. So I ended up doing about 18 that's good time. Yeah. That's I'm sure that's the best way to, to talk about your time in prison, right?

Oh man. It was such a surplus. So now I'm interested in the relationship dynamic with your wife. You know, you've, you've gone through this experience together. Now you have children and there is, you know, or the one on the way or however the case may be, and your there's gotta be this conversation that you're having with your wife now, but okay.

Like what's going on at home. What's next for us? How are we going to handle this situation? So bring us a little bit into that relationship dynamic between you and your wife. Yeah. T to rewind a little bit, the day that we pulled up, you know, the day that I got sentenced, we parked our car outside and I put the money in.

Like it was not, it was not in our game plan to do anything except for walk back out of the court building that we've done for the last six and a half years. And so we didn't plan, we didn't talk about it. We, we didn't even think of the idea, you know, of like her having to move out of our house or her having to take over the bills or her having to get my password for baking.

None of it. We talked about any of it. And so when, when she gave me that sentence and the judge gave me that sentence, it was, I literally blacked out. And as I came to, you know, they were, it was the first time in my life. They were, they were putting the handcuffs on my wrists. And one of the reasons that I was like, what in the world, my left handcuff was cutting into my skin.

It was so. And you'll never forget those moments. You never forget the sound of that steel as they click together, you never forget the way that they smell. They smell old and like rusted out. And so I looked across the courtroom and, and told her that I loved her and, you know, knew that I was built for this.

And there was a part of me that felt, ah, like this is over, this is over, this is a new chapter. And it was literally a millisecond long, you know, I didn't, I didn't wallow in that. It weighed in there. I didn't feel great. I don't want to set that BS up, but there was a moment where I was like, okay, this is a new chat.

And so having that dialogue with my life. Yeah, it was, it was intense. What I started to do, you know, when you, when you go into intake, when you go from jail to prison, you know, when they take your photos and you know, your blood and all that stuff you have a period of about 21 days plus, or minus a month where you're just sitting in holding and you, you there's no telephones because they're afraid that you're going to tell your loved ones where you're getting transferred to.

And there's no windows, it's like a really bad Vegas nightclub. And I'm, I, I have access to a number two pencil and five sheets of paper a day. And so I start writing to Melissa because I can get stamps. So I started writing to Melissa and I start telling her about, you know, everything's okay, and this is what's going on.

And here's kind of the scene. And, you know, and I was, I initially started writing for. You know, to let her know that I was okay. But what I quickly realized was that that writing became therapeutic and cathartic for me. And so we actually took that exact relationship and wrote hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of letters back and forth to one another.

And I took it as an opportunity for us to deep dive into our relationship. I wanted her sometimes, especially in today's world. Right. I, I now call him text message. Tough guys are keyboard warriors. Everybody feels a little bit more comfortable behind the screen. And, and so I took that as an opportunity, my wife and I did to say, okay, like, let's talk about everything.

What's our fears. What's our weaknesses. What's our strengths. What's our goals. What's our dreams. And so when we started to communicate on paper, our relationship had had. So healthy during that time that I was incarcerated, I can't even put it into words. And as we started to write back and forth to one another, and then I got transferred to a prison yard where she could come and visit, she made those visits every weekend, every Saturday and every Sunday drove hours one way.

And our visits became optimistic. We would talk about the things that we were going to do. This wasn't a death sentence. This wasn't a life sentence. And so her and I would have these conversations where I would say, I am so grateful that this time, this two years, but we can set aside and we can learn more about one another that we can dig deep and understand what we want, because I don't want to be 80 years old, 70 years old, 60 years old, living with that six letter word that most people call regret.

We know friends and family members that don't want to be married. I don't ever want to be in that position because to me that's a death sentence. And we created this beautiful, you know, two years, both on pen and paper and in person where we would literally architect the life that we were going to live, as soon as I was out.

What a different way to, to take that situation. I mean, I would say that's gotta be definitely in the minority, right? There's gotta be less than 1% of the people that would find themselves in your situation that took that challenging spot. Made something beautiful out of it looked at the not only the glass is half full, but also let's, let's look at the glass itself.

Let's really inspect what's going on here with us, become the best OSS that we can become for each other then as well. And for our family moving forward. It's really amazing. And the, the fact that you were journaling and it became this therapeutic experience that you went through, understanding who you truly were.

