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Mountains & Molehills · A Time to Sharpen

0:09
Is there anything worse than a dull blade?
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Yeah, well, lots of things, I guess.
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Poverty, war, settling into a nice movie Friday night with
0:21
your family. You finally got all six kids
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settled in. You got the popcorn, you got the
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lights down and everybody's on the couch.
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You hit play and you get the pinwheel of death, and the movie
0:35
will not start thanks to rural Internet.
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Why won't it play, Dad? Oh, can we just watch a movie?
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You can hear it now. Seriously though, a dull blade
0:47
is bad. It's unusable.
0:50
In fact, it's downright dangerous.
0:52
Knives need sharpening. From Whetstone Boys Ranch in
0:56
Mountain View, MO comes a Time to Sharpen, a bi weekly podcast
1:01
that examines how we can all be better versions of ourselves.
1:05
Better counselors, better teachers, better parents, better
1:09
people. The problem isn't the problem.
1:19
The problem is how you think about the problem.
1:21
Jack Sparrow. Today we're talking about
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mountains and molehills. Because sometimes we minimize.
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We shrug off something real, call it nothing, and wonder
1:31
later why resentment keeps showing up uninvited.
1:34
And other times we catastrophize.
1:36
We turn a hiccup into an earthquake.
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The fact is that what feels small to one person can be huge
1:42
to another, especially when trauma or chronic stress is
1:45
involved. Those reactions can be
1:47
protective, not pathetic. So we're not here to shame
1:50
anybody, but we are here to get perspective because a steady
1:54
life requires proportional responses.
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Join us this week on A Time to Sharpen as we get practical
2:00
about internal tools, family dynamics and team culture,
2:04
discussing strategies that help us to handle hard things without
2:07
turning everything into a disaster or a dismissal.
2:16
Welcome back to A Time to Sharpen.
2:17
This is Axel Imita. I'm here with Brandon Maxwell,
2:21
who likes to mimic me every time I say that on the other side of
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the table, we've. Just done it so many times.
2:27
We just are. We just know the timing.
2:30
It's a staple. It's a staple, man.
2:31
Yeah. Yep, it's a good way to just
2:34
kind of break the ice and get get a little laughter going.
2:38
Yeah, yeah, the ice is. The ice is usually broken
2:41
though. Yeah, it's true.
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It's just a saying. All right, Let me just say that.
2:46
Yeah, it's just a saying. Speaking of ice, we've had a
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snowstorm here. The great snow apocalypse in the
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West Plains area. I guess nationwide as well.
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Like just a huge band of snow covering our nation.
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It's always interesting to see how quickly the bread and milk
3:08
fly off the shelves. You can kind of tell how much
3:12
weather is being talked about by how bare the shelves are when
3:17
you go into town. So people always seem to stock
3:20
up and never seems to be quite as bad as they project it, which
3:24
is understandable. They want people to be ready.
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Well, that's actually a good lead into what we're talking
3:28
about today, catastrophizing versus minimizing like this
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storm is this is this storm an opportunity for for you to, you
3:37
know, gather around the fire and, and cozy up with hot
3:42
chocolate and a book and and everything.
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Or is this something where you're struggling to find heat,
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you know, and you're running out of gas and you can't get to the
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snow, you know, to the to the snow to the to the supermarket.
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And, and we've had like just in our own staff here a variety of
4:03
situations. Yeah.
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So you. Just never know if you can get
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into the ranch and when you're doing 24/7 coverage with boys
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and you have responsibilities that way.
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That's what these storms always kind of make me ponder.
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It's like, OK, now, you know, do we have if things get bad, we
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can't get to the ranch, who's on campus, who's going to have to
4:29
get to campus? And those are always things
4:32
these days that we got to think about.
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Depends on who you talk to. Like are you the one stuck here
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on campus that can't get home, that's having to do double duty?
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Or are you the one stuck at home that gets a little extra time
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to? Yeah, sorry.
4:46
Yeah. Yeah.
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Sorry, go ahead. Somebody I I just had this
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conversation yesterday that I hadn't talked to him in a little
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bit and we were just talking about the snow and he's like,
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does it remind you of your Montana days or was that you who
5:03
asked? I don't think it was, no.
