Latest / Relatively Functional Dads / Episode 008 - If You're Not First, You're Last (And Other Dad Lies)

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Episode 008 - If You're Not First, You're Last (And Other Dad Lies) · Relatively Functional Dads

• The Boys And Audio: welcome to the Relatively Functional Dads podcast for fathers doing their best and learning every day. We're just three relatives walking through faith, fatherhood, and real life together. That was me. ⁓ experts here, just honest conversations about the wins, the struggles, and the moments that shape us as men and dads. Some days we've got it together, other days we're just trying to get to bedtime, but we keep showing up. And if you're dad... ⁓ In the middle of it too, you're in the right place. Let's journey through this together. Buddy: Reese, ⁓ we've all seen Talladega Knights ⁓ and it is racing season here in Indiana. Probably the worst quote from a dad ⁓ on a movie to date has got come from that movie. ⁓ if you're not first, you're last. Poor Ricky Bobby built his entire life on that deck of cards only to ⁓ see that castle come crashing down whenever he meets his dad, who's a scumbag. He says, Ricky, that's ridiculous. You could be second, you could be third, heck, you could be fourth. But ⁓ I think for dads we we adopt some of that mentality sometimes. If if you're not first, you're last, we go freaking all in on too many things. And if we're not careful, fatherhood is one of those. And what I mean is not going all in, but this mentality if we cannot be the absolute best, if we cannot crush everything, then what's the point of even showing up? ⁓ Probably other things in all of our lives we can relate to, whether that's fitness, whether that's our job or our marriage or our diet, dare I say. You're a little bit of an all in or all out type of guy. But ⁓ dads, that's where we're going here today. ⁓ Reese, especially, because he is a man who has experiences with this, is going to be carrying the squad. So ⁓ yeah, lean in. Looking forward to a great episode. Didn't even make it sixty seconds without you tearing me down. Absolutely. Because ⁓ I've missed you. I've missed you. ⁓ This is our bro language. ⁓ Reese has been in Cincinnasty a couple times since we've recorded, which means there's probably some stories. ⁓ it is open house season, ⁓ which not for real estate. If you're in, you know, the Midwest, that means there's graduation parties. In the South, we don't do that. But graduation parties, that means we have been in public with our kids multiple times. Yeah. So there will be stories. and ⁓ we're gonna have a good time today. So I don't know, Reese, what's on your mind, man? You know, if you see me tapping my foot over here, it's because I get real nervous before we start these things. B given the fact that we don't have a live audience and we have tens of followers. Yes. There's a lot on the line for me with what I say and do on this podcast. But we're looking to change that. Yeah. And one way that you can do that is through liking. I guess more than one way, multiple ways, commenting, subscribing. We'll take any feedback. Yep. Looking for followers. ⁓ pity follows, we'll take them. We'll take them. Encouraging follows, we'll take them. Yes. As I've mentioned before, there's just a lot of knowledge and wisdom up here that I would like to impart to the world. Yeah. Also, buddy. The thing that's amazing about Reese is ⁓ we we get some some haters in some of the Instagram reels. And ⁓ your willingness to put yourself out there for the dads, ⁓ only to be not just chopped down by me, but by the general pop. Instagram in general. So, anyways, we're doing this for you guys. In all seriousness, ⁓ drop some comments mostly because we want to engage with you. We want to know what's on your mind. If you got fun stories, should have known better, big dad energies, things we want to celebrate with you. We want to learn from you, segment ideas, prayer requests, all those things, man. Like we the reason why I hate Instagram. The only reason we have one now, the reason why we're on YouTube is not just so you can see our faces, but so you can comment easily and engage, is we want this to be. Like I mentioned last week, ⁓ in interview with Derek, ⁓ a surrogate community. If you're lacking that as far as going through this whole dad journey, ⁓ you feel like you don't have anyone else, we wanna be there with you until you find some physical men in your life to do that with. So anyways, man, it's gonna it's gonna be an episode. Producer Noah, man, what's on your heart? What's on your mind? He is behind the camera, but he is here in spirit and actually physically here as here, he's here. As handsome as ever. As ever. I'm just laughing at the the subscribe thing that we do. Before we had this podcast, I was subscribed to one thing on YouTube. Yeah. Since we've had this I have killing people subscribed to almost every channel that I watch regularly. Because it costs you nothing. Exactly. I didn't but I didn't I didn't care. Yeah. Now I gotta scroll through all the things I subscribe to to find the channels I wanna listen to. Go and subscribe to ten channels and then subscribe to Yes, that's right. Anyways, we we joke about that. It does help, but ⁓ Yeah, anyways. Always looking for ⁓ a follow feedback. If there's any critiques, you can send that ⁓ to our email, ⁓ buddy.gozy69 at gmail.com. and ⁓ and you'll get bounced back and with that ⁓ we'll dive into our segments for the day. We got for the win and should have known better. ⁓ starting off with for the win. Anything for you? Yeah, I got a couple, so I'll I'll start with one and then and throw it back to you and ⁓ probably we'll share the second one. F First one is just ⁓ Na Naomi finished up preschool, so did the whole like end of year recital, ⁓ end of year performance, and it was as beautiful and awesome as you would think it is. I mean, not the singing was beautiful and awesome, but just like when I tell you I was locked into my daughter for yeah twelve minutes. There could I don't know if there was any other kids there to be honest. I don't know how they did. But ⁓ her her sense of pride and excitement Grayson was there doing half the hand motions, sitting sitting down next to us because Naomi has taught half of them, you know, the alligator song and this little eye of mine and all all the just the classics, man. So ⁓ a lot of a lot of pride there. That was a huge win of just this year having her step into school. So much that she's learned about the Lord, about friendships. ⁓ her she was terrible at her letters, bro, but she's getting a lot better there. And I don't I don't mean like four year old bad. I like bad. For a four-year-old. And ⁓ so she's she's getting, she's growing. And I had this moment buckling her into her car on her last day of school, which was like the week after the the recital. And ⁓ she has this binder, and then the binder, her first day of school, we took a photo and had like a about me page, and I was I was reading that and looking at that photo as I'm buckling her in ⁓ to her car seat, and I'm I'm just it's one of those moments you just pause. And you just feel like God's saying, like, hey man, just be present for a second. And I just I just stared at her for about five seconds and then I looked at this photo that was right next to me. It's like an it's like an eight by eleven. It's a big photo. And ⁓ how she has physically changed in the last nine months in addition to, you know, all the things that she's learned and her emotional, you know, her EQ and her relational capacity and stuff like that. It's just amazing to see how beautiful my daughter has become. And ⁓ so yeah, it's it's summertime, summer break. ⁓ Really thankful for that that experience, but her confidence and who she's become ⁓ through stepping into to preschool. I know there's a lot of dads that Noah included you're gonna be sending, you know, Mason to to school for a couple of days for the first time here in the fall. It's a big step. I think it's a lot harder on moms than it is dads, but ⁓ I found myself just really enjoying that experience of her growing and learning and I'm I'm looking forward to it in the years to come. So Heck yeah. That's awesome. Yeah, bro. So she moving on. Yeah, I think she's gonna make it Okay, she's gonna move on. She's gonna make it mostly because they want your money and they ⁓ they they say ⁓ hey, if you'll come back we'll we want your money. We want you Exactly. Exactly. We all need more of it. So yeah, she's gonna she's gonna be ⁓ she's gonna have a great time next year. She's already looking forward to it. That's awesome. Time's flying. It is. It's crazy. It is already gonna be in kindergarten. Right. Kindergarten? Well, she'll be pre she'll be pre K. Okay. So she's gonna be the oldest in her class. So she's got two years of preschool and then she'll be in kindergarten after that. So she'll go an extra day, longer days. But ⁓ so for the listeners, if you don't know, I got a four and a half, a two and a half, and ⁓ a one month old. So that's the crazier things is like the long days, short years is like we are really in the midst of that right now. So trying to slow down, not rush back to work. not, you know, rush to bedtime and and and soak in some of these monumental, these big moments in your kids' lives