The Warrior Spirit: Glenn Sturm's Insights on Resilience and Life After Cancer

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to the Living the Dream Podcast with Curveball. If you believe, you can achieve. Welcome to the Living the Dream with Curveball Podcast, a show where I interview guests that teach, motivate, and inspire. Today's guest brings a powerful story about resilience, purpose, and redefining what it means to truly live. Glenn Sturm is a 17-year cancer survivor, four-time best-selling author, and decorated military officer with over three decades of service. So, Glenn, thank you for your service. And Glenn feels like it's not just about the titles, but it's about navigating uncertainty and you know, basically just uh figuring things out when life gets tough, when life throws challenges at you. So we're going to be talking to Glenn about his story and everything that he's up to and gonna be up to. So, Glenn, thank you for joining me.

SPEAKER_01 1:14

Well, thank you for having me. I'm looking forward to talking with you.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

Why don't you start off by telling everybody a little bit about yourself?

SPEAKER_01 1:22

Um, well, it starts with being an army brat a long time ago. My dad was a career army officer, uh, served in World War II, Korea, Vietnam. And as a results from staying in the army after all that, um, I went to 12 schools growing up, uh, four different high schools. And uh that kind of set you up on a different path. And uh I loved it. I uh college undergrad, University of Florida, uh MBA from Pepperdine, and then University of Florida for law school. And uh that's you know, that's the history to that point. Um I uh served in the Army active duty for four years, uh, got out and loved it so much. I stayed in reserves for 33 more years, and then uh was in business after the Army initially, then went to law school and did pretty well. Practiced law for about 25 years, and then got a cancer diagnosis. And after the cancer diagnosis, um I ended up having to quit practicing law. Um, and so for the past uh 17 years, I've been doing photography and writing books and having surgeries. And so uh every day is a day to celebrate life. And the one thing about me that I started with is I won't let cancer define me.

SPEAKER_00 2:47

Yeah, and speaking of that, uh how did that uh moment when you got diagnosed with the uh incurable cancer uh change your outlook uh initially on life?

SPEAKER_01 3:00

Well, my daughter and asked them how long I had. I wasn't there when she did that. Because I uh well, the best way to describe it was a great scene. I was back to Jackson, Wyoming to see my daughter, my my ex-wife or my son, and I slipped on the tarmac getting off the plane and hit the uh asphalt you know pavement, and I had uh uh torn my ACL. I'm laying on the ground saying, Woe's me, woe is me. And I remembered something my daughter told me that was dad, the ambulance is gone. And laying on the ground, I thought that dad, the ambulance is gone. And I said, It's time to get up. You know, you know, you can't change the cards you've been dealt, but you can change the future, and so that's what I've tried to do for the past 17 years, is tried to make the world a better place and tried to celebrate life every day. And there are all sorts of ways I try to do that. But uh, if my daughter hadn't given me that phrase, Dad, the wine millence is gone, I don't know what I would have done because it was just so prophetic with Anda pop in your head when you're laying on the tarmac. Uh you know, it would just change my life, I think. And so go ahead, sir.

SPEAKER_00 4:32

Go ahead. No, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 4:34

I was gonna say, I mean, I one of the things I do is most of my almost all my cancer treatments have been at the smilo cancer treatment at Yale University in Connecticut. And I say I leave cancer in Connecticut, and uh so when I leave leave the treatments, I'm just another person trying to make the world a better place every day.

SPEAKER_00 4:59

Well, I know a lot of people talk about resilience, but you are forced to live it on a daily basis. So what does resilience look like in practice to you?

