Five years ago I built a trailer with one simple goal: spend more time hunting. The plan was straightforward: load it up with dehydrated meals, a small battery bank, and whatever else I could cram in for a 7 to 14-day trip. That was it. That was enough. Until it wasn’t.

When my job moved remote, the calculus changed. Suddenly the question wasn’t how long could I scrape by. It was how long could I actually live and function out of this thing without it falling apart around me. Last season I spent 28 consecutive days hunting, working, and living out of this trailer in the Midwest. The year before that, 35 days straight. No house, no hotel, no compromise on where I was setting up.

That kind of extended time in the field doesn’t happen by accident. It happened because I was willing to be honest about what wasn’t working and actually fix it.

Three things broke down when I pushed beyond two weeks: power, food, and connectivity.

The power situation was the first domino. What worked fine for charging a phone on a 10-day trip turned into a liability the moment I added a laptop, a monitor, Starlink, a WeBoost, a fridge, and a fan to the load. I had to go from a weekend-style power draw to something that could sustain full-time use. The key wasn’t raw capacity. It was predictability. I needed to know exactly what my system’s limits were so I could make smart concessions when bad weather rolled in and the solar panels weren’t pulling their weight.

Food was next. Dehydrated meals are fine for 10 days. After that, they start to feel like punishment. When you’re up at 3:30 AM to be in the woods, grinding through a full work day, and back in the stand by 5 PM, you need real food. An IceCo dual-zone fridge/freezer solved that. Lunch meat, burgers, chicken, real calories for real demands. I made two grocery runs over a month. Could’ve done it in one.

Connectivity was the final piece. WeBoost handled it when I had cell signal to amplify. But I kept pushing into places with zero signal, which is exactly where I wanted to be. Starlink filled that gap. Together, layered, they covered almost every scenario, except the occasional campground where half the site is also running Starlink and your bandwidth gets throttled. Even then, the truck is never more than two miles from a signal.

The gear, the bow, the saddle setup, that stuff almost goes without saying at this point. What actually made this work was treating the trailer like a problem to be solved, not a box to check. Every trip exposed a gap. Every gap got fixed. Now the only thing limiting how long I stay out is the bed, and I’m not quite ready to address that yet.

If you’re thinking about building something like this, test it short before you go long. Three-day trips in bad weather will teach you more about your system than any YouTube video will. I promise.

I’ve wasted more time than I want to admit standing in my garage trying to figure out what I need for a three-day hunt. Digging through bins, questioning whether I packed my headlamp, wondering if that sleeping bag is in the truck or still in the basement. That friction is real, and it costs you. Not just time. Motivation.

That’s why I went all-in on building a truck camping setup that removes every excuse to not go.

The whole philosophy is simple: minimize the decision-making so the only question is whether you’re going or you’re not. Everything has a place. Everything stays packed. When a window opens and I’ve got two days to burn, I’m not running around the house trying to piece together a kit. I’m backing out of the driveway.

The tent topper changed the game for me. Sleeping in the bed of the truck sounds rough until you actually do it right. Off the ground, protected from wind and weather, and completely self-contained. There’s something about closing that hatch at night in the middle of nowhere that just resets your head. No hotel, no tent poles, no dealing with wet gear on the ground. Just you, the dark, and tomorrow’s hunt.

Food and water follow the same logic. I’m not out here trying to cook a four-course meal at 9 p.m. after a long sit. It’s calories that are easy to manage, water I’ve already accounted for, and zero time wasted on logistics that distract from the actual reason I’m out there. Comfortable enough to sleep well. Simple enough to not become a project.

Here’s what most guys get wrong about truck camping for hunting: they over-engineer the comfort and under-engineer the efficiency. The goal isn’t glamping. The goal is getting out more often, staying longer, and being sharp when it matters.

If you’ve been putting off short trips because the setup felt like too much work, this episode is for you. It doesn’t have to be complicated. It just has to be ready.

There’s a particular kind of restlessness that hits a hunter in the off-season. It’s not impatience exactly. It’s more like a low hum in the background of everything you do. You’re mowing the lawn, you’re half-present at dinner, but somewhere in the back of your mind you’re replaying last season’s misses and mentally walking new ground you haven’t set foot on yet.

