“We’re asked how we could have done something better to change a situation but a lot of times, there’s nothing more that you could do. But that questioning of yourself, is what ends up causing change.” -Jeremy Loque
US News lists this year’s most stressful jobs, a firefighter occupying a high spot in the top three. Traumas, injuries, fatal encounters, chronic illnesses, and emotional strains certainly contribute to that ranking. In this episode, Bruce will bring you deep into the realm of first-responders with Wailuku firefighter Jeremy Loque. Enjoy the trip as Jeremy walks you through the life of a firefighter and how everyone can find opportunities to give to others and show kindness. Saving lives and protecting properties certainly sounds exciting and heroic, but these men are ordinary people like us. The weight of the responsibility they bear will at some point take a toll on their overall well-being. Stress is meant to increase motivation and efficiency. Every job has it. Sometimes however, it gets so overwhelming that it becomes unhealthy. Tune in as Jeremy shares how he was able to take care of his mental health despite being in a high risk, exceedingly stressful work environment.
Takeaways:
02:47 What It’s Actually Like to be a Fireman
10:02 What It Takes to be a Firefighter
17:34 Firefighting Rocks!
24:09 Find a Separation From Stress
31:36 3 Ways to Improve Mental Health
37:16 Monetize Your Passion
46:58 Shed the Macho-ness
50:59 Opportunities Are Everywhere
57:15 Step Up and Do Something Different
Resources:
Book
Podcast
Even the toughest mind needs to heal. Separate yourself from stress and discover ways to improve your mental health as Bruce as he interviews Maui County Fire Department’s pride, Jeremy Loque. #podcast #RecipesForAGreatLife #Fireman #automotives… Share on X
Quotes:
07:53 “When something goes bad and you can’t 100% trust the people next to you, it can turn out bad for everybody.” -Bruce Jeppesen
15:08 “The ones that are always trying to scam away are the ones you cannot trust in a bad situation.” -Bruce Jeppesen
16:00 “It’s about confidence. Some people are loud because they’re confident, and they back it up.” –Jeremy Loque
18:03 “I don’t think there is a better feeling in the world than being able to help somebody when they are about to give up.” –Jeremy Loque
20:54 “If we all help each other a little more, it would be a better place, for sure.” -Jeremy Loque
22:54 “We’re asked how we could have done something better to change a situation but a lot of times, there’s nothing more that you could do. But that questioning of yourself, is what ends up causing change.” -Jeremy Loque
37:28 “It’s not the money. It’s the ability to do whatever you want when you want to do it.” -Jeremy Loque
40:22 “If you look into doing nice things for other people, that offers a lot more impact.” -Jeremy Loque
47:51 “You can’t force people. What you can do is create an environment where they’ll feel comfortable to share.” -Jeremy Loque
51:25 “There’s opportunities everywhere. It’s just that you’re not ready to take them or you’re afraid to take them. You need to be honest with yourself.” -Jeremy Loque
01:00:45 “There are people that have the same things going on. It may not be a carbon copy of what our lives look like but our mentalities are similar, and the only way for them to know that is letting the message out.” -Jeremy Loque
Meet Our Guest!
Wailuku firefighter, Jeremy Loque is one of Maui County Fire Department’s pride. He came from a family of firefighters and is determined to continue the legacy.
When he’s not responding to fires or saving lives, Jeremy is busy with automotive and detailing. In 2018, he received training from Renny Doyle, one of the originators of modern detailing and later, was handpicked to join the Air Force One Detailing Team, a precious privilege indeed!
Firehouse Detail Maui
Transcriptions:
Bruce Jeppesen: Everybody, Bruce Jeppesen with the Recipes For A Great Life Podcast. Today, I got a really wonderful friend and a great guy we’re going to be visiting with. He’s a Fireman in Maui. He’s got a great background, things that he’s accomplished, things that he’s doing and things that he is looking to do in the future. I wanted him to come on here to be a guest because part of the thing that we’re talking about with all of this is the different levels of ways that our jobs can affect us. Everybody thinks our Firemen have the greatest job in the world and all that kind of stuff. And after we hit, Jeremy and I were at an event in Utah together last year when we met. And so he shared some stories of what he could, and that was the first time I’d ever heard of what Firemen do. I just thought that they wouldn’t put out fires. I didn’t realize they did all this other stuff so I want to welcome him to the podcast. We’re going to cover some general things, and we’ll just get to get started. Jeremy, how are you doing, man? Thanks for being on. I really appreciate you.
Jeremy Loque: Yeah, thank you. Thank you very much for having me, and I appreciate you wanting me on this podcast. What you’re doing is great, and I appreciate that. Yeah, in Utah, it was good meeting you. I know we’ve had a good relationship in the past as far as being online and through this whole pandemic, but it was very nice to meet you. Thank you.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yeah, that was an event to remember for sure. I guess, as much as you can and you’re comfortable with, could you kind of describe what your daily job is, the people you encounter and some of the things that you have to deal with just so people that are watching can have a better idea of actually what firemen do.
Jeremy Loque: Oh, yeah. It varies throughout the country exactly what we do depending on where we’re at. There are some volunteers, there are some paid careers, there’s a lot of different aspects as far as what happens to the fire service. It’s not a one size fits all kind of thing. We’re kind of a Swiss Army Knife, I guess you could say, for the counties and states that we work for, they send us. Police are there to keep us safe. Sometimes, the medics are there, they’re part of the fire department. Sometimes they’re separate, but they’re there mainly for taking care of people. And we’re there for, I guess you could say the heavy lifting, whether it be rescue or fire mitigation, hazmat stuff like that.