I would challenge people out there just to start writing their, their shit down too often. We keep stuff bottled up in our heads and we don't ever get an opportunity to get it out on paper and then read our thoughts and share that with another human being. You know, you go back to the time that we were growing up, we used to write notes to it.

Do you actually have to put the pen to the paper and write those things and share that experience with someone it's, it's something that I think something that we think we need to get back to as human beings. I couldn't agree more. I couldn't agree more. It's it's, it's, it's part of our daily, like literally as I sit here, it's part of our daily, we still write down pen and paper every day.

And, and, and, and now we do it with our little ones, you know, we just did our 20, 22 family goals. You know, when we put those there they're of course digital, because our kids are way more advanced technologically and we are, but you don't still to this very day, every morning, I start out, you know, journaling and some sort of, you know what I call spirituality.

I'm not, I'm not forcing a religion upon anybody, but where I deem spirituality, I'll put spirituality in the vein of purpose. And so what I often find in a, and I'm sure you guys do as well, is so many guys that I know wake up at the age of 40 with what should be a good life, right? That they're still with their wife, their kids don't have any major deformities or elements.

We've got a fairly decent job, if not a great paying job. And they hate their life. You're describing me if five years ago I was mad. Exactly, exactly. And, and you know this, but these are the guys that have a death sentence who have a life sentence when you, when you start to realize, and I, and I, I really deep dive into the word change.

Oftentimes. So many times in our world, we're told, Hey, don't change. Don't change. Don't change. Don't change. You don't want to wake up one day. And your spouse says, you've changed. Your friends, say you've changed. Your family says you've changed, but then you wake up at the age of 40 and you will. I have changed and I'm miserable.

And I don't think that we deep dive enough into ourselves and into our souls and really rewire our belief systems from 20 to 25 to 30 and so on. I believe that with the word change, when we, when we grow up. You know, we get the old adage, tigers and leopards and stripes and spots, right? Oh, a tiger. Can't change.

It's in a leper catch in a zebra can't change. Well, the good news is everybody listening is we're not damn jungle animals. You can be better. You can rise above any of your biography if you will. But what I, what I will submit to you is this. And I say this with the most intention and the most powerful feeling that I can get across to everybody listening, you will never rise above the opinion that you'd formed of yourself.

I've loved that the strongest force in the human personality is the need to remain consistent with how you define yourself. We know this to be a fact. So if you wake up with the age of 40 and you've defined yourself as X, this is your fault. But the good news is how you got there was just to a series of habits so we can rewire those habits and we can get you to where you deserve to be.

And you could be take that, you know, the tiger stripes and the spots and become a liger, which is for magical abilities from the point of dynamite. I'd love, I'd love to just really quickly. Like walking into prison for that first. And so now you're actually in, in that you're locked up. You said he wrote down up the river that's yeah.

I've never talked to him about somebody who's been up the river or in the clink, or it's like, those are the notes that I take when I'm doing, when I'm interviewing for a podcast, but because the idea of prison comes from documentaries or, yeah, exactly. So like, what was that? Did you have to keep to yourself or did you just have to like where you just kind of solo in this or did you yeah.

Good question. So, so you're driving, you're on a bus you're on this rattle trap bus you're driving across the desert because never has a federal or state government put a prison in a decent town. And so they're, they're, you're, you're driving to the middle of nowhere. Our particular prison was literally so close to the Mexico border at nighttime.

When the sun would go down, we could see the Mexican flag. Okay. I would say 80% of our, our corrections officers walked over the border every day, took their us dollars and their W2's and then cruise back over to live in Mexico. So it, when you're driving, you're on this path, there's 50 of you. You're shackled head to toe, you know, and, and literally like, you've, you know, you're you're shackled and you pull up and it's just this big, long drive, you know?

And it's just concrete tower after razor wire, after concrete tower, after razor wire. And then the bus finally stops and you pull up to the front and there's so much razor wire and chain link that you can't actually see everything inside. You can see the, you can see the oranges and you can see the people moving, but there's so much razor wire and chain-link and, and areas and Sally ports in between you and the yard that you can't actually see.