is I would say a win for me too, because I am I am prone to to hurry through those. Sure. So anyways man, I'll throw it back to you. It's it's been a few weeks. Yeah. What do you got? What's been good? ⁓ yeah, I well, what's been good. There's been a lot. We again I love going to Cincinnati. So ⁓ got to hang out with my family. My brother is home from college, so I got to see him two weekends in a row. We don't typically go Two weekends in a row, but ⁓ Memorial Day weekend was a little overcast and rainy. My my parents just got a pool, so we were like, We'll just weather looks better this next weekend. Why don't we just c pop back over and hang out? ⁓ so and your sunburned ears can can let the audience know. I am the sun was out. Burnt to a crisp. I don't ⁓ I don't lay out very often, but I did this past weekend and now I'm I'm paying for it. So But you'll look sexy in about three weeks, dude. Don't even have to wait that long. I'm right here. You're right here. In the flesh. My win for the past however many weeks is I got sick. That's not the win. ⁓ good for you. getting sick for me, everybody does it a little bit differently. For me, I don't want anyone to interact with me. ⁓ don't want Anyone to help me for the most part. I mean, if it's real bad, then maybe. But I'm not looking to be waited on. I just want everyone to leave me alone. I mean like to be in a dark room with some saltine crackers and a Gatorade, because that's how we used to do it growing up. But video games? Depends how sick you are. ⁓ probably a sitcom. ⁓ nice nice TV show. The office in the background. A cold basement, laying down, falling asleep, that kind of thing. Okay. ⁓ but I got sick. Not the first time since Roman's been born. I got sick in November, but I don't remember how we ended up handling that. I felt like this was the first time though that there were still responsibilities on my plate, like for real. Yeah. ⁓ while I was sick. ⁓ and because I typically I don't bother anybody when I'm sick, I don't need anything from anybody, but I also don't contribute anything productive to anybody else's life when I'm sick typic typically. Right. ⁓ And I felt like I I don't feel like I r hit it out of the ballpark, but I felt like I got enough done. Like I I was able to I was home with Roman one of the days that I was sick, ⁓ managed to keep him from hurting himself badly, ⁓ as I laid on the couch and That's a win. Rolled off and crawled over to him whenever he was about to, you know, face plant into something or stick his tongue in an electrical socket or something like that, 'cause you know, he wants to eat everything. Everything. So And he can move. I mean that that boy's fast now too. He is just a win for real. He's he's like lightning. He just goes wherever he wants, finds new things to eat, whether they're edible or not. ⁓ so yeah, I think my win was that I ⁓ not that I didn't think I had it in me. Getting sick mildly and continuing to do the day to day stuff doesn't seem like a whole lot, but As someone who really does tend to just shut down when they get sick, I really did not want to feel that stereotype of the dad that just like, you know, gets the sniffles and then has to just hang the mom out to dry to deal with all with just our one kid. You got two babies in the family all of a sudden that Elly has to deal with. Yeah, and I found that with stereotypes, you almost have to overcompensate to prove the point that, like, hey, we're not gonna believe this about our household because it's not true, just because it's true in other areas and stuff like that. So ⁓ Again, didn't necessarily hit it out of the park, but I was happy happy with my performance. You know, immunity. Dads Yeah, exactly. Dads can get sick, ⁓ but you can't be sick if you're a dad. If that makes sense. Like you're going to get sick as a dad, but you cannot be sick. So that's what I'm hearing you do. You speak for yourself. I included What's your perspective? There's no quite certain big baby no. I am not helping. I am not helping your wife's perspective of the stereotype. If Jordan has talked to her at all about me getting sick. All of mankind is just I will be I will be great. I'll be great. I'll be great. I'll be great. And then I drop off a cliff and ⁓ I just like the all or nothing dad now adds sickness to it. Now I did say I thought. I was up to snuff while I was sick. We don't know what Elly thinks about my performance. we were talking about this before we hit record, is we need to have a a reaction episode where our wives listen to what we have to say and we have to see their immediate reaction. So that would be one I'd pay for to see if Elly agrees with that. So we're thinking about switching to pay view, putting up a paywall for us. Mem members only. Members only. ⁓ Yeah. ⁓ That's idea. That's an idea. Switching over to should have known better. You wanna go first? Yeah. ⁓ it's it's more for me instead of should've known better, it's like I don't know better and I need some help. ⁓ and the big one is is discipline. That's why I joked like I've said two or three times we will not do an episode on discipline 'cause I've not I've not figured it out yet. And ⁓ we only talk about stuff that we figured out. That I have feel like I'm I'm at least in process. Maybe I'm in process but not progress yet. ⁓ every time I feel like I'm figuring it out, man. They just they're squirmy. These kids are squirmy. They're smart, they're manipulative, and ⁓ now that we have a third child, it's like they know. They know they can take advantage of you. And what I mean by that is we're we're pretty, I would like to think we were before Keris came, pretty consistent. If we say, Hey, if you do this one more time, or let me lay this out for you, if you don't listen to dad. you're not gonna have your special treat. So we do a piece of candy a day, or you're not gonna be able to have ⁓ you know, ⁓ extra time reading Narnia, because I read Narnia every night with Naomi. We're not gonna do that tonight. Or we're gonna go to timeout. And I've I just found myself getting real lax, ⁓ really tired, mentally tired, physically tired, hard being in two places at once physically. A lot of times I have one of the kids, but now I have I have two the two oldest. Madeline's been breastfeeding or, you know, doing other things that she she needs to do with Karis. So ⁓ I mean I got a little called out by Madeline in a very lovingly way. ⁓ I handled it okay. ⁓ in the moment. It was calling those like, I'll go for a walk. So I don't know how I really feel about that. But she was right. Of of I've I've been a little bit lax of like third, fourth fifth threat instead of like, hey, here's a warning and then here's the consequence. We don't spank in the household. Soft like Charmin. Soft You are waiting to say that. Just call it soft. ⁓ that's where we're at. Gentle parenting look it. Look at. I'm just kidding. ⁓ I would like again, we're not gentle. We're just not I don't know what's in the middle. We ride the fence, man, and it's not arcing. So maybe we gotta pick a side. So ⁓ gentle but firm. So we're trying to find this this ⁓ consistency And this last week's been a lot, ⁓ I don't want to say better. I've been a lot better with following through, but it's been hard. Yeah. Because you follow through and then the the meltdown and the tantrum that your kid has is way worse than the previous behavior. And now you have to take them into the other room and and we we try not to have like timeout as just like a punishment, but more of like a place we go to a regulate our emotions because you can't talk to them logically, dude, whenever they're in that heightened state of just just being pissed off and But ⁓ you know, then you gotta step away from the other kids or the other day we're driving back from church and we're in the minivan and one of my kids is is kicking the back chair and like you can't just pull over, like we're almost home, Karis has to eat. So it's not even should have known better. I don't know better. We're figuring this out. If I was texting with one of my buddies, he's got kids almost exactly our same age. Like, I want my kids to respect my authority, but I also don't want them to be afraid of me. And ⁓ so I think it is a hard line. It's a hard line to find. I'm airing more on the side of fear. No, I'm just kidding. I'm absolutely making sure they don't feel ⁓ like I'm domineering over them. But we've talked about this before. Respecting authority is something that starts in the household with your dad and it has to extend as they grow older to so many different areas of their life. So ⁓ yeah, that's a little bit of my ⁓ I don't know, should have known better, trying to figure it out better. You don't have old enough kids to talk about this. So I can't talk to you. I don't know, Noah, you're Ma I mean Mason's almost three, so you can at least discipline him. Yeah. We're The There are many times where he just does something and he's not meaning it in any particular way, but we're like, dude, do we say no to that? Like, we've said no in the past, but he's not hurting anything. And I've been checked multiple times this like even this last week of Am I having him Am I saying no to him for something that is him just being a toddler? Yeah. Or am I saying no to z something that actually needs to be stopped? ⁓ and so we have gotten into a place