JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Re-entering society is a concept that’s often associated with military combat veterans for very understandable reasons.
But there’s another group that deals with similar issues: combat fighters.
It’s a jarring change of life to go from fighting in front of huge audiences to private life.
When your life is filled with violence and perhaps fame, going back to day-to-day mundane activities is not as easy as it sounds.
That’s why Jason “Mayhem” Miller’s story is so fascinating.
“For me, it was a nightmare,” said Miller. “For me, I went from the fight world to crime because I had no other way to really make it. I didn’t have any structure in my life.”
In our interview, Miller opens up on violent mistakes that cost him dearly as he was coming out of the fight world.
“I got in a bar fight and did some time, serious time,” said Miller. “Nothing would shake me out of this mindset until I found MVP.”
So that gets us to the next part of his story, a program with the acronym MVP, which stands for “Merging Vets & Players”.
“MVP got me to be human again. Because when you’re pushing yourself to the limit as a mixed martial artist, you have to be a beast. An animal. It’s part of the game,” said Miller.
Miller shared with us what it was like doing things that many people take for granted: like going to the supermarket.
But we talk about much more than just MVP.
Miller has become a media phenomenon over the years. For a time, he hosted the show “Bully Beatdown” on MTV. And now he reads the news on “The Adam Carolla Show,” one of the world’s premier podcasts.
“I do the Adam Carolla show every day. He hired me as the newsman. That could only come probably because I was in MVP,” said Miller. “I was chatterboxing with everybody. Getting used to verbalizing what I feel and what I think and I went on the Adam Carolla Show. Because of my fight days, we’re old buddies.”
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We also grill Miller on some fight topics like Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson.
“I’ll fight Jake Paul tomorrow if they let me,” Miller said, adding that he would have loved to try back during his heyday in the fighting world. “I would have done the same thing if our internet connection speeds were fast enough back in the day to justify on YouTube.”
We also discuss topics with Miller like whether Jon Jones is the greatest in the world and the California wildfires that have affected many of his friends.