That’s where K.C. and I found ourselves in this episode, and honestly, it’s where I think most serious hunters live from February through August.

We got into the anticipation of a new season and that electric feeling of scouting fresh country you’ve never hunted before. There’s something almost spiritual about standing in a new piece of woods with a stick bow on your shoulder and nothing but questions in front of you. Ground hunting with a trad setup doesn’t leave you a lot of margin. It demands that you close the distance in a way that most hunters never have to think about, and that changes everything. How you move, how you think, how you manage the inevitable doubt that creeps in when the woods go quiet.

Because here’s what K.C. and I kept coming back to: doubt is part of the deal. Despair shows up on long trips. There are mornings you climb out of your sleeping bag wondering why you drove eight hours for this. The hunters who kill consistently aren’t the ones who never feel that. They’re the ones who’ve learned to respect the feeling, sit with it, and keep putting one boot in front of the other.

We talked about the mental side of all of it. Confidence, visualization, the kind of self-awareness that only comes from time in the field and honest reflection. The best hunters I know treat the mental game the same way an athlete does. You prepare for failure as much as success, and you build systems that hold up when emotion wants to take the wheel.

We also got into deer behavior, being in the right place at the right time, and how skills from completely different disciplines can transfer into better hunting. That last part is something I think gets overlooked constantly.

If you’ve ever walked back to the truck empty-handed and wondered what you’re missing, this one’s for you. Pull it up on the drive to work. It might not give you all the answers, but it’ll remind you you’re asking the right questions.

SHOW NOTES AND LINKS:

—⁠Truth From The Stand Merch⁠

—Check out ⁠Tactacam Reveal⁠ cell cameras

— Save 15% on ⁠Hawke Optics⁠ code TFTS15 

—Save 20% on⁠ ASIO GEAR⁠ code TRUTH20

—Check out ⁠Spartan Forge⁠ to map your hunt 

—Save on ⁠Lathrop And Sons⁠ non-typical insoles code TRUTH10

—Check out ⁠Faceoff E-Bikes⁠

—⁠Waypoint TV⁠

Most hunters spend their off-season trying to make things easier. Better gear. Warmer clothes. Closer access. And honestly? I get it. Comfort is seductive. Your brain is literally wired to chase it.

But here’s what nobody in the hunting industry wants to tell you: comfort might be the single biggest thing standing between you and consistently killing mature deer.

In this episode, we’re digging into something that underlies everything we’ve talked about in the Hunter’s Operating System series. Discomfort. Not suffering for the sake of suffering, but deliberate exposure to hard things that builds the kind of conditioning most hunters never develop.

Here’s the reality. Mature bucks don’t live in easy places. They live in the margins. The nasty, hard-to-reach terrain that most people look at and immediately write off. If your threshold for discomfort is low, you’ll never consistently go where the deer actually are. Or you’ll go once, decide it isn’t worth it, and head back to the easy spots everyone else is hunting.

I talk about what training jiu-jitsu taught me about this, because a hard round on the mat and a brutal November sit have more in common than you’d think. Both put you in a place where your body wants out and your brain starts building its case for quitting. The difference between hunters who punch tags and hunters who don’t often comes down to whether they recognize that negotiation for what it is: a feeling, not a verdict.

I also get into a two-week Midwest hunt that nearly broke me. Eight days in. Same buck. Two misses. Tag still in my pocket. I almost went home. I didn’t. And in the last 30 minutes of the last day, everything came together.

That’s the hunt. Not the one on day one when you’re fresh and fired up, but the one that happens when you’re exhausted, beaten up, and your brain has assembled a genuinely reasonable argument for quitting.

The hunters who separate themselves aren’t the ones who never feel that pull. They feel it just as much. They’ve just built the capacity to stay anyway.

Every hard thing you choose in the off-season is a decision you’ve already made before the season starts.

