Jon grew up in Kansas City, never got hit by a tornado there, and then moved to Nashville in 2016 where everybody told him the tornadoes just bounce off the hills. The night before it happened, his wife actually asked him what they would do if a tornado came, since they had no basement. He told her not to worry about it.
At 1:00 AM the warning hit his phone. He turned on the TV, saw the meteorologist’s eyes go wide, and realized a tornado was on the ground ten miles away and coming straight for them. He got the whole family into the interior hallway, and as he reached to shut the last door he heard it. Everyone says a tornado sounds like a train. Jon says it is more like five jet engines that rumble your chest. He shut the door, jumped on his daughter, and the windows went pop pop pop while the wind bounced them back and forth in the hallway. It lasted maybe ten seconds. Then dead silence.
When he opened the door to the kids’ room, there was no ceiling and no wall, just an orange sky and a neighborhood that looked like a bomb went off. A brick wall had collapsed onto his and his wife’s bed. A tree had fallen across both of their cars. No sirens came. No neighbors came out. They sat alone in eerie silence smelling propane and cut wood until his cousin finally got within three blocks and they walked the kids out through downed power lines to safety.
The part nobody talks about
Here is what stuck with me. The tornado was the easy part compared to what came after. That storm was on the ground for 63 miles and killed 25 people, and Jon came out of it carrying serious survivor’s guilt, right alongside the strange anger of watching the house next door not even lose a shingle.
For three months straight he woke up at 1:00 AM on the dot, shaking, reliving the whole thing like Groundhog Day. A full year later he was still freezing up. He would be on a sales call, get a generic “severe weather expected tonight” alert, and completely shut down, then go home and lie in bed refreshing the radar for hours. It was his barber, a guy named Steven Mason, who pointed him toward EMDR therapy, the eye movement treatment that finally unlocked the trauma so he could tell the story without his body shaking. Six sessions. His test to see if it worked was going to see the movie Twisters in a theater. He walked out feeling great.
We spent a good chunk of the episode on this, because I have a lot of guys who listen, and we have all been handed the same “suck it up, be a man” script. Jon’s point landed hard: you are important enough to get the help, and sometimes you just need somebody to be your barber. Look out for the people who are struggling and let them know they matter.
The PSI Method
Out of all of it, Jon wrote a book and built a framework he calls the PSI Method. The name is a play on tire pressure, pounds per square inch, because after something knocks you flat your life feels a little deflated and you have to pump it back up. Here is how it breaks down:
- P is for Power. You have the power to choose how you react. Jon could have played the victim, and that would have been understandable. Instead he chose to learn from it, grow from it, and teach others.
- S is for Smart. Remind yourself you are smart. He was beating himself up for not knowing enough about insurance and logistics, but not knowing one specific area does not make you dumb. You find a friend who knows that thing.
- I is for Important. You are important enough to get help. Jon waited a long time before getting treatment because he felt like he had to make sure everyone else was okay first.
Power, Smart, Important. That is how you fill the tire back up.
From survivor to a mission
The business grew out of all the young dads at his old job who kept asking him what they would actually do if it happened to them. So he wrote a short survival guide, small on purpose so a busy dad could read the whole thing in one sitting, and put it on Amazon. People kept asking what should go in a go bag, so he built one. That turned into Edlin Tornado Solutions and the tornado go bag at tornadosmart.com, which ships pre-packed with the survival guide, a lantern, a first aid kit, and video sessions, all the stuff he wishes he had that night.
If you take nothing else from this episode, take the practical stuff. When a warning hits your phone, get to the innermost part of your house away from windows, because debris is what kills people. Know your spot now, before the siren. And the three things Jon says belong in every go bag: a first aid kit, a light source like a lantern, and a whistle so rescuers can find you if you get trapped. We also got into the Enhanced Fujita Scale and why a tornado can jump from an EF0 to an EF4 in seconds, which is exactly why you cannot afford to assume it will not be that bad.
You can find Jon’s book, the PSI Method, on Amazon, and learn more at jonedlin.com and tornadosmart.com.
Listen to the full episode of the Drink O’Clock Podcast wherever you get your podcasts. Follow us on all socials at @DrinkOClockPod.
Want to be a guest on Drink O’Clock? Send us a message on PodMatch here: podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/drinkoclock