SPEAKER_01 5:08

Well, I I don't know. I mean, uh I've had 55 surgeries. So I've gotten very expended instead of having surgery. Um I I I don't people ask me, you know, how do you do it all the time? And I say I don't know how to answer that question. Because what are you supposed to do? I mean, I'm not gonna sit in a parking lounger with my feet up and watch TV. Um we're we're all blessed with different skills, and God's blessed me with some amazing skills. And I would be letting my family down and me down, and everybody I've worked with down if I didn't use those skills. So I don't dwell on cancer, but there's a great phrase that I love. We must all give up hope for a better yesterday. I can't change the the diagnosis. I can you know live my life properly. I work out six days a week. I um you know spend time writing books, I do photography. Today I was doing putting the plans together for the next eclipse shoot in Spain. Um and and so I've always got something to do that will help me teach somebody else something or have me learn something. And every day I learn something is a good day. Um are there days that are harder than others? Yeah, but none of them are that bad. Um, there's there's something that happened when I uh got cancer, and it was normal to me because I was a lawyer doing big deals, you know, billion-dollar transactions. When you have a transaction like that, you have a team of people, a team of experts. And so you've got you know, tax lawyers, you've got environmental lawyers, you guys got lawyers and lawyers to work on the transaction because you can't miss anything. And what happens is when you have that group together, you work to consensus building on everything. Well, I didn't realize that there's something called multidisciplinary cancer care teams, which is something that's been going on in Europe and Spain, excuse me, Europe and Australia, Spain's part of Europe, obviously, um, for over 30 years. And when you are being treated by a multidisciplinary team, your survival chances are increased dramatically, and your quality of life is also increased dramatically. I've got a great quality of life. Uh, and so I put my own team together before we had teams in the United States, before teams were prevalent in the United States. Um, most people in the United States, most patients in the United States don't know about the multidisciplinary teams. So I've got a book that'll be coming out in the next six weeks on multidisciplinary teams to try to simplify it for everybody to understand what they do. But it's like people think about a problem being black and white. Well, it's not that way. Problems are just more like a ball. You have to look at all sides of the issue to get the best results. To really understand the issues, you got to look at everything. And what the multi-discimer teams do is that. But then they actually go a step further. They don't just look at the outside of the ball, they go through the air hole on the ball, go to the inside of it, and then look out. So they're trying to look at everything from all sides. And when they do that, then they come to a consensus about what's the best treatment. And there's a brand new study that came out that said when the multidisciplinary teams get together, and this could be it, it's never happened, I don't think, but there are up to 50 members of a team uh with different disciplines. But the when they get together, the diagnosis and treatment protocols are changed between 15% of the time and 50% of the time, on average. So that it just depends on the type of cancer. In some cancers, the the uh what the team changes is 90% of the time it happens. That the you know the the treatment protocol or the diagnosis just changed in some cancers 90% of the time, because you need that multidisciplinary look at everything, you have a group of people looking at a problem and uh it works. So I I that's what happens to me as is I've had a team, I've had a team since the first six months I was in practice having treatment, and that's just a very different way of approaching the problem. Uh, if if more problems were viewed at this way, uh if our government viewed some problems this way, where they had to get everybody together and figure out what they agreed upon, and then once we figured out everything we agreed upon, we could identify those things we disagree about on. And generally, when we disagree in those cases, it's we have different facts. So then we zero some of the facts. Most people don't disagree that much if they'll listen to each other. So I don't think it's resilience to me as much as it is coming from a background of problem solving and critical thinking, and knowing that my answers are not right all the time. And if I'm right, you know, 90% of the time I'm lucky. If I'm right 50% of the time, I'm still happy because I've got other people who are helping me get to the right point.

SPEAKER_00 10:47

Well, I know that you don't sugarcoat hardship. So why is that honesty so important when it comes to illness and adversity?

SPEAKER_01 10:57

I don't think of myself as being ill. Um I gotta take treatments, but it it's okay. I think of it this way. I live in Wyoming and we don't have a state income tax. So in a lot of states, that state income tax is like you know six percent to 13%. Well, when I'm having the most amount of treatments I have to have, I I'm you know in treatment or traveling to or from treatment, you know, you know, five days in a month. So it's like at the 13% level. So my tax is different than people who live in tax in states where they're taxed. My tax is cancer. And um, once I pay that premium that month and go to get my treatments, I'm free from it for another rest of the month. Um it sounds like a corny way of explaining it, but uh, I mean, again, I I I can't change the history, I can change my future. So I spent lots of time researching cancer, lots of time writing about it, and then the rest of the time I spend uh you know doing photography, and the proceeds from the photography goes uh to this date, 100% of the revenue has gone to children's health and cancer causes. Um, so I spend my days trying to help others, and and I don't think that's dodging the issue. I think it's just the way I live.

SPEAKER_00 12:36

Well, talk about how your military black background influenced the way you approach your diagnosis and long-term survival.