SHOW NOTES AND LINKS:

—⁠Truth From The Stand Merch⁠

—Check out ⁠Tactacam Reveal⁠ cell cameras

— Save 15% on ⁠Hawke Optics⁠ code TFTS15 

—Save 20% on⁠ ASIO GEAR⁠ code TRUTH20

—Check out ⁠Spartan Forge⁠ to map your hunt 

—Save on ⁠Lathrop And Sons⁠ non-typical insoles code TRUTH10

—Check out ⁠Faceoff E-Bikes⁠

—⁠Waypoint TV

There’s a version of hunting that looks great on the outside. Big buck, good photos, done by noon. Then there’s the version most of us actually live, which is messy and complicated and tied up in kids and jobs and the slow realization that your priorities don’t stay the same forever.

That’s what Greg Litzinger and I got into on this one, and I’ll be honest, it’s one of those conversations that kept going in my head long after we stopped recording.

Greg isn’t out here pretending that hunting exists in a vacuum. He talks openly about what it means to chase deer when you’ve got a family counting on you, and how the calculus of a day in the woods changes completely once other people are in the equation. That’s not a complaint. It’s just the truth, and it’s the kind of truth that doesn’t get said enough in hunting media.

We spent a good chunk of time on burnout, and I think that part will hit home for a lot of people listening. It’s easy to grind yourself down chasing something that’s supposed to bring you joy. Too many sits, too much pressure, not enough honesty with yourself about why you’re out there. The fix isn’t complicated, but it requires admitting something most hunters resist: that more time in the field isn’t always better, and that scouting smarter beats sitting longer almost every time.

We also got into location and intel, which Greg treats as the serious discipline it is. Knowing where deer want to be before you ever climb a tree is the whole game. That part of the conversation is worth a relisten if you’re building a strategy for the fall.

But what stuck with me most was Greg talking about fitness and time. He’s not dramatic about it. He just lays it out plainly: the physical demands of hunting don’t get easier, ignoring that is a mistake, and the window you have to bring your kids into this thing is shorter than you think. The memories made in the field are the ones that last, not the antlers on the wall.

Whether your kid is old enough to run a treestand or just old enough to tag along and ask a hundred questions, don’t wait for the perfect season. Lead by example and enjoy the process.

Hope you get as much out of this one as I did.

WHAT TO EXPECT FROM PODCAST 492

• Scouting and historical sign tell you more about a buck’s potential than any single trail cam photo ever will.
• Don’t chase scrapes. They’re exciting, but they’ll burn you. Focus on the habitat instead.
• Knowing where a deer isn’t is just as valuable as knowing where he is. Eliminating country keeps you from burning good setups at the wrong time.
• Mature bucks will humble you. Missed opportunities and close calls aren’t failures, they’re information.
• The shot is just one moment in a very long process. The anticipation, the tracking, the recovery, the emotional weight of it all. None of it is clean or simple.
• When you’ve chased a specific animal for years, every decision carries real weight. This episode gets into that honestly.

SHOW NOTES AND LINKS:

—Truth From The Stand Merch

—Check out Tactacam Reveal cell cameras

— Save 15% on Hawke Optics code TFTS15 

—Save 20% on ASIO GEAR code TRUTH20

—Check out Spartan Forge to map your hunt 

—Save on Lathrop And Sonsnon-typical insoles code TRUTH10

—Check outFaceoff E-Bikes

—Waypoint TV

Tom Murphy and I have had a lot of conversations about deer hunting, but this one felt different. We got into the kind of detail that most hunters never talk about out loud, specifically what it actually takes to hunt a mature buck over multiple seasons without losing your mind or your confidence.

Tom’s account of finally closing the deal on a deer he’d been after for years is worth the listen on its own. The shot, the tracking, the emotional weight of the whole thing. He doesn’t sugarcoat any of it.

We also dig into scouting, historical sign, habitat quality, and why knowing where a deer isn’t can be just as valuable as knowing where he is. Simple idea. Hard to actually put into practice.

If you’ve ever locked onto a specific animal and let the whole thing consume a few years of your life, this episode will feel familiar. If you haven’t, consider this a fair warning.