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Somebody asked me about that just because of my time in
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Montana and just the snow and a lot deeper usually there during
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the winter time. But I just said, you know what,
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I love the snow. But these days, compared to
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then, I just have a lot more responsibilities.
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And like, when I know of a major snowstorm coming, all I can
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think about is like, OK, what's going to break at my house?
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What's going to break here? Yeah, what's going to what extra
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work is this going to cause? I don't know.
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It's just unfortunately where my mind has tended to think.
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Well, and the, the mind is where this kind of thing happens, the
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the, the minimizing versus catastrophizing.
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And so let's start with that like, and, and just as by way of
5:51
a road map here, we're going to be talking about these two
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tendencies that we have as people.
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Some temperaments tend to tend to jump right to, you know,
6:05
exaggeration, hyperbole, you know, that escalated quickly,
6:09
that kind of thing. And other people tend to be more
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like, it's not a big deal or to underplay things or to
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understate things. And there are reasons why we do
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that psychologically related to like defense mechanisms and like
6:24
protecting ourselves emotionally and safety and everything like
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that. And patterns that develop over
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the the course of our life that are influenced by traumatic
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events that we may have had earlier, some of which we're
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aware of, some of which we're not.
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But we're going to talk about all that, open up that that that
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can and, and then talk about it as it relates to our behaviors
6:44
and strategies and approaches as parents, teachers and, and
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counselors. And again, we're not counselors,
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we're not therapists. Just a disclaimer.
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We're going. To share, we are.
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Parents. We are parents.
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We do a fair bit of counseling and this is a therapeutic
6:59
boarding school. So, but do you know, seek out
7:04
professional help with these types of things?
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If you don't have a counselor or therapist and and you need one,
7:10
then we encourage you to do that.
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Don't, don't worry. Not that anyone is doing this,
7:14
but if you are replacing that with listening to this podcast,
7:18
then don't do that. I think we need professional
7:21
help. We've actually that's that's the
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second movie reference already in the podcast.
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Yeah. So we've already got two of them
7:30
in I. Think we need professional help
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one? That's Nacho Libre, the.
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I don't remember that. When they I.
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Think we need professional help? It's a Escalado.
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Yeah, we're talking about, you know, we must go pro and we need
7:42
some professional help to get to the next level.
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Yeah. Right.
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And then and then you did well. It made me think of glass Cage
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of Emotion. That was one part of it, yeah.
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We did. Have in prepping for this though
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we made another Nacho reference I think.
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No, it was a Will Ferrell reference that you made that was
8:04
oh, I just on the tip of my tongue.
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It may it was in the what's the show with the glass cage of
8:10
emotion. Is that Anchorman?
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Anchorman. It was an Anchorman quote.
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Oh, that escalated quickly. That's what you said.
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Yeah. So anyway, just wanted to make
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sure that our our listeners are are catching the.
8:22
Yeah, you got to keep track with the movie reference.
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You know, I remember when we started this podcast 70 episodes
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ago now, that was going to be like a regular feature.
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It was like, OK, we're going to have a literary component.
8:37
You know, we talk about maybe share a poem, a movie reference
8:41
to have like a cop pop culture thing, because a lot of podcasts
8:44
like have that tie insurance, like listen to us talk about
8:47
movies which you've enjoyed, but also get to hear us talk about
8:50
all these things. And so we still do a fair bit of
8:53
that. Yeah.
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And we have a whole podcast about movies and things like
8:57
that. But yeah.
8:59
But that, I mean, the glass cage of emotion, that's kind of ties
9:02
into what we're talking about. Yeah, here.
9:05
So getting back on track. Yeah, exaggerating
9:09
catastrophizing. So let's, let's start with,
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let's start with parents like, and our spouses and our families
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like. Do you see that tendency in your
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children? Do you have some kids who swing
9:21
towards 1 extreme or the other? Yes, I do.
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They're not all perfectly balanced individuals.
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At this point, still working on them.
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Yeah, a little bit of work makes me progress.
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Makes me feel better as a parent.
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Yeah. And it's every, I would say,
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well, I have some kids that really don't do that at all and
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then some that do it a lot in different ways.
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The ones that do it a lot is are are they tend to be a little
9:49
older going through. Well, it's I would say.
