Everything You’ve Ever Wanted is Sitting on the Other Side of Fear.
Dave Albin is worlds #1 Firewalk Expert. Tony Robbins put his faith and trust in Dave to facilitate fire walks for 17+ years. Though initially he resisted the idea of walking on coals exceeding 1000 degrees, after a little last-minute encouragement, he found himself celebrating at the other end of the fire lane, with an encouraging group affirming, “You did it, you did it, you do it!” That was the life-changing moment Dave’s love, passion, and fascination for fire walking was born.
In this conversation, we explore the act of fire walking and the ability to stand up to one’s fears and take on whatever challenges life sends forth. According to Dave, fire walking is more than a single act undertaken on a single day of your life - it’s the ultimate metaphor for mastering life’s obstacles and our insecurities and fears about them.
Show Notes
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Transcript
With me today is Dave Albin. He's the world's number one firewalking expert. He's been doing it. He did it for over 17 years for Tony Robbins. And I'm excited to learn more about what firewalking is, how he became an expert, and why you as a listener might actually want to do a firewalk, what it can do for you, change your life, and so forth. So, how did firewalking actually begin?
What is firewalking?What is firewalking?
Sure, let's start with what it is. It's the act of walking across hot coals, which basically has been around for a thousand years, which I know sounds like a long time, and it sounds, what? How come I haven't heard of it?
However, if you do a little research, you'll find that cultures around the world have been doing it, again, for hundreds and hundreds of years. And they've been doing it as a rite of passage, which unfortunately in America, we've lost that. We don't do rites of passage in America anymore.
And so, culturally, it's been used for a marriage, a graduation, the birth of a child. The Indo-Europeans were very interesting in their fire-walking campaigns because what they did there, when the warriors would have to go into battle, the night before the battle would take place, the women would build the fire for the men, and they would take care of everything. And then that evening, the men would walk. And if the men didn't walk, then you were dishonoring the process and you wouldn't be allowed to go to battle, which would be your whole family would be affected. So the Polynesians, the Hawaiians, the Native American Indians, right here where I live, I live in the northwestern part of the state of North Carolina. And so the Cherokees inhabited this area, and they fire walked up here.
Lots of Native American...
So that leads me to one of my questions, which is if I was getting ready to go to battle, I rock climb. Rock climbing is one of my passions, and I'd be worried I'd burn my feet.
Well, that's like worrying about falling.
Right. So one of the questions I have is, how does it work? Is it safe?
I guess the answer is it is safe, but how is it safe? Because it doesn't seem like it should be safe, if possible.
Yeah, all right. So that's kind of like a three-part question. Is it safe?
Let me answer it this way. I've walked a half a million people. Guess how many of them have been hospitalized?
I'm going to guess zero.
That's correct. Absolutely. My team and I have walked everybody from Usher to Oprah and everybody in between.
For example, Daniel, my daughter was six years old the first time she fire-walked. My son was nine years old. I've walked hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of kids.
So what do you say to the people that… So say I'm afraid to fire-walk because I think the holes are really hot. They are really hot, right?
They are hot. They're a thousand degrees. Absolutely, they're hot.
There's not a question if they're hot or not. You better believe they're hot.
So how do you prepare people to walk them? Do you have to prepare them mentally to get over their fear?
Absolutely. Sure.
Think MMA fighter. We see a lot of that on TV today. Think professional athlete.
Think an Olympian. Think about what they're going to go through before they go to play the Super Bowl or the World Series or you're going to the Olympics or you're going to go in against Conor McGregor, MMA fighter type things. So you have to prepare yourself mentally and you have to prepare yourself physically.
I forget his name. You probably know who it is. It's the climber that climbed El Capitan with no ropes.
So what do you think that guy thinks about? You think he thinks about falling No, absolutely not.
He is so 100% focused on his path to the top. So long story short is that's my job. My job is to prepare them mentally.
I tell them, hey, can you burn yourself? The coals are 1000 degrees. What's the answer?
Now, why is it that 90% of everybody that firewalks doesn't get a burn at all None, nothing. Now, some might get a little kiss.
You know what I mean?
What I mean by that is they might get a little blister, but it's gone.
That's what I got when I walked. Yeah, okay. But you told me that the facilitator that did my firewalk did the coals wrong because, and maybe it was my fault because I didn't wait.
I wanted to go first while they were really hot and not try to walk fast. So I went really slow and deliberately planted my foot like hard into the coals. And when I got to the end of the walk, I found a hot coal between my toes, and I got a little blister.
And first I was like, well, this isn't supposed to happen, right? And they're like, no, the coals are pretty hot, Daniel. And it did get stuck between your toes.
It was supposed to happen.
Yeah. And you told me, David, that it shouldn't have been a large coal.
They should have packed it down a little more. So when you burn hardwood, let's take oak or locusts or hickory, and it's dry wood. It's been seasoned, all right?
So let's say it's been sitting, and it's been air-dried for over a year, and you build that fire out of that wood, and you let it burn all day long or several hours, it's going to render. And so what happens in the rendering is you flip it over, and you keep turning it over to get all those big chunks out. Let them burn down, let them render.
So we only want little coals. We don't want big old chunks of coals. That's my job as a fire tender to make sure that doesn't happen.
So then when you lay those coals on the sod on the grass, then you pat them down. You have a flathead shovel, and you beat them into the grass. That way, when you do step on them, they're kind of underneath the grass.
They're not sitting on top, right? So that if your toe goes in between, it doesn't trap it and end up in between your toes, right? So there's preparation that has to go into that.
And so that's what happened.
What made you do your first fire walk?
How did you, did you see Tony advertising for it? Or this is what I want to do?
No, no, total opposite.
Yeah, tell me about it. Your first one, how you got into it.