Majority of things that we do is, very well, you can just say there’s, we are our career department, every county has a different area and we’re all separate. We don’t work with mutual aid as much as they do in the mainland because we’re separated by water. So it’s hard for us to hop on a plane, and we can’t just drive our trucks over to the next state and work. There are some things that we do differently. But as far as day to day activities, we’re there to help people just like anybody else in the first responder realm. Majority of time, we’re doing medical calls, a lot of notes. 80 to 90% of our calls are medicals or some kind of medical assistance calls so we see a lot of things. The things that most people don’t want to see. And sometimes, it sticks with you. And sometimes, it comes back. That’s kind of what we talked about. It could be a year, it could be 20 years after you retire. It comes back. So that’s one of the things that I am really concerned with. It wasn’t a concern when I got in, but that’s something I wish they would have explained better. But you can wish in one hand and do something else in the other and see which one fills up. And majority of the time, wishing does nothing. So it’s time to try and make some changes. And that’s what I love to do.
Bruce Jeppesen: Well, it’s kind of funny, up until I met you, I had never really been around anybody who works on fire departments that are, the level that you’re at, most of them are like, where I live are all small volunteers. They get a fire call, they jump off the tractor, they get in their pickup, go jump on a fire truck, and maybe it’s a grass fire, stuff like that. And then the thing you typically hear is, what firemen do is they go rescue a kitten out of a tree. And the rest of the time, they’re either polishing their vehicles or working out so they could be in a fireman calendar.
Jeremy Loque: I’m not saying that we don’t do that either. I’m just saying that we live with each other. Majority of the time, as career guys, it’s our second family. The guys I work with, we spend a third of the year with each other. Well, and like I said, it can vary, but we’re there every third day or so, or whatever their schedule might be. We got to be close. It’s not some place, it’s more close than others. For me, I’ve been lucky to work with some awesome people. And the more progressive in my career, the more selective I get with who I want to be around. I’m blessed to have really good people around me right now immediately where I work. So that’s been a big help.
When something goes bad and you can’t 100% trust the people next to you, it can turn out bad for everybody.” -Bruce Jeppesen
Bruce Jeppesen: Well, I guess depending on what somebody’s background is for their career, most people don’t have to be quite so focused on the amount of level and trust that they have to put in the guy that’s standing next to you, or gal. And the majority of people in the public take everything for granted. It’s like you have a problem, you call a fire department. Something else happens, you call the sheriff’s office, or police department, or whatever. People are so used to having other people show up. They have no idea what the level of trust that you have to have, and the level of competency just to help keep each other alive if something goes bad. So that is a big thing that I remembered from being in the military years ago. And then a few years ago when I was in law enforcement where there’s a lot of people you don’t want around you when something goes bad. And usually, when something goes bad in those situations, if you can’t 100% trust the person or people next to you, it can turn out bad for everybody.
Jeremy Loque: Yeah. And that lack of trust puts you at a disadvantage. Because now, your attention is focused away from what it should be and it can turn into a bad situation. So that’s a lot of stress. There’s a lot of stress involved in everything in life, I think. But the fire service, for me anyway, graduated. Throughout my career, I’ve chosen to work at the busiest place that we have because I wanted to learn. It took me about six years to figure out I didn’t want to be a fire. I just did it because of the security. That’s what everybody thinks, like, oh, go be a fireman. Or you could have your medical, your dentist, all of that stuff that they look at it like as being a six year job. And it is not saying that it’s not right. But like I said, they don’t tell you. The other thing, of course, cancer is a big issue in our service especially with the new combustible that all of a sudden and all that stuff. So cancer is becoming a big issue. But the biggest issue, I think, is the mental health aspect. It just doesn’t get addressed enough. It’s always a reactive thing rather than a proactive thing. It’s getting better. I’ve talked with Nick [inaudible], another person that we’ve met up in Utah, there’s got to be something that we can do before it consumes someone.
Bruce Jeppesen: I guess for those who don’t know, and I don’t really know the process either, could you take us back and give us a quick rundown on what it takes to get hired, and then the training you have to go through, and then to what would lead you up to where you’re at now in your position.
Jeremy Loque: Yeah, sure. No doubt, we definitely can do that. So it’s usually just a high school education. You don’t have to have a college education, but it does help you, and they do have fire science degrees that do help. In some areas with no positioning, when you take the test, they’re getting some extra points here and there. So there is an advantage to that. It also helps you, when you do get into the training scenario, when you do have to do all the book work involved, you’ve kind of been through all that stuff. So you take a test, usually, and then you take a physical test which is a generalized kind of physical thing. For us, it’s a mile and a half run. I think it’s a 100 meter swim with a dive, ladder climb, all different things, and then an obstacle course at the end. So there’s a bunch of different things you got to do in one day in their little amount of time. And then you get put on a candidate list, and then you get interviewed by the chiefs. And then from that interview, you get put on another list. And then from that list, you get chosen to be in the recruit class. That process can take anywhere from one year to two years sometimes. Just matters when the openings come up. So that’s how our department does it.
And then after your, our recruit training is about a year, half a year long. We are not an EMP department, we run through a contract service called American Medical Response, AMR. They do our medical advanced life care, they do all our transports. We go there as first responders, but we respond to pretty much everything that they do for assistance. Our training is about six months. Like I said, we train everything. Since we’re on an island, we got to know ocean rescues, mountain rescues, rope, grassfire, structure fire, we do a lot here. And our training is top notch. That’s one thing that our county doesn’t skimp on is our training. We have some of the best training, I think, in the state, if not the best training. So we’re kind of at the tip of being progressive with our training, and that’s pretty much how you get into the fire department.