And you get off the bus and you're shackled up and you're taking your steps down the bus and you're taking your steps onto the yard and they give you a bed roll and they give you a pillow and, and they give you a cell assignment. And you know, there you are. And I had a gentleman walk over to me, you know, prison is, is obviously very racially motivated.

And so I had a white guy walk over to me and, and, you know, obviously between my, my hair and my blue eyes, he said, all right, so you're with us. And, you know, he said, where are you going? And I showed him my, my slip. And he said, all right, I'll show you where it's at. And you know, he showed me to my cell and, and there you are sitting on your bunk in prison just like that.

And I didn't want to be in that room. I didn't want to be in that cell. And so I, I wanted to go out to. And on this particular day, the workout yard, the rec yard was open. And so I walked outside to the workout yard and, you know, I had sunglasses on and I just stood in the workout yard on this concrete slab.

And I just wanted the sun to let me know that I was alive. Those were my very first moments in prison. And I knew really quickly. I had a feeling very quickly that I needed to have some friends and, and the biggest guy on the yard that I could find he was, he was doing laps. He was shirtless. He had to weigh 280 pounds just solid and another white guy and he had a Walkman on.

And, and so I just started mirroring his activity. And about a week into it, him and I had a conversation and he told me his story. He was a family man as well, and ran a couple of small businesses. And the reason that he was in, he purchased steroids from China and shipped them to a ups store and they got him for drug trafficking.

And so yeah, family man married kids the whole nine and big dude. And, and so him and I started, he was my partner from that point forward. And, and we actually still text message to this day he's out and thriving and doing well. And so that was, that was my workout routine. That was the guy that I was paired up with.

And. Just because I was a little bit intelligent. I figured, you know, the biggest dude on the Lord may, or may probably most likely going to be the guy I should saddle up with. I will tell you, cause everybody loves a good prison story. I will tell you a good prison story. About halfway into my sentence this, this guy lands on the yard, this black guy, and he lands on the yard and he is as big, if not bigger than, than my workout partner, Lauren, he's huge.

And this guy is doing pull-ups, you know, and in sets of 50 and big monster. And so he's on the yard for a couple of weeks and he does some things that are not, are not right. So he takes some people's food because of who he thinks he is or what yard he came from. He says some things to some certain people.

And when it really got crazy, was he talking to other individuals, workout shoes, and we're only yard walking and I have never heard the screams so loud in my life. And there's this guy, he probably weighs 170 pounds soaking wet. And he has two socks wrapped around both of his hands. And he has master locks like from a firm that we used in high school, like saved by the bell style, you know, 15, 24, 36.

He has two master locks in they're wrapped around both of his middle fingers and they're wrapped in socks and she is splitting. This guy opened this big dude that was doing the 50 pull-ups. He is splitting him open, left, right. And center because this is the guy whose shoes that he told. Beats him literally to the point, you know, the guards come out, guns come out, you know, rubber bullets get fired.

Everybody's on the ground. And it was it literally. And I say this all the time with no joke. And when I say it, but like the smallest little psychopath in prison is some of the most dangerous individuals, you know, they call them missiles or they call them heat seekers. You know, they call them enforcers, but these guys were relentless and it, it came a point where, you know, the backstory was the, the individuals that ran the yard, sled to the guy who got his shoes stolen.

Hey, if you don't step up and do something, this is going to continue and it's going to be worse and worse and worse. And. I, I swear to you. I didn't see it happen from the beginning, you know, but the scream and I still remember to this day, a decade later, the scream that you heard on the yard from this guy, I mean, his head is just being split open, like a watermelon.

And that's where the prison term, not that, but that is often referred to the prison term of, of having your wigs split. I'm wondering a lot of prison terms. So this is amazing. Were you ever in, in danger of, of your, for your life in prison, like ever like worried about being shivved or shanked, or was that the, is that the right term?

If you're looking at me, we both serve to two hours of detention, acute, and you guys were hardened criminals back in the day, right? No. Fortunately fortunately, no, I had I had, once I was classified you know, once they, they go through the intake process, nothing, and I know you guys are going to be shocked to hear this, but nothing with the government goes quickly.

I know spoiler. And so, you know, from the time you go from jail, then you get classified to a prison yard. You kind of go to what, what they call a reception as stupid as a term is that sounds, they literally call it a reception yard, which is just like thousands of dudes in like bunker style or dormitory style.