1995. A buddy of mine found out that Tony was coming to DC, Northern Virginia, where we lived. And he basically said, Hey man, did you know that Tony Robbins is coming to town for an event?
I'm like, no, had no clue.And he goes, dude, I want to go. Will you go with me?
And I said, sure, I'll go see Tony. Absolutely. And so he said, great, let me call you back.
So he calls me back like an hour later. And he goes, all right, it's all done. I took care of everything.
We pick up the tickets at Will Call. And here's what they said to do. Number one, drink a lot of water.
You must stay hydrated. Number two, bring snacks. You're going to spend a lot of time in the room, which is an understatement.
And then he said, you know, and they said, bring a good attitude and be ready to play full out. Okay, well, how much was the ticket, Dan? This is in 1995, by the way.
He said $695. And I was like, what, $6700 in 1995? That was a lot of money back then.
And he goes, don't worry, you can pay me back. And I'm like, yeah, no, I'm not concerned about that. I'm just saying, you know, it's a lot of money.
This better be good. So just as he's getting ready to get off the phone, he goes, oh, wait, hey, I forgot to tell you something. We're gonna be doing a fire walk.
No, he didn't tell you that first, huh?
No, I didn't know anything until he told me that. And when, as soon as he told me that, I don't even know what that means. I never heard the term fire walk.
But the word fire walk in the same sentence didn't sound like anything I wanted to do. And so I'm like, oh, hell no. In my head, I'm going, nope, not going to do that.
That's crazy. I'll go see Tony, but we'll let the morons do that. And so I just kind of was subservient, right?
I was like, yeah, sure, Dan, whatever. Sounds really interesting. All right, bro, see you then.
Well, the big day came, and we got there, 3,500 people. We're all checked in. Tony took to stage at two o'clock in the afternoon.
And the next thing I know, it's after midnight. We've been in a room for 10 hours with Tony Robbins. And so, and I'm holding fast, I'm not gonna do it.
I'm figuring out what my extra strategy is gonna be, but I'm not gonna do it. And so, the next thing I know, again, is after midnight, and all of a sudden Tony goes, take your shoes off. And I'm like, oh no.
Uh-uh, uh, I know where you're going with that, man. I'm not doing that.
So you knew what you were getting into, but you were having second thoughts?
No.
Once you got there at 10 hours.
No, I wasn't gonna do it from this onset.
Oh, you're just going to hang out with the rest of the program?
It's only this part of the seminar. Right, so I'm not gonna participate with that part of it.
Got it.
Right? I wanna see and do everything else, I just don't want to.
Okay, it was part of a bigger seminar.
Yeah, it's a four-day event.
Got it.
Four-day event, this is day one that night. It's midnight.
Midnight.
And so, the problem I have is when Tony said, take your shoes off, I'm not gonna take my shoes off, but I've got 3,500 people around me, and guess what they're doing?
No peer pressure.
Yeah, right, they're taking their shoes off, right? So what am I gonna do? Not?
Everybody's gonna know I'm a coward, or I'm a chicken, or whatever. So I'm like, all right, just relax. Just take your shoes off, don't worry about it.
When you get out there, ditch your buddy, and go hide in the back, because I'm with my friend.
You know, you do work with veterans. It seems like going to war, where you're afraid, like I would be afraid, but you know, your buddies are doing it, your comrades are doing it. So it helps you, in a way.
Did that help you, seeing so many people?
No, because the veteran thing came way later. This is just me in my first event.
Okay, so it's not helping you out?
No, it's not even on my radar at that point. You know, I hadn't started working for him, or any of that. So the bottom line is, I decide I'm not gonna do it.
I'll go out there, I'm gonna go with my buddy, and I'll just ditch him, and I'll go hide in the back.
Good strategy.
Yeah, I think it's a great strategy.
You know, 3,500 people, they won't miss you, right?
They're not gonna miss me, nobody's gonna know.
They paid for it anyhow.
Yeah, so bottom line is, that's what I do. I get out there.
Well, by the way, when Tony's got you going out there, he's got everybody chanting and clapping, and clapping.
So next thing you know, you got 3,500 people going, yes, yes, yes. And we're all walking out into this huge parking lot where the fire walk's gonna take place. And when you get out there, it's even worse because he's got African drummers.
So now you've got this intensity of those drums in it, and they're intense, man. It's African drummers. It's a beautiful sound.
You know, it's dun, dun. I mean, it's phenomenal. So as I'm walking out there, my buddy's kind of short.
He's like 5'4, and all of a sudden, I just slip off to the side, and off he goes. And so now I just make my way to the back. I get out there, and I've got it all figured out.
I'm just going to sit back here, and I'm going to chill, and I'm not going to do it. And well, here's the challenge. Tony Robbins knows that the Fire Walk is probably one of the most life-changing experiences any human will ever go through, period.
That's why he brought it into his seminar. And he also knows there's people like me. So he knows that if we don't do something to try to help the people that are hiding in the back, that we're going to miss the paradigm shift.
We're going to miss the whole experience. And so what's he do? He trains people to come find you.
He knows. He knows where we are and what we're doing. And so sure enough, I'm back there minding my own business, thinking I got it all figured out.
Here comes this guy, man, out of nowhere, Daniel. He comes walking right up to me, makes eye contact, and now he's got a beeline for me. And he gets, I don't know, 15, 20 feet from me.
And he goes, he's looking at me funny, right? Like a dog.
Are you running?
Well, like a dog that hears a funny noise, right? You know, they twist their head. He's looking at me kind of funny.
He tilts in his head and he points at me. He goes, hey, man, are you okay? And when we're not okay, what do we say?
Yes, we are fine.
Yeah, we're fine. All good here, man. No worries. You know, move along. Nothing to see here, pal. Well, this guy goes right for the kill shot.