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Normal changes and things like that.
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Well, yes, there's some of that, but also from the younger ones
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it's like vying for attention. So you know, we have, we
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mentioned we have 6 kids. So sometimes it's trying to
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play, you know, getting, getting, getting the attention
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that maybe you don't feel like you're getting.
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So sometimes you got to be louder or you got to make
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something, you know, the, the greasy will or the squeaky will
10:17
gets the grease. And so sometimes they have to
10:21
play it up a little bit. Or if they feel like one of the
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older siblings is doing something then they don't like,
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they know that if they can scream loud enough that like
10:29
somebody's going to pay attention to me and going to
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mitigate the the problem. And so that is something that we
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definitely see in our family, yeah.
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That's a really good point because a lot of these
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tendencies that we have as individuals and organizations,
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because organizations are made-up of individuals,
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churches, things like that. Like we behave in these ways
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because we've we've developed patterns over the years.
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And it could be as simple as I'm the fourth child and I don't
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something was going on in my family when I was five years old
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and I have no memory of. But during that time, I learned
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in order to get my needs met, I had to be loud.
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Or I learned in order to not experience like, bad things, I
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had to be quiet and to night, like fade into the background
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and not make a big deal. So yeah, they become ingrained
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in us, these behaviors. Yeah, that's, and that's a
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difficult thing for parents because you don't.
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We've had that at different times with parents and the boys
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that we've worked with. Like some of that trauma has
11:35
been because of like maybe a sickness, like maybe the mom has
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had cancer that they're battling cancer for two years.
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And like all hands on deck and all the bandwidth and energy has
11:47
to go towards, you know, helping her get better and go through
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that process or anything. All the things that she's doing
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now, everybody else has to jump in and kind of suck up those
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duties and it just creates a a new normal.
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And a lot of times, especially as younger kids, when those are
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the formative years where maybe you're supposed to be getting
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that more nurturing and care from your mom, she's not
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available to do that. So that's just an example of
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some of the families we've worked with and we all have
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different seasons that we go through.
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And as a parent, I think it's key to, I guess, observe that we
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can't obviously control those things, but understanding that
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the tendency that those seasons can can create some some
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difficult situations for kids to navigate.
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Yeah, yeah. It's important for us as as
12:44
parents, teachers, counsellors to, to realize that all of our
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young people that we're that we're working with have that
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going on. And, and so we have to like
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recognize it, name it like you can't, you can't manage
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something that you can't name. There's a, there's, I heard a
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really good phrase in a podcast that I was listening to that
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that said something similar, but it said it in a more creative
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way. Maybe it'll.
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Be you can't manage it if you don't monitor it or or measure
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it, it's measured. Is that it?
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OK, it was. Something that's more a little.
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Different than that, but this is the basic idea.
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And so like, and, and also this idea that like trauma just is
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what, what is traumatic to one person.
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And we throw that word trauma around a lot these days.
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And sometimes it's not very meaningful, but like real trauma
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that impacts your your behavior and your relationships with
13:40
other people and disrupts your ability to like manage the world
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around you. And like, that's the situation
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we're dealing with here with our boys is often times related to
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something that from the outside looks small, but to that person,
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it was huge. And so the, the idea of like a,
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we had a conversation here at the ranch recently about
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something that was like big to one person, but was kind of
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small to someone else. And someone used the word
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hiccup. And they weren't, they weren't
14:14
intending to minimize this person's feelings and they
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weren't even addressing that person's feelings, but they were
14:18
just generally, generally describing problems at the ranch
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that are small in nature. And they described them as
14:25
hiccups. And several, it wasn't just one
14:29
person, but other people heard that as, oh, well, you think
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this problem we're having is small.
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It's not. It might be small to you, but
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it's not small to me. So like to one person, it could
14:39
be an earthquake, the other person's it's a hiccup.
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So we have to be careful with like the language that we're
14:44
using when we engage in a relationship with people,
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especially if there's a strain or if that relationship is
14:53
fractured and you're trying to work through some things.
14:56
Yeah, that's a good reminder for us as parents to understand it.
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It goes both ways. So as parents, it does US well
15:04
to keep that understanding that this is a big deal for our kid
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and that it's real to them and it's meaningful to them, and
15:14
it's obviously, and to treat it as such in the right manner.