And then from there, they ship you off to different yards. And once they have a bus load that goes to this, your, this yard, it goes out or a bus load of that yard. It goes out. And so this, this holding period is plus or minus like three months. Okay. And then once I got classified, which is what that means, once I got classified and they were like, oh, you know, first time non-violent has an education.

They sent me to the minimum yard. And on that minimum yard is really where accomplished ventures was born because on that minimum yard, everybody had to have a job. And it was, it was considered a working yard. So in most of these small towns across America, where the prisons are, the industry, a lot of the inmates will do a lot of the dirty work.

They could work in the fields, they could work in the factories, you know, they could work in a myriad of places. And so at our particular location, we had about 50 different jobs in the community. So we actually worked for the parks and rec. We worked for the, the city and you know, where we would go around and landscape the, the parks or the yards of the pools.

We worked for the fire department. We worked for the Sheriff's department. We have all of these jobs, right. There was a, there was a garden and because of my degree and because of where I, I, I kind of put myself in on the yard from a teaching or a tutor perspective when people find out about my.

Because you find out about everybody's crime, when people find out about your crime, they started, you know, Hey, wall street. I got a question for you, you know my mom's starting this or how do I invest in that? So it kind of became this like financially related conversations on the yard, let's take a classified.

There was a tutor position that was available out at the community college. So the, there was this the small business development center. It's an SBDC, it's a nonprofit they're nationwide. And they are usually in cohorts with, you know, smaller community colleges. And so the four yards that made up my city, my prison city would meet at this community college.

And now keep in mind, Rob, you know, running around and following with the boys and girls. We have our own Sally port section one of our own, you know, trailers that we're going into, you know, as inmates. Nonetheless, we're still part of that community college. So. I get out there and so rewind because of my degree.

And so this tutor position becomes available and they say, Hey, you know, we want you to go and, and teach out at the college. And I say, yeah, cool. Let's do it. And so when I got out there that day, that week they were putting together like business plans for ideas for small businesses. And I didn't have a job at this point other than to tutor.

And there was really no direction. And so I, I kind of went person by person and said, what are you doing? What are you doing? What are you doing? What are you doing? And I would give them ideas. Hey, have you thought about this? Have you thought about that? And naturally I became kind of a go-to guy and the gentlemen at the small business development center said, Hey, why don't you teach a business?

One-on-one course. Great. Let's do it. And so we've started to put together courses in curriculum and, and I would, I would literally just write all day long for these. All day long because they didn't have access to Google or the internet. And so when guys would come to me, they'd be like, oh, I, Travis, I'm going to be out in 30 days.

How do I set up a business? And I'd be like, okay, you need to go to the secretary of state website. What city are you? What state are you going to? Okay. So it's going to be sos.ca.gov. You're going to need to pull up the articles of incorporation. You need to file those. Don't worry about this. And don't worry about expediting them.

Just make sure that this is what a registered agent needs. Okay. So what's that stuff. And I'm writing all this down for these guys. All right. Now, once you have those registered, now, now that's what the state. Now you're going to need an EIN number. That's an employer identification number. It's a nine digit number that's given to you from the IRS.

It's free. Don't pay anybody for it's called an SS dash four form. Here's what like, and I'm walking them through all of this. And, and what I realized guys is all of a sudden, I've got everybody at the college is like, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait. This, guy's got some real knowledge here. He's, he's willing to share it because that's an unusual thing in prison and not just the prison in today's world.

Let's be honest, right? Everybody doesn't want to share their idea because of crab in the bucket theory or scarcity mindset, or someone's going to steal it, especially in prison. Nobody's given away free game and that's all I wanted to do. I really wanted these cats to succeed. And so the business 1 0 1 course turned into a credit course and it turned into a finance course.

And, and when I say course, I really want the listeners to understand we're writing with pencil and paper and pen and paper. So it's not like, you know, we have PowerPoints and, you know, spreadsheets and Charlotte, this is a very rudimentary set up, but nonetheless, very impactful. And what I realized then this is where the moment that that accomplished was born, every one of these guys got out and they needed press.

They needed to have their credit run for an apartment. They need to get a vehicle. And Mo more often than not nine times out of 10, they, they have poor credit or no credit. And they go to some buy here, pay here, car lot, and some jerk off who worked there with give them a 20% interest rate, got a 1984 Saturday.