SPEAKER_01 12:45

Um family has a motto that my I think my my dad may have come up with it, but it it was attributed to the family well before him. And uh that is the the motto is Sturms never quit. We don't know how to quit. Well, um that when I was in the military, it was clearly evident that that was the way you had to think. Um the people in the military in in lots of the units make it easy to quit, and they want you to quit. I know why is that? I mean, if you're gonna quit in a situation that's not in combat, um you're gonna really be at risk for quitting in combat. So if you have an attitude that you don't know how to quit, and it gets and you actually it's pervasive, and you work for bosses who don't know how to quit, and you work for NCO, work with NCOs who don't know how to quit. That's the way you live. And uh and the SEALs have lots of great sayings. Those of us in the army don't get to talk a lot what we do much, so but uh the only good day was yesterday, the only easy day was yesterday. Well, you know, that's the same kind of a thing about don't know how not knowing how to quit. It's the same way of thinking of we must all give up hope for a better yesterday. But that's the that's the almost the negative way of looking at it. What I try to do again, first I'm not gonna let cancer define me. Secondly, every day I work hard at putting a smile on somebody's face, and especially somebody who you can see has not had a good day, and there are all sorts of ways of doing it, but the hard days to do that are when we're having a blizzard in Jackson and I can't really drive. So the only way I talk to somebody is on the phone, and so it's like when you talk to somebody on a call center, you're booking a ticket for something or something else, and you can tell they've had a hard day, you work at trying to get them to laugh and making fun of yourself. But if you put a smile on somebody's face every day, you're making the world a better place, and that's what I need to I try to focus on. Um, is trying to make every day a better day for me and for others. And uh again, I'm I'm not gonna let cancer define me. Now, cancer may kill me one day, but that that's gonna be something that's shocking to me that that happens. Uh, because I I think that I'll as long as I keep my treatments going, I'll be okay. Uh you know, and chemo is not always fun, but uh it beats the alternative. And when I think about it, is that I I don't have to work those extra, you know, five days a month to pay state income tax, then I'm really happy about. So I just don't worry about it and move on.

SPEAKER_00 15:55

Was there a specific moment where you realized you could still regain control of your life despite the uncertainty?

SPEAKER_01 17:24

You know, it started that day on the tarmac. I mean, I I wrote in in my first Cambridge Post that I don't know how long I've got, but I'm gonna make it good for every day that I've got. And that came about about reading something that somebody else had written. One of the first things that I read uh when I got diagnosed, uh, was a gentleman who had my cancer and had passed away, and he had six months to live once he got it. And he said he was lucky, and I'm sitting here saying, What are you talking about? How could you say you're lucky when you only had six months? The guy said he was lucky because unlike his friends who died in Vietnam, or who died in a car accident, or died from a heart attack, he had six months to make things right. He had six months to hug his family, six months to make amends for mistakes he had made. And you know, he had that time. And you know, if you think about that, I mean I I I was shocked when I read it, but that's one of the reasons I wrote what I wrote about I'm gonna make it good for as long as I've got. Um, I don't know how long I've got, and I never asked, I didn't find out about that and how long I was supposed to have until my daughter told me after I'd been surviving for 16 years of continuous treatment. Um, but boy, oh boy, was that a great article to write, read. When anybody is in a bad situation, you know, the question is, are you a victim or are you gonna be the survivor? Are you gonna be the warrior? And you're gonna take charge and accept responsibility and move forward. It's an easy thing to say, but again, you nailed it when you said, Is uh is the military part of the reason I address things that way? Yes, it is. My dad's part of the reason I address things the way that way. My mom, see my mom's a was a breast cancer survivor for 40 years. Um and I never heard her say a negative thing about that. All she did was joke about it and used humor to you know to you know tell people that okay. One of the things she taught me was when people ask how you're doing when you've got cancer, um, that's just a greeting, it's not a question. So if you ever want to have somebody who asks you that question not be around anymore, tell them everything. Um, if you want them to be around, just say I'm fine. Uh if that makes sense. I mean, people it's it's it people most people don't really want to know how it is. And so you just say, I'm fine. If you tell them about what it's like to be connected to an IV for six hours and and having to learn how to deal with nausea occasionally, um they probably don't want to hear that. Uh, you know, one of the great things about nausea though is a nurse, and this something I should talk more about is the caregivers. A nurse at um Smilo came to me one day and said, Glenn, instead of taking those, you know, those anti-nause meds, why don't you try queasy drops? And I said, What's that? And she said, They're ginger chews or liquid, like uh lifesabers. And lo and behold, they work. So ginger does a good thing about getting rid of nausea, and so it's another hill to climb because that's one less thing I had to deal with. Because I always carry those ginger lifesabers type lifesaver type candies in my backpack. And so you just find ways to solve problems. Um, and and the thing for me is when I'm feeling the worst, is when I do some of my best writing. Uh so I don't want to get up and walk around, I can sit in a chair and and uh sit and type. And I have to go back and reread it because some of the times I type like that aren't very good. Uh but again, you make fun of yourself and and celebrate life. Uh it it's just it's just amazing. So that the the the thing that's that my next book's about is what I've been so passionate about. I actually almost finished my first novel, which is going to come out in May. And I became aware of this multidisciplinary cancer care teams and how much they've changed, working out the reduction of mortality rates, which is on average, mortality rates are down by 70%. That doesn't mean survival rates are up 70%, but it means that the risk of dying if it's if it's 14%, losing 70% of that's a big deal. Um, and I read more and more about it, it became clear that this was not well known in America, and that the studies were there and people weren't talking about it. And so, why is that? Well, uh, in in the multidisciplinary approach, a single doctor doesn't make a decision on how do you treat it. A team does, a team of doctors, nurses, and administrators who get together and go through you know all the assessments, all the tests to see if they can find a better way of doing anything. And it works.