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But there's also the wisdom side that we bring as parents, the
15:23
perspective that our kids don't have to help walk them through.
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That is like, you know what, looking at the long game and
15:31
playing the long game, this really is, we know that this is
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not a big deal. Like we've been through this,
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other kids have been through this, and this is a hiccup.
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Like we can know that. We just don't need to put that
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in their face. Like in in downplay, It's like
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you shouldn't be worried about this.
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Like this is, it's not going to even be a thing a year from now,
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you know, but it is right now a thing.
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And it it's important to me. And so as parents, not
16:01
discounting that, but helping to walk alongside them and be
16:04
present in that, but also helping to see the perspective
16:09
that you have as us as parents that you know, this is not as
16:14
big a deal as it's being made out to be, but being able to say
16:19
that in a manner that is not downplaying what they're.
16:23
Feeling. Yeah.
16:23
Being dismissive. It's hard to do that sometimes
16:26
because there's such an exaggerated response that
16:29
teenagers have to some things. And we're not even dealing with
16:34
trauma here. We're just talking about like a
16:36
breakup. Right.
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And the kind of the the emotional distress that a
16:43
teenager will feel after a breakup.
16:47
It's someone described it to me once.
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That was helpful because I didn't have any of those in high
16:51
school. So I didn't have a girlfriend.
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So it wasn't it wasn't an issue with me in that regard.
16:56
But but the idea that I may have lost out on the love of my life,
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like, I don't know that this feeling is ever is first time
17:05
I've felt it. I don't know that it's ever
17:07
going to come back. And so if that's the way that
17:10
you're building it up in your mind, then it makes sense that
17:13
you would have this extreme, sometimes in some cases suicidal
17:16
reactions to high school romance.
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Like, come on, that's that's so small.
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And then there's another of examples that teenagers will
17:27
will inflate the the significance of something,
17:29
mainly because they've just have it based on their experience.
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It is the biggest thing that's ever happened to them, failing a
17:37
test, for example, or getting AB instead of an A.
17:40
Like what is going to my future is destroyed now.
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I'm not going to get into my, the College of my choice.
17:45
And all these plans I have for my life are just going to fall
17:47
apart. So like, meeting them in that
17:50
space and listening to them and trying to understand and, you
17:55
know, feeling empathy for them is like, so important.
18:00
Yeah, yeah. What other I would say, you
18:08
know, thinking about what are as a parent, you know, there's
18:14
hills to die on and there's hills not to die on, right?
18:18
And as we work here with the boys and always trying to figure
18:22
out what our core values are, and you know, the main thing
18:27
that we try to impart on the boys here, there's things we
18:30
have to hold steady and tight to and some things we got to just
18:33
like we call it, drop in the rope is a term or somethings.
18:36
We just, it's not a hill worth dying on.
18:40
So what would you say? Maybe we'll start with hills
18:45
that are not worth dying on. Yeah.
18:48
That are, yeah, I think we're, we, I don't think we've
18:50
mentioned this yet, but the, we're thinking about the title
18:53
for this podcast being like mountains and molehills.
18:57
We may have mentioned that, but what is a mountain and what is a
18:59
molehill? And what you're asking now is
19:01
like, what, you know, what are those mountains?
19:04
What are those hills worth dying on?
19:06
And so like, it depends on the relationship.
19:09
It depends on the context. Like are we talking about a
19:12
relationship at work? Are we talking about a marriage?
19:14
Are we talking about our son or our daughter?
19:17
Like in regards to like children or, or students, young people
19:23
that that we work with, like issues of character are
19:25
important, issues of safety are important.
19:28
They have to be addressed. You know, if not immediately
19:31
there is there is time pressure and they need to be dealt with
19:36
in a serious manner, respectful, but a serious manner.
19:40
Matters of opinion, matters of preference, matters of taste,
19:44
you know, things that were ego enters and it's really easy to
19:47
like merge our egos with an issue and for that issue to
19:52
become important, not because the issue itself is important,
19:55
but because our ego is important.
19:57
We have to protect our our sense of dignity and that that's what
20:01
you get into in like a struggles like power struggles like it's.
20:08
It's not about the it's not about the nail.