Bruce Jeppesen: The thing that I kept hearing about all the time before I even went into the military or law enforcement was the people who I really trusted would tell me, they say: “Sign up or volunteer for any extra training that you can.” And the funny thing was with some of the guys, they say: “When you go to the military, you go to basic. Don’t volunteer for anything co’z you’re gonna be cleaning latrines and digging ditches. You don’t want to go, sorry.” But when I got into law enforcement, I did that. And it’s amazing how people list supervisory roles or whatever. If you are looking to train but you’re not being, there’s a lie with that.
Jeremy Loque: There’s a fine line with that. And we definitely see it, everybody else right now. And it shows that everything other than that, what kind of person you are. So yeah, I like that you brought that up. That’s absolutely true.
Bruce Jeppesen: After I’d been in a while, I was talking to a guy who had just transferred from a unit. And here we are, we got to talk about that subject. He was telling us about this guy that showed up and he’s this big, young, stocky young guy. He just thought he was the cat’s meow. And the first thing he did was walk up to his first Sergeant, who is a pretty high ranked enlisted guy, and he told the first Sergeant: “First Sergeant, you’re my most favorite I ever have. If you want me to help polish your boots, or iron your uniform, or all that crap, you just count on me and I’m there.”
Jeremy Loque: I’m sure, that’s not the first time that happened to him. He had somebody come up to him and tell him that.
“The ones that are always trying to scam away are the ones you cannot trust in a bad situation.” -Bruce Jeppesen
Bruce Jeppesen: But then as typically as it goes is, it’s just part of what he caught. This wasn’t really hazing, but well, you volunteered to be here so we’re gonna welcome you. So some of the staff, they start messing with each other and stuff like that. That guy paid a pretty healthy price for being such a knot head, something like that. But it’s funny to see it. And the guys that are legit are great. The other guys, they’re always trying to find a way out. And those are the guys, the ones that are always trying to scam away are the ones you cannot trust in a bad situation.
Jeremy Loque: They’re always the loudest ones, usually the loudest ones out there trying to be the most visual. I noticed that co’z I’m part of some of our training, and I see it now. You can see the guy’s trying to be visible instead of just doing it. So it’s pretty obvious. I wish I could tell him that, but I just take it for what it is.
Bruce Jeppesen: One thing I learned about that is, there’s a benefit to that because it teaches you who you can trust in most situations. I mean, they’re not all bad. But a lot of times, there wasn’t gonna be that mouthy show off. Those are the ones you try to keep your distance from, and it’s paid off for myself I know.
“It’s about confidence. Some people are loud because they’re confident, and they back it up.” –Jeremy Loque
Jeremy Loque: It’s about confidence too, I mean, I know some people are loud because they’re confident, and that’s perfectly fine. Yeah, that’s a different attention to those people draw. They back it up, you can tell. But the ones that you notice are the ones that don’t have that, tjust kind of make an ass out of themselves. And it is what it is. But I totally understand what you’re saying.
Bruce Jeppesen: I have some questions that I kind of like to review with people, it helps get to know the person a little bit better. And the thing that I’ve come to notice is that it helps you find that commonality between people. I remember when I first got into law enforcement, one of the things that nobody ever told me about was the adrenaline rush when something happens. So I thought that I was the only one that did it. I was like, man, what’s wrong with me, I’m the only one, you get nervous, or scared, or whatever. And then you find out later down the road that everybody has it, but nobody talks about it. They don’t talk about the fear, the anxiety, all of those kinds of things. So some of these questions are just, they’re super simple. You share whatever you’re comfortable with. And if you don’t want to ask a question, go on to another one. But what is it about firefighting that really makes you want to go to work?
“I don’t think there is a better feeling in the world than being able to help somebody when they are about to give up.” –Jeremy Loque
Jeremy Loque: Besides the guys that I work with, and I think there’s no, once someone’s life or somebody is in despair and they’re in a situation where they feel like life or death situation, or anything like that, when you’re there to assist and you’re able to help, I think the feeling that you get from that is, I don’t think there is a better feeling than that in the world, that being able to help somebody when they just absolutely about to give up on something, or someone or whatever it may be. That to me is why I still go to work every day. That’s kind of how I look at it. The moment that I truly do not want to be there, I think I should. That’s how I look at it. There’s a lot of people that don’t, they just stay there, and they kind of create this rough environment for people around them. But for me, I look at it as a privilege to do that and have that opportunity. But there are times when I’m not gonna lie, you get something like a stubbed toe and you’re just kind of like, really? We’re going to somebody who stubbed their toe or something silly like that, we do go to those as well. But other than that, just being able to help somebody else out in their time of need, it’s a feeling that I cannot get to explain.
Bruce Jeppesen: I think that is a very common feeling amongst people who are in public service, whether it be fire, EMS, law enforcement. A lot of people that I was fortunate enough to know after I got hurt in the military were the medical staff all the way from the people from the Mercy Flight crews, and ER nurses, doctors, and then you get out of the ER into your room or whatever. And the amount of care that people love to give is phenomenal. And so many times, we kind of lose sight of that just because on a day to day basis. If we have a job, we go to that. It’s boring. Maybe you’re staring at a computer screen all the time so you don’t see that kind of stuff. And one of the things that I try to share with people is like, hey, if you have a job like that, next time you go through a drive thru by somebody behind you, their meal or something, and it’s that care of helping, but something like that is, there’s nothing better than helping somebody was no ulterior motive.