And, you know, they have an $800 a month car payment, and then they would start doing some illegal stuff in order to make the car payment. And so I told my wife, I can fix that. Like FICO score is free. I can get these guys their score twice a year. And so I started having them write to their loved ones and we were obtaining their credit scores and their credit reports.

And I'd be like, is this your name? And you'd be like, no, that's my, my brother-in-law and my cousin. Alright, let's dispute it. Let's get that written. Let's get that off. And sure enough, I was like, holy cow, if I can get these guys at six 20 or six 40 or six 50 to walk out the gates to, they can go to Toyota or Nissan or, you know, go to a small dealership and lease a car for a buck 99 and get an apartment so that they're not slinging meth in the, in the hood.

And this is a life changer. I can teach it. And this is. And that's, as far as my thought process really went at the time and I knew I could fix a problem and I wanted to. And so now you're now when you, when you're out, you recognize, wait a second, I was onto something here, there there's not a lot of people that are in your space that took the opportunity to help better individuals give them a second chance rather than so you did that.

So just inherently you had that in you to want to help other people. Then when you get out. So now you're out and you're trying to rebuild shit in your own life. Tell us what then that became. So now you're out, like what, what is the future of the accomplished program now? Yeah, I am rebuilding. They, they wouldn't allow me to work for myself while I was on while I was, I was still on probation.

So I worked at nighttime overnight. I stacked bread trucks so that I could work for myself during the day and build my own business back up so that I had, you know, a W2. I, I work nighttime and I stack bread trucks for a guy for a small bakery. And as I'm rebuilding, you know, everything kept pointing back to me, educating these guys.

And I, I started with a financial literacy course, and I wanted to make sure that when they got this course, that it was totally tangible that you could walk out and you would, you could get your FICO, you could set up a business, all the above. You knew what a bank account looked like, felt like. And you could do that fast forward that that caught on fire because everybody wanted to learn about money until you fast forward.

A decade later, almost a decade. You know, accomplished is now the largest provider of prison, curriculum and content in America. We have about 400,000 tablets that we're all in on a daily basis. And we teach everything from financial literacy to entrepreneurship. And now our biggest focus is the mindset, the mental awareness, and we've moved into, you know, breath, work and motivation and, and, and consciousness, because I'll give you kind of a small why behind it is for you or not.

For the three of us to walk into a job interview, let's say that could be a daunting task. What's he going to ask me? What's she going to ask me? What should I wear? Right. But imagine that you don't have a resume. How do I explain where I was for the last three years? And so I wanted these guys to control the narrative, and so I would start teaching them about controlling the narrative and I'd say, Here's the thing, here's the thing, Dennis, I'm grateful for your time today.

And I'm grateful for this interview. I want to let you know that the last 20 months of my life have been taken from me. The reason I applied for this position with your company is because there's three things I learned about myself while incarcerated that I think directly apply to your job posting. If you'd like to tell me that we can continue.

I'd love to tell you about my story and how I can bring value to your company. If not, I don't want to waste another 20 minutes of my life or yours. And most employers were like, holy crap, do you have three friends? Like the authenticity, the self-confidence oh my gosh, I can teach you to sell a car or a widget.

I can teach you how to pack a ups truck, but like, holy crap. First of all, thanks for being honest, that doesn't happen. Second of all this self-confidence where did you learn that? And so those are the courses that we're now more focused on, right? Like the, the building up of the main. Is where I believe we've met in life.

When we build that man up to give him a purpose and a passion, the profits follow. And so that's where accomplished ventures is focused. We're in approximately 155 different jails and prisons around the country. And I get to spend my days traveling the world and speaking to the department of corrections and the bureaus of prisons on how to actually rehabilitate inmates.

And then I get to spend some time with the inmates and take it una and find out where their pain points are and really help build them up from a mental perspective so that they're ready to hit the gate running. It's absolutely fascinating. With building men being the name of our podcasts, it fits right in with that idea of, well, this is the first interview we've done with someone who has been incarcerated.

So many of the interviews, the people that we talked to have gone through that specific challenging spot in their life and the chips were down and they had to make a decision. Am I going to fold, or am I going to, I'm going to play the hand that was dealt and I'm going to fucking go all in on me in the best possible way that I can.