He wastes no time. He goes, hey, man, you gonna walk tonight? And I'm like, I'm agitated.
Of course.
That he would even ask me that. Why the hell do you think I'm hiding in the back, you idiot? And I'm like, absolutely not.
You know, like, get away from me, man. And the guy was really good because he goes, hey, man, that's cool.Hey, no problem.
Listen, we don't want you to do anything you don't want to do. And I went, oh, okay, he's going to get me out of here. No, he's not.
He's setting me up. Because the next question he asked me was, he goes, wouldn't you at least like to watch?
Hmm.
And I went, well, yeah, sure. Why not? Let's go watch these people burn their feet off.
He's getting me outside, getting me out the door at least.
Yeah, so anyway, he said, well, look, man, you can't see anything from back here. You're a hundred yards away. I couldn't.
I have 3000 people in front of me. I couldn't see anything. I could hear it, right?
I could see over here in the corner there was a big giant fire. They started, they built a pit, probably early in the day, like one o'clock, and that pit's 35 feet wide and 70 feet long. It's huge.
And they just threw cords of wood on it all day long. And it just burns, and it burns, and it burns. And at the end of the night, it renders. And so they take wheelbarrows, and they take all the coals, and they load them in steel wheelbarrows. They pull a wheelbarrow in, and then they put two lanes of sod, of grass, on each side. It's called a fire lane.
It's three feet wide, 18 feet long. And as we talked early, we sprinkle those coals on there.
What does render mean?
Render just means that they burn all day, and they turn into coals after they've burnt all day.
So if I don't do barbecue, I'm not a barbecue or whatever coal guy, that's why. To me, I just picture you're burning the wood, and there's always coals. It sounds like these coals get real special at the final after all the wood burns or something like that.
Yeah, they turn into coals. They turn into little… They start off as big coals, and then they burn to medium coals, and they burn down to little coals, and that's because you just take pitchforks and shovels, and you continue to turn all that over.
And that's called the rendering.
That's the rendering part. Yeah, they render.
So they got to… They're doing a tricky job. They brought you outside, and they're like, hey, you want to get a closer view?
So now they got to you close up front. Your feet, your shoes are off. You're standing by the coals.
You're just supposed to be watching, right?
Well, that's not exactly how it works. Because you got 3,500 people, and you have a certain amount of length, so you have to kind of move through these people. And so now that I'm kind of like in line, because I want to get up there so I can see it, another stranger came up to me.
And he whispered in my ear and he said, he knows when you're ready. When he says, go, you go. And this guy just went pew, and he disappeared in the night.
And I go, I'm thinking, what? What does that mean? What are you talking about?
What do you mean he knows when you're ready?
It's like, boy, there's where you go.
What does that mean? And so I'm kind of, and so I'm moving along, and again, I've got 1,000 people in front of me. I can't see it.
But I actually get to a point where I can see at an angle, right? I can see over here, and I'm like, wow, okay, there they are. Yeah, okay, they're doing it.
I'm watching people now, and it's mesmerizing, because it's every race, every creed and color. They're walking on fire. And my brain's going, wait a minute, we're mammals.
We're taught to run from fire, not walk on it. So I can't, it's just not making any sense to me at all. And so now I'm, but I'm mesmerized, can't take my eyes off it.
Kind of like the car wreck, right? You say you're not going to look at it, but we all do it. And so now I'm not really paying attention to what's happening in front of me.
And I'm looking down this angle, like this pipeline, and all of a sudden, the next thing I know, boom, guess where I am? I'm at the front of the line. Now I'm staring down at that fire lane.
Those coals are bright red. You've seen that. You know what that looks like?
The wheelbarrow's there. You can feel the heat coming off. It's real.
And so your brain, my brain's freaking out. My heart's beating so fast. It feels like it's going to jump out of my chest any moment.
Well, there's a trainer standing there on every lane. And all of a sudden the trainer kind of screams at it. He goes, eyes up.
Like, oh shoot. Yeah, that's right. All right, get your eyes up.
Well, when I was in the room with Tony for 10 hours, guess what he teaches you to do? Keep your eyes up. Don't stare at what you fear.
Keep your eye on the prize. The prize is in the celebration inn.
Don't stare at what you fear. Good, good tagline. Don't stare at what you fear.
You're looking at the mountain, you're going, yeah, I could fall, I could fall.
Oh, we don't look down.
Right, you don't look down and you don't think about falling. You focus on every moment of, you know, this has to go here and connect this and pound that in and hook up that. You know, it's all, you know.
Focus on the task, not the fear.
Focus on the task, not the fear. And so the next thing I know, the trainer said, squeeze your fist and say yes. Now he's trying to interrupt my pattern and get my physiology and my brain to go together.
And so I went, yes. And he went, stronger. And I went, yes.
He could tell I wasn't in a peak state. I was leaving a lot on the table and he knew it. So he got in my face and screamed at me.
It was literally like, stronger. And so now it's fight or flight, right? I threw my hands in the air and I said, yes.
And he went, go, go, go.
Remember the guy? He came up, he said, he knows when you're ready. When he says, go, you go, I did.
And so here's the first thing I learned about firewalking. When you take the first step, oh, you'll take the second, third, fourth and fifth. I promise you.
Oh, sure. Because when I did it, I did want to get across. I was deliberate, but I kept moving.
Well, you're not gonna stop. You're not gonna stop and stand on those calls.
You'd start on fire probably.
Well, you would start on fire, but you're gonna burn your feet.
Right, okay.
You can only stand on them for a second or so. And that's why you just walk normal. You walk the normal, that's why you can actually do it.
The physics of it, if you will. And of course, they put a couple of guys there that lock arms and they stop you. And they're like, stop, wipe your feet and celebrate.