“If we all help each other a little more, it would be a better place, for sure.” -Jeremy Loque
Jeremy Loque: Yeah, absolutely. I absolutely agree that that’s something that I don’t think a lot of people don’t have, but they don’t think about it. Now, I don’t think they do. It’s not something that I hate to use, but it’s popular. It doesn’t seem like everything is about me, and what I’ve done, or what you need, or what I’ve accomplished, and it’s all about me. A lot of the time, it’s not about anybody else. So you’re right, we all just kind of help each other a little more and it would be a better place, for sure.
Bruce Jeppesen: Well, the simple thing for me is, when I think about that, and when I visit with other people it’s got to start somewhere. So if it starts with me, or with you, or somebody else, just that gift of giving because you want to do something nice for some people. And so that goes into what you’re doing with the extreme situations that you guys get into, where you literally carry somebody out of a burning building, or save somebody from drowning, or something like that. I mean, I can only imagine it would stick with you forever, and just be the best feeling that you could ever come up with.
Jeremy Loque: Yeah, yeah. And it’s a double edged sword.
Bruce Jeppesen: Right.
“We’re asked how we could have done something better to change a situation but a lot of times, there’s nothing more that you could do. But that questioning of yourself, is what ends up causing change.” -Jeremy Loque
Jeremy Loque: It’s a double edged sword co’z I’ve never personally carried anybody out of buildings. Luckily, every fire that I’ve been to, everybody has been evacuated. But we trained for that. Those are situations that are more common in high populated areas and we all are at risk, it’s a lot easier to kind of get out of houses. It can still happen, especially with older communities, or older members of a community. But for the most part, our houses are relatively easy to get in and out through windows or whatnot. It’s not locked down because we have to deal with extreme weather. The only thing that we got to do is heat. So yeah, I’ve been to a few fires in my life, but a good amount. I haven’t gotten to that situation. But I haven’t gotten into other situations, life and death situations many times over the last 14 years that I’ve been doing this. Like I said, it’s a double edged sword. Because a lot of the time, it doesn’t end the way we want it. We’re kind of asked a lot of times, how could we have done something better to maybe change at all. And a lot of times, it’s really nothing. There’s nothing more than you could do. But that questioning of yourself is what ends up causing it, and then it starts to create this little pocket in your brain that eventually starts to eat away at things. And then next thing you know, it just catches up to you when it builds up to a certain point. And some people just don’t, their mind blows, or scratches, or they explode. There’s a lot of situations that I can’t really talk about anymore, so I just leave it at that. I’ve come to a good place, as far as understanding that I couldn’t do anything more.
Bruce Jeppesen: Another question that I like to ask, whatever part of your life, whatever it is, what do you love to do? If you have a day off and you just have the free time, what can you not wait to go do?
Jeremy Loque: Well, sorry, I got some allergies in so many places, but I have a side business. I detail cars, and I do a little bit more high end stuff because it fits my schedule better. And that’s one of the things that I enjoy doing because it’s a separation from all of this distress, it’s something that I can kind of just zone out and do. And it’s been good for a long time. I’ve made a commitment to do it well. So I’ve gone to many trainings, and I’ve been fortunate enough to meet a lot of people within that industry so I can be a part of a lot of different projects, you could say. I’ve been in sports my whole life, baseball. I played baseball a lot. I still play baseball to this day. I don’t know why, but I still do because it’s fun. I just enjoy playing softball. Of course, not too much into softball, but I think I will eventually be once my body starts breaking down. But I like playing golf and spending time with my family. As much as I would love to say I go to the beach often, I don’t go enough. I gotta be honest with you, I’m just so busy working. So those are the things I like to spend time with. And so far, my family and some athletics.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yeah. You would know better than anybody. Other than people from Hawaii that I’ve met, that were at the event, but everybody in this part of the world is Hawaii. It’s all just gorgeous, tropical, whatever, you get to go surfing or sit on the beach.
Jeremy Loque: Yeah, well, it is. But yes, in fact, they get so caught up with everything, just you forget that it’s there.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yeah. The crazy thing about that is, people that go to Hawaii for vacation, that’s what they do. They don’t think about Hawaii as a place where people actually live there, work there, like they do everywhere. Like you live there and you don’t go doing whatever. And it’s kind of funny how they, I guess, just don’t look at things or whatever.
Jeremy Loque: It’s not the easiest place to live. I’ll be honest with you, it’s not the majority of the time that we got to work two jobs, three jobs to be able to afford to live here. That’s something that’s extremely unfortunate. And there’s a lot of factors that play into that. I don’t want to get political, but there’s a lot of factors that play into that. And that’s something that really bugs me. That’s something that affects me a lot mentally. I don’t make that known to a lot of people that it affects me that much. But I also look at the things that we learn, the things that we see is you get what you work for. Uou complain all you want, but if you’re not going to go out and do the work that you need to do, you have to adjust. I’ve worked for two years straight, like over 120 something hours a week, every week. Didn’t go out, didn’t do anything and spent time with friends, always busy, always saying that I’m busy. And for the most part, I was. Sorry, I’m kind of branching off on this.
Bruce Jeppesen: It’s fine.
