Photo Credit: Marion Abrams – Madmotion
I was standing at the edge of the Chittenden Reservoir, shivering, panicking, and crying. The second Death Race I ever entered had brought me to this moment: a three-mile swim in freezing, murky water. I wasn’t prepared. I didn’t have the right gear. And worst of all, I knew that if I didn’t do this, I wasn’t going to get my official finish.
It crushed me.
I’d already been through hell—carried logs, crawled through mud, solved puzzles on no sleep, endured hours of physical and mental torture—all because I chose to. But here I was, broken. Not because my body gave out… but because of my own fear. My own doubt.
And it was in that moment of despair that something else crept in. A thought that would echo louder in the years to come:
What kind of life am I living where I can cry about not being allowed to suffer more?
That’s the paradox of these events—of endurance races, ultra marathons, rucks, and crucibles like the Death Race. We show up. We pay to be here. We opt in to pain. We have time to prepare to suffer.
We choose to suffer.
That ability to choose to suffer, is a privilege.
That moment at the reservoir wrecked me—not just because I was cold and scared, but because I felt like I was losing something I’d worked so hard for. I wanted that official finish. I wanted validation. And it felt like it was slipping through my fingers because of a swim I couldn’t face.
Later, once I was warm and dry and removed from the moment, I started to unpack it. I was ashamed at first. Ashamed of the tears, the panic, the weakness I felt. But beneath that shame, something deeper began to stir.
What kind of life have I built where not being allowed to suffer becomes the thing that breaks me?
I realized then just how absurdly privileged that was.
I wasn’t drowning. I wasn’t being forced into that water. I could have walked away—and I did. My life went on. I had a home to return to, people who cared about me, a future full of choice and opportunity. The pain I’d felt was real—but it was temporary, self-inflicted, and most importantly, optional.
The Contrast of Involuntary Suffering
Years later, this hit even harder.
Because most people don’t get to opt into their pain. They don’t train for it, prepare mentally, or tell themselves “this will make me stronger.”
They just live it—every day.
Most suffering in the world isn’t a race you signed up for. It doesn’t come with a waiver or a finish line.
No one chooses to lose their home and sleep on concrete through a Northwest winter.
No one chooses to live with chronic illness, every day shaped by limitations they never asked for. No one chooses to live in a body that betrays them. No one signs up for systemic injustice, inequality, violence, or oppression. That pain isn’t part of a personal growth plan. There’s no waiver, no starting line, and certainly no medal.
That kind of pain isn’t about growth or transformation. It’s about survival.
The suffering we experience in events like the Death Race is hard. Brutal, even. But it’s still voluntary. It’s designed. Controlled. It ends.
And recognizing that—really internalizing it—doesn’t mean we should feel guilty for signing up for things like the Death Race.
It just means we need to hold space for both truths: that chosen suffering can be transformative and that unchosen suffering can be devastating.
I’ll say it again:
Recognizing this shouldn’t breed guilt.
It should breed empathy.
These experiences should make us more empathetic. More aware. More driven to show up for others who don’t get to opt out of their pain.
We come out of these races stronger—not just in our bodies, but hopefully in our hearts.
And strength like that should be used. Shared. Leveraged to help carry the weight others never agreed to bear.
Because if you’ve chosen to suffer, and come out the other side stronger—you now hold something powerful. A kind of strength that others may never get the chance to develop on their own terms.
So the question becomes: What are you going to do with it?
Suffering as a Teacher
What I didn’t realize back then—standing on the edge of that reservoir, sobbing in front of Joe De Sena, unraveling—was that not finishing that swim would become one of the most important lessons of my life.
Because in that moment, I faced a version of myself I didn’t like. I felt like a failure. I’d come so far, and I was going to come up short because of fear. I felt weak, ashamed, and unworthy. But those feelings didn’t destroy me—they taught me. They made me curious. Why did that break me? What was I really afraid of?
That failure became a mirror. And in the reflection, I saw how much of my identity had been wrapped up in achievement, in toughness, in chasing the next hard thing just to prove I could. That moment forced me to confront the ego I’d built up around toughness, grit, and always pushing through. I started asking better questions:
Why was this breaking me?
Why did I need a finish to validate everything I’d already done?
Later, I’d find words for these thoughts in one of the books that changed me: Ego Is the Enemy by Ryan Holiday.
It took time, but I started to see that the race—the real one—wasn’t just against a course or a clock. It was against my own ego. My assumptions. My blind spots. And what emerged from that wasn’t just a more capable athlete. It was a more self-aware human.
It helped me realize what the Death Race had been whispering all along: that ego isn’t strength. Ego is what convinces us that failure means we’re worthless.