So now I'm down in the celebration inn, and I'm down there with 3,000 people and they're all jumping up and down and screaming and yelling and celebrating. And it's exhilarating, you know, you did it. It's like one of the most life-changing experiences, I think, that's out there now.
But here's where it gets interesting. Yeah, that night, it was, I felt like I could do anything upon the completion of the Firewall. It's that quick.
But where it got interesting for me was the next day. And that's why I'm here doing what I do to this day, is because, so now we're going into day two, right? And we're all standing in the forest, we're getting ready to go into the venue, and I'm being very observant, and I'm watching everybody.
Oh, he starts that, he does that at the beginning of the seminar, gets you really engaged to...
Yeah, day one, the night of day one, he does the Firewall. Then you have day two, day three, and day four still to go. So now we're in day two.
Nice.
And we're standing in the foyer, like I said, getting ready to be led into the venue. And I've never seen anything like it in my life. People were connecting so humanistically, it was absolutely beautiful.
The night before, we didn't know anybody, right? You don't know anybody. The next morning, you feel like you know all of them.
You feel like they're all your brothers and your sisters, there's comradery, there's connection. You did something the night before together collectively that was absolutely phenomenal. And so I'm watching people, and they're laughing and they're crying.
I had so many people crying and telling their story and talking about the fire walk and talking about their fears. And it was like, whoa, so did we drink the Kool-Aid last night? And the answer is, yeah, absolutely we did.
And we did it collectively. So it bonded us. And that was the beauty.
That's what I saw. Look at how this bonded all these people. And I never forgot that part.
Well, later in the event, I met one of Tony's trainers, guy by the name of Ted Macy. Super, super guy. And matter of fact, him and his wife, Mary, both were trainers for Tony.
And I'm just talking to Ted during one of the breaks. And so I asked him, I said, so Ted, what's it like being in this environment on a regular basis? And he said, dude, are you kidding me?
He said, let me tell you something. If you can get into this environment, get here. It's gonna change your life forever.
He said, as a matter of fact, you see those people standing over there with the black shirts, with the pink writing on the back of the shirt? I'm like, yeah. And he goes, dude, they're volunteers.
They're just like you. They came, they wanted to come back. They want to give back.
So here's all you got to do. When you go home, call Robbins Research and ask them to send you a volunteer crew application. All right, I did that.
And like nine weeks later, I got a letter in the mail that said, Dave Albin, congratulations. You've been selected a crew with the Anthony Robbins Company. Well, they look at your application.
They pretty much know everything about you. They knew I had a military background. They knew I had a security background.
They knew I lived on a farm. They knew that I knew how to use tools and axes and log splitters. I know what kindling is.
I know what hard, I know the difference between hickory and oak. And so all of that experience got me put into a subcontractor's position. I volunteer, I think I volunteered five or six times, and then they offered me a subcontractor's position.
And by the way, when I'm volunteering, I gotta pay my own way. I have to pay my own airfare, I have to pay my hotel, I have to take my food, travel, all of that. So it's $1,500, $2,000 every time I was doing it.
And my wife was a true thrill, because she didn't know a damn thing about Tony Robbins. And yet I'm dropping all this money, because I'm thinking that this is going to influence my life down the road.
You're like one of those Grateful Dead fans that follow Grateful Dead around, except yours was really more expensive.
Yeah, exactly. So once they hired me as a subcontractor, they did something really smart. They gave me a free ticket.
And I got to take you there.
And I took my wife. So she went to the event. And on day four of the event, when she graduated, that night we were walking on the beach and we were talking about the event and what's going on.
And she just said, I get it. Okay, this guy's a bad ass. If you want to go roll with Tony Robbins, you go right ahead.
As long as you're getting paid, we don't have to take money out of our savings account.
And then how did you actually become the Firewalker Facilitator?
So I started working with Tony in 1995. I became a subcontractor in 95, 96. In 2003, Robbins offered me the captain's position.
So how many years, how many years or months was that?
I mean, how long have I been there? 2005, what is that? Eight years, seven years, something like that.
But I became a subcontractor in 96. So four, five, six, seven years, I guess. Then he offered me the captain's position, which meant that I would take over all of his Firewalks globally.
And he also took into consideration that I was homeschooling my kids, and he paid for my whole family to travel. So my kids, who at that time were six and nine, and their mom and I all went on the road with Tony Robbins. That was in 2003.
So the reason I ask is, I'm trying to inspire other people out there to do something they really want to do. If they find something they'd like to do, keep pursuing it. So I'm kind of wondering, I'm putting myself in your shoes.
I love this. I'm having to pay for five trips. It's getting to the point where I'm, can I really afford this much longer?
And then you become a contractor. You get a ticket. So that's helping.
What are you doing? Are you helping burn the wood? Because you said you know a bit about wood.
How do you actually, how long from that point did you really have to work hard or stick with it?
Wonder, am I really gonna be able to keep doing this for a career before he asked you to really, he gave you all those benefits and he really gave you a full-time job. You could support yourself.
How long did you have to keep at it?
No, it wasn't like that. I had another business. I had a very successful business, my wife and I did.
And so that was our main source of income. Once I became an assistant captain, and he also put me on the security team because I had a military background and a security background, I started helping taking care of Tony's celebrities. So I got a small salary, but all my expenses were paid.
So it allowed me to be in the environment. And I thought, you know, this is gonna look good on my resume that I worked for Tony Robbins. There could be a real upside to this.
And I was doing a lot of things on the production team. I was taking care of the fire walks. I was taking care of his celebrities.
So again, I just thought, this is gonna look pretty good on my resume. And then when I took over all the fire walks, I was like, okay, this is pretty intense. And again, my family got to go.
So my kids got to go. So that was very inspiring for them. Their first event was Sydney, Australia.
What was your day job? What kind of business did you have that you have to go back to?
I was an entrepreneur. I owned an alarm company. We installed a residential and commercial alarm system.