Jeremy Loque: So that was one of the big parts of me breaking down mentally, that just kind of killing myself. It was actually longer than three years. It doesn’t sound like it’s a super long time, but I worked 56 hours and I’m putting in 50 plus hours of my business. Got to a point where I just kind of wanted to give up on everything. But because it’s hard as I work here in Hawaii, you might break even or you might be able to live a little bit more comfortably rather than make half of what I could make now and live the same way somewhere else. That’s unfortunate. That’s unfortunate, especially to the native people that’s here.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yeah, it’s unfortunately happening in a lot of places. Well, I’d like to include everybody that they can, and that’s why it’s our military veterans, fire EMS, medical people, and I most definitely want to include our law enforcement, K9 handlers and medical people. And because so many people are feeling neglected and left out, and one that I was surprised that I have to double check this statistic, I just had a hard time, believe it. But they talked about veterinarians. People take such amazing care of animals, the amount of stress and the problems that they have. So I want to include them. But it all comes back to a super high stress careers dealing with things, stupid rules, or laws, regulations that just make no sense. And that’s where people who are really good hearted want to help, you want to do the jobs like yours and stuff I did, all the garbage that comes with it is where a lot of people start to struggle. My old job, if you just let me go do my job, I’d have been as happy as could be. But then the [inaudible] with this other stuff and you’re like, that’s not what I signed up for. And had I known that, I would not have signed up for it.
I would say that the most important thing that I want to do is, I want to reach out and connect with people, and I want people like you, with what you’re sharing with your story, we’ve covered a lot of topics. But the main thing is, we’re all human, and we all suffer from different issues, your struggles and the commonality of like, hey, I talked to this guy and he’s a fireman in Hawaii. He has the same struggles as a guy in maybe California, or Ohio, or wherever. And that’s any of the jobs we’ve talked about. And then people start to realize they’re not alone. And if they can say, hey, maybe I’m not the only person feeling this. Can you, or would you be willing to share some advice or encouragement, or both, to people who are struggling that are feeling alone. That they’re feeling like they’re the only ones that are going through it, and maybe some suggestions on what they can do.
Jeremy Loque: Number one, get a therapist. Don’t feel like it’s a weakness, and don’t be very selective, be extremely selective on who you choose.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yep.
Jeremy Loque: And the second little bit of advice is find something that you’d like to do if you can monetize it even better, because that’s going to give you even more sense of purpose, and it’s going to allow you to do other things like help other people in different ways. Anytime that you can pick up a skill that you can, in essence, make people happy pretty much because you’re providing something for people. For me, I got to a point where I’m like, why do people even like what I do? Like on the side as far as detailing, and people love driving nice clean cars. Sometimes when I get down in the dumps and I get frustrated, I just have to remember that we just try and figure out a hobby, or something that you can contribute to the community outside of the job, and kind of make a difference. So even if it’s small, that’s kind of my two areas of advice, I guess. Because it would be good to be able to go home and share things with your significant other, or your family, or whoever it may be that you’re around, but they’re not going to connect it. I still struggle with that with the people I’m close to. And then it gets frustrating because you feel like you’re not being heard or you’re alone, and that’s where therapy supports. It gives you a way to critically break down what’s going on with you and figure out ways to combat that. That’s the biggest key. Of course, help and try to keep yourself getting an adequate amount of sleep, that’s also important as well for us who work shifts. It’s not the easiest thing. I live off of three hours of sleep, and that’s not very good. It’s something I’m definitely addressing. It’s been one of my priorities this year, and getting my health in order. So those are, I guess, you could say three things to kind of help your mental health is to find a therapist. Not in that order, find a hobby that you enjoy, get out and move around. Do something physically, take care of yourself.
Bruce Jeppesen: And I did it completely backwards because I was raised under the, men don’t show weakness, which a lot of people still do, which I think is absolutely the dumbest thing ever. But I went from all of that to being even a worse introvert than I had ever been. And then I started closing myself in and not realizing that I was getting depressed. And then I was in a full blown deep depression for three and a half years. And in three and a half years, I gained over 60 pounds. So people that I rarely saw, they’re like, damn, what’s going on?
Jeremy Loque: I totally get it.
Bruce Jeppesen: Without going into all the details, I went through depression, and then I was suicidal, which I know a lot of people don’t want to hear, but it’s so prevalent. And that’s another thing I wanted people to know is that they’re not alone in that. So which led me up to go in to see a psychologist, and I didn’t know any better because I was trying to keep it quiet. I ended up going to this elderly lady. I was there, I think three times, I’m like, okay, I’m not doing this. So I went to another guy who actually was somebody that my father knew. I walked in, I sat down and he went, he called me into his office, and the first thing he said to me was: “I’ve been doing this for over 30 years. And when I looked at you in that lobby to call you back, you were the saddest looking person with an expression I’ve ever seen in this entire time.” I’m just like, Oh, man. So literally, one hour with him, because he knew my family or our family and he says: “I know you guys are outdoors people.” Long story short, he says: “I know you like cars, you go find something to buy to start working on.” I went home, I finished inside of my garage, started working on cars, neighbor’s lawn mowers, anything I could get my hands on and it completely turned me around.
Jeremy Loque: Absolutely.
Bruce Jeppesen: That is such great advice that you shared, and that made me remember that. And the other thing, like the monetization, says you’re in this job and you just can’t take it anymore. Hopefully, you’re not depressed or suicidal. But you got to the point where you’re worth more and you want to get out of it so you start looking at a side hustle of some kind, which is referring to making your own, if you can monetize your hobby. I mean, that’s critical. And then you might just find something that will get you out of there and make more money.
Jeremy Loque: Right. That’s one of the things that makes you happy.
Bruce Jeppesen: Right.