where he's doing something and then I am taking way too long to to process that and by the time that I get to be like, ⁓ no, it it it this this is an okay place, then all of a sudden the the moment's passing. It's fast. And that's all Madeline, like we have to pre decide these things. Cause when I'm tired and there's again, I'm already kind of like overstimulated. I'm I'm like trying to hit the target and when they're that young, like you said, you have to do it in the moment. Yep. I there have been a couple of times that I in in the recent past that I have I have let too long of a delay go by that then it it just doesn't line up and then it falls flat. And I'm like, ⁓ man. You know the J. Cole line that just really speaks to me is my dad ⁓ he he was given jail when he needed that's right. He was given jail when he needed education. And that's how I feel like is this just for punishment or am I correcting them? And obviously there is a a a a a penal like That's disgusting. Punishment involved. Penal, not penal. Penal penile. Penile is actually ⁓ happening again. Call back to the cervix episode. P penal. P E N A L. Okay, we'll get that on the ⁓ make sure you get the edit that ⁓ closed capture right. The penal aspect of it of ⁓ not penal call for pen. I'm stuck. The penalties and get much sleep these days, okay, everybody. I slept terrible. The PNL aspect of it, like there is punishment, but it has to be corrective. And that's what discipline is like if discipline is discipleship, if d discipline is is corrective, we can't just punish our kids, ⁓ without there being some sort of corrective aspect to it. And that's where when I'm tired and I'm saying the wrong words and I'm trying to correct my kids, it's hard for me to be able to pin down how do I not just punish them, how do I actually make this a a teaching moment. And how do you how do you make it so that I I'm not doing this because it's convenient to do right now. I'm not doing it because what you're doing is loud and it's just grating on my ears when you're doing absolutely nothing wrong. Sure. ⁓ and then identifying, nope, this actually is some this is a behavior or I hate nagging my kids. Like some like you can nag them all the time of don't do that, don't he's almost three. That's what a three year old boy's gonna do. Versus, ⁓ this is wrong and and he knows this is wrong. Yeah, and as they get older as someone who drove my stepfather crazy with him having to nag me to get things done. I hated it. Yeah. He hated it. Yeah, dude. Nobody was getting anywhere with it. It was just like ⁓ him resorting to having to tell ⁓ other people that I allowed to influence me in my life, say, Hey, would you mind just telling Reese this? 'Cause he's not listening to me. Yeah. So different. I don't want to lose my voice. Yeah. Because you're just so we're we're figuring that out for sure. ⁓ yeah, I learned another new word today. And this has been great. So what do you got? ⁓ man, this is like classic for me. I thought I'd beat this. This is ⁓ immunity. Nice. ⁓ which I don't know why. I'm like the king of relearning lessons over and over again. But we drove to Cincinnati a couple week for Memorial Day weekend. if you ever wanna have Elly and I get uncomfortable and start laughing at the same time, like nervous laughter, talk to us about our experiences with car rides over 30 minutes. ⁓ I usually text you and I'm like, have fun with your fight. Because ⁓ we have found that the balance of who drives determines the power dynamic in our relationship. Okay. Not power dynamic, but like the ⁓ if sh we found that if she drives too much. I start to be viewed as like a seven year old that she totes around. Yeah. If I drive too much, we both have a nervous breakdown because if I turn at more than five miles an hour, it's like slamming up against the side of the door and stuff like that. It's not. She's much more tame than that. But ⁓ So what's the perfect balance? Is it 50-50? Do you share the burden? You know, it's ⁓ we haven't found that yet. I think that's part of the. Yes when when you come up to a before you even turn. Yeah. No, no. Luckily, there's no passive aggression. It's just direct confrontation about the way that I'm driving. Which can be. Which I will say I appreciate more than the other thing. But ⁓ I drove us to Cincinnati. I do like to drive when we have longer. Car rides. I would say the balance is more that I drive when we have longer car rides because I like straightaways and we drive on 74 for a hundred plus miles. Yeah. That puts her to sleep. For me, I'm like, thank goodness I don't have to think again for however long. I'm just on this road for forever. Well, we left at rush hour on a it was a Thursday night, so it was a classic case of I had expectations in my mind that because we left on Thursday instead of Friday for Memorial Day weekend. There wouldn't be anybody on the road at three thirty or four PM. I'm also annoyed because when I was growing up in Ohio, it felt like rush hour started at four thirty or five. Yeah. But if you live around four sixty-five in this day and age, it starts at like three. Those Gen Zers, man, they don't they don't like working more than six hours. They let them off at two thirty. It's a crazy Me neither. It's crazy. It's you I'm talking to sign me up. Yeah. Am I Gen Z? I don't know. You're right on the cusp. Either way, take it back. ⁓ but ⁓ so I drove and it was the most stressed out on edge that I've been. We were in bumper to bumper traffic. ⁓ Roman has lost the ability to sleep in the car. Sucks. ⁓ he's not bad in the car most of the time, but once he gets there, or if he needs to nap, he doesn't. So like he's not napping in the car anymore. He's just hanging out. Let me interrupt you. Go for Have you thought about having her sit in the back seat? ⁓ we have. However, that could solve some stuff. We have done that at at times. We've also had the person in the passenger seat just swan dive into the back whenever it gets bad. Tough on the rotator cuff, dude. All the the weak and back. Very much so. Yeah. ⁓ that's why I have her do it. Yeah. ⁓ just kidding. but maybe have her sit in the back. Yeah, it wouldn't wouldn't be a bad idea. All I know is that this time around I she did not sit in the back. Okay. And I don't remember if Roman had started to get loud. All I know is that I was on edge, probably because I don't like when things don't turn out the way I thought they were gonna turn out. And I for some reason unbeknownst to me, I had set expectations that there wasn't gonna be a whole lot of traffic. Yeah, dude. Really idealistic thinking. And ⁓ man. I also like to tell myself that if I don't raise my voice, then then I'm fine. Like ⁓ if I d if I don't like get loud, which doesn't happen very often anyway. Yeah. If I don't get loud or rude, then I can say whatever I want calmly. Sure. Well It's not the case. Negative. I we got we finally merged onto seventy-four after which should from where I live take thirty to forty-five minutes. It had been an hour and fifteen minutes. Yeah. I had about lost my mind at least two or three times. Not lost my mind. Right. So again, in my head, I was batting a thousand at controlling my emotions and not letting off any any of the steam. Maybe the fire. I was probably letting off some steam. But finally merged and ⁓ I said some choice words ⁓ as I was trying to merge and somebody like wouldn't let me over or one of the one of the people was going too slow and ⁓ I think my wife was scared that I was going to just run us off the road or something like that to just be done be be done with this car ride and lose my mind. And I would say the should have known better is that one, I shouldn't have set pre pre expectations of what the car ride was gonna be like or idealistic expectations. Yep. And then two, probably should have just Let her know I was already a little on edge about the whole react respond prayer. Yes, and let her just drive because she had offered two or three times. Okay. And I was like, after she offered in the car, I took it offensively and was like she's saying that because she thinks that I'm on edge. Yeah. Which I'm not. Which I'm not, by the way. I was. So ⁓ yeah, that was my ⁓ that was my should known better. Did y'all repair quickly? Yeah. Yeah, we did. ⁓ good. That's a win. Normally I would it's one of the things we would say is a strength in our relationship is quick repair. We would just love to then have the things that need to be repaired come less frequently. ⁓ so yep. And if you can do it before the car ride's over, kind of how we would progress is we would drive back from Indiana back to Tennessee. Madeline would feel really upset, maybe cry for the first half hour. I would feel very guilty that I'm taking her away from her family. Even though she signed up for this when she married me. and then I would not probably attune to her feelings very well. And then we would fight over something that's not even a big deal. That's all within the first ninety minutes. We got another five and a half hours to make up and talk. And so by the halfway point, we're hopefully back on the same page. Gotten some ice cream. Yeah, man. Get little food in us. Let's just get that done in the beginning, man. So good for y'all. Yeah. So figured it out. Ready to dive in? Yeah, man, all or nothing. What you got, bro? Yeah. Part