Forged by FIRE with Ryan Rodriquez

Have you ever come off of a bad or frustrating call, and get on the truck or back to the station and use that sacred space to debrief and express your feelings and frustration to your crew only to hear someone on your crew say something like, “It could’ve been worse!” or “we’re just lucky to have jobs!”? When people respond to your vulnerability and willingness to express frustration in this way,...

As firefighters, we are expected to perform incredible physical tasks at the drop of a hat. But we should all be asking ourselves the same question, “am I ready to answer that call?” Being strong isn’t the only thing we should be focusing on. We should be focusing on all of the elements that will make us effective firefighters, and more functional human beings; sleep, nutrition, and fitness. In to...

When we start out in our careers, we are incredibly passionate for the job and the opportunity to live our dreams! Sometimes the light gets a little dim and sometimes we burn out altogether. It's this burnout that can cause us to lose our identity, our sense of meaning, or even our lives due to suicide. In today's episode, I will talk to return guest, Chris Chandler-Yates about passion, how someti...

When I first started my career in the fire service, we used paper reports that had carbon copies that we had to file and keep records of. Now, things are digital and we don’t use nearly the amount of paper and ink that we used to. Even though things have changed, we still need to be rockstars when it comes to documentation. If it doesn’t get documented, it never happened, right? So why would we sl...

Early on in my pursuit of becoming a firefighter, I was told about a principle that I keep on the back burner to this day. That principle is more of a question that I can repeatedly ask myself if something I was doing ever raised a question within myself. I’ve witnessed a lot of people come and go from the fire service, whether it’s due to resigning because they’ve found a different passion, early...

If you listened to last week’s episode, then you heard me announce this new program I’m developing for people looking to connect with me and others in an exclusive group called “The Cadre”. Well, just as a refiner’s fire forges steel into its intended purpose, this group exists to refine us as men and women in the fire service into our highest quality and potential. That being said, I’m changing t...

As firefighters and EMS professionals, we see things sometimes on a daily basis that “normal people” don’t see their entire lives. The traumatic things we see take a toll, whether we want to admit it or not. In today’s episode, I will talk about how the unpredictability of the things we see affects us, how confronting (not ignoring) our emotions will make us better firefighters, and I will give yo...

Last week I focused on how if you aren’t growing, then you’re dying. Growth looks different for everyone. The question that really matters is, “what does growth look like for you?” The key to growth is to learn new things. But what kinds of things should we be learning and how do we choose? In today’s episode, I will talk about why it’s important for us to always be learning, categories that we sh...

If you aren’t growing, you’re dying. Think about that statement. Think of all the living things on this earth and then accept the fact that if they aren’t growing, they are dying. The same goes for us. The opposite of growth is death. As we progress through our lives, we hinge our purpose on a sense of growth. If you don’t have something to work toward, then you come to a place of complacency and...

If you aren’t watching Ted Lasso on Apple TV+, then you are missing out! Jason Sudeikis plays an American college football coach who heads to London to manage AFC Richmond, a struggling English Premier League soccer team. There’s a specific episode that’s my absolute favorite. Season 1, Episode 8. It’s titled “The Diamond Dogs” and we’ll get into why it’s called that and the several reasons it is...

I recently had the opportunity to do a guest spot on another podcast called “Fight the Burnout” hosted by Chris Chandler-Yates. His show is focused on gaining different perspectives when it comes to burnout in public safety and the strategies we use to fight it. Chris was gracious enough to share his audio with me so that I can share it with you. In our conversation, we talked about some of the th...

We all have different backgrounds and experiences which we bring to our role as firefighters and EMS professionals. This is the true sense of diversity that allows us to bring our unique skills to the table. David Berez has had PLENTY of different opportunities to learn a multitude of skills; EMT, Police Officer, and even an internship with the medical examiner! He’s taken his experience and rathe...