20:10
You remember that video with the, oh, yeah, the nail in her
20:13
forehead? She can't get the sweater on.
20:15
And her husband's like, yeah, I think the nail in your forehead
20:19
just is not about the nail, Right.
20:21
And then finally, he's like, that sounds hard.
20:25
And she's like, thank you, you met me where I'm at.
20:29
And then she goes to give him a hug.
20:30
And then. And then the nail gets in the
20:32
way. But like you have to help them
20:37
to kind of see the perspective on on things in relation to
20:41
safety versus, you know, a matter of opinion.
20:43
So that's my first thoughts. Yeah, I would say you said
20:48
respect, definitely. I mean respect.
20:51
Why is that a hill worth dying on?
20:53
Because it's like it affects every relationship, right?
20:56
Your marriage, your working relationship with any of your
21:01
coworkers, just your, your faith, respecting authority.
21:06
That's something obviously with boys that we work with is they
21:11
struggle with just that. Authoritarian.
21:14
Can't tell me what to do so like honesty that's like, yeah, I
21:19
think our that's our very first character trait that we.
21:23
Work on, yeah, matters of character.
21:25
I think that's why we talk about sharpening the character of
21:28
young men. We have 6 traits.
21:30
Those help us to kind of keep focus on, you know, main things
21:33
to keep the main thing the main thing.
21:35
So honesty, self-control, kindness, loyalty,
21:42
responsibility, perseverance, if it comes down to one of these
21:45
kinds of issues, then we, we take note and we're like, OK,
21:48
this might seem like a little thing to you right now that
21:51
you're behaving in this way, but here's why it's connected to a
21:54
larger issue. He was faithful with little will
21:57
be faithful with much. And so you can, you can go the
22:01
other way and get nitpicky about stuff.
22:03
And I've certainly aired on that end of the spectrum at times.
22:07
I and I tend to, if I'm going to make a mistake One Direction or
22:10
the other, it's going to be on that side.
22:12
So I have to, I have to be aware of my tendencies and of my own
22:19
predispositions when I'm, when I'm talking about this stuff.
22:22
But yeah, issues of character like honesty mountains, not mole
22:27
hills. Yeah, we before the podcast we
22:31
talked about I heard a just kind of preparing for this one
22:35
question to help as parents with that in a particular issue is
22:41
will this matter when they're 25?
22:43
Yeah, specifically dealing with our kiddos and when you think.
22:48
And so I thought that was pretty good.
22:49
It's like if it's talking about taking care of an honesty issue
22:54
and a heart issue, like, yeah, that's going to matter when
22:56
they're 25 because it's going to, if they can't get that
22:58
right, it's going to affect everything that they do, you
23:02
know, moral boundaries, you know, if that's a hill to die
23:07
on, if they don't, they could drastically affect before they
23:11
even get to 25 what the direction looks like.
23:14
You know, they could start off on the wrong foot or, you know,
23:17
substance abuse and how exposed to just media and all that stuff
23:23
that can, can blur those moral lines of what, you know, we
23:28
expose our heart to. Those are those are big things.
23:31
So all right, well, I mean, we could, there's a few other, I
23:36
mean, you can talk about faith and some family boundaries or
23:40
like just family unity type stuff like not helping our kids
23:44
really be a part of a family. I I.
23:47
I think it comes down to like communication, like how do we
23:51
communicate to our Co workers, our spouses, our kids that this
23:57
is a big issue with me and how do I do it in a respectful way
24:00
so that they hear me? And then what attitude and
24:03
disposition do I have when I'm listening to them?
24:05
So they're like some, there's some like techniques and some
24:08
tools and some tips to throw another T in there that we can
24:13
use that will allow us to do that in a helpful way.
24:16
Like going back to naming something like with kids, maybe
24:20
you're like, is this a, is this a Pebble?
24:22
Is this a rock? Or is this a boulder to you?
24:26
How does it, how, how are you feeling?
24:27
Because you know, I'm personally feeling like it's, it's a Pebble
24:30
and here's why. But I, I hear you saying it
24:34
feels like a boulder. Why is this a boulder to you?
24:37
Help me to help me to understand it, like in a non judgmental
24:40
way. Like you can ask that question.
