The Long Strange Trip Podcast Episode 11: From Special Ops to Civilian Life: A Father–Son Conversation
About the Episode:
Have you ever spent twenty years becoming an expert at something, only to wake up one Tuesday and realize that version of "you" doesn't exist anymore? It’s a bit like driving a car for two decades and suddenly finding yourself in the middle of a forest without a map—or a car.
In this episode, I’m joined by someone who knows that feeling intimately, though his "office" looked a lot different than mine. My son, Sam Patrick, recently retired after twenty years as a Special Operations veteran. He’s now a campus coordinator at The Honor Foundation, helping other elite service members navigate the choppy waters of civilian life.
We sat down to have a real conversation about what happens when the uniform comes off but the mindset stays behind.
What We Explore Together:
The Identity Gap: How do you go from being a high-level operator to... just Sam? We talk about that disorienting moment when the title vanishes and you’re left looking in the mirror asking, "Who is this guy?"
The Loss of Tribe: In the military—and in business—we often take our community for granted until it’s gone. Sam shares the raw reality of losing that immediate sense of belonging and how to start rebuilding a "civilian" circle.
The Honor Foundation’s Mission: Sam explains how they help veterans move past the "what" of their service and get down to the "why" of their next chapter.
Resilience vs. Suppression: We dig into the mental health hurdles of transition. It turns out, the same grit that makes you successful in the field can sometimes be the very thing that keeps you stuck in retirement.
I’ll be honest, I’ve spent a lot of my career teaching people how to transition out of their businesses, but listening to Sam reminded me that whether you’re a CEO or a SEAL, the heart of the struggle is the same: purpose.
If you’re feeling a bit "lost in the woods" in your own transition—or if you just want to hear a father and son try to make sense of this long, strange trip we’re all on—I hope you’ll give this one a listen.
Transcription:
Introduction (Josh)
Welcome to the Long Strange Trip. I'm Josh. the host of the show. We're going to dig into six areas together, finding real work-life integration. Instead of that brutal 9 to 5 5 split too many business owners to live with. We're going to approach retirement as an actual reinvention. Rather than just stopping work. and we're facing death honestly, and avoiding PTSD around it. We're also building resilience,
when life throws us curve balls. We're sharing wisdom across generations. And finally, we're understanding the patterns that show up in all our transitions. I'm not coming at this as an expert I'm a fellow traveler figuring this stuff out in real time.
Especially now as I navigate my own dual cancer diagnosis at 73.
Welcome to the Long Strange Trip. I'm glad you're here.
Josh Patrick:
Hey, how are you today? This is Josh Patrick and you're at the Long Strange Trip Podcast, and today is a really special day for me because today I get to talk with my son, Sam Patrick.
Sam has spent, I don't know, 21, 22 years in the military, maybe 23, something like that, and he recently retired. He also is very active in what's called the Honor Foundation, where he is now helping people transition from special operations into civilian life, which is a difficult thing. So today we're gonna talk with Sam about his transition and the work he's doing with the Honor Foundation.
So let's bring Sam on. Hey Sam, how are you today?
Sam Patrick:
I'm good, dad. How are you?
Josh Patrick:
I'm well. So, Sam. Tell me, let's start with your transition out of the military. How long ago did you actually retire?
Sam Patrick:
Uh, so July of 2024 was when I actually retired, but I also kind of had a mid-shift transition also toward the end of my career in 2020, 'cause I left active duty and went to the National Guard full time, which was a relatively major professional change of pace.
Josh Patrick:
So let's talk about that for a while. What made that transition? Was it an easy transition? Was it a difficult transition or—
Sam Patrick:
The first one wasn't too bad because you're going from one organization to another one that's quite similar. There are subtle nuances. I would say it's like going from Coca-Cola to Pepsi. You're familiar with the industry, it's a similar common operating picture, the end state is still very similar, but the subtle internal operating nuances are probably slightly different. And then, of course, the difference in mindset and personnel. The actual transition from out of military service was quite different and full of challenges that you don't quite appreciate as you're going through it.
Josh Patrick:
What kind of challenges did you have?