unknown 23:19

And it

SPEAKER_01 23:20

Works dramatically. And it's just not talked about. I mean, I don't know anybody who I've talked to about the topic who understands it. Recently, for instance, I was on the airplane and a gentleman sitting next to me is a physician retired, a very well-known cardiologist, and he's got cancer. And the hospital that was treating him has something called a tumor board. Well, tumor boards was the way things used to be done. And that is the principal doctor would come in and tell you, tell the other doctors about your case and what he was doing. And that's basically it. It was an education thing. Well, today, you know, you don't do that. You have a group of people and you put it up there, everybody tries to find a better way of doing it and tries to reach a consensus. Well, this doctor tried to participate in the tumor board for him. Again, world-renowned doctor, cardiologist. And he said, I'd like to listen to the tumor board to see what they have to say about me. He said, You can mute my phone. And the hospital refused to let him listen. So, you know, in a multidisciplinary approach, patients are encouraged to listen and participate in the conference. It's called patient-centered care instead of physician-centered care. And if you think about that, it's so important. I mean, how can you make a decision on what whether what your doctor is doing is right if you don't know what the alternatives are? Um, it requires more engagement by the patient and accepting more responsibility by the patient. Some people, that's not a good thing for. A lot of people, it is good. But even if it's a friend of yours sitting in on it, or you're or your intern is sitting in on it, having that other person there who's listening on your behalf is probably a really good idea. And when you look at the multidisciplinary approach uh versus the tumor board approach, where you have consensus building and you've got up to a 90% change in the diagnosis, sometimes it's as little as 15%, but 15% change is a big deal. Um, you know, it's something that has to happen, and it's the reason why I'm getting kind of on a soapbox to talk about it. Um, it will completely change the results. Um, I mean, the survival benefits are just amazing. There was a Williams and Thompson study uh that reviewed 56,187 patients. And it was clear in that report, which has been quoted like 700 times, that report, in other reports, that there was a materially reduction in the risk of death for people who are going through the multidisciplinary route. And again, the doctor, the court, the cardiologist I was talking to on the plane hadn't heard of this and hadn't heard that the requirement that you invite the patient to participate. And so then I asked him, where was he going? He said, he was going to a new hospital because he was upset with the old hospital that wouldn't let him even listen. And he, where's he going? He's going to Johns Hopkins, and Johns Hopkins prides itself on doing a multidisciplinary approach. Uh, the University of San Francisco Medical Center, breast cancer group, has been doing multidisciplinary for years, and their results are spectacular. So, you know, part of what I'm doing today to maintain my passion is making sure people understand that this is available, that there's a different way of approaching cancer. And if you change the way you're approach, the results are going to be better.

SPEAKER_00 27:21

Well, for someone who is currently facing a crisis, what is the first mental emotional shift that they need to make?