The reason I ask is, I imagine you're having this really cool, incredible experience every time you get to work at one of Robbins' events. I would be like, God, do I really want to go home? I'd like to just go to the, like the Grateful Dead tour again.
I never went to a Grateful Dead concert, by the way. I'm just using this as an example. People love the experience so much, they keep going.
How did it feel to have to go back and do the alarm business? Or was it a big enough company?
No, no, no, it didn't happen like that. I had my company way before, I had my company before I went to the event. So that was our source of income.
That was my business. It was called Neighborhood Alarm Company. And so we were very successful.
We made good money. I, you know, my wife was taking care of all the administrative stuff. I took care of sales, I took care of installations, I took care of service calls.
So you know, we were running a business together. And so we didn't.
That's why I could literally afford to go do it, because I was making enough money in the beginning that I could go and volunteer.
But then again, once he started covering all my expenses, that made a big difference. So again, so I went to work, if you will, I took over all of his fire walks in 2003. Now my family's on the road with him.
We went to London in 2005, and that's where we set the world record. Now I say world record, I do want to be clear here so that your listeners know, Guinness Book of World Record was not there. However, we fire walked in London at the Docklands out of the Excel Center in 2005, 12,300 people.
That's the biggest fire walk in our planet's history. The only thing that comes anywhere close to that is another Tony Robbins seminar, where we walked 10,000 or 9,000, whatever. So that happened in 2005.
In 2014, I'm driving down the road, my phone rings, and it's Google. And Google goes on to ask me, are you the Dave Albin that does the fire walks for Tony Robbins? Yes, I am.
What can I do for you? Well, if you're not under any contractual obligation or non-compete, we'd like to talk to you about hiring you. I'm like, well, Homeboy is a free agent.
What you got?
Give me an offer. Make me an offer, right?
I mean, they found me.
They were serious. Obviously, this is Google.
You know, Google wants to find you, they'll find you. They knew everything about me. And so I'm like, well, tell me what's going on.
Well, we have this event that we want to do. We have 148 executives. We want to create a paradigm shift experience.
We want to lock these people together and create the camaraderie between them. We know a paradigm shift experience that you can facilitate would do that.
And so that's what we'd like to do. So I was available. I even asked them, you know, what's your budget for this? And they wrote it down.
They're like this. And I went, okay, I can work with you guys. And so, in fact, when I was there, after we did the experience, one of the one of the executives, this gal and I are sitting at the table having lunch, and we fired up a conversation, and she said, hey, Dave, you know, you don't really work for, I mean, you have another business, and this isn't your full-time thing, right?
I'm like, no, and she said, you know, you may want to think about starting your own company and create these experiences for corporate America. She said, you'll be the only guy out there that's doing it at this level. And she goes, and you know what?
Corporate America will be all over you. That will eat you alive.
Wouldn't you be competing with Tony, though?
No, absolutely not.
Because you're just doing fireworks, and he's doing whole programs.
I'm going to them. Tony doesn't do that. You want to do an event with Tony, you come to him, right?
So I'm taking it out to the world. So in fact, when I came back after this meeting with Google, that's when I told Tony, I said, hey man, we need to talk. And he knew, I've been with him at that point almost 20 years.
And he says, you're leaving, aren't you? I was like, well, don't put it that way. I'm not, you're in good shape.
You don't need me anymore, Tony. There's a half a dozen guys out there, men and women right now in that parking lot that can do what I do. You don't need me.
You're gonna be fine. They'll take great care of you. I absolutely promise.
And so when I retired, him and I sat in the green room and we talked for like two hours. And it was great, it was phenomenal. And we laughed and we cried and we talked about a lot of things.
And to this day, we're still good friends and he's doing great, I'm doing great. And the woman that told me that corporate America will hunt me down because of these incredible experiences, she was right. Because right after I did Google, I went to NASA.
And then I went to Notre Dame. Then I went to Virginia Tech. And then I went to Microsoft and Heineken and Remax and the entrepreneur organization and the YMCA.
I started speaking at junior high schools, high schools, companies all over America and internationally started hiring. And so that all got established in 2014. Firewalk Productions, doing business as Firewalk Adventures, was established in 2014.
And you do something special with veterans, right? Are you involved with the veterans?
Yeah, well, that just happened here a few months ago. So I was on a podcast like yours, and we interviewed. And after we interviewed, we were talking sidebar, and I was talking to Natalia, and she asked me a question that changed my life.
She changed the whole trajectory of my company and my mission and all of it. Because she said, Hey, David, have you ever done a fire walk for a veteran? And I was like, you mean specifically?
And she said, yeah. And I go, no, why? What's going on?
And she said, well, you know about the suicide rate, right? And I'm like, yeah, I heard it's like 22 a day. And she goes, no, that's not true.
Not even close. That's only if they leave a note. And that's not even counting the attempts.
She said, it's up around 40 to 50 a day.
And man, you might have that, that was a gut punch to me.
And that means that if you take 40, who actually followed through, multiply that by, I don't know, 100,000s of actually considering it, it's a pretty dark time. It's a very dark times, yeah.
So anyway, so I said, look, my dad was a highly decorated World War II. He was career military officer, National Guard Army. So I was like, okay, I get it.
I've come, this is what I've been called to do, absolutely. So I said, well, look, give me a couple of days to think about it. And let me get this formulated in my mind and we'll circle back and we'll get it planned.
And so I went to bed that night and I literally, Daniel, I woke up in the middle of the night and it hit me like a ton of bricks, man. And it was operation, do no harm. And then I was like, well, there's other categories.
Yes, we have a huge issue with veterans, but we also have, there's a high suicide rate amongst first responders. And single-
Do no harm, like do no harm to-
Well, let me finish this one part. Yeah, we'll come back. So there's four categories.
