The Untold Story: MrBallen's Fallout With the NAVY Seal Community

I've always been a big Storyteller for sure just in my life um and I uh when I got medically retired from the the SEAL Teams it happened kind of abruptly like we knew or I should say I knew that I would be being I would get medically retired I knew it was coming but the date that I would be released from service was not entirely clear and then it was kind of like all of a sudden I was told that actually your date to be you know kicked out of service is like right around the

corner like super quick and so I I I had this kind of frantic like now what do I do like I you get like a retirement uh you get paid if you get medically retired it's like it's not it's not really enough to live on but it's definitely enough to like survive for a little bit but I needed a job you know I needed a civilian job I got really no sense of what I could do I mean as much as um you know people are naturally inclined to think that Navy Seals bring a lot

to the table and they definitely do beyond the battlefield you know like just as people it's very difficult to think about how would translate those skills and experiences to like business especially when like when you're in the military it's not just a seal thing it's a military thing you kind of live in a bubble you're living in like the military bubble and you're not really exposed too much to like modern technology like as an example I I get out of the the military in 2017 and I didn't understand like what a a Google sheet or

Google doc was and like I I'm I'm a I was a fairly tech-savvy person before I went in the military and I like didn't understand like what are what are this what are these sheets these like Google Sheets that people are sending me and like Google documents I none of it made sense but like there's all these like simple things that you don't think would be hard to learn but in the military you have like your own software systems and your own Hardware like all the technology is like military you're not touching civilian stuff and

so you get out and you're like not only do I have no idea how to talk about what I did in a way that's meaningful or that fits you know the job description you're looking for but I literally don't understand how to use modern technology and so it was it was this mess where I just kind of knew that what I would need to do to get a job and this is all leading to YouTube Don't worry um I knew I needed to like meet people and so I was like oh I'll Network you know

I'll meet people through Linkedin or something um and I wound up connecting with this guy named Jordan celic who's this former investment banker turned entrepreneur in New York City uh and I don't even know how we connected but it was this random like he was looking to help veterans and I'm like a veteran looking for a job and he was this big propon he believed in networking as like a thing you should do and I brought up I was like I want to meet some people and he's like oh come to New York I'll I'll

I'll introduce you to some you know investment people or whatever some Finance people and whatever and maybe you get a job out here and so it it quickly turned into the there's a Snowball Effect where I was like well you know can I bring some of my buddies that are transitioning out of the military as well and it quickly over the course of like six weeks went from I'm going to go to New York and meet with Jordan and like meet a few people to like you know 15 people on my side all seals that

are transitioning or jobs guys and like a whole bunch of like hiring managers and folks from different Industries in New York like having almost like a conference um it is like very uh spontaneous in a way but it was this really cool thing where like I remember looking out at this like sea of like networking happening amongst elite special operators and like these Elite firms in New York and Jordan and I were like this would be a really cool like business like create a charity that like hosts these types of events because clearly there's a

need for like veterans to like learn how to assist and so we ended up starting this charity called Elite meet that we held these these events where like Elite spec op studes and gals met with business people and they got jobs and it was great and so ironically my job became running a job search service if you will but we use social media to to drive attention to both get donations and to get other hiring you know companies to come to these events but there was this goofy thing where you know Special Operations sold soldiers

Warriors whatever like they are notoriously not willing to promote themselves now I will say there's a huge caveat there's tons of seal content there's lots of but like those represent the minority of people that are like in out of that Community the bulk of of folks that are seals for examples will like literally barely ever talk about it they keep it to themselves it's like the whole silent professional thing and it almost goes against like a code of ethics to even begin to talk about it and so really there's a challenge getting these guys to

self-promote to like get a job even when they're in the even when they're in these networking events that we're setting up and so I began using social media to tell stories about either specifically members of these units I'd get the permission and I would tell a kind of watered down deployment story where there's some sort of like you know takeaway that shows that they're a great leader or something but it was really hard to get permission from people and it was just easier if I talked about my own experience and then relating it to how

this applies to a wide swath of other special operators that like I'm the representation of the Baseline and so if youd hire anybody you know this this story showcases not just what I can do but what all these people can do and I was really good at writing these stories like they were like LinkedIn you know like little like several paragraphs long um and so that was when I began thinking about like social media just as a thing it was like fascinating to me that just telling stories written stories on LinkedIn could drive donations like

hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations uh and like very big businesses were coming to these events these like little events who were hosting from social media and so I I ended up going off the deep end a little bit with with social media where um I ended up not so much posting about how to how to drive attention to the charity but more like how to build my own personal brand as like a Navy SEAL a former Navy SEAL and I like broke the the card the card I committed a cardinal sin in the

seal Community which is like aggressive self-promotion like above and beyond just trying to get a job like I was posting stuff on social media that in no way was sensitive information it was nothing like but it's more patting yourself on the back like look what I did at and it's more in the seals it's about the team and you want and I'm also like I did the minimum amount of time you can do in the teams and I mentioned earlier like there are people in the teams that do like 20 deployments you know what I

mean I'm I'm I'm giving you my experience from like two little deployments there are people that have done so much more and I'm on a white side team I'm not even on on Development Group it just Team Six and so it quickly I became like a piece of crap in the eyes of the active duty seal Community for the stuff I was putting online where I was like you know I think I had like 50,000 followers on on Instagram all in the strength of like talking about being a seal I thought that I wasn't crossing

any lines but at the same time I knew that it was like you know you're you're making lots of enemies and I remember when I started getting messages from people that I served with like directly like literally was laying behind a wall taking incoming fire with this person and they're sending me messages that are not Anonymous they're like you don't ever say that online again you're disowned from the community no yeah and so it was like heartbreaking so you want to talk about like The Humbling moment of when I got my ass kicked in high

school it was nothing compared to like the barrage of hate that I would get y nearly every day what didn't they like because I would see it as an outsider and think this is in a way inspirational for people who might want to get into this a lot of people would see your story and think this is a career that I've never considered before but I think I have what it takes I want to be able to serve um to me it comes off as something that that's more so positive is like sharing these experiences

in such a way that that can Inspire other people so objectively that's all true and if you and I deleted a lot virtually all of the stuff if you were to go back and look at all of it I would probably cringe reading it but you would not read any of them and be like I don't get it you wouldn't you wouldn't read it and be like oh yeah I see that because objectively all I'm doing is sharing real experiences that are my own I never acted like I specifically was like the leader and I

was the guy doing this it was always really my actual POV it was never meant to to prop me up as being more than I was but it's almost like if you start kind of pointing at yourself and saying like I'm the guy the SEAL Teams are just not cool with that at all like with with very rare exception guys are get like all all seals that are pretty public right now are facing some level of of hate from the actual active duty Community how they handle it is is on them for me personally I

became so depressed it was so so I had I had to leave Virginia I literally left Virginia Beach where I was living which is a hot spot for seals because I would go out and nobody nobody acted inappropriate no one like but I'd see people that I know I mean every freaking Navy SEAL is like here in Virginia Beach it's a small town and I'd like get death stairs from people that like personally knew me not like Anonymous like staring me down like at the gym or at the grocery store and it's like dude I

can't do this I can't be here and so I like fled Virginia and went to Pennsylvania to like literally get away from people that hated me um and then I made the decision you know I'm like I I'm in a way building a strong brand in the sense that I'm growing my followership uh on Instagram and across social media but it's again it's all on this like I'm the Navy SEAL narrative and I remember talking to my wife and I was like I can't do this anymore like I can't handle the level of hate I'm

getting like I mean really these are deep cutting things from people that really know you well uh and so I ended up deleting everything but I was I was thinking to myself that I still really loved the like what social media represented um I loved that that I love the idea that anybody could post something to the internet and in theory they could like go viral and they could become a thing I hope I'm not prying but how are those relationships now with with the Navy guys horrible still destroyed gone have you ever tried to

mend that or is there no point at respect just you know it's one of I think that now enough time has passed since I was posting the stuff that ultimately triggered the reaction I got like it's been so long and and dude I this is the first time I've spoken about my military stuff publicly in like years and this was frankly even watered down um so I don't think that these people necessarily are holding vendettas against me I think a lot of them probably forgot don't even care because it didn't affect them personally it was

like oh screw that guy um but uh no I it frankly it's it's a it's a troubling part of my life that I I have people that at one time I would have literally died for and who would have literally died for me that I am I don't talk to at all like people that meant an enormous amount to me that are no longer in my life and yes I'm sure sure I should probably be the one to to reach out and do and I've done that with a couple people but it's painful to to

even breach that I think that I've just kind of a avoided it and maybe one day you know our paths will cross again but not holding my breath