About
In 2015 I left the United States Marine Corps and became a civilian after serving my country, I sacrificed, bled, and did what was necessary for me to do right for my people and country. I had all intentions of staying in the service for the full 20, but life’s waters guided me back to the civilian sector rather than special operator. During this transition, it was my time within the VA that truly highlighted a problem that did not sit well with me.
I was diagnosed with PTSD and Post-Separation Anxiety, and while it was spicy getting out, it was being deemed “broken” that caused so much unneeded damage to me. After years of specialized training, and decades of overcoming adversity in glorious fashion I was told that I would never be able to be “normal” or “fully functioning” again.
Instead of taking the post-war cocktail, I sat with the pain and discomfort. It was the memory of my mentor that kept me fully in the fight, and I was determined to live in his memory, so I stayed in the fight. What brought me through the Storm wasn’t numbing the pain, but finding clarity, discovering the order within the chaos, and reclaiming my mastery.
The gym, lovingly called the Iron Church, allowed me to be better than who I was yesterday. Nature became my church and allowed me to discover the need for adversity as well as flowing and peace. My mentors and my people allowed me to embrace the rites of passage. It was not easy, but not many things that are worthwhile are. I embraced the discomfort, leaned into it, found my way, and thrived harder than ever before. It was in the following decade of studying and completing more initiations that I discovered that the diagnosis of being “broken” or experiencing “trauma” wasn’t problematic, but it was a flaw in the system.
Through the adversities ranging from childhood to now, have resulted in building a model that you to master your life and to truly thrive because of your experience. Built upon the foundational understanding that you only know where you’re going when you understand where you’ve been, it requires cleansing the story and reclaiming your authority and mastery.
This has been created because there are so many others who are in the same position as I was, and the solution needs to be created that allows for growth and true celebration to occur rather than simply existing.
Invictus Clinic will not try to convince you that your life is all
sunshine and rainbows. The reality of life is that hardships are
unavoidable. The only difference between the victor and the victim is how you work with life’s events. Knowing that you are not what happens to you, but what you choose to do because of it.
Meet the Founder
Bradon Vermaat
Let it be known I do not claim the title of War Hero. It was my job, and my sacred duty, to make sure I got my brothers home from Country so that they could be reunited with their families. They are War Heroes. They are also my brothers whom I am honored to call family to this day. While I would have given anything to be on the frontlines with them, I enlisted when I was 17 years old on September 11th, 2010, and that day was more important to me than waiting until
I was 18 and choosing infantry. It was also the best decision I could have made for I found family at 3rd Battalion 7th Marines and discovered my ability to teach others specialized skills while also be trained as a battle coordinator and Watch Chief for Afghanistan.
These priceless skills, gained over decades, implemented in real time, grown through progressive overload, all meant for me to teach others. After being Medevac’d from Afghanistan in 2013 after breaking my wrist and keeping it a secret for three months, I spent the last year and half of my enlistment at my bases’ Marksmanship Training Unit. It was there I gained the role of Chief Instructor, and it was there that I discovered my deepest love for teaching. I am an athlete and a fighter, but teaching others how to conquer stokes my fire like nothing else I have ever experienced.
During my time as Chief Instructor, I was introduced to the concept of “Train the Trainer”, and it is the concept that I have used in my teaching and coaching ever since. My tole is not to keep clients for long periods of time; I teach the tools and concepts needed for you to overcome and thrive and then have you graduate so that you can continue to progress through your journey. Make no mistake, you must make the climb up the mountain, but it is my duty to teach you skills, concepts, perspectives, and tools for you to find the route up. You deserve the effects of earning the view at the top, but it is my duty to make sure you get there.
The Origin
To better give this concept a better understanding, when I was staring into the abyss and searching for a lesson to stay in the fight, I discovered that very reason one night while watching Painting with Bob Ross. It was three in the morning, my mind screaming at the perceived reality in which I found myself in, and during this time the episode that came on was Bob sharing the news of his wife having cancer and that you had to take the good with the bad. During this display of vulnerability as well as intention, I was downloaded with a thought that has stuck with me ever since:
“Your Life is your masterpiece. From the day you are born, to the day you die, you are adding color to the canvas. Yet a painting with too many highlights is superficial and has no depth. A painting with too much shadow is murky and you cannot see anything clearly. Only when a painting is properly balanced with highlights and shadows
do you have a true masterpiece.”
This is what enabled me to stay in the fight, was it easy? Not by a long shot, for to make something new I needed to embrace even more ‘failures’ than ever before. Was it worth it? To a degree that is hard to believe. It is my deepest desire for you to understand the same truth in your own life without having the learn it the hard way and without guidance. Just as Ram Dass once said, "We are all walking each other Home."