And so you did that and not only, not only did you do it for yourself and, and came out, I would argue a stronger individual than when you walked in. You took that and now you're helping so many other people do the same thing. It's absolutely remarkable. I just want to. Pay my gratitude towards you in doing that.

It's such a needed thing. And it's also taking away from the idea of that, the process being so punitive in nature, where there's a Scarlet letter saying you made a mistake, whatever it was in your life, whether it's your father, it's not your fault or whatever the situation was, and you are learning from it and becoming better and getting that second chance.

So it becomes a true opportunity for growth for this moving forward into the future. Not that we're just, or it's it's punishment, and then we're gonna, you're you're gonna be out. And then it's, you're going to get, it's going to be that self fulfilling thing again, you're gonna be back in again and again again.

So I it's phenomenal that you've you went in this direction. I absolutely give you all the credit in the world. It's it's amazing. Yeah, I appreciate it, brother. I think what I learned about myself during that time incarcerated. Was that everything that I had to create a beautiful life was already inside of me.

And you knew this yourself, you know, five years ago, you like all of your ambitions and your deepest, darkest secrets and wildest dreams. Like they're literally just waiting for you to go all in. They're waiting for you to let go. And that like that, that is where the narrative needs to start with with the men in this country, with the men in this world.

What I found is that most, I won't say most, a lot of the conversations that are not happening around the dinner tables of America are because most men are uncomfortable with their current situation. Most men are not comfortable taking their shirt off in the mirror, so they don't want to talk to their kids about being physically fit.

Most men are living paycheck to paycheck with a job that they freaking hate. So they're not comfortable talking to their kids about taking over the world and becoming natural. That's where I think that this narrative and the narrative that you guys are pushing really, really gains traction, is that we're being sold a bill of goods about a society that just isn't true.

We all have the opportunity to improve. And I would submit that it's actually our obligation. As men, as masculine men to get better, to become better, to build something. And those are the visions and the narratives that we should be passing down to future generations. Well, you mentioned the tablets, the 400,000 tablets in different prison areas around the country, the curriculum that you have, helping people become entrepreneurs.

What do you see as the future for the accomplished program over the next five or five or so years? What are the next steps as you move forward in that great question. A twofold number one technology in prison is going to change rapidly. I believe that you will not go to prison in the next five years in America without a tablet.

And let me tell you why they're going to save a ton of money with the use of technology. If, if one individual can pull up a FaceTime and be able to talk to their family or their relatives or their loved ones, I no longer need to move that individual to the. I now need to employ a guard to move that individual to visitation.

If, if I can, if I can face time on my tablet, into education and into school, I now no longer need an education instructor on the yard. I saved that salary. So technology is going to change the prison system greatly. And you have the Pell grant coming out in 2023, which will be the first time an incarcerated individual will be able to obtain Pell grant money for school, for school.

And that is going to only happen on a grand scale with the use of tablets. So I believe that tablets in America are going to become the forefront in terms of the prison system and, and at accomplished ventures, we believe that we're going to be on the forefront of that curriculum, changing the way and paving the way.

The second thing that I've learned is this. I've had so many departments of corrections and, and PNP parole and probation come to me and say, Hey, we've heard about what you've done inside, but once these guys get outside, we're having such a tough time keeping them on. And so my focus for 2022 and beyond is convicted mindset.

Convicted mindset is all about the bridge of building the men after they are released. And so we walk them through the tangible pillars of life. We start with mental, we'd go into physical, we move into spiritual and we end with financial it's a 52 week course where we walk individuals through how to X, Y, and Z.

How do I wake up in the morning? How do I make sure that I'm doing what I should be doing? How do I make sure my habits are aligned with my intentions, which are aligned with my goals, which are aligned with my actions. We're literally building the men the way that they should have been built and parole and probation is not going to do that.

I'm sorry. You're not going to get a live branch from a dead. So it's our obligation to be the bridge after they leave the gate and they're fired up and they built themselves inside. It's our opportunity now at convicted mindset to take them and from where they are, to where they deserve to be, that that should be a requirement for anyone who's coming out of an incarcerated experience.

That should almost be a requirement for any man to come through a 52 week program at some point in their life when they graduate from high school and they go through this program to help them understand what being a man is all about and all of these different things. Like it's a life requirement track.