SPEAKER_01 27:31

There are two if you're if it depends through whether you are in crisis or a family member is. Um when you're in crisis, my suggestion is research. Read. Find out everything you can find. Start by reading what other people your condition have done. Uh if you're the caregiver, it's harder. Uh I mean, I I I can't understand how the caregivers do it. Because generally they nobody pays attention to them. Um, and you know, you're you're there to support the patient or the person in crisis. And you've got to take care of yourself. One of the things they teach in the military as a leader is if you don't take care of yourself, you can't take care of your troops. And so, as a caregiver, you you've got to do that. You've got to look out for yourself in order to be the best caregiver you can be. Now, that doesn't work for everybody. My lifelong best friend's wife had early onset Alzheimer's, and he absolutely refused anyone's help to help him help his wife for the rest of her life. And he quit his job and took care of her the rest of his life, well, the rest of her life, and went on for six years, and he basically was almost like a hermit. It was not healthy for us who were watching it, but it was what he had to do. Um, but you know, he he succeeded in getting done it done, and Susie benefited extraordinarily because of it. But again, take care of yourself as a caregiver, as the patient, or as the person in the crisis, you've got to know what your options are. You've got to know who's at the best at trading the options. And it could be all sorts of things. It could be, you know, you could have been in a car wreck, and you know, you can't really do much uh because of your injuries. Still, you have to make a decision are you gonna take on take it on or not? And if you take it on, you're gonna be better, you're gonna feel more in control of the situation, and you're gonna have a better quality of life when you do that. And all the studies show that no matter what kind of cancer you have, the higher your quality of life, the longer you live, no matter what cancer it is. So there are all sorts of ways of approaching that, but insisting that you have a high quality of life is the is the way to do it, and that goes it applies to the caregiver too. Um you know, if you take care of yourself and have a good quality of life, you can do a better job of taking care of your person you're helping. Um, but the studies all show that the high quality of life is critical. Um in cancer, there are two real common problems uh that everybody has, and that's what's called cancer fatigue syndrome. You have no energy. And anybody who knows somebody around cancer knows that. Well, there are multiple ways of approaching that situation, and that's where the multidisciplinary team comes in so well. Um it turned out that I was diagnosed with narcolepsy, which means I was falling asleep in the middle of the day. Uh, and so, you know, how do you address that? Well, I was given a medication for that. That medication had the ability to help me with the second thing, which is uh uh cancer, you know, chemo brain or CRCI. And that medicine helped me focus and helped make my cognitive ability maintain. And uh that's been borne out by all sorts of tests, but by the quality of my life is wonderful. The fact that I work out is what everybody tells you to do, and very few people do do. Um, but you you know, you've got to make a decision that you want to live and you're gonna solve the problems. Um, and by doing making that decision and going forward, you know, it it's it's how you address the problems. I mean, if you you cannot be passive. Um, and if you've got a problem, there's somebody in almost every cancer center in the country, even the small ones, uh, that's called a nurse navigator or a guide. And their job is really to address your side effect problems and improve the quality of your life. Uh, and those people are just saints. Uh, they they just you know get you to see the right people. Um if you need spiritual help, they can arrange that. If you need uh other types of palliative care, uh, just assistance in how you deal with the problems, they're the ones to help you with it. And they're also there to help the caregivers. Uh but almost every hospital, no matter how small they are, have those navigators, and uh they're very busy people, but you have to insist that you get the help that you need. That the hospital is being paid for that uh as part of their overhead, and the insurance companies or Medicare or Medicaid is paying that, so you're entitled to getting it, and you have to ask for it and demand receiving it.

SPEAKER_00 33:24

Thinking about your legacy, what impact do you hope your story uh leaves on others?