one. We're gonna talk about ⁓ just the trap of extremes. And I think like as as men in general, I'd I'd be like curious. I mean, this might be a stereotype that's not true, but we got three men here, so we can have a tiebreaker if it's true for the majority. I think we are prone more than women to this like all in mentality. I don't know if it's ego, I don't know if it's just a sense of adventure or wanting some sort of high purpose in life, but As you as you share about this, Reese, ⁓ I'd be I'd be curious because we do have some some women that are listening if they struggle with this as well. But I I see this as something not just myself, but a lot of men that our friends, our Friday morning group, they struggle with. Yeah, no, I would agree. ⁓ and I would say that I experience this all the time. ⁓ and I think that one of the reasons that I'm mentioning pitfalls for this type of thinking is that ⁓ All or nothing thinking feels really productive because it sounds intense and committed. I wrote down it sounds very sexy. ⁓ Because a problem solved tomorrow sounds way better than a problem solved a year from now. Yeah. ⁓ whether that's me saying that to myself in my own brain, or when I'm trying to convince somebody, whether that's my spouse, a friend, an employer, that a shortcoming of mine will be dealt with quickly and efficiently, ⁓ and with great intensity and basically letting people know I'm about to get after it. Yep. And this isn't this is going to be a non-issue from here on out. ⁓ so I think that that's one of the reasons why it it tends to be a way of thinking that can cause problems is that it sounds good, but most of the time it creates inconsistency, shame spirals, whenever you inevitably don't live up You overpromise and underc un or underdeliver. You burn out. come across as non-reliable. Yes. ⁓ and you build both in your own head and with others' unrealistic expectations. And and here's where as a ⁓ as a dad, you often can't go all in in that area. So let's take ⁓ fitness. Man, you could be all in wanting to prep for a bodybuild, ⁓ or maybe a weightlifting comp or run running a marathon. You could be all like you could do meal prep and your sleep schedule around it and you're working out two, two and a half hours a day. And if you say, I'm just gonna do that without like including your spouse, without considering your responsibilities, you maybe you do it well for three or six weeks, but who have you pissed off and let down in the process instead of having a slow, consistent build, stacking days? ⁓ and I think that's where sometimes dads who used to be able to kind of flip that switch based off their own desires, but now realizing, ⁓ I have like two, three, four people that now depend on me that I need to run this run this by to see if this fits within where I'm at in my life right now. Yeah, absolutely. ⁓ I think another way that it can come up is it ⁓ it feeds into instant gratification. Okay. Yeah. Again. So again, you're gonna solve it quickly. And then also it appeases people. So again, for me it's one of the quickest ways I can get somebody off my back. Okay. ⁓ Because you're working on something intensely. Yes. And again, somebody may bring something up multiple times and I'm finally just like, I'm sick of hearing about this. I'm just gonna sound so into this and so confident that I'm gonna crush this that maybe they'll leave me alone for a while. ⁓ so ⁓ where do you tend to become all or nothing? You feel like it's things like parenting, spiritual life, fitness in the bedroom? Yeah. Absolutely in the bedroom. ⁓ trying to sleep seven, eight hours a night is where I perform in the bedroom best. So yeah, trying to go all in getting seven hours of sleep a night in the bedroom. ⁓ I mean, my career without a doubt. So that's that's my kryptonite is ⁓ I mean, there's a whiteboard right behind the cameras right here. ⁓ yeah. And I am just such a a charts and diagram diagrams and plotting success and I got wildly important goal number one, number two, number three up there, lead and lag measures. Like I love charting at the beginning of the year. A really hard to reach goal. I work in business development and sales. So a lot of it's you can control the harder you work, the more productive you are in a lot of ways. so that's where like I want to be all in to crush some of these goals that are way above what anyone else is anyone else has expected of me. ⁓ but at what expense or what costs. And I I think there's a lot of men that ⁓ they do struggle with that because again, they they didn't have to consider other responsibilities. They could work fifty, sixty, seventy hours a week ⁓ to get there. They could kill themselves and feel really proud about it. ⁓ but something suffers. So what I've I've really had to begin to see is hey, I have a certain amount of hours a day and in a week. And how productive can I be within that limitation of time frame? And then surrender whenever I don't get there. Sure. ⁓ because there's there's days or weeks where I'm like, I was not as productive as I wanted to be. That did not go how I wanted it to go. ⁓ this quarter did not land how I wanted it to. ⁓ so with without a doubt, it's it's my career vocation. And it's not because of my boss putting it on me or like we need the extra money. I just, I am just such a I'm an Enneagram three. I don't know if y'all Do the Enneagram, but it's literally achiever. So like give me something that's hard to achieve and I find my satisfaction ⁓ in that. And it's just the easiest place to do it is where I spend the most time, which is my job. Sure. But good stuff. An additional area in all of that is ⁓ want of things in in terms of extreme, where if there's something that I enjoy doing, okay, I want as much of it as possible to the extreme that I can have it. And then if I can't have it to the extreme that I want it. Yeah. Then I don't want any of it because then if I get a little bit of it, then I just want to want more of it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And where I've seen that come into conflict, which naturally that just automatically sounds like it comes into conflict. But when it comes into conflict is when Jordan is willing to work with me to be like, Okay, I like we can carve out an hour for you to go and do this, but I'm like, but I want two. Right. I might as well just not do it. Exactly. And then and then she's frustrated because she is trying to make sacrifices to help me do something that I would enjoy. And I am grateful to that, but then I sh shove that in her face, it feels, because I'm like, well, I she'll ask me how something went, like if I got to go and do something ⁓ and I was able to be with somebody's for maybe an hour, and I we were in the middle of something, and then I could have done it for longer, and I have to be very careful in kind of the way that I phrase that, not only for my interactions with her, but also the interactions for myself because I look at that and I can always just focus on like, ⁓ but I wasn't there for as long as I wanted, or I didn't get to do this to the degree that I wanted. Yeah. And totally discount the hours of time that I did get to have right of enjoyment or the thing that I did get to do at seventy five percent. Sure. And enjoy that seventy five percent of Recalibrating that is good. Yeah. ⁓ so that's been something that has shown up a lot. ⁓ I full completely agree with the the like I it feels like I'm accomplishing something to go all in and it also seems to communicate a message to someone else that whatever I'm doing is is being taken seriously. ⁓ but then it drops off because it's unsus it's not sustainable to be able to do that. What's Meek Mill saying roll killers move in in silence? Royal gangster move in silence? Gangsters move in silence and I don't talk a lot. Okay, there we go. And by the way, it's originally Tupac. It is Tupac. My dad let me know that when I had him listen to Dreams and Nightmares one time. He goes, he just stole that from Tupac. And I was like, Well, I think it's a tribute. And he goes It's a tribute. And he goes, ⁓ I guess tribute's just stealing other people's work. That's hip hop music, bro. It's hip hop music. ⁓ but it is like that. It's like, hey, like I really do feel like I I think about it's silly, but I think about that. Like the real ones, they show me, don't tell me. And I tell my kids that all the time. I guess I'll do this. Yes, yeah. No, show me, don't tell me. The real ones, they don't have to speak in hyperbole. They don't have to convince you. Like, I want to be known as someone that, like, man, he's he's just consistent in his action. But in other areas of my life when I don't want to put in the work, it's easy just to overcompensate with our words. Yeah, it really is. I mean, Noah, we've talked about it plenty of times. The the thing you were talking about, ⁓ I don't I don't really have any interest in partaking in something I enjoy to a to a small extent. The number of times that ⁓ there's been a time constraint and I've wanted to either go disc golfing or something like that, ⁓ and b Elly, somebody else, parents, friends be like, Well, don't have enough enough time to play, but you might have enough time to like go play like nine holes. amount of nine hole and I'm like games that I've had a nine whole season. I'm like nine holes? ⁓ an eighteen