We recently did a program. I was a free event. We called it the pillars of masculinity. And we asked people that we had interviewed over the past couple months. We said, send us a three-minute video clip, giving a piece of advice to a high school young man. And it was the, the piece of advice around self-discipline around authenticity, about identity.

It was, it was such a rewarding experience and we did it for free and we'll release it. Just, you know, anybody who's interested in taking a look at it. But I have a son who is 16 years old and he watched, he was like, that was amazing hearing men explain their experiences and things that they've gone through mistakes that they have made.

But also what did they learn from these mistakes that would further help the next generation of young men like pulling them up by, you know, like when they needed that experience to be pulled up? It was for, I mean, for me, it was probably my most rewarding experience through this, this program through building men, but there's such a need for it.

So if there's any way that we can support you in your mission, we are all on board. We absolutely love what you're doing. I would like, well, first of all, I would love to see that, that, that video. And then secondly, what I'd love to do is let's have a conversation and see if we can get that into all the potential.

Let's throw it off, like we'll, we'll have it over to you within the next couple of days. And there's that, there's some synergy here. I definitely feel that. I feel like the mission of building men really aligns with what you're doing. And I'm so happy that we were able to connect with you today.

Travis tell the building men audience where we can reach out to your work, where we can find you. Yeah, absolutely. If you're on social media, it's I am Travis Richie. And if you have a loved one that's incarcerated or a friend or a family member that's incarcerated and feel that they can benefit from any of our programs, that's over@accomplishedventures.org.

And if you are on this side of the fence and feel that you want to be built up and want to join and, and really be in a network and a community that builds people up, that's convicted mindset.com. Tremendous brother. Anything, any final questions then? So first of all, it's just amazing Dennis hinted at this before, but how much of what you said resonates just with me personally, right?

Like just all the struggles that you went through, all the things that you're working with. So what would be one thing that you could tell the building men audience that they could start today? Let's say wherever they are incarcerated or not just wherever they are feeling stuck, feeling like they don't have purpose.

What's one thing that can, they can do starting right now, man. Such a great question. You'll never be successful until you're able to turn your pain into great. I think so, oftentimes we have been sold such a bill of goods with social media that you can wake up with three filters on your face, you know, a six pack abs and a million dollars all from your mother's basement.

And it's complete bullshit. It really is. I think the reason that so many of the men that we talk to have a problem or have an issue is because they're pictures of their life do not line up with how it is right now. So rewiring that perspective, I believe that you have to find your ultimate freedom within sight of you.

And most of the time it requires you going to that point of pain, that point of trauma, to realize what it is that you are here on earth to do. We only have in, in general, 78 of these go rounds, 78 years. That's the average, you know, white dude on this planet plus, or minus 80 years. And so if we've used up half of that, I want to make sure that you are not stuck in one of the traps of self doubt for the next half of that.

Absolutely tremendous turning pain into greatness is the name of this podcast episode to fund building men. Instagram is building.men. Building men coach@gmail.com. Our website is building men.io. Check out our sponsors. We have two sponsors right now could be a third on the way. We'll go back to the tea thing to start the episode.

Our sponsors are become stronger industries, maker of handmade steel maces and finish the race of power where you can get everything building men. Truly appreciate Travis Richard for being on. I didn't get an opportunity to ask you about. Pack of smokes is currency. We'll do that the next time. I just want, I need to know about, I saw you wrote that down a pack of smokes, Shiv pack of smokes, Quaid Nelson.

That's how I do my Doyle rule. And I also wrote, I wrote Kelly capacity because I had a crush on her from a saved by the bell when she was she wasn't one of the lines also. How about if we're talking about crushes and we're taking it back to the nineties, how about Topanga, Topanga, Alyssa Milano. I mean, you could do a whole episode just on that, on that, on that.

And the, our final thing is if you're interested in. Four day, three night experience. Me Anthony, Austin, Linney and chase Tolleson. We'll be holding the hero's journey. Men's retreat, April 28th through May 1st in lake Tahoe, California. It's a truly holistic experience helping us find community, find brotherhood and go through a bed S you know, four day, 300 experience.

So check that out for the building men audience go a step further than you thought you can go. We'll see you next time on building men. .