24:43
I don't understand. Explain it to me, you know, or
24:46
you can say help me to understand what is your feeling?
24:49
I really want to understand it. Yeah.
24:51
You know, and then it will get defensive.
24:53
And that's, that's just kills it.
24:55
A defensive stance. So like a scale of 1 to 10, you
25:00
know, that's another tool that you can use.
25:02
But, you know, something a little more creative is like a a
25:05
Pebble, a rock or a boulder like that.
25:07
Especially kids. Yeah, they can visualize that a
25:11
little more. So well, I guess on the back end
25:16
of that, let's what what are a few hills not worth dying on?
25:21
You know, we talked a little bit, but we probably mentioned a
25:23
few of those in the conversation.
25:26
But specifically maybe as we with the boys in situations that
25:30
we work with here, maybe well, let's go this direction.
25:36
What are some mountains, perceived mountains that boys
25:39
have when they first get on campus here?
25:42
Oh, that end up being molehills. Well the typically the one that
25:48
comes is off the top of my head, no pun intended, is a haircut.
25:53
Yeah, like, why is that a why is that a big deal for the boys?
25:56
Woo. Lots of different, lots of
25:58
different reasons. Like like yourself.
26:01
Image is so important when you're a teenager.
26:02
Like your hair? Yeah, just.
26:04
Wraps like you look at yourself in the mirror and you notice
26:08
that all the tiny little things that are wrong with you that no
26:11
one else notices. And you can inflate that into
26:14
such an extreme degree that that that is catastrophic to them.
26:23
Like their their identity and who they are and whether or not
26:27
they're they're going to have friends, whether or not people
26:29
are going to like them, whether they have value like is wrapped
26:32
up in their public appearance. And yeah, it's.
26:35
One of those things where they feel like they have total
26:40
autonomy over, you know, they just they can they can control
26:44
it and be able to have it the way it's their hair, it's their
26:49
style. And and from a parent
26:51
standpoint, like that is not really a hill to die on is the
26:56
haircut. You know, as far as just in a
26:59
regular, it's a different situation here at Whetstone that
27:04
we can talk about. But in a normal setting at home,
27:07
like the haircut, that's not a hill to die on, right?
27:12
Would you agree? Yeah, I would agree like to to a
27:15
certain extent with kind of some modifiers like like if your son
27:22
you go through this with a 11/12/13 year old, I'm going
27:25
through this now with Asher. It's like, and I went through it
27:28
with Caleb, it's like you have to like pay attention to your
27:32
physical appearance at some point.
27:34
Like that's part of becoming a man.
27:35
Right. So you have to, like, take a
27:38
shower. You have to go in your hair.
27:40
You have to think about what your hair looks like when you go
27:43
out. Yeah.
27:44
And I and you have to, like, explain that this isn't a matter
27:47
of how what you should think about what other people think of
27:51
you or of of how much I love you.
27:53
It's like I'm giving you a skill here and I need you to listen to
27:57
me out of respect. And so that means that you need
28:01
to like care about your physical appearance, but that's just not
28:05
on their radar at that age. Like the idea that you would
28:07
start to stink if you don't use deodorant is a foreign concept
28:10
to them, right? And putting that on feels weird.
28:14
And it's no one likes change And some people have sensitivities
28:20
like to parts of their body or all this stuff.
28:24
And it's just not A1 size fits all situation.
28:28
Yeah. So it can, it can sometimes turn
28:31
into a situation, to answer your question, that is a hill, yeah,
28:34
that you have to be willing to die on, I guess.
28:37
Yeah, the context. And we're, we're using a
28:39
metaphor here. We're not talking about.
28:41
You have to use that with some common sense, but.
28:45
Right, Yeah, there's definitely not a blanket thing.
28:51
Because there's a lot, I do think parents have a tendency to
28:57
like go to 1 extreme or the other, either it doesn't matter
28:59
at all. And I'm going to let them look
29:00
however they want to look, which then has a ripple effect on
29:04
their self esteem and all kinds of horrible stuff.
29:07
So you have to, like, treat it like it's important, but then
29:09
you have other parents that are more militaristic about it and
29:12
they push their kids away because they're so, you know,
29:15
concerned about what they look like.