“It’s not the money. It’s the ability to do whatever you want when you want to do it.” -Jeremy Loque
Jeremy Loque: Being able to not necessarily have money, and I don’t want to sound that shallow. I guess you could say, it’s not the money, it’s the ability to do whatever the hell you want when you want to do it. That is the thing that I started figuring out recently, like in the last maybe two years. Why am I working so that I can be comfortable when I could work the same amount, put the same amount of effort. I figured out a way to get me to a point where, if I wanted to go take my daughter to a different lab, why do I have to wait 10 months to save up for that? I just go like next week, you know? And that to me is what is monetizable. And doing that is to me, it’s the freedom of that. And I think it’s looked at in a bad light because it’s not an easy thing to do. And people don’t want to do it. So instead of understanding it and figuring out, should I have a palette, I think we’ll make some money off of this. Instead of looking at something as selfish, looking at something as being an opportunity. Because honestly, I look at this because I’m a sports person. I love baseball a lot. It’s been a big part of my life. And every year, and I’ve talked to a few people about this every year, there’s kids that got to go to the mainland and play tournaments or whatever it may be, and they got to do this big fundraising to get some, I said it’s not cheap to fly from Hawaii to the mainland.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yep.
Jeremy Loque: Wouldn’t it be awesome if you could just show up there and just drop them a check and be like, Hey, good luck, go kick some ass. Go practice, rather than having to do car washes and say go practice. But then there’s another thing too there, it’s like you kind of want them to earn it. You kind of want them to do something so they get to earn that. You got to be a little bit selfish for that.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yeah.
“If you look into doing nice things for other people, that offers a lot more impact.” -Jeremy Loque
Jeremy Loque: You always look at being selfish to something, that’s a bad thing. And if you use it in that, in the way that it can be that way? Of course, yeah. Money is not a bad thing, it’s just a tool. It allows you to do things that you might not be able to do later. And I’m learning this, and it can be frustrating because you’re trying to figure it out. But you can’t just get frustrated until you finally have something that clicks. So to me, that’s how I look at that. And then you said monetizing. That’s what should be there, not just I want to make money for myself so I can go do things for myself. To me, that’s not the right way to go because it’s gonna be short lived. I think if you look to change, like we began talking about this, doing nice things for other people, if we go with that in mind, I think that that offers a lot more impact.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yeah, exactly. Even if I get bummed out, if I go somewhere and say, you go through a drive thru, sometimes I’ll just buy somebody something behind me because I know I’m not gonna see him. And they’ll just be like, what do you mean? Somebody just did something like this. So it’s just that little tiny effort. And it’s not even effort, because you hand them a credit card, you say, throw that on there. Well, I don’t take anything, then it might cost you 10 bucks. And you do it for the pure joy of giving and not looking for anything in return.
Jeremy Loque: And it looks like it out there. Somebody actually does something nice for me. Maybe I can go do something nice for someone else. So it’s a chain without chamber action throughout that whole thing. And some people do it just for attention. I get it. That’s part of the social media craze, I guess, to give somebody money on the side of the road and take a picture of yourself doing it. If you’re doing it for that reason, then don’t do it. If you want to do it to show other people that they should be doing it. I’m giving money to this person because I want you guys to start doing this. That’s a different message. People need to understand that because you can tell when it’s bullshit.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yeah. This is a question that I love asking people throughout history and going way back to the beginning, who is one person that you would love to sit down and have a conversation with, or have a beer with or whatever?
Jeremy Loque: It’s not the first time I got asked this, but I always have a hard time answering.
Bruce Jeppesen: Some people always have a ready answer, like, yeah, I’d love to talk to Napoleon or something like that.
Jeremy Loque: If you asked me this question five years ago, I would have just ratted somebody. But I think nowadays, I’m so much more deep into thinking about things that when you ask me a question like that, it’s not a bad question. It’s just, I really need to think about it. Because it’s like, why? In one of the fellows’ podcasts, he said he would like to sit down with, I believe it was somebody else who would like to sit down with him because he wants to figure out, how did you able to manipulate that many people? It’s not because he’s evil. It’s because it’s like you did something that created a movement with so many people that you call the world war. What if you could do that for good? Thinking outside that box or even pulling that whole box up so when somebody asks like, you just asked me that question, it’s like, I never really think about it. But honestly, if I had to give you an answer right now, let’s say my grandma. She was one of the most giving people that I’ve ever met, and she was like a strong person. I just wanted to talk to her now from all the wisdom that I’m trying to learn. Sorry, I’m getting a little bit emotional now. But yeah.
Bruce Jeppesen: You know me, man. I’m Mr. Emotional with everything. I love it. I’m not ashamed of it or embarrassed by it.
Jeremy Loque: Not anymore anyway. But he got me on that one. But yeah, I would say that I would like to have a lot of conversations with her. Before, I didn’t really understand all that stuff. Right. So yeah.
Bruce Jeppesen: So with your career, your side business and other things, where do you see yourself in like a 5 or 10 year window?
Jeremy Loque: 10 years, to be honest with you, I don’t see myself living deployed. Unfortunately, I cannot see myself struggling to live here my whole life the way it’s been. And I love this place, I don’t want to leave it, but I cannot put myself through that struggle and that frustration. I love this place, but I don’t see myself living here in the next 10 years. I see myself moving to the mainland pursuing a different business venture.
Bruce Jeppesen: The one thing I learned about this is, if you leave, you can always go home. Who do you want to help most with what you’ve been experiencing? What you’re trying to learn and all of that kind of stuff. Maybe not a specific person.
Jeremy Loque: Honestly, any firefighter that is struggling with this, or any first responder. Plain and simple, any of them that wants to talk, any of them wants to try and figure it out, or just needs somebody to talk to that is non judgmental and is able to just listen. That’s how it should be. That’s how it shouldn’t be. But it’s not that way right now, and it needs to change. So that’s what I would like to help. That’s who I’d like to help now. That’s my new vision.