Sam Patrick:
I was actually thinking about this before we picked up the call. One thing I think a lot of people in the military take for granted is how much is provided for you and you don't have to think about—healthcare, housing, clothing, etc. The schedule is very fixed and predictable, even though you may have to go away for periods of time. But once you realize that there are very few other professions or industries like that, it can be a little challenging when you step off that threshold.
Josh Patrick:
So what kind of challenges specifically did you have?
Sam Patrick:
The biggest one, I think, is kind of the loss of purpose and loss of identity. No offense to anybody in the service, but once you get out, no one cares. It's not as brash as that, but people don’t—you’re done. Everything that’s in the rear-view mirror is behind you. And while there are certain skills and experiences you can leverage for your next journey, at the end of the day, you can’t rest on those laurels. It’s really the loss of collective purpose and community that’s the hardest part.
Josh Patrick:
And, by the way, that's pretty much true, I think, with everybody that does a transition out of one career to someplace else.
Sam Patrick:
Mm-hmm.
Josh Patrick:
My experience is business owners who sell their business have a sense of loss because nobody’s calling them. Executives retire from a company where they’ve been for at least five years, maybe ten or twenty years—same thing. All the people that they were related to at work fall off the wayside. And then we have in the military, I’m assuming it’s pretty much the same thing. Most people you talk to on a regular basis, they kind of disappear.
Sam Patrick:
Yeah, no, it’s very similar. I think that’s another thing too—the military transition is not spectacularly unique. For a careerist, if you do 20-plus years in any profession and then all of a sudden it’s onto the next great adventure, it’s a tremendous sense of change. I can’t define it for everybody, but there are lots of variables and different highs and lows that people go through.
Josh Patrick:
Yeah, that would make sense. Did you have any highs and lows that you went through?
Sam Patrick:
My transition period was complicated by multiple things on personal and professional fronts. For me, after getting out, it's been trying to figure out and focus energy on things that are fulfilling. I have multiple different avenues of effort, as we like to call them, and I’m trying to find what fills the bucket, as the kids say. That’s one of the hard things to do.
I think one of the big ones we all deal with is that sense of imposter syndrome. When you’re transitioning from a high-stress corporate position and going to something else that you’re not familiar with, there’s the whole “fake it till you make it” mentality. I think a lot of people self-select out of opportunities without even trying to set foot through the door. I’ve struggled with figuring out what I want to do and how much time I’m willing to give it.
Josh Patrick:
Yeah, that’s not an unusual thing. Are you doing a bit of experimenting—trying this and that and seeing which fits?
Sam Patrick:
Yeah, definitely. Through a lot of the things I’m doing that are passion projects or volunteer work, you’re not tied monetarily or by deliverables and expectations. You get the opportunity to experience the internal vibe of the job and then decide if you want to pursue it. I highly encourage people to do that—internships, fellowships, or just volunteering—to get inside an organization and assess its culture before you fully commit.
Josh Patrick:
So for retiring service people, it would seem it’s a little bit easier for them because they have a retirement to fall back on and don’t immediately have to go out and make money—or some do, but—
Sam Patrick:
Yeah, for careerists who do the 20 years, you get your military pension and usually some sort of VA disability, which provides a comfortable safety net. When mentoring people, we ask, “What do you want out of life financially?” That’s your benchmark. Then open your aperture to the professions or jobs that meet those ends.
One pitfall a lot of guys get into is going into contracting after the military. The golden handcuffs get placed on them—they start living to the means they’re making instead of what they needed when getting out. Then they get stuck in this cycle where they have to keep doing a certain thing because they’ve gotten used to that standard of living, which is sometimes entrapping.
Josh Patrick:
Yeah, that makes sense. So your work with the Honor Foundation—how did you get started with that?
Sam Patrick:
For background, the Honor Foundation is a special operations-specific transition program. The military spends $13 billion a year on transition programs run by the government—they try, but don’t always hit the mark. The Honor Foundation fills some of the gaps for the special operations community, putting them through a three-month program. What’s unique is we make the individual look at themselves. I went through the program, volunteered for a bit, and now work for them as one of the campus coordinators in Washington.