Humility, on the other hand, teaches us to grow.
Resilience in the Chaos
The Death Race is chaos. It’s designed that way. It doesn’t give you a map. You don’t know when it ends. You don’t know what’s coming next, or how long you’ll be pushed. It’s chaos—by design.
But it’s controlled chaos. That’s the key.
It’s meant to push you to your edge, then shove you past it, forcing you to confront what’s left when the ego is stripped away.
You know—deep down—that you can tap out. You can go home. You can stop.
That’s where resilience is forged.
Not the kind you fake through motivational quotes or grind culture—real resilience. Not the loud kind. Not the Instagrammable, Tik-tokable kind. The kind that’s quiet, rooted, and enduring. The kind that says, I can hurt and keep going. I can fail and still show up. I can suffer without losing myself.
The quiet kind that sits with you when things fall apart and says, “You’ve been through worse.”
The race gave me that. And while I didn’t realize it right away, that kind of resilience isn’t just for surviving hard events. It’s for showing up in real life—for your partner, your team, your community. It’s for staying grounded when others are falling apart. It’s for helping carry the weight when someone else can’t.
That’s the kind of strength that stays with you long after the race ends.
How I Show Up Now
That shift—learning to let go of ego and lean into humility—changed how I operate in nearly every part of my life.
I started to recognize struggle in others. I started to feel more deeply for people in situations they never signed up for. And I began asking myself:
How can I take this strength I’ve built—and use it for someone else?
That’s the spirit behind Sound Surveillance.
Yes, we install cameras and help prevent job site theft. But really, we’re in the business of protection. Of giving people peace of mind. Of standing guard when they’re not around. Of easing one of the many burdens they carry.
The company I’m building is rooted in the lessons I learned crawling through the woods at 2 a.m., crying at a reservoir, failing, and coming back stronger—having presence, purpose, and protecting the vulnerable.
The Real Finish Line
After that second Death Race—the one where I stood crying at the edge of the reservoir—I came back the very next year and earned my official finish. But even then, the goal wasn’t just to prove I could survive the chaos. Something had already started to shift inside me.
It was in the years that followed—with the finish behind me—that I began doing the deeper work. Not just training harder or chasing the next challenge, but truly asking myself what it all meant. How I wanted to live. What I wanted to give. Who I wanted to be.
I’d started reading more. Reflecting more. One book I mentioned earlier—Ego Is the Enemy by Ryan Holiday—hit me like a punch to the chest. It gave language to what the Death Race had been trying to teach me all along: that ego isn’t strength. It’s a shield we hide behind—and often, it’s the very thing that keeps us from becoming who we’re meant to be.
That book helped me reframe failure. It helped me see that tapping out of a swim wasn’t a mark of weakness—it was the beginning of humility. Of growth. Of building something deeper than an “official finish.” It made me realize that real endurance isn’t about being the last one standing. It’s about how you carry yourself when the spotlight’s off—how you show up when it’s not about you at all.
Later, Stillness Is the Key gave me even more clarity. That the next level of growth didn’t require more suffering—it required stillness. Presence. Space to listen.
Not everything needs to be a crucible. Sometimes the bravest thing is to sit in silence and ask, Who am I when I stop trying to prove something?
Now, I try to carry that forward every day.
Whether it’s through my business, in my community, or in quiet moments no one sees, I try to use the resilience I’ve built to serve something greater than myself.
Because it’s not about the medal.
It’s about the meaning.
It’s not about the finish.
It’s about how you show up when no one’s watching.
So if you’ve earned your scars through chosen suffering—use them.
Don’t just wear them. Let them guide you toward service. Toward purpose. Toward standing up for those who don’t get to tap out.
That’s the finish line that really matters.
Your Turn
So here’s my challenge to you.
You’ve suffered. Maybe in a Death Race. Maybe in a crucible of your own choosing. Whatever it is, it was something you chose to face.
Now what?
Will you let that suffering shape you—or just harden you?
Will you keep chasing finish lines—or start building something that helps others reach theirs?
Because there are people out there in a race they didn’t choose.
There’s no gear list. No waiver. No option to quit. No recovery week.
They don’t get to tap out. But you get to.
And now that you’ve come out the other side—stronger, wiser, humbled—how will you show up? You’ve built strength. Now it’s time to use it.
- Who can you show up for today?
- Where can your resilience become someone else’s refuge?
- What will you do with the privilege of your chosen suffering?
- Who can you serve?
- Where can you stand beside someone who’s still suffering, and say: I’ve been through pain too. And I’m here.
Ego wants the trophy.
But humility builds the legacy.
The world doesn’t need more finishers.
It needs more people who know what it means to fall apart—and still choose to help hold others together.