hole course. Just it's literally not possible to go play nine holes when there's eighteen holes that we have to get through. The best is when I'm ticked and I play actually a nine hole course that just has different T's for the nine baskets so you can run it twice to do eighteen. Right. And then I get done with nine and it like this actually happened ⁓ two weekends ago, maybe. I got to go, there were some buddies that were going and I got to go. And I was asked Jordan's like, Can you just be back when the kids When Mason gets up from his nap. And we finished nine at like three PM. And I had to go also run and get some topsoil and some other things for some gardening. What a dad. And I could have continued to go and I wanted to. And I was like and then I started to grade it like but I can't I can't go finish this with my buddies, even though I'd already communicated I most likely would not be able to. Like the expectation was set there and I still was like, was this even any fun? Yeah. And totally discounting. I was there with two buddies that I never get to see. Way better than sitting at home. Yeah. But recalibrating what what is what is success? What is good? We talked about grieving. If you didn't call back last episode, grieving some of the things that are are hard about how fatherhood changes changes your life. I gotta hear about yours because I got about six I could say for you. that's lovely. I gotta hear. Well, I got more than that. Okay. I'm just kidding. Buckle up. I ⁓ keep it under an hour. I yes, keeping it under an hour. I I put any habit change or I then I put with a little arrow above it. Any attempt at habit change. That's honest. Yeah. Any attempt at habit change, there is no I'll start small and then like do this consistently for a while, which is hilarious because I say that almost verbatim to every person that asks me about what a solid training program is. I know. You professionally tell them the opposite advice. Yes. I'm like, you're gonna wanna work out at least six days a week. ⁓ and s the seventh day's active rest. So you're you're ready to come in and hit the bike for an hour. Yeah, stuff like that. ⁓ no. Absolutely. People come in and they're like, who haven't worked out in years? You think I tell ⁓ to do that? No. They're like, should I do it's my favorite. Should I be doing three or four days or should I be doing four or five days a week? And ⁓ how many sets per muscle group is optimal for growth? And I look at them and I'm like, well, I haven't seen you in here in three weeks. Why don't we start with me seeing you at least two times per week? Not with me as a trainer necessarily, but just like I don't see you. So unless you're traveling all the time and you're going to gyms and I'm places that I'm not, let's start with ⁓ doing some basics for 30, 45 minutes, two times once once a week even. So ⁓ any habit change, I this happens all the time with my spiritual rhythms. I would rather try and read the Bible in a week than ⁓ than commit to spending five minutes in the Word every morning. ⁓ you like a good challenge. ⁓ yeah, I'm like, well, a good gun. I'm like, I something to strive for. ⁓ something to something to Hang my hat on after God instead of striving after him. I remember the first time someone mentioned a 24 hour fast to me, and I said, Is this a joke? What are you kidding me? Anyone could fast for 24 hours. What did Jesus do for 40 or 40 days? I don't know about you, but there's a flavor to this that specifically hits me, and it might be just like me dabbling in the cheaper mindset. And it's I want to go as hard as I can to complete a thing and then be done. And it almost always happens with things that you are never done with. Sure. Whether that is like and I love my wife. I want I I g I get to love on her and and per pursue her for our entire lives, but I look at it and there are times I'm like, okay, I just need to rush and rush, rush until we can get to this date that I've set up and then and then I'm good for however long. And that's not at all like in in work, in family, in just general things that I want to do, I try to go as hard as I can to then be done with it and then be like, okay, sweet. I get some on I'm good. And then I can move on to something else as opposed to the things in our lives as adults, as husbands, as fathers, as productive employees. Just normal. General people in society. There are things you constantly have to do and continue to do, and they don't just end. Yeah. But I want to go as hard as possible to the extreme. Okay, can I get an entire year's worth of like dental appointments done? Can I brush my teeth for like hours? And then be done for the year. No, that's Can I have to flow 24 hours straight to not have to floss the rest of the year? My buddy was convinced he could brush his teeth every other day. Cole, if you're listening to this every other day for three minutes, I was like, bro, I promise you that's not how it works. Probably has way less cavities than me. That's how God's Listen, genetics, genetics and teeth are ⁓ very unfair. But frustrating again, Enneagram three, I'm not gonna harp on this too much because I know that was a whole era that we're kind of past with Enneagram. But their shadow side is they they push themselves to exhaustion. Until they get to a point where they're just like, What's the freaking point? And they just disengage all together. I'm done with all this. Like the burnout is real. So that has been a journey for me, knowing that of like, hey, don't quit on your hardest days and don't think you're absolutely king of the world when you're crushing it on your best. Like most things that are worth it in life are somewhere in between of just consistently showing up. It's the difference between outcome oriented thinking and process oriented thinking. So ⁓ again Another big thing that I will do is I will pick an outcome that I want to achieve. Yep. Whether that's weighing a certain amount, hitting a certain number on a like a certain amount of weight on a lift, reading the whole Bible in a year or something like that, or faster, all these different things. But the problem is let's say you get to the outcome. A lot of times, me especially, I don't have a plan for after that. Yeah. So even if I do achieve it, I don't typically have the foresight or the intentionality, or I have not shown to have the intentionality to think past the outcome. So once I get there, like many people, we just go right back to the old stuff. So I've tried to tell people more recently, and again, my setting is the gym, so it's a lot of fitness related stuff. You have to stop viewing this as a it's not that you can't have goals. Right. That you and like benchmarks that you want to achieve, but you have to stop viewing this as a I want to get to hear. Yeah. It's a this is who I am now type of way. I've become the type of person who does this. And then you have to come up with a repeatable process of what that type of person does for day in and day out that is realistic enough to be achieved often. Yeah. Because I think one of the biggest pitfalls for me is that I am just a diehard optimist. No amount of failure really gets me to the point where I don't think I can achieve the same thing that I failed at a hundred thousand times without changing anything. And that's the problem, is that if you don't make adjustments, it's that whole definition of insanity thing, doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. I'm not saying it never happens. I have definitely gotten to a point where I've failed enough that I've been discouraged into being like, Well, I'm overwhelmed. I'm over it. I'm done. Forget it. ⁓ but more often than not, I will just get right back up again and get knocked out and get right back up again and do the same thing over and over again. So I think that choosing to believe that like the things you want in your life, you have to come up with a process of like, how can I just be this person forever? Yeah. Which can be daunting whenever it's something that you're probably Taking on because you're not very good at it at the moment, or it's not something you've been successful at a lot in the past. So ⁓ I think we've pretty much I mean, I had a bunch bunch of other things. One big cutting things out. I do the same thing with cutting things out rather than adding things in. Cutting out sugar. We've talked a lot about adding like habits and things like that or creating new habits. Yeah. The all or nothing approach for getting rid of bad habits. Yeah. Same thing for me. No TV ever again. I'm watching three hours of YouTube videos a day. What does Reese do? We're done with the how you know what sounds sexy? I'm giving up TV for a year. Right. Media for a year, besides like what I need for my work. Yeah. Just done with it all together because man, it sounds so much cooler to say that. We can talk about it. It's a talking point. Yeah. It's like getting your reward now by just getting which again, I don't always go into it with the idea of But caffeine was that for me. I gave it up forty days for Lent. ⁓ it was a big deal. I someone drinks two or three cups of coffee every day. And I haven't I mean, it's been six, eight weeks. I haven't gone I haven't gone a whole day without it since because it it it really was instead of becoming the type of person who doesn't need this to