Josh Patrick:
What did you learn when you went through it yourself?
Sam Patrick:
I mentor our new fellows to not be like me and take it for granted, thinking you have a plan. That was my biggest pitfall. I thought I had transition figured out before I did it. I didn’t lean in on the personal journey of discovery as much as I could have. We put fellows through the Gallup Strengths assessment and the Career Leader assessment to help focus their aperture—how to use their strengths as superpowers and leverage them in their next chapter.
Josh Patrick:
What were the challenges you had going through the Honor Foundation?
Sam Patrick:
Taking it for granted and thinking I had it figured out. Most of what I do now revolves around lessons learned from mistakes—mine or others’. With the Honor Foundation, the challenge is realizing that what you’re about to embark on—a major transition—is harder than you think. Accepting, being vulnerable, and acknowledging that it’s hard is key.
Josh Patrick:
And how many of the people going through the Honor Foundation program actually do that?
Sam Patrick:
Pretty much everybody in the cohort. One thing I do early and often is set conditions and give them the cold hard truth: “This is hard. Don’t be like me—really take the time and put the effort in.”
I also discovered through my own transition that my ADHD was terribly dysregulated. In the military, ADHD can actually be an advantage because you’re constantly switching focus. Once you leave that environment, it’s harder to focus. So I tell people—take the time, genuinely, instead of rushing through it like we did so often in the military.
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The Long Strange Trip Podcast
Josh Patrick with guest Sam Patrick
Josh Patrick:
Hey, how are you today? This is Josh Patrick and you're at the Long Strange Trip Podcast, and today is a really special day for me because today I get to talk with my son, Sam Patrick.
Sam has spent, I don't know, 21, 22 years in the military, maybe 23, something like that, and he recently retired. He also is very active in what's called the Honor Foundation, where he is now helping people transition from special operations into civilian life, which is a difficult thing. So today we're gonna talk with Sam about his transition and the work he's doing with the Honor Foundation.
So let's bring Sam on. Hey Sam, how are you today?
Sam Patrick:
I'm good, Dad. How are you?
Josh Patrick:
I'm well. So, Sam, tell me—let's start with your transition out of the military. How long ago did you actually retire?
Sam Patrick:
Uh, so July of 2024 was when I actually retired, but I also kind of had a mid-shift transition toward the end of my career in 2020, 'cause I left active duty and went to the National Guard full time, which was a relatively major professional change of pace.
Josh Patrick:
So let's talk about that for a while. What made that transition? Was it an easy transition? Was it a difficult transition, or—
Sam Patrick:
The first one wasn't too bad because you're going from one organization to another that's quite similar. There are subtle nuances. I would say it's like going from Coca-Cola to Pepsi. You're familiar with the industry; it's a similar operating picture. The end state is still very similar, but the subtle internal operating nuances are slightly different.
And then, of course, the difference in mindset and personnel. The actual transition out of military service was quite different and full of challenges that you don’t quite appreciate as you’re going through it.
Josh Patrick:
What kind of challenges did you have?
Sam Patrick:
I was actually thinking about this before we picked up the call. One thing a lot of people in the military take for granted is how much is provided for you—and you don’t have to think about it. For instance, healthcare, housing, clothing, and so on. The schedule is very fixed and predictable, even though you may have to go away for periods of time. But once you realize there are very few other professions like that, it can be a little challenging when you step off that threshold.
Josh Patrick:
So what kind of challenges specifically did you have?
Sam Patrick:
The biggest one, I think, is the loss of purpose and loss of identity. No offense to anybody in the service, but once you get out—no one cares. It’s not as brash as that, but people don’t... you’re done. Everything that’s in the rear-view mirror is behind you. And while there are certain skills and experiences you can leverage for your next journey, you can’t rest on those laurels. It’s really the loss of collective purpose and community that’s the hardest part.
Josh Patrick:
And, by the way, that’s pretty much true, I think, with everybody that transitions out of one career to someplace else.
Sam Patrick:
Mm-hmm.