SPEAKER_01 33:36

You were the first person who's ever asked me that question. Um it's a great question. I hope that I teach people that you don't have to quit. That life is worth living, that um your children or grandchildren, if you've got those people um are critical, and you can change their lives or how you approach your problem. And if I teach people that, it's fine. I mean, my my grandson, I've got one grandson, one grandchild, grandson. And uh my my grand my dad's dad uh took me to a place in Montana every summer as a kid from at the age of three to the age of 17. So Lake and Glacier National Park. I I refer to it as Grandpa's Lake, the correct name of it's Bowman Lake in Great Glacier. It's one of the most beautiful places in the continental United States, and it's not very well, it's not visited a lot. But my grandpa did wonderful things like that, and he he took the time to spend with me, and it was just a critical thing. The other thing that I actually got to do again was something that happened to me. My dad was a uh regimental commander in the 60s, and the Secretary of Defense and the Chief of Staff of the Army were on that installation, and they were you know being briefed by my dad and his team about you know the condition of the unit and everything else. And at 10 o'clock in the morning, my dad got slept a message that my dog had died, and they knew my dog was sick, and um dad excused himself from the meeting shortly thereafter for a couple hours. He came home and picked me up and took me out, and we bought a puppy together. So my dad started out as a private in the army and retired as a full colonel, uh, commanded units in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. Uh, and this tough army officer, you know, who was a who was a you know full-blown army officer, spent the time taking me to see that. And that taught me something. And that taught me that I knew no matter what happened, my dad loved me. Well, about seven, eight months ago, my grandson had a dog who was he's six now. So the dog was probably 12 years old, but he was born for 11. And that dog died. And my daughter called me up and told me about it, and I said, Beth, go buy him a puppy today. And my daughter said, Nah, dad, we're gonna wait. I said, Beth, I'm gonna I'll find you a replacement dog at a at a kennel, you know, uh rescue. And I found it all just the same breed and everything else. It looked great, needed to be rescued. So I called her back up and I said, Beth, I found this dog and it looks perfect. And she said, Dad, you know, we're not we we don't want to do that right away. I said, Okay, let me explain something to you. And I told her the story about what my dad did for me. And she had never heard the story because I hadn't told her, I'd never come up. And uh, lo and behold, what did my daughter do? She ended up going out, and they didn't they bought a new puppy, uh, wasn't ready to be taken home yet. But they got her dog, her son, a puppy that day, and Sam will remember that forever. Um, and that's the kind of legacy that I hope I make. I hope I create memories for my children, my grandson, and others on how to approach problems and how to solve problems. And uh, you know, I hope when I'm gone, I mean, uh, my kids aren't going to inherit much because it's all going into a trust to uh help other children. I I went to college on a scholarship by the army, and I want to help other kids get the benefits that I had about education and not being uh in debt at the end of the rate, you know, when they got their degrees. Uh so that's what we're gonna do with my money after I'm gone. And so that's part of my legacy, I guess. Trying to set the tone for others that they can uh achieve their goals and that only them, only you can stop you. So, you know, that's easy to say. That's a hard thing to do when you have when you don't see an approach to it. So it's a large part of what we're gonna do, is where I'm gone is hopefully teach kids on how to approach those kind of problems, how to solve them, and have the resources there to help them solve them.

SPEAKER_00 39:14

What tell us about any upcoming projects uh besides that book you got coming out here pretty soon that you're working on that listeners need to know about?

SPEAKER_01 39:23

Well, yeah, the the next eclipse is August 12th, and it's a sunset eclipse. And um, you know, I I write books about eclipses, but it's if you ever get a chance to see an eclipse, it's a life-changing event. It's not just an eclipse day, everybody focuses on that. But the the night after an eclipse is a new moon, and the stars just jump out of the sky, they absolutely jump out of the sky, and it's um it's just a wonderful thing uh to see. Um for that eclipse, I'm taking four other people with me, uh, in addition to my team, to teach them how to shoot pictures of eclipses. Um it's a large part of what I do is trying to teach others. So in my books about eclipses, there's a section about how to shoot an eclipse, how to plan for an eclipse, and then all the settings for the cameras. And uh now I'm gonna start doing it in person. And hopefully, a couple of the people are gonna be there are uh just out of high school, once just out of college. And so hopefully I'm creating some more eclipse chasers who can teach other people how to do it. So uh my next book that comes out is on the multidisciplinary cancer care teams, and um, that will be out uh in the first two weeks of May. I was hoping it'd be out this month, but I don't know if we're gonna get there yet. And then uh the other book I'm coming out will come out hopefully on Memorial Day, which is the Murphy Green Secession. And that book is concerns uh novel, it's book one of a six book series. And the uh two characters was a Jewish family from New York kid who's married at 18 and goes into the military, and he meets a kid who's from Wyoming and Idaho and a rancher, and uh they become best friends, and it's a multi-generational, multi-family uh series. Uh both of them are married. The uh kid from New York's wife, uh, they got married at 18, and she ends up being a Mossad agent, and the kid from Idaho uh marries a woman who's very smart, like his mom, uh, who's turns out to be the richest woman in the United States, and they get married at 19. So it's uh multi that book goes from World War II through uh the Vietnam, the start of the Vietnam War. And then there's a second book, the third book, and then the last three books of that series are World War III, which we all hope never happens. So uh my my one of my most recent books was Warriors Hate War, which is the history of the US military after World War II. Um, and uh it's gotten some pretty good reviews uh because it it shows the we asked it it basically asks the question how have we lost all but one of the wars we've been in since World War II? Um and there's a different people have different definitions for winning and losing, um, but we have only prevailed in the first Gulf War. Everything else was at best a tie. And so, how's that happened? How do we make those mistakes? And it it focuses on the Powell doctrine, General Powell's doctrine, and if we follow the Powell doctrine, now we don't have those problems, and so it's designed to teach people the questions to ask uh about our military engagements, like the one we're in now. And if you ask the eight questions that General Powell says you have to ask, um you will avoid big problems. And we clearly fail in one of his eight questions in the current uh war we're pursuing with Iran. So hopefully we prevail there and hopefully it ends quickly. But that's a it's a good test and a good education about the history of it of our US military.