perform and function, I it was more of just kind of like a mind over matter, get get get to that end date, which is not the point of fasting. And fasting is is one of the best ways to establish discipline, ⁓ not just to abstain from something, but to become the type of person who is not ruled by your appetite, is not ruled by your desires. That's the point of fasting, not to say that you finished a fast. So and sometimes it's helped me with that, but it's been disappointing since then for me because I I thought I'd changed and I hadn't. Yeah. It sucks. And this is tea, by the Devil devil's. Devil's advocate to the one particular point in this is there are times where it does help to go to extremes. Yeah. And and like have the this is this is cold turkey stopped. Cocaine. Yeah, drugs. Yes. Yeah. Drugs. ⁓ and well, even then actually there are tight trade there. Tight trade. Don't listen to me. Yeah, but we're not licensed. But like for instance with social media, yeah, there are times when it actually is like when you hop off of it and you say, Okay, I'm I'm done. Like you you make the joke, like I'm done with social media for a year. But there are times when you're like I'm I'm just done with this. I'm deleting it. I am yeah, I am not coming back to this for right now. And even if it's not for right now, that can sometimes extend and extend and extend to the point where it like all of a sudden it's no longer a draw for you. Sure. So it's this weird dynamic where almost always you want to be moderated in the way that you apply change to actually affect and get the outcomes that you want to have. But there are times when extreme measures work. But it's so frustrating because you want to apply one particular success in a small area that you understand the bounds for and say, Okay, no, this is done and here's why and you move and you move on from that to the rest of everything else that you do. Sure. And I have not been able to walk that line well at any point in time. But there have I have not had certain like social media apps on my phone for years now. And it's inconvenient at times. But it's been great. Yeah. Now I find other avenues to serve to serve. ⁓ but that being said, it's been it has been helpful for me. And it y it's very funny to see so on my Instagram, like I haven't actually deleted the account, but I haven't had an app on my phone in forever. And I like you can see kind of when that happened because all of a sudden like there are no posts after like I think I think senior year of college. Yeah. Yeah. Long time. Yeah. And and Those are wonderful things, but that particular example is few and far between. So some people might point to Yeah, I have had success going to an extreme and cutting something out or doing something to the fullest, but almost never is that ⁓ a prescription for the rest of the way that they do those kinds of things. For sure. And I mean, I think that you make a good point. There are gonna be people that the all or nothing approach just works for them. No but as a dad it becomes harder to do. Yes. That's kind of the point of all sure. Yes, yeah. Sorry, coming back to it. This this is a dad podcast. So like if that's all how you operated and you became a dad and you're like, what do you mean, baby? You're not on on board for me doing meal prep where all we eat is macaroni and beef every day. You know? I saw I saw this video, it was a short, and it was this big buff dude, and he cooked ten pounds of beef and ten pounds of macaroni. I almost sent it to you. And then he just put it in the biggest bowl you've ever seen. And that's why I was like this all or nothing approach Aga again, that works for some people. It will not work in my household because if that's all I fed my kids for dinner every night, that's not a healthy diet for them. They're hitting their macros, but gosh, they need some vegetables. Jordan would leave our house like instantly. She she did like a a stint in college of doing meal prep and she's like, Yeah, never again. Like we she she will eat leftovers when she has to. She does not like eating leftovers because it's the same thing that she and she wants to do something different. And I would much rather just sit there and be like, Sweet. Let's make all these meals and throw them in Pyrexy. I will eat the same thing. I don't care, especially if it's good food. But it's not but to your point, being a dad changes that entirely. And you gotta be able to roll with those punches, or else it just leads to strife that is otherwise unnecessary. It is necessary for your formation, for your growth, for your pursuing your wife and for leading your children. But otherwise it's unnecessary Yeah. So now I have to choose healthy food day to day and it takes more intentionality. me to do that, to hit a hit a healthy diet and to not eat bad things because I cannot do that all or nothing approach in this season of life. Yeah. No, that makes sense. And it and again, it's just so tough. The more littles you have and the the difference of like Elly definitely cannot do the meal prep every day sort of thing either. So again, it really does become like a how do you make it work for your situation specifically? Different for each family. A lot of nuance for sure. That's an example that doesn't apply to everyone. Sure. But n for most families, it's not gonna be meal prep for all for everyone in the whole family all the time unless You know, it sounds nice. I'd I'd if anybody if anybody wants to like adopt me into their family where we do meal prep, everybody does the same meal prep. I love it. I love it. ⁓ But ⁓ no. I think that's great. Anything else we want to touch on in that topic before I before I move on. Yeah, let's get we gotta keep it under an hour. I gotta keep it. We are we are way behind like s I don't know, five hours last night is kind of the average. So maybe that's a lot for this season. We're doing better than we could, but newborns are tough. They're tough. It's not good sleep either. That's the thing. I just wake up sore. No, dude, it's not. Like why am I sore? I went to sleep. No, even when I got seven hours with Roman and but it was with two or three wake ups to hold him and stuff like that, which means I'm spending ten hours in bed because it's a long feed with the bottle and stuff like that. It was like I'd wake up and it would feel like a hangover. Yeah. Not that I've ever had one of those before, but ⁓ we can imagine. Yeah. Anywho. You hydrate. I do. And like I've said, drink in the morning. Just kidding. I don't I don't condone drinking in the morning specifically. If we ever want to get into the nuance of recovery-based approaches, we have some more to talk about. For alcohol. All of that to say ⁓ is that the extreme intensity of the all-or-nothing approach is what makes it so appealing. It's exciting, but the consistency with little little changes over time is what's going to build those big changes that you're hoping to have overnight. ⁓ and next we're gonna dive into why the all or nothing approach seems so attractive. I know we've touched on that some, so we may skip through some of this, but ⁓ I wrote down something that it makes me I feel like I'm in control when I do the all-or-nothing approach, Scott. So it gives me that sense of control. Like I don't have to rely on on Jesus for this, I don't have to rely on anybody, but My good old American pulling myself up by my bootstrap self to accomplish all the things that I want to achieve in this life, both for myself, my own ego, and also just the people around me, the way I'm viewed. so I think that for me it's the illusion of control. I get to kind of tell people I'm locked in, I'm gonna become the perfect dad, I'm him, Timothy, everything's starting now, right now. No better time. Enough someday starts today. Enough someday starts today. No free shout out. No free book on Amazon. Yeah, good book by Blaine Jeremetrius Gozy. ⁓ but Real Fatherhood's in the trenches day in and day out. ⁓ so it's not always gonna be sexy. It's not always gonna be this big it's not always gonna be big, it's not always gonna be big news. It's gonna be the stuff that nobody really notices that happens. ⁓ kind of quietly ⁓ day in and day out and i think that that is just part of building that consistency yeah ⁓ I I ended up writing down that ⁓ one another big thing that I struggle with with the all or nothing approach is that you kind of just start viewing anything less than perfection as failure. And one way to stop doing something typically is that you just don't want to do stuff that you fail at over and over and over again. Normally it at some point it it typically beats a person down to the point where they're like, I mean, what's even the point anymore? ⁓ your original quote from Talladega Nights is the exact is exactly what I'm trying to. If you're not first, you're last. ⁓ you could be second. If you're not perfect, if you're not the best, it means you're the worst. So I would say I'm a natural encourager. I love to encourage people, help give people perspective on what they're doing well. Yeah. ⁓ because I've noticed that a lot of people like to just beat themselves up, people are self-deprecating. I do it too, ⁓ but I like to just make sure people are recognizing the way that they're winning, like the way the wins in their life, the things they're doing well. And I