There's one, you got veterans. Number two, you got first responders. You got single mothers, where the suicide is really high.
And you have kids that have been abused and neglected.
How is single mothers really high? Is it the stress? And the resources and just the-
It's really high. I just lost one. I just lost a dear, dear friend, Deborah.
Single mother.
Single mother, absolutely.
I was not aware of that. That was one of the categories.
Well, you know, it's really hard. It's hard on a mom.
She's gotta do everything.
She's gotta work full time. She's gotta take care of all the kids. She's probably got a deadbeat husband if she's working in.
She doesn't get any child support or alimony or help or support. And so it's hard. And I know this because I was born to a single mother.
So single mothers, I try to do all I can with single moms. I try to hire them when I can. If you go to my website, I've got a beautiful website.
Well, that's Brooke. That's Brooke Calhoun, who lives here in Ash County. That's Brooke, man.
She's a single mom. She created my website. It's a great website.
Isn't it? Yeah, she's awesome. You know, the girl that cleans my house, she's a single mom.
That one of my creative directors, Jessica Brace.
How does your program work for these people who don't have the money like Google does?
Corporate America pays for it.
Oh, awesome.
Good question. So what I did is I created a 501C3 for Operation Do No Harm. So you'll love this, man.
So Corporate America has obviously been very good to me. I've been hired by some of the biggest companies in the world. And so they would come and say, hey, Dave, we're launching a new product.
We know you do the Fire Walk. We want to do that for our people. Are you available on such and such a date?
Boom, we schedule it. There we go. So Corporate America has been hiring me in that capacity, right?
Maybe it's not, they're launching a product. Maybe there's ascension. Maybe there's culture issues.
Whatever it is, they bring it to me. And then I interview them. I say, so tell me what's going on?
Why are you wanting the Fire Walk for your company? Well, this is happening or that's happening. Great, let's go fix it.
Well, now there's a whole new dynamic because now a corporation can come to me and say, hey, Dave, we want to hire you. And I'll say, well, let me give you another option in addition to us doing this for you. How'd you like to make yourself look really, really good in your community?
How's that?
Well, you would have done it anyhow, not just for the PR. Your heart is into this.
Well, no, it's not for me. No, I'm talking them.
Oh, okay.
How would you like us to make you look really good to your community?
I see.
XYZ company, right?
Yes, yep.
So what we'll do is, yeah, we'll do the far walk for you, but you have four categories you could choose. If you want to sponsor veterans, first responders, kids or moms, then we can do that. So basically, here's what happens.
You make a donation to Operation Do No Harm, which is a complete write-off for you. Operation Do No Harm will hire Firewalk Productions. Firewalk Productions will come in, my team will come in, we'll do all the work, we do all the heavy lifting, and you get all the credit.
Nice.
Yeah, it's such a win-win situation. And so now they're people. You know, let's say we did the Firewalk on a Saturday, and they had a hundred of their own employees, and we had a hundred single moms, for example.
So now on Monday morning, guess what they get to process? Not only did we participate in one of the most powerful experiences on the planet, We helped other people. We helped other people and we helped save their life.
So if you're a single mother or a veteran, how do you know, how do you get to participate on those programs? How do you even know where to find them?
It's pretty easy. Just go into your community and go to churches. You can go to community leaders.
You can go to the chamber of commerce. You can go to the better business bureaus. I mean, there's all kinds of resources out there that know where single moms are, right?
There's Facebook groups. It's really pretty easy to find them.
If I knew a single mother or a veteran who was going through a rough time, would I just give them your website?
Well, I mean, anybody could go to our website. Typically, once a company hires us to do the event, they become...
They go out and look for the people.
Yeah, they go out and find the vets or the first responders or whatever.
They're doing it for their local community.
Yeah, they're doing it for their local community. And again, it makes them look really good. And they should because they're doing a really great thing.
They're saving somebody's life.
So for people listening, if you have a business, a large enough one to support the donation, this is something you could do. You would get a hold of David and Firewalk Adventures and go, give me a bid, let's design a program. Where then I as my company, I go out and I look for single moms or veterans and so forth.
That's how it would work.
Well, actually what they're gonna do is they're gonna make a donation to Operation Do No Harm because that's a nonprofit.
So now they get to write that off. Most companies have to do something every year as a write off.
So this is a phenomenal way to fulfill that.
You're crossing a whole lot of things off the list.
Yeah, you're crossing a whole bunch of stuff off the list at one time. So they make a donation, they get the write off, they get all the recognition, they get the massive change within their community and their people. All those moms now know that that company over there and the community knows that that company did this wonderful thing for their community.
So again, they get all the recognition, makes them look really good, it makes them feel good, it connects all their people together because they did something extraordinary together as a team, as a unit. So like you said, Daniel, it just checks all the boxes.
In what size business, I don't know if you feel comfortable giving me a ballpark starting figure in dollars, what kind of, how large a business would you have to be to support this kind of operation?
I don't think that really matters.
If they're a successful company and they need a write-off at the end of the year or in the middle of the year, it really doesn't matter, then they just write a check.
They're doing well enough for a write-off.
It's because companies do corporate get-togethers all the time.
Oh yeah, they spend like Wells Fargo, for example It's ridiculous how much of your money they're spending on stuff. You're like, did you really need to do this?
Yeah, well, I don't question their intention as long as their intention's good. Because a lot of times these corporate events are boring as hell. Yeah.
They go golfing.
Exactly, that's what I mean.
Golfing's not gonna change anybody's life, that's for sure. Or they go on scavenger hunts. I mean, you know what I mean?
Okay, great, you get together, there's a little bit of camaraderie, but it's not a life-changing experience.
Or they go to the Bahamas and just lay on the beach for a week.