29:18
Yeah, and that's I guess the point that I was making is just
29:21
like not pushing your kids for them to look what you want them
29:24
to look like, you know, from a what you think is a nice.
29:30
You don't want everybody to think that your kid always looks
29:34
nice. And sometimes that comes back to
29:36
just issues that you struggle with.
29:38
You know, you want to appear as a the perfect family and you
29:42
want everything that everybody to have the perfect little
29:45
haircuts and this and that. And so it's, it's not a easy
29:50
thing because it, you know, from there, you're talking about, you
29:54
know, what our kiddos wear and the dress and you know,
30:00
obviously there are certain hills that need to, that you
30:03
need to die on with our daughters as far as what they go
30:07
out of the house wearing, right. So there's, but there's other
30:12
things that I don't know. There's there's not.
30:14
Giving up that fight in some ways in our society, Like we
30:17
watched What Women want the other day, we went on a little
30:20
Mel Gibson kick, watched Braveheart, and then did you see
30:23
What Women Want with Helen Hunt? Where he like falls on his head
30:26
and he magically attains his ability to know.
30:28
What women are thinking Oh yes, yes, it's.
30:32
Pretty funny, but like he goes dress shopping with his daughter
30:37
at some point for the prom because he knows that really
30:40
matters to her and he's trying to step up and be a good dad.
30:43
And he knows everything that she's thinking about herself and
30:46
about how the dress fits and how other people are going to look
30:48
at her. And he cut.
30:49
She comes out at one point and wears this like by today's
30:53
standard, really modest dress, like it wasn't super low cut.
30:57
The back was a little low where you like could see like the
30:59
small of her back and but it wasn't like super short.
31:02
And I looked at it and this was only like 20 years ago or 25.
31:06
I think it came out in 2000. And and it was like, he was
31:12
like, no way. And I was like, most parents
31:14
would be tickled pink if that was the prom dress these days,
31:18
right? But where we've come, you know,
31:20
in terms of our decency standards, if you want to call
31:24
them that for like a better term is pretty far.
31:26
So we've like, I guess I say that.
31:28
So they we've given up the fight that we've decided isn't isn't a
31:31
hill worth dying on. But maybe, maybe it was.
31:33
Maybe it is. Well, yeah, I don't mean you get
31:36
that slippery slope to where at some point it's, it's a hill
31:42
that you need to die on, you know?
31:43
So it's, yeah, I, I guess that brings up a good point, just
31:50
that they're, it is not an easy landscape to navigate all the
31:55
time with these things. And every kiddo is different.
31:59
They have different personalities, different needs,
32:02
and they based on age and situation, they're going to be a
32:10
glass case of emotion over certain things.
32:12
And just for us as parents to be able to, I think just the advice
32:17
is 1, you have to, I mean, know your kids and study your kids,
32:21
you be present. And another thing we talked
32:25
about as far as just a word we used was that was important is
32:30
just a pause, right? Like when we're kind of in the
32:34
heat of the moment or we're kind of dealing with some of these
32:38
heightened emotional outburst with our kiddos over certain
32:42
things to not react out of anger or emotion, but really to just
32:49
have a a pause, collect our thoughts and let let the moment
32:54
just rest and breathe a little bit before knowing how we're
32:58
going to respond. Because really in certain
33:02
situations, we may something really may kind of just stick in
33:06
our craw and like really get get us riled up and we want to.
33:11
It just takes everything we got to not just come back with that
33:15
power struggle and, yeah, you know, a negative emotional
33:19
response. Yeah, yeah.
33:20
Whether that's overstating it or or understating it, like I think
33:24
it works both ways. You can jump right to the worst
33:27
possible scenario, worst case scenario, or you can just jump
33:31
right to the point of, oh, that's that doesn't matter,
33:33
That's nothing. Be dismissive about it.
33:36
So both of those are incorrect. And I think a lot of times too,
33:39
it comes down to a matter of control.
33:41
Like, what are we really arguing about here?
33:44
You know? Yeah.
33:44
Take, for example, the classic battle about how to load the
33:47
dishwasher. Is this a really matter?
33:50
I understand maybe it's not stacked properly.
33:53
It doesn't get like all the way clean.
33:54
Or maybe there's a better way to do it than.