When it comes to being a firefighter, we absolutely love what we do. But just because we love what we do, doesn’t mean that we love where we're at. Now, that could mean where we’re at in our career, what crew we’re on, or even what organization we work for. In his book, “I Love It Here”, Clint Pulver talks about the elements that create an environment that people are proud to be in.  He’s don...

Quality nutrition can help your body reach its full potential and keep you off of those prescribed medications for things like hypertension, high cholesterol, or even diabetes! By using food in conjunction with a comprehensive approach to wellness, you can find balance and sustainability, decrease your job-related health risks and improve quality of life. It all starts with food. In today’s episod...

According to a recent article in Business News Daily , the top three most stressful jobs in America are; enlisted military personnel, firefighter, and airline pilot.  The factors used to determine this list include things like physical demands, on-the-job hazards, environmental conditions, and the risk of personal injury. As firefighters and EMS professionals, we might be surprised that our p...

Getting hired on with a fire department is a gauntlet of a process.  It’s set up to test your mental faculties, your physical ability, and your interpersonal communication skills. Holding yourself to a high mental and physical standard and knowing who you are puts you in the top bracket of candidates; this goes for getting hired AND getting promoted. The idea of “upper limiting” kicks in when...

When we show up to a structure fire, we know that there are a lot of different variables working against us and our ability to successfully put the fire out with the least amount of loss.  One of those variables is what’s known as a “flow path”. The flow path is the route that air takes when it heads in to feed the fire and the route that the fire, smoke, or heat heads for to leave the structure....

“If you’ve got time to lean, then you’ve got time to clean”.  This was a slogan of one of the managers of the first job I ever had, working at a movie theater.  I understand that he was dealing with teenagers who wanted to just hang out, watch movies, and snack on popcorn all day, and in that situation he had the right approach. That phrase still haunts me to this day and as a result, wh...

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, if you fail to plan, then you plan to fail.  We have plans when we are approaching fire and EMS scenes.  Once we get on scene, we put that plan into action and make adjustments as needed. I had the pleasure of sitting down with Bill Dungey, a guy who's just got his feet wet in the fire service, but is making a big splash.  He’s personally p...

Raise your hand if you’re a firefighter.  Now, keep it raised if you’ve ever done yoga.  I’m guessing the majority of you had to put your hand down.  I was once one of those people too!  So, don’t feel too bad.  The statistics show that being a male firefighter makes me HIGHLY unlikely to ever do yoga.  However, years ago I signed up for some classes at my local gym a...

I say this just about every episode that I publish, “our career is unlike any other on the planet”.  We spend at least a third of our lives at the firehouse and we love it!  One of the things that I really love about this job is that I never have to take work home with me, there aren’t any deadlines that I need to meet. The corporate world works on a system that breaks the year up into q...

We all know that a career in the fire service and EMS is unlike any other career out there.  That’s why we tried so hard to get hired and worked so hard at going through fire academies and paramedic school to get here. We see a lot of things that people may never see in their entire lives.  We all have our own ways of coping and compartmentalizing.  However, sometimes we allow the d...

One argument that I am constantly hearing at the firehouse is education vs experience.  There seems to be two camps of people; you either believe that experience should be what matters most or education should hold the most weight. When it comes to hiring and promoting, we should be taking BOTH into consideration.  Not one or the other.  We should be seeking out individuals who have...

Chris Ruano works in the southern California region as a Captain, where he is dedicated to the tactical approach to firefighting and doing what it takes to be physically capable to do the job.   Being a firefighter in southern California offers a dynamic challenge of not only being well-versed in structural firefighting, but there is a BIG emphasis on and a need for wildland firefighting tact...

In FIRE and EMS, it’s our job to respond to other peoples’ emergencies regardless of their nature.  We all know that people call us for some very serious and sometimes very crazy things, but ultimately, we are the ones charged with adapting to the situation and providing help. We’ve spent hours training for any possible situation.  We train on the fireground.  We train in the EMS sk...