think that part of the problem is that people are like, Well, if I didn't do it exactly a hundred percent the way that I wanted to. Or if I didn't get to my exact goal, then everything was a failure. Yeah. one thing that that's coming to mind me is ⁓ you can go all in and you can achieve something. ⁓ but the scary thing is you might climb the ladder, but it's leaning against the wrong wall. And that that was a picture that was given to me a few years ago. I don't I don't know from who or where, but if I'm gonna go all in on something, what is the one or two or three things that I for sure want to go all in at? And then be good at others. So what is in my career, what is the one thing I want to be really good at? In my fatherhood, what is the one thing I want to define me? ⁓ w within how I can serve the local church, what is like cause I can't do everything, be all all places for all people. ⁓ It's really important for us to be locked in and focused of like, hey, ambition is incredible, goals are extremely important, but just don't make sure you're you're succeeding at the wrong things. Because you might succeed, but what have you lost to get there? And that's terrifying when you're talking about career or you're talking about ⁓ physical fitness and some of the achievements you can have. Or ⁓ shoot, man, you might even be an incredible father. You might be obsessed with your kids and then they go off to school and then what type of well balanced life do you have? You would kind of lose yourself. You lose yourself, man. I love to hunt. I can be obsessed with that. And I become, man, a really solid hunter. And then so you get what I'm saying. Anything you have to count the cost if you're wanna go all in for it, I think. You guys quote some pretty amazing people, but I quote people more like Jim Carrey. Okay. A pretty amazing dude. I'm pretty sure that this is correct. I don't know if I'm gonna nail the the quote, but he basically is just like, I wish every person could Become rich and famous and realize that it's it's not it's not ultimately fulfilling. Sure. there's it's not enough. And can we can we learn from people like him? Hopefully. ⁓ Jim Carrey's the man. But yeah. Do I get that right? ⁓ yes. ⁓ he once expressed, I think everyone should get rich and famous and do everything they ever dreamed of so they can see that it is not the answer. It's not the answer. So like can we pre pre decide what is the answer and then go all in after that? I think that's what's important. Yeah. Felt like that was like a loose shout out to Jesus there, but I don't know. Yeah. ⁓ everything comes back. Either way, back to the ⁓ perfection or failure and nothing in between. some real life examples of how that shows up. Wrote some of them down. Things like missing a bedtime and feeling like a terrible dad, losing your patience once and assuming you've ruined your child. ⁓ setting impossible expectations for routines, both for yourself and for your household. You've seen me with the ⁓ what it what the l way of not the way of life, the way ⁓ yeah, rule of life. Rule of life. That's what I was looking for. The rule of life chart where I fill in all the squares and things like that. It's too much. Too much too too many twos. Nobody's ever gonna be able to follow that. ⁓ so setting unrealistic expectations. ⁓ this one's big for me. Swinging between hyper engaged and emotionally absent. Yeah. So Super engaged one day, multiple days, week, month, and then getting so burnt out that suddenly one day I come home and for the next week it's like the people that are closest to me are like I he doesn't seem like himself. He just seems like he's not here. Sure. He's here, but he's not. ⁓ so being emotionally absent and just trading back and forth between those extremes ⁓ and expecting yourself to balance work, fitness, marriage, parenting, hobbies, friendships perfectly. Yeah. So just kind of again, unrealistic expectations. Do you feel like you see that pop up in your life with anything that we haven't talked about? I want share another quote. It's from some basketball player in the NBA that I don't remember, but ⁓ he would not do a one on one interview. Don't look it up, no 'cause it really don't matter. but this ⁓ NBA player ⁓ would not do a one on one interview with a female reporter and he kinda caught some flack for that and he said, I can tell you this, if I'm gonna make someone mad, it ain't gonna be my wife. ⁓ I do remember this. So like that's that's what I'm talking about. Like there's gonna be something that you you drop. Yeah. You're gonna drop the ball. And ⁓ we have to take care of our our health. So I'm not saying don't prioritize physical fitness to some degree. ⁓ you have to prioritize not completely ⁓ losing your life. So you gotta have some hobbies, you gotta have some friendships. ⁓ but Obviously you can go overboard there. So like what is a well balanced life look like? I think it starts with saying what is what is the thing or two or three that I I cannot let fall ⁓ daily. Like these are the things that have to happen. Very important daily. For me, it's showing up and giving my best at work. For me it's ⁓ second shift from five to eight PM, just really crushing it. And right now it's trying to connect my wife with my wife first thing in the morning because it's so chaotic during the day. It's like those are the three things I I can't let. Now I'm a fill in other areas. Fun things like this. I'm gonna fill in fitness and exercise. I'm gonna fill in ⁓ hopefully learning, ⁓ time with Jesus. Even that's kind of irregular for me. I wish it wasn't. No, I ⁓ but you know, like what are those three or four pillars and then other things like this may not happen every day or every week. Sure. ⁓ but and I have to be okay with that. And it's not all in or all out. So no, that's a good answer. So I you can answer we can go through both of these at the same time and they can be quick, but where you kind of answered it, but swinging between between extremes. Is there anything that you feel like you go all in on and then you stop? Or you I don't know I'm sure you struggle with the all or nothing to some extent, but I don't know how much it comes up in your life versus others. But Yeah. I I'll I mean it it I do to some degree, but I'll let you share more 'cause I do feel like this is a little bit more of a shadow side for you that could connect with dads more. Not that I don't have mine. No. But I think for this topic it's you. Yeah, and I mean, again, I don't wanna beat a dead horse because we've talked about some of this. It it's it's most habits fitness, nutrition, spiritual rhythms. I wrote all of those down. It'll be all in for a little while. ⁓ I've shared with people close to me in the last six months that ⁓ three months before, or like sorry, pretty much probably eight months before Roman was born, I pretty much just counted macros. For those who don't know what that means, it's basically like counting calories and figuring out What you need to do to gain weight, lose weight. ⁓ and then I stuck to a pretty strict five day a week training program for about eight months. And then when Rome was born, we were blessed enough to have people that did a meal train for us. So I rather than insulting everyone and w wagging my Tupperware containers in front of them whenever they showed up with a and they'd bring dessert. With with a with a meal and dessert. ⁓ I just said, I'm I'm gonna just Go hands off and not this is probably one of the best reasons to give up my stuff that I versus to being blessed and receive it. ⁓ but either way, for the next six months, I basically just not all on Meal Train stuff, but Meal Train lasted, I don't know, a month, month and a half. It felt like a lot of leftovers. ⁓ and I just kind of gave all of the discipline up rather than trying to keep some of it or anything like that. I just said, I've been disciplined, I'm gonna just ride on the foundation I've built. Which does work if you're it's gonna be a shorter time, but I basically did that for six months. I gained about thirty pounds, not good weight. My whole family was calling it Reese's Fat Christmas. ⁓ your family is brutal, yeah. It's great. I love it. Max especially. I bet he said that. My man Max. I don't know if he said it to me. I used to see you. I I don't know, but definitely a lot of people. so sad. And then January first hit and then ⁓ yeah. ⁓ I normally make fun of the New Year's resolutioners, but I joined in and decided I did too, 'cause I had to survive the winter, bro. Decided that I was gonna just go gallon of water a day. I was like, it's over, I'm going after it again. Exercising every day. And well, I've lost twenty five, thirty pounds and but it's crazy if you can use some of those extreme things to get you where ⁓ you can maintain, like to help you level up and then s and then how do you ⁓ become the type of person that can stay there with habits and stuff? That that's that's fatherhood. I think I think that makes a lot of sense in fatherhood of all right, let's get to a healthy place that we can maintain. Yeah. So I would say that's one example of one that I swing back and forth from, which again is funny because I'm a personal trainer. But th it's sticking this time for sure. No doubt. Yes, no doubt. ⁓ and then next thing we can talk about is what we tend to give up completely