Bruce Jeppesen: So I guess what accompanies that. And obviously, you don’t certainly don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. But do you have somebody that you can contact now that would help you when you get to struggling?
“You can’t force people. What you can do is create an environment where they’ll feel comfortable to share.” -Jeremy Loque
Jeremy Loque: Right now? Yeah. I don’t want to say our department doesn’t do a good job of what all of us do. We do have peer support. But then again, I think that the downfalls of that is what if there’s somebody that doesn’t have anybody in that group that they feel comfortable with? So why is it that every month, every Captain should go through that training? I believe every officer should go through that training and be able to be a peer support person for anybody there. But that equals the module thinking kind of gets in the way of that. We go through a bad call or something like that, and we go back, we say, and somebody’s got anybody to talk about. And everybody always knows, no, I’m good. I’m good. You can’t force that out of people. What you can do is create an environment where they’ll feel comfortable to share. And until that’s done, I think that there’s got to be a way for that to happen. And it has to happen from, unfortunately, to pop out though. And it’s not our department, they’re doing what they can. I just don’t think that nationally, it’s no. That’s the last thing you want is morale to be down with a guy on the bottom. Everything is out, it just becomes a really bad situation, I guess you could say. That also brings cohesiveness within the group. Or if you’re able to, if you’re bothering something and it’s always magnified with other things that’s going on, but people bring stuff in from home. We all live normal lives, that’s why I give the police guys credit with all of that stuff they want to deal with right now. Oh, I cannot even imagine that. But that’s a whole different story, and I want to get into that.
Bruce Jeppesen: One of the things that I’d like to do, I guess, is just encourage and share with people, as you know, we’re kind of coming to the end of our time here. But through the struggles that I’ve dealt with and all that kind of stuff, I never gave up on some of my dreams. One of my dreams, as you will know, because you were one of the first ones to witness me talking about it, was to write a book. I just want to show people that I’m not bragging here. I got this, and you could read that, but became a bestseller in January. One of the tools that I use for all of the years of dealing with all the stress, depression and all that stuff, and I talk about it, and the thing is I have this insane passion for food of all different ethnic types and everything. So in the book, I talk about different recipes, some of my favorite recipes and food is such an amazing thing to draw people together. You go to an event or something like that, and I say that too because I want to encourage people to do that, to write a book to follow those dreams. Go to the events like we did, we went to the Utah advance with the 365 driven group and we met some of the most amazing people. Instead of looking at it added as an expense, you look at it as an investment in yourself. Would you say that was a fair assessment?
“There’s opportunities everywhere. It’s just that you’re not ready to take them or you’re afraid to take them. You need to be honest with yourself.” -Jeremy Loque
Jeremy Loque: Oh, yeah, absolutely. And you never know what opportunities will come at you. And I just did a video on this when I got to catch up in it anyway, I’m falling way behind. But anyway, I just did a video that told me that would be bad. But I just did a video on opportunity because I hate hearing people say that there’s no opportunity there. There’s opportunities everywhere. If you’re not ready to take them, or you’re afraid to take them, be honest with yourself and tell yourself that. Because if that’s true, the more you blame other people about it, or to blame other things about it, it doesn’t help the situation, it just makes you grumble about it next week. Because you realize that there’s a lot of opportunities out there, I understand. And even with that happening, I’m not ready for certain opportunities that I haven’t taken advantage of. And that’s my fault. That’s nobody else’s fault with me. No, I can choose to go and take some classes at the college. I can choose to go get certified with a certain skill, I can choose to be a part of a group like we’re in to learn from other people. I can choose that. Well, if you look at things, basically as I can’t afford it, well, then what can you afford?
You have to look at yourself and be honest with yourself. It’s like, okay, what can I afford to do to get me out of this situation. Books aren’t expensive, you can read a book. There’s YouTube, which is free. Everybody has a phone nowadays, there’s YouTube, there’s all kinds of stuff online, then you can figure out something that you can do to monetize. With the X factor is the heart is the hard work. Nobody wants to do the work. I’m okay with doing the work, but I do too much of the work to put myself in a bad situation, if that makes sense. I don’t know if that makes sense, but I kind of mindlessly work. Instead of being, I guess I’m more like a big ball machete rather than a scalpel. You could say, I’m just whacking at things as hard as I can. And eventually, I’m going to cut through it. Instead of having something that’s precise that I could just cause the least amount of energy, I will get the same job. So my problem is that I go into things with this big amount of energy, because I feel like if I throw a lot of energy on something instead of sitting back and looking at it being like, you know what? I don’t need to throw that much energy at this. I learned a couple more skills, I can do this just as well, really, really quickly. And that’ll be able to give me more time.
Bruce Jeppesen: One of the big reasons why I started this whole podcast project is because I’ve learned so much from podcasts. I remember the very first one I ever listened to is [inaudible]. And that came about, he had a commercial or a post on Facebook and he’s standing by his beach house or standing by the beach by his house in California. He was talking about excellence and being a hard worker. And the thing that I remember so clearly about that is,he says, be the hardest worker in the room, and you’ll level up. I’m like, what the hell does level up mean? And what are all these other terms he was using? So I started watching this podcast, and the people he had on there were amazing. I learned a lot, so that’s literally how I got started into this whole thing with the 365 driven group, the people that I’ve met starting this podcast, writing my book and all this other stuff. And it’s such an awesome way to connect with people.
Jeremy Loque: Yeah.