Whatever, yeah, see, here's the bottom line. This is important. What doesn't challenge you doesn't change you.
I like that one.
Yeah, it's true. You know, you're a mountain climber, that changed your life, absolutely. So the bottom line is, you know, again, we put them in a win-win situation.
Now, let me fill in something here that I didn't share with you. So the other thing that I add to the Fire Walk is the board break.
I saw that on your website.
Right, so here's what we do there. So what we do is we have them write something on front of the board they want to move towards, right? We have to write something on the back of the board, want to move away from.
Then we have them write anybody's name on the board that they're in conflict with, right? So if forgiveness or reconciliation or both are part of that relationship, it ends tonight. Stop carrying around that resentment.
It's gonna cloud your thinking. It's not gonna allow you to propel yourself forward to an extraordinary life. You gotta get rid of it.
You gotta let go of the resentment. Then to create the right of passage, I have them write anybody's name on the board that they've lost. So now a mom or a kid or a first responder or a vet can write the name on the board of somebody they lost.
And what we do is we invite them to the spirit of that person to the event. And it could be a grandmother or a family member. It doesn't matter.
We want to create the right of passage. So then we do that. We take them outside.
We have board break stations They break the board. It's a simple martial arts move.
Dojos around the country do them every single day. And then they break the board. Then we kind of walk them in a circle.
Then they get to throw that board into the fire, and we get that on video so they'll have it, along with the photography of that moment.
It also sounds to me that just like the fire walking, the board breaking doesn't sound, that sounds like a challenge of fear. You mentioned martial arts. I think karate chop.
I would be afraid to, I would break my hand.
Right. Yeah, so you- And you're not, it's not even close, right?
But it's another, it's another thing.
It's a challenge, it's a psychological challenge. The physical is really easy. I tell them, look, a five-year-old kid can break that board.
I've seen it done.
How thick is the board?
Yeah, you know, it's not thick.
It doesn't have to be that thick.
And by the way, between you and I, the boards that I buy, I buy them from a martial arts wholesale supplier. They're specifically cut and done to be board breaks. And they come in all kinds of thicknesses.
So if I have little kids, literally, like five, six, seven years old, it's a real thin little board. And they go, boom, man, and it breaks. It snaps it.
It's beautiful. When you can do that for a kid, it's powerful. And then we have-
Yeah, it is. And again, so I have three levels of thickness of the board, so you can do kids, teenagers, if you will, and then adults. And you know, you're gonna break that board.
And so then when we're all done again, we throw that board into the fire. They get that, they get to see that they, you know, something they're working towards, something they need to stop doing, the resentment part of somebody's name on the board, and then the rite of passage of the person they've lost. So they capture all that.
Then when they've done all that, they throw it into the fire, then we fire walk them. And then I do something really, really, really magical. And it's proprietary, but I'm gonna go ahead and share what it is on your show.
So what I do is I put everybody in a circle after they've done the board breaking the fire walk, and I say, look across the circle here and make eye contact with somebody you don't know. All right, now, everybody made contact, everybody got a partner, great, go to that person.
And so when they get, I say, stand three feet in front of that person. Now, I'm gonna put you in what I call the heart hug. So normally we hug this way, right? Kind of right.
I'm gonna have you do it the opposite. And the reason is how-
So normally people lean to the right when they go to hug someone, but instead they never thought about that.
Normally when you hug somebody, right? I'm doing it the opposite. That way my heart is sitting on top of your heart.
Okay.
So now close your eyes. Now with your eyes closed, I want you to take a nice deep diaphragmic breath. I want you to pull as much oxygen into your lungs as you possibly can.
Ready? Go. Boom.
So now, and I tell them, now hold it, hold it, hold it, hold it. Exhale. Now do it again.
Bring as much oxygen into your lungs as you possibly can. And here's what happens, Daniel. On that second breath, that cleansing breath, guess what happens?
Their hearts calibrate.
They start beating at the same time. So now after they do that, then I do it again, then I do it again, and I do it again. And the next thing you know, you've got everybody's heart at that seminar, 100 people, 200 people, whatever, 300 people, their hearts are beating at the same time.
And I will tell you, my brother, it is one of the most magical moments you could ever imagine. So no wonder Corporate America wants to hire me. I'm creating literally one of the most powerful experiences they'll ever go through.
It would be really nice to go back to work after that. Yeah, really productive. Great point, great stink.
Yeah, Monday morning's different. Monday morning after this weekend is going to be magical. And you know what?
They're going to talk about this for a lifetime. This isn't going to last like a week.
They're not going to leave your company.
Well, there's a golden hand cup to that. The other thing is we give them is one of these. What is that?
Do you see that?
It's the Coles. Oh, the Coles. You saved some of the Coles they walked on.
Yep. And then that way they can set it on their desk, or they can set it on their coffee table, or they'll have it.
The reminder.
Yeah, it's right there. They can look at it every single day. And it says, I fire walked with XYZ Corporation in 2024 or whatever the year is.
So that is really, really, really powerful.
And then we have other things they can get too. Like we have necklaces that they can get if they want, and it's got a necklace inside.
Are they the Coles?
No, just a necklace, and it's got my logo. Got the logo there.
Fire Walk Adventures.
The flaming feet right there Yeah, the flaming feet.
Yep, and it's on your website, which as you mentioned.
That's what the necklace is. It's wood and it's been burnt into the wood with the flaming feet. So those are available.
So yeah, we're real proud, man. We do a spectacular job and we started in 2014, and we, you know, no plan in heaven.
And I take it you'll be doing this until you...
Can't breathe anymore.
It sounds like a great dream job.
I'm 70, and I don't look at this as a job. I tell you what I look at it.
I look at this, it's like one of the last things Tony Robbins said to me, literally.
He said, Albie, with great wisdom comes great responsibility. Make us proud. Go do what you know how to do.