WHAT TO EXPECT FROM PODCAST 491

• Scouting and historical sign tell you more about a buck’s potential than any single trail cam photo ever will.
• Don’t chase scrapes. They’re exciting, but they’ll burn you. Focus on the habitat instead.
• Knowing where a deer isn’t is just as valuable as knowing where he is. Eliminating country keeps you from burning good setups at the wrong time.
• Mature bucks will humble you. Missed opportunities and close calls aren’t failures, they’re information.
• The shot is just one moment in a very long process. The anticipation, the tracking, the recovery, the emotional weight of it all. None of it is clean or simple.
• When you’ve chased a specific animal for years, every decision carries real weight. This episode gets into that honestly.

SHOW NOTES AND LINKS:

—⁠Truth From The Stand Merch⁠

—Check out ⁠Tactacam Reveal⁠ cell cameras

— Save 15% on ⁠Hawke Optics⁠ code TFTS15 

—Save 20% on⁠ ASIO GEAR⁠ code TRUTH20

—Check out ⁠Spartan Forge⁠ to map your hunt 

—Save on ⁠Lathrop And Sons⁠ non-typical insoles code TRUTH10

—Check out ⁠Faceoff E-Bikes⁠

—⁠Waypoint TV⁠

There’s a moment in every hunt that matters more than all the scouting, all the prep, all the miles you put in. It’s the one where the deer finally shows up.

And if you’ve done this long enough, you know it doesn’t always go the way you thought it would. Your heart rate jumps, your breathing changes, and all of a sudden you’re not thinking as clearly as you were ten minutes before. You rush something, force something, or just come unglued for a second.

I’ve been there more times than I’d like to admit.

This episode is about that moment—what actually happens when pressure hits, and why most of us aren’t as prepared for it as we think we are. Not from a gear or setup standpoint, but mentally. Being present, staying composed, and letting the moment play out instead of trying to control it.

A lot of it connects back to things I’ve learned on the jiu-jitsu mat. Same kind of pressure, just in a different setting. When things tighten up, your instinct is to react fast, to get out of it. But the guys who are good at it don’t panic. They slow down, breathe, and make better decisions because of it.

Hunting’s no different.

If you can learn to recognize that feeling when it shows up—and not fight it, but work through it—you give yourself a better chance when it actually counts. Because in the end, that one moment is usually what it all comes down to.

WHAT TO EXPECT FROM PODCAST 490

• Most hunting mistakes happen under pressure, not from lack of skill.
• If you don’t train for pressure, you’ll default to panic when it matters.
• Presence and patience are what separate clean execution from rushed decisions.
• Pressure doesn’t create problems, it exposes them.
• The best hunters slow down when things speed up.
• Learning to sit in discomfort leads to better decisions.
• Consistency comes from managing the moment, not forcing it.

Link in Bio: 

SHOW NOTES AND LINKS:

—Truth From The Stand Merch

—Check out Tactacam Reveal cell cameras

— Save 15% on Hawke Optics code TFTS15 

—Save 20% on ASIO GEAR code TRUTH20

—Check out Spartan Forge to map your hunt 

—Save on Lathrop And Sonsnon-typical insoles code TRUTH10

—Check outFaceoff E-Bikes

—Waypoint TV

This week I’m joined by Kolton Schenker, and we spend some time talking through what it looks like when hunting starts to shift from something you do… to something you really commit to.

We get into his background—years behind a compound bow, time spent out West, and what came with finally stepping into land ownership. But where the conversation really settles in is around his move to traditional gear. What that transition felt like, the frustration that comes with starting over, and why he stuck with it anyway.

He shares a few stories along the way—close encounters, missed chances, and the one that finally came together with a stick bow. And like most guys who make that switch, it wasn’t about making things easier. It was about slowing things down and paying attention in a different way.

A lot of it comes back to the same idea: the longer you do this, the more you realize it’s less about the outcome and more about how you go about it. The work, the reps, the time in the woods—and the people you get to share it with along the way.

WHAT TO EXPECT FROM PODCAST 489

• Long-term reps build intuition 19 years in, Kolton still finds new ways to learn.
• Trail cams show you what’s there, but observation sets teach you how they move.
• Getting lower, tighter, and uncomfortable often leads to more real encounters.
• Switching to traditional gear forces you to slow down and truly focus.
• Misses aren’t failures, they’re part of the process that makes you better.
• The reward isn’t just the shot, it’s the encounters, the moments, the grind.
• Hunting becomes more meaningful when it’s shared, with land, with family, with purpose.