Josh Patrick:
My experience is business owners who sell their business have a sense of loss because nobody’s calling them. Executives retire from a company where they’ve been for at least five years, maybe ten or twenty years—same thing. All the people they were connected with at work fall off the wayside. And then we have in the military—I'm assuming it's the same thing—most people you talk to regularly kind of disappear.
Sam Patrick:
Yeah, no, it’s very similar. I think the military transition is not spectacularly unique. For a careerist, if you do 20-plus years in any profession and then all of a sudden it’s onto the next great adventure, there’s a tremendous sense of change. I can’t define it for everybody, but there are lots of variables and different highs and lows that people go through.
Josh Patrick:
Yeah, that would make sense. Did you have any highs and lows that you went through?
Sam Patrick:
My transition period was complicated by multiple things on personal and professional fronts. For me, after getting out, it’s been trying to figure out and focus energy on things that are fulfilling. I have multiple lines of effort, as we like to call them, and I’m trying to find what fills the bucket, as the kids say.
I think one of the big ones we all deal with is that sense of imposter syndrome. When you’re transitioning from a high-stress position to something you’re not familiar with, there’s the whole “fake it till you make it” mentality. I think a lot of people self-select out of opportunities without even trying to step through the door. I’ve struggled with figuring out what I want to do and how much time I’m willing to give it.
Josh Patrick:
Yeah, that’s not an unusual thing. Are you doing a bit of experimenting—trying this and trying that to see what fits?
Sam Patrick:
Yeah. A lot of what I’m doing are passion projects or volunteer roles, so you’re not tied monetarily or by deliverables and expectations. You get the opportunity to experience the internal vibe of the job or gig and then decide if you want to pursue it. I highly encourage people to do that—internships, fellowships, volunteering—getting inside an organization to assess its culture before you commit.
Josh Patrick:
So for retiring service people, it would seem a little easier because they have a retirement to fall back on and don’t immediately have to make money—or some do, but—
Sam Patrick:
Yeah, for careerists who do 20 years, you get your military pension and usually VA disability, which provides a comfortable safety net. When mentoring people, we ask, “What do you want out of life financially?” That’s your benchmark. Then open your aperture to the professions that meet those ends.
One pitfall a lot of guys get into is going into contracting. The golden handcuffs get placed on them—they start living to the means they’re making instead of what they needed when getting out. Then they get stuck in a cycle where they have to keep doing a certain thing because they’ve gotten used to that standard of living, which can be entrapping.
Josh Patrick:
That makes sense. So your work with the Honor Foundation—how did you get started with that?
Sam Patrick:
For a little background, the Honor Foundation is a special-operations-specific transition program. The military spends $13 billion a year on transition programs run by the government—they try, but don’t always hit the mark. The Honor Foundation fills the gaps for the special operations community with a three-month program. What’s unique is we make the individual look at themselves. I went through the program, volunteered for a bit, and now work for them as one of the campus coordinators in Washington.
Josh Patrick:
What did you learn when you went through it yourself?
Sam Patrick:
I mentor our new fellows to not be like me and take it for granted, thinking you have a plan. That was my biggest pitfall. I thought I had transition figured out before I did it. I didn’t lean in on the personal journey of discovery as much as I could have. We put fellows through the Gallup Strengths assessment and Career Leader assessment to help focus their aperture—how to use their strengths as superpowers and leverage them in their next chapter.
Josh Patrick:
What were the challenges you had going through the Honor Foundation?
Sam Patrick:
Taking it for granted and thinking I had it figured out. Most of what I do now revolves around lessons learned from mistakes—mine or others’. With the Honor Foundation, the challenge is realizing that what you’re about to embark on—a major transition—is harder than you think. Accepting, being vulnerable, and acknowledging that it’s hard.
Josh Patrick:
And how many of the people going through the Honor Foundation program actually do that?
Sam Patrick:
Pretty much everybody in the cohort. One thing I do early and often is set conditions and give them the cold hard truth: “This is hard. Don’t be like me—really take the time and put the effort in.”