Bruce Jeppesen: Because now with technology, like you said, everybody has a phone, a lot of people like to escape by watching sports or whatever. If you’re gonna watch sports for two hours, maybe take a half of an hour and watch a podcast because there’s so much out there, you’re gonna find something on a topic that you love. And I just want to encourage people to do that because it has been the key for my transformation from where I was even just over a year ago.
Jeremy Loque: Oh, yeah, absolutely. It just got the gears turning. I went from being somebody who was just floating through life by just taking it week by week to somebody that all of a sudden now has to figure out what I want to do with life. And that was a different feeling for what that podcast did, allowing me to actually disengage from being that sedentary kind of thinking person to somebody who is actively trying to figure out different things to do. I still have a lot of work at it, but it got the gears turning, and it’s led me to follow and get to know some pretty amazing people. And that’s kind of what groups kind of weed out people who you don’t want to be around. That’s why I like being a part of the RFA group, as well as this 365 driven group. It’s people that I align with a lot more than the guy down the street, or even the people that I know. Not saying that that’s a bad thing, it’s just that I just want something different.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yeah. Somewhere along the line, that seed get planted. And once it’s planted, even if you’re not paying attention, it’ll sneak up on you. And then one day to be like, this isn’t okay anymore. I’m tired of working for this miserable place, or this relationship I’m in with my spouse and my kids, I have got to step up and do something different. And just one little step at a time, that’s all we got to worry about. It’s just what we got to do. And that one little step will be the change, it’s better than staying where you’re at now.
Jeremy Loque: Keep as I was, I would like to say that I was okay being where I was. But nobody remembers, okay, now, nothing ever comes of that. But the problem I’m having is that I’m trying to do a million things now at once. So like I said, that dull machete, that’s how I feel now because I came from such a stagnant place for so long to all of a sudden wanting to do everything. I’m still in that phase that I got to really kind of figure it out. I get overly frustrated because I just tried things, so many things, and try them now. Please everyone that I forget about myself.
Bruce Jeppesen: I can tell you that that will come. I’ve done that, and I still struggle a little bit with it. But part of it’s kind of that feast and famine kind of deal. And then for me, it’s like I have to use an image. For me, it’s putting a puzzle together all my life. You got these little pieces, you got to someone, you got to turn them over and you got to look at the cover on the box. And I was like, okay, well, wait, the dog is over on this corner, whatever. And the best thing is to not beat yourself up for it because you can’t figure it out right away.
Jeremy Loque: Patience. Yeah, patience is important. And that’s something that, now, when you get exposed to it, it’s like, I don’t have any patience now. But the problem is, now, I got all of these offshoots of energy going. It’s like, gee, I got to figure out how to get this going in one direction, instead of still thinking about this business idea. Okay, great. Write it down. Look at it every now and then. But don’t be like I’ll be working on a car, and I’ll be thinking off different things that distract me. My focus is not there. I went from being somebody who had zero focus to somebody who has just too much focus. My brain just consistently runs to a point where it makes me exhausted, and then nothing ends up happening.
Bruce Jeppesen: I’m not laughing at you. I’m laughing because everything you’re saying is just a reflection of myself. So yeah.
“There are people that have the same things going on. It may not be a carbon copy of what our lives look like but our mentalities are similar, and the only way for them to know that is letting the message out.” -Jeremy Loque
Jeremy Loque: Absolutely. I think that’s why we vibe with each other so much. It’s so weird. There’s other people that have the same things going on. It may not be a carbon copy of what our lives look like, but our mentalities are similar as far as, and if two people that’s there more, and the only way for them to know that it’s like letting the message out. And who knows, I might have a breakthrough that might help you, and you might have a breakthrough that might help me since the world is part of a network. As introverts like how we really are, or for the most part live their whole lives. It doesn’t allow us to gather networks. Now, we’re kind of starting to get out and be able to form that. And it’s a lot more selective because of the people that we build out. Well, that’s the thing that I like about it.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yeah, the quality of relationships now where everybody encourages each other, there’s no little cliques that are like, oh, ignore that person or whatever. Because we’ve all experienced that. I can’t believe it’s been at least an hour already. So much as I hate to do it, I want to be respectful of your time. I can’t thank you enough, Jeremy, for being here. It was such a blessing to have met you, the friendship commodity, all that stuff, it means the world to me. Do you have anything set up? If people want to check out what you do for your side business, do you have a website or anything if somebody wants to contact you?
Jeremy Loque: I don’t have a legit website. yet. The reason is because, yeah, I’m just gonna be honest, I just haven’t gotten around to, but I do have an Instagram account. It’s @firehousedetailmaui on Instagram, as well as Firehouse Detail Maui on Facebook. And those are my business pages. As far as you know, my work other than doing fire things, it’s there. And there’s some cool cars there. So if you guys have any detailed questions, or anything like that, you guys can send me a message, ask me more than happy to talk about it. In my personal pages, I hardly don’t go on it as often as I should. But you can. If you want to get to know me, you can message me on my business account, and then I’ll send you a link to my personal stuff. But yeah, my name on Facebook if you want to add me. So Jeremy Loque.
Bruce Jeppesen: Well, I’ve looked on your site there, and I’ve seen some really cool cars. That’s another connection we have as well as our 365 group is cool cars. And yeah, so if you’re watching this and you just want to see some cool cars, go check out his Instagram and see a few of them, and that you’ll get a little more insight as to what he does. So Well, thank you, Jeremy. Again, I can’t thank you enough, and I appreciate you taking the time. We will catch up with you soon, I guess.
Jeremy Loque: Sounds good. Thanks, Bruce.
Bruce Jeppesen: Yeah, thank you.