SHOW NOTES AND LINKS:

—⁠Truth From The Stand Merch⁠

—Check out ⁠Tactacam Reveal⁠ cell cameras

— Save 15% on ⁠Hawke Optics⁠ code TFTS15 

—Save 20% on⁠ ASIO GEAR⁠ code TRUTH20

—Check out ⁠Spartan Forge⁠ to map your hunt 

—Save on ⁠Lathrop And Sons⁠ non-typical insoles code TRUTH10

—Check out ⁠Faceoff E-Bikes⁠

—⁠Waypoint TV⁠

This week I’m joined by Will Coggin, and it’s one of those conversations where you realize pretty quick how many parallels there are between the things we spend our time on.

We talk about how hunting and jiu-jitsu have a way of bringing people together fast, and how a lot of what Will learned in the military—discipline, structure, adaptability—shows up again in the woods. Not in some forced way, just in how you approach problems, deal with failure, and keep getting better over time.

We also get into hunting in the Blue Ridge Mountains—what that terrain demands from you, how it forces you to adjust, and why the process ends up mattering more than the outcome. And somewhere along the way, it turns into a conversation about community too—why having the right people around you matters, and how things like the Veterans Mat Collective are giving guys a place to keep growing, both on and off the mat.

Like most of these conversations, it comes back to a simple idea: if you stick with something long enough, stay open to learning, and surround yourself with good people, you’re probably going to get more out of it than you expected.

WHAT TO EXPECT FROM PODCAST 488

• Shared challenges and interests create fast, meaningful connections.
• Discipline and structure carry over from the military into hunting and everyday life.
• Hunting and jiu-jitsu both reward attention to detail and the ability to stay present.
• Mastery comes from learning how to learn, not just repeating the same actions.
• Adaptability is critical—both in the woods and in life transitions.
• Challenging environments like the Blue Ridge Mountains demand patience, strategy, and persistence.
• Community and brotherhood—are essential for growth and purpose.

SHOW NOTES AND LINKS:

—Truth From The Stand Merch

—Check out Tactacam Reveal cell cameras

— Save 15% on Hawke Optics code TFTS15 

—Save 20% on ASIO GEAR code TRUTH20

—Check out Spartan Forge to map your hunt 

—Save on Lathrop And Sonsnon-typical insoles code TRUTH10

—Check outFaceoff E-Bikes

—Waypoint TV

This week I’m joined by Vince Battiata, and we spend a lot of time talking about what it really takes to hunt public land the way most guys say they want to—but don’t always follow through on.

We get into the reality of balancing time, making decisions when things aren’t clear, and what it actually looks like to chase big deer that don’t give you many chances. Vince shares some stories from past seasons—some that worked out, some that didn’t—and what those experiences taught him about timing, access, and trusting your gut when it matters.

A lot of this conversation comes back to putting in the work—scouting, learning from past hunts, and staying committed even when things aren’t going your way. And like most good hunting conversations, it ends up in a familiar place: the guys who stick with it, pay attention, and keep showing up are usually the ones who figure it out over time.

WHAT TO EXPECT FROM PODCAST 487

• Limited time forces better decisions and sharper focus in the woods.
• Confidence and timing matter more than perfect information.
• Chasing big deer is a long game built on failure, adjustment, and persistence.
• Access and mobility often determine opportunity more than anything else.
• Historical sign and past experiences shape better decisions moving forward.
• The best lessons come from hunts that don’t go your way.
• The reward is in the process—earning it, not just killing one.

SHOW NOTES AND LINKS:

—⁠Truth From The Stand Merch⁠

—Check out ⁠Tactacam Reveal⁠ cell cameras

— Save 15% on ⁠Hawke Optics⁠ code TFTS15 

—Save 20% on⁠ ASIO GEAR⁠ code TRUTH20

—Check out ⁠Spartan Forge⁠ to map your hunt 

—Save on ⁠Lathrop And Sons⁠ non-typical insoles code TRUTH10

—Check out ⁠Faceoff E-Bikes⁠

—⁠Waypoint TV⁠