I also discovered through my own transition that my ADHD was terribly dysregulated. In the military, ADHD can actually be an advantage because you’re constantly switching focus. Once you leave that environment, it’s harder to focus. So I tell people—take the time genuinely, instead of rushing through it like we did so often in the military.
Josh Patrick:
One of the things I read about a fair amount is retiring military folks that fall through the cracks. Is there a lot of that in special operations, do you think?
Sam Patrick:
I would say it’s probably less, but the special operations community masks incredibly well and compensates incredibly well. So it’s not as many who show it, but when people break, they break catastrophically. I don’t have the data to back it up, but I’d assume catastrophic moral injury events among special operations veterans are more intense than others.
Josh Patrick:
Is that because of the pressure they were under for the period of time in special ops?
Sam Patrick:
It’s a multitude of things. One of my other passion projects is trying to get longitudinal data on that very question—to figure out how we can build better front-end resilience. Veterans as a whole are treated well; they just have to put in the work to access the resources available. When you’re in the military, things are relatively easy to access; when you get out, the onus is on you. It’s not on your commander—it’s on you to go out and do it.
Josh Patrick:
So when you start working with people in the Honor Foundation, are they still active duty or have they retired?
Sam Patrick:
Yes, they are still active duty for the most part.
Josh Patrick:
And how much time before retirement is there?
Sam Patrick:
My personal recommendation—if you can start 18 months before separation, that’s ideal. It gives you a smooth glide path instead of a vertical climb. For those who can’t, at least six months before. The sweet spot is 12 to 18 months. That time allows reflection and planning. And a lot of guys who go through it end up reenlisting—they’re not all end-of-career guys.
Josh Patrick:
That makes sense, because they look at what’s on the outside and it’s easier to stay in the military, I assume.
Sam Patrick:
Yes, and the job market right now isn’t great.
Josh Patrick:
The job market’s always the job market—sometimes better, sometimes worse. So, are there other placement programs in the Army? Do they start that far in advance, or do they wait till you’re pretty much retired?
Sam Patrick:
They do exist. There’s the SkillBridge program and various internships where you can be placed with companies. For example, I had a friend who went back to his brother’s farm in New York and farmed for six months. It depends on how you spin and sell it.
By design, the military’s Transition Assistance Program isn’t bad—it’s just overdone. People lose enthusiasm, and sometimes the facilitators don’t care as much. But overall, there’s plenty of assistance—it’s just about narrowing down what you have time for.
Josh Patrick:
And how many organizations did you say there were?
Sam Patrick:
The RAND study I read listed 76,000 veteran service organizations in the U.S. That can be as small as a nonprofit with three people it serves. I think a few thousand are the heavy hitters nationwide. But it’s a crowded space, and we’re all competing for the same donor pool.
Josh Patrick:
How do service people decide which to go with? How did you end up with the Honor Foundation versus something else?
Sam Patrick:
Honestly, word of mouth and rapport. I ran into one of my old pilots in the commissary—he convinced me. In special ops, we’re notoriously distrustful of outsiders. Our campus fills up just by word of mouth. If you put out a quality product, grassroots recruitment works.
Josh Patrick:
That makes sense. It seems your program fits well with our general transition model—anticipation, ending, passage, and finally, new normal. You get people early, during anticipation, giving them a long runway before the ending. Once they retire, they enter what we call “passage,” that messy middle where nothing feels right.
Sam Patrick:
Yep.
Josh Patrick:
And I’m assuming that happens with pretty much everyone, including military folks.
Sam Patrick:
Oh yes. That passage phase—it’s rocky, like going through a hurricane. Our goal is to help them go through it—not storm-free, but with less turbulence. Instead of a category five, we’d rather they face a gale.
Josh Patrick:
Exactly. Everyone who has a major transition goes through four steps: anticipation, ending, passage—the messy middle—and finally, a new normal. It’s like a butterfly coming out of its shell.
Sam Patrick:
Yeah, that’s the big one.
Josh Patrick:
And for some people, it might take a few weeks. For most, six months to a year. For some, many years.