SPEAKER_00 43:44

Well, so people can keep up with everything that you're up to with the letter contact info.

SPEAKER_01 43:49

Well, it's it's the easiest way to get me is glennsturm.com is my website. And uh it's g-l-en-n s t-urm.com, and you'll see a bunch of my photography there and books and uh releases about you know portions of the new books that are coming out. Um and uh and uh and one of the rules I've got is on my cancer books. If uh people uh read the book and they decide they're gonna give it to a friend of theirs or a family member of theirs who's gotten cancer, if they'll send me a note, an email, um, and my email address is really hard. It's my first name at my last name.net, blanketstern.net. If they've given the book away, I'll sign another book, first edition, which I've kept, and send it to you. Uh and the current record is one person has done that 10 times. And so I'd like to have a lot more people do it 10 times. So those books, my the replacement books I send are free because I encourage you to share the book with others. Um, there's hope that means you believe it's helping. And the last thing is you think I'm wrong about something, I want to hear about it. Uh I I I love and I love conflict of ideas and insist on conflict of ideas without conflict of personalities. Uh, that's one of the things we always run our business. Business like as we want conflict of ideas. Uh, that's how you get to better results.

SPEAKER_00 45:27

Do you have any final thoughts for the listeners? If there's anything I forgot to talk about that you would like to touch on?

SPEAKER_01 45:34

Well, no, but I just want to go back to that put a smile on somebody's face every day. I'm gonna give you one other thought. If you put a smile on somebody's face every day, you're gonna end up with a smile on yours. But the other thing is, all the companies that I've had and the little firm that I ran, um, I asked everybody who worked there to ask themselves the following question on the way home from work every day. What did I do today to make somebody's job easier or their life better? Again, what did I do today to make somebody's job easier or their life better? You're not gonna have an answer for that question every day. But if you ask yourself that question every day, you're gonna be a lot more successful. And the people you're around who are around you are gonna be a lot more successful, and you'll be able to celebrate life. It's uh two ways of approaching things because no matter what situation you're in, you can do those two things and you can have fun with it, and you can make people around you enjoy life more.

SPEAKER_00 46:48

All right, ladies and gentlemen, glansturm.com. Please be sure to check out everything that he's up to and pick up that book. If uh all of his uh books, and if you know of anybody that's going through a crisis or cancer or anything like that, please be sure to follow rate review, share this episode to as many people as possible. Definitely share the information about the multidisciplinary teams because uh I've never heard of it. And like he said, it's not well known in America, and I'm sure that there's a lot of people out there that that have not heard of it. So if for nothing else to get that out to people, uh please share this episode and also share www.curveball337.com to everybody you know to keep up with all things living the dream. Thank you for listening and supporting the show. And Glenn, once again, thank you for your service and thank you for all that you're doing to try to put a smile on somebody's face and make the world a better place. And thank you for joining me.

SPEAKER_01 47:51

And thank you for having me, and and thank you for what you're doing. This is what you're doing, it's very important. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 47:57

For more information on the Living the Dream with Curveball Podcast, visit www.curveball337.com. Until next time, keep living the dream.