instead of adjusting. So, ⁓ What sort of things do you once you get overwhelmed or once you've just had enough, you're like, I'm done? Or ⁓ hobbies. Hobbies, yeah. I can't tell you how many times we at Mad Madeline like, ⁓ I'll just stop hunting. Like I'm just trying to hunt this year. Instead of going once a week, or like maybe I shoot my bow twice a week instead of every other day the month before. I can't move my trail cameras. I just kinda keep ⁓ where they are and if I shoot a buck, I shoot a buck. If not I'll shoot a dough and put it in the freezer. It's like, man, that's That's for me a tobbies. Cause it's like almost like I'm fearful to kinda get that taste. And I didn't turkey hunt this spring 'cause of that with Karis Cumin. ⁓ yeah, it's it's hard once you get started with some of those things. It's okay if there's not if you can't think of one. Is there anything that you have tried to do well as a husband or father that you've messed up so many times that you just get irritated and you're just kinda like d probably not the big things. I know you pretty well. Just like, I don't know, something small, like you tried to ⁓ You tried to set the table for the kids too many times and they just kept throwing stuff off or something like that. That's just a random Nothing's coming to mind. Yeah. No worries. Nothing's coming to mind. Dishes. Dishes. Okay I do the dishes and I do them apparently so slowly that Jordan is like, just let me do the dishes because you can't you can't do them in a quick time frame. That's a dad hack just suck at the chore. And I I still try to do them, but I every time I go to do them, I either have to she has to be gone for the evenings. Do the dishes. You she just comes home to the dishes done. It doesn't matter how long it took while she was gone for them to be done. Yeah. But other than that, like I just know the moment I go to be like, ⁓ I can do the dishes, she's just going, Yeah. I'm not gonna see him for an hour. Yeah. Well, sometimes I like having an hour alone, even if it's doing chores. That's what adulting is. Like, let me let me go mow the grass so I can have some time by myself. That's exactly what mowing is. Again, I didn't know that because I didn't mow most of my life, but ⁓ just found that out recently. It is great. It is great. So well, let's wrap this thing up. I mean, ⁓ let's do it. It's it's been an awesome conversation. ⁓ we're gonna go all in on this topic for the next twelve episodes. Yes or we'll never talk about it again. We'll we'll figure that out after this. One of those. One of those two. Reese, give us some some practical, some things to think about, some closing thoughts, just things you're you're chewing on. Yeah. I'm basically just gonna go from our last page, but just kind of a mind shed or mindset shift. So instead of things like commentaries or your inner thought life of things ⁓ saying things like I ruined everything. Just chalk it up to I had a hard moment that needs repair or I made even I made a mistake and it just needs it needs a repair. So yeah. Get mad at your kids, a little bit too mad at your kids. Don't speak to them in an unbelievably kind way. Rather than it's over or like my kid I've I've ruined everything. Just chalk it up to Lord forgive me and ⁓ give an apology. It's something I'm learning too, is like hard just because you have a hard moment doesn't mean it's gonna be a hard day. Yes. Or don't let a hard day trickle to a hard week. Yeah. Because kids can it can be difficult and you don't respond well, they don't respond well. But then when you start thinking, well, this is if this is how five PM went, you know, bedtime's gonna be terrible. If this is how the week is, like this weekend taking them to the zoo is gonna be crazy. Nah, man, you gotta take those those thoughts captive. Just keep just keep showing up. Don't go all or nothing. Yeah, don't slip into full on pessimism. Yeah. It'll it'll ruin your life. ⁓ another thing you can shift from is Rather than beating yourself up over missing a day of one of these like yeah smaller habits. ⁓ I got a mentor that says, just never miss two days. That's good. Yeah. It doesn't and if you miss two days, obviously still just be like, I'm picking it back up tomorrow. A third. Yeah. But ⁓ rather than missing a day and quitting, because again, that's very common. It's like, Well, if I can't do it perfect, I'm just not gonna do it. Just tell yourself, you know what, I missed it today. That's not what I want long term. I want this to be an everyday thing. Yeah. We're back at it tomorrow. It's good. ⁓ so You can keep building habits even if you miss a day. ⁓ I guess one reflection for anybody that's listening is what is one of those small, consistent habits that would matter more than dramatic intensity? An example I gave of that was five committing to five minutes of silent listening prayer over what I would much rather do, which is a 24 hour silent retreat. Sure. It's not a bad thing. If you got the margin for it and you can schedule that. Quarterly, couple times a year, once a year, that's great. On top of that five minute day habit. Let that be an anchor that spurs that. Because what I what's again way more attractive is the I'ma just deal with this now. I'm not good at sitting with my thoughts and talking to God. I'm gonna just do this twenty-four hour retreat and come back forever different. You know, one of the most convicting things I've heard recently is the type of person you are outside of prayer is the type of person you are inside of prayer. So even even that mindset of like I haven't sat alone with God for weeks and then I'm gonna go out into the woods for twenty four hours, dude. That's hell. I've done it. It's not great. So how can I be that type of person preparing for that 24 hours in the woods by practicing that regularly? ⁓ just in my day to day with him. Yeah. And last last thing, just a few of the few practical examples. It could be praying with your kids, like one of these small repeatable actions, could be praying with your kids. ⁓ regulating before reacting. You've talked about react and respond prayer. So just choosing to rather than just letting that first that first emotion jump out at everybody in your family or people at work, anything, sitting there and trying to regulate yourself. Yeah. ⁓ speaking encouragement intentionally, I think that's big for a lot of people. ⁓ if you're the type of person who beats yourself up 'cause you are a perfectionist, tell yourself what you're doing well, even if it's just once, two, three times more per day than you're doing right now. can make a world of difference. And then ⁓ reconnecting after conflict, whether that's with people at work, people at home, friends, family, etc., reconnect rather than just stonewalling or trying to shove it way deep down. So ⁓ do you want to pray us out? Yeah. Anything any thought any final thoughts? No, it's it's really good. Again, like ⁓ this is gonna look so different if you got kids that are teenagers versus newborns. Yes. ⁓ that's true. Very little of what we said can be Prescriptive meal prep or don't meal prep. It's it's really about, hey, who's the type of person I want to become? What would that type of person do regularly? And then what are the most important things to prioritize to get there? Understanding that I may not be able to go all in for it, but we've said this exhaustively. Let you'll probably accomplish less in a day than you want, but more in a year or a lifetime. Sure. So that's that's kind of what we're trusting when we ⁓ We give up the all in mentality overall, but focus on just a few things that are most important to consistently show up at. So so that's what we'll do. Dads, before I pray us out, just a reminder, ⁓ engage with us. We'd love to talk with you. Please share this with ⁓ other dads if this was helpful. ⁓ and if it wasn't helpful, let us know. ⁓ so we can make it more helpful for you because we do this so that we can grow as three dads ourselves. But really it's it's for you guys so that we can grow together. let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you that this is something that you're deeply concerned about. ⁓ you want us to go all in for you. you want us to be dads that ⁓ practice the ways of sacrificial love, which which requires all of us. We we empty ourselves daily, but we just ask that you would show us what that is. ⁓ that if we train for anything, it would become the type of person who can love people around us better. If we give up anything, it's so that we can have more ⁓ capacity to love the people around us. So ⁓ we don't want our false self to be gratified by doing great things or achieving or, you know, being known for for doing one or two things super, super well. Our identity is just being sons of you. And ⁓ from that place of sonship, Father, that we just ask that you would help us to show up consistently in the unseen places and the secret places, knowing that. ⁓ long obedience in the same direction is something that you will honor if that direction is is aligned with your heart. So help the dads listening ⁓ to align their desires with your desires and help them to continue to show up ⁓ so that our children ⁓ would be able to become more like you because of our presence in their lives. In Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Cool. Thanks guys. Peace.