We've done that. I also, by the way, I have an academy. Now this is really interesting.
So once a year in October, I run a five and a half day academy. That means people from around the world, literally, come, and I teach them all of this stuff. I teach them how to facilitate a fire walk.
I teach them the board break. I teach them the glass walk, the arrow break, how to start their own business, how to do kids, how to do corporations, how to start the business, how to do sales, how to do marketing, how to talk to all the fire marshals, how to get things approved, how to join a chamber of commerce. We teach them all of that.
And it's a spectacular experience because we're doing it up here in the Appalachian Mountains where I live.
So this is something you wanted to become a fire walk master and do this. So kind of like a franchise or it's just a certification?
No, it's just a training and I certify you at the end. And then you can go home and facilitate these experiences in your hometown. Or maybe, see, I get a lot of different people.
Like I'll get people that come from big corporations and then we'll train them. And then that person will go back and facilitate these experiences in their own corporation.
It's just more productive that way. So you don't have to keep going back every month.
That's just up to them. Look, you wanna hire me to come out? Well, you can send one of your own people and you can do it yourself.
And then I have entrepreneurs, I have business owners that also come do this. So they can go back and they can do these motivational experiences and trainings for their own people. I have trainers, I have coaches, teachers who come to the academy to learn and then they go back and they facilitate.
With their students, their classrooms. Whatever, yeah, whoever they're overseeing. The other thing is that now they also have access to me.
So let's say that I have an event in Orlando. Well, I've got a student that graduated who lives in Orlando. So now I can call up my friend Jess and say, hey Jess, I'm coming to Orlando.
We've got an event. You want to come play? And I pay them to do it, right?
So now I have people around the country that I know, I've trained them and I trust them to help me facilitate all over America.
Nice, it reminds me of the idea that you shouldn't be selfish and worry about, oh no, I can't share this with anybody.
Yeah, no scarcity here, brother.
No scarcity, yeah. It's awesome.
Anything else you want to say, Dave? I really appreciate you being with me here today.
It's been really cool.
Yeah, sure, it's my pleasure, man.
Well, thanks for reaching out to me. I know it took some guts, man, to reach out to me and to ask me, like, you know, what if he says no?
It does, rejection, rejection.
Well, it's because I fire walked.
It's because I fire walked.
Right, exactly. I got over my fear.
Yeah, we got the, we had the bond. You know, I get asked all the time, so, Dave, can you share a pearl with my audience? You know, you worked for Tony for almost 20 years.
What can you share with them? And, you know, one of the things that I would say is, every single thing that happens to us, Daniel, whether it's good or bad or somewhere in between, we create a story about that experience. And we're the architect of our lives.
And so we can either create a really empowering story or we can embellish or we can, you know, make up a story that doesn't, it disempowers us. And so I say all the time, you want to change your life, change your story. And I think one of the greatest books I've ever read, one of the greatest books that's out there was written, it's called Man's Search for Meaning by Victor Frankel.
And I think Victor left us one of the most incredible experiences based on a horrible situation that he was in. He went to Auschwitz. He was in a camp, and during World War II, he was scheduled to be killed at Auschwitz.
And so here's what he learned. And by the way, they take everything from you. No clothes, no food, no hope, nothing.
You'd be standing outside in the cold with other prisoners. And every day you're hearing them. They're taking those men and women to the chambers and killing them.
They can hear them scream. It's horrible. And can you imagine waking up every day, every second of your life, you don't know whether you're gonna die that day, a horrible, painful death.
It's just, you can't even imagine, it's excruciating. Well, here's what Victor Frankel figured out. He said, there's one thing you can't take from me.
I have to give it to you. I have to let you take it. I have to relinquish it.
His mind?
His attitude. I have to give that up. And so he also realized that someone, and this is where divine purpose comes in.
And that is, he said someone has to get out of here and tell the story. And that's what kept him alive. It's purpose and it's a really high purpose.
That's why there's a high suicide rate amongst firefighters and vets and moms and kids, because they give up hope. Imagine you're a vet, you get deployed, you go over there. One of your best friends gets his head blown off.
Every single day, you're moving together as a unit, keeping each other alive, which is a very high sense of purpose. And then that dreaded day comes where you got to go home and you go home and you lose all that camaraderie because your best buddy, he lives in Kentucky and you live in Florida, right? And you're fragmented.
And the next thing you know, depression sets in. And as soon as depression sets in, you reach for something to deal with it, alcohol or drugs. And the next thing you know, we lose them.
So that's why the Fire Walk and the experience and everything that we've created here creates a new purpose. Because one thing I didn't tell you, and I want to get this point across, because it's really important for anybody that might be listening. And that is one of the things I do at that event, I have those vets stand up and they take an oath.
And they promise to do no harm. And when a veteran promises and takes an oath, guess what?
They stick by it.
They stick by it.
And do no harm to themselves.
That's right. Do no harm to themselves or anyone else, because they hurt their loved ones too. I mean, come on, if you take your life, you're destroying your family.
Because they're the one who has to clean up the mess.
How do they, what kind of, do you help them find a new purpose?
Well, yeah, the first thing I do is I have them promise to do no harm. And then I invite them back into the community. Now, you just firewalk, you just did the board break, you just did the hard hug.
We just influenced your life for the rest of your life. So do me a favor. Do yourself a favor, do your fellow veteran or first responder, a mom or kid, whatever, go recruit them and bring them back into this environment.
And so that it rekindles that purpose. Now I have a responsibility to go save my friend, just like I did when I was in Afghanistan, right? So we're just creating that purpose back here in the States.
Anyway, man, thanks for having me on your show. I really appreciate it.
Thanks David.
Maybe we can do it again sometime.
Awesome.
Have a good, have a great day.
Thanks, you too.
Bye.