In my own case, when I retired—though I wasn’t admitting it—it took about three years before I finally said, “Okay, here’s something I can latch onto.” That was a hard time, and for me it was also health issues. For my age, that’s not unusual. For your age, I’d assume it is.
So if you were talking to a service guy who wasn’t in special ops, what would be the three to five things you’d say to focus on before leaving?
Sam Patrick:
I’d say, figure out who you are—first and foremost.
Josh Patrick:
And what do you mean by “figure out who you are”?
Sam Patrick:
In the military, it’s always “we,” never “I.” The individual isn’t celebrated. You have to look at what gets you out of bed, what’s important to you, and what your values are. In basic training, they break you down and rebuild you as a team. Afterward, you need to reverse that programming—it’s okay to be selfish and look out for yourself.
Take advantage of the benefits and resources. The VA is full of people who want to help—it’s just hard to navigate. Persistence pays off.
Also, remember: people want to help veterans. Many companies have veteran employee groups. On LinkedIn or in job searches, people want to help those leaving the military.
And one more thing—showing up on time. In the military, that’s second nature. Apparently, in civilian life, it’s not as common.
Josh Patrick:
I’d say that’s true, because you have to show up. So, one more question for you, Sam: why do so many military folks fall through the cracks when they retire? Is it because they’re not 20-year people—more like 10-year people?
Sam Patrick:
What do you mean by “fall through the cracks”?
Josh Patrick:
When I read about homeless folks, veterans pop up often. What I don’t know is—are these 20-year vets, 10-year vets, or 5-year vets?
Sam Patrick:
That’s hard to say because the data isn’t complete. I’d be curious how many were discharged under less than honorable conditions, had discipline issues, or medical conditions that led to substance dependence.
News often sensationalizes these things. Personally, I don’t think the numbers slipping through the cracks are that big. Without unbiased data, we can’t know for sure. There are many contributing factors, but no single “why.”
Josh Patrick:
I think the big macro question is: are these homeless veterans 20-year vets, 10-year vets, or 5-year vets? It seems hard for a 20-year vet to fall through the cracks.
Sam Patrick:
I’d bet most are single-termers. If you can make it 10 years in the military, that shows commitment and drive. I don’t think it’s about services—it’s about mindset, mentality, and resilience. Of course, there are outliers. But most who fall through probably did one tour, didn’t like it, got out, and got stuck.
Some people get comfortable in discomfort. And there’s also a nonconformist streak—some just don’t want to follow society’s rules. Add substances and mental health issues, and it’s a complex problem. No simple solution.
Josh Patrick:
So Sam, unfortunately we’re out of time, and we could go on longer, but I don’t want people to sit here for an hour—we get boring after that.
Sam Patrick:
Yeah, that’s right.
Josh Patrick:
So, if somebody wanted to contact you from the military who’s retiring, would you be willing to talk to them?
Sam Patrick:
Yeah, absolutely. My email address for the Honor Foundation is [email protected]
You can also go to www.honor.org
, which is our homepage. We have programs for everyone in the military, not just those in special operations. There’s also a program called Vector Accelerator, a self-paced, four or five-module course that helps you focus on yourself and narrow your trajectory for what’s next.
Josh Patrick:
That sounds like a wonderful service. And I have something I’d ask you—if you’ve enjoyed listening or watching this podcast episode and think you have a good story I should hear, contact me and see if you’d make a good guest on the show.
It’s easy—just go to [email protected]
(that’s the number two, and “Solution” is singular). See if The Long Strange Trip Podcast might be right for you.
So, this is Josh Patrick with my favorite male friend, Sam Patrick, and you’re at The Long Strange Trip Podcast. I hope to see you back here really soon.
Josh Outro:
Thanks for spending this time with me today. I really appreciate you being part of this journey. I'd be grateful if you leave an honest rating and review. It helps other people find these conversations. Lets me know what's landing with you and what isn't. If you love this show, give us five stars, and if you hate it, give it one star and I'll just cry a little bit.
Keep asking the hard questions, keep being honest about what's difficult, and remember. We're all just trying to figure this out together.
I'll talk to you next time on the Long Strange Trip. Thanks for stopping by.