33:56
But but there's different strategies, too, with loading
33:59
the dishwasher. Like, there's just one way.
34:02
I mean, who's ever read the dishwasher manual?
34:04
And it's like, this is the way you is.
34:06
Can we settle the debate once and all?
34:07
Once and for all. This is the way.
34:09
This is the way. So, but those things accumulate
34:14
power over us over time. Like it becomes a power struggle
34:18
battle that gets add to all the other arguments that we've had
34:22
and all the other times that we've argued about the
34:24
dishwasher or in any number of things that are they're really,
34:30
you know, mole hills, but they become mountains.
34:32
So now we have to treat them like they're mountains.
34:34
We can't just like, magically turn it back into a molehill.
34:37
Yeah, Yeah, I know For us sometimes where it gets tough is
34:44
I go back to the dishes. That's always the the one job
34:49
post meals that is like nobody likes to do and having.
34:57
So there's already a kind of this negative or sometimes
35:01
frustration that then, you know, they're doing the dishes.
35:05
And so sometimes like if you're more of a picky person or you
35:11
just really rubs you the wrong way that they're not loading it
35:14
right. If you're like breaking stuff or
35:16
they're like mistreating an appliance or, you know, there's
35:20
some different levels. But if they're just putting the
35:23
bowls up top and they need to be down below and some things like
35:28
that, they have their system and they're not really trying to be
35:32
disrespectful about it. Like you could push your kid
35:35
over the limit where they're already kind of frustrated that
35:39
you're having to do the dishes. Like no, no, no, no, you're not
35:41
doing this right. You know, you just that
35:44
exacerbating our kids kind of, you know, message from that
35:50
verse. Fathers do not exacerbate your
35:53
kids, but you just kind of always nitpicking and just they
35:56
can't do anything right. And you're just that goes back
35:59
to control. You know, some of that just
36:03
sometimes we let our kids just do it and let them know that
36:07
it's not going to be done right. And then you can show them say,
36:10
hey, here's why you don't put a cup UPS, you know, normally up
36:15
in the dishwasher because it's full and it has to be 1 chicken.
36:20
Yeah, the old they got old. Natural consequence.
36:23
Strategy. Yeah, yeah, just let it happen.
36:26
And then you can have a teaching moment.
36:28
You have to be patient, right? You got to pause, say OK, I'm
36:31
going to let this thing. Happen and you got to be willing
36:33
to let things break. Yes.
36:36
Right. And that's not fly off the
36:38
handle. Yeah, I think another thing
36:41
enters in this too. Like there's a reason why we
36:44
have a mom and a dad, right? Is that we can, we can hand off
36:50
these things with certain kids. Like you may have a kid that
36:53
triggers you in one way, your spouse has a way that another
36:57
kid that triggers them in another way.
36:58
And so being able to tag team and to, to bounce ideas off of
37:03
each other, to talk and strategize and get on the same
37:07
page and to ask your stuff on your spouse.
37:09
Honestly, am I, am I overreacting here?
37:12
Like, maybe you can give me some feedback about how I'm handling
37:15
this situation. We do that here at the ranch.
37:17
You know, it's, it's important strategy.
37:20
Yeah. Because you can get really into
37:21
some power struggles with certain voice.
37:24
Yeah. You know, from thinking kind of
37:29
turning gears towards the faith element and this idea of
37:34
mountains and molehills, you know, it really comes down to
37:39
our our faith. It's a faith issue a lot of
37:42
times that we make a lot of molehills into mountains because
37:47
our eyes are not where they need to be, right?
37:49
We're focused on things that we don't need to be focused on.
37:54
And ultimately we're not focused on Christ who says don't worry
37:58
about tomorrow. You know that tomorrow's got
38:00
enough problems of its own and so it's all often a good picture
38:05
of where we are at and calibrate where our our faith walk is at.
38:10
When we tend to be over exaggerating our problems and
38:16
things that are before us that we blow out of proportion.
38:19
It's a direct proportion with where we're our faith is that.
38:23
Yeah, yeah, My dad has a phrase back to a Freddy ISM.
38:27
He's like, don't don't sweat the malt, don't sweat the small
38:29
stuff. It's all small stuff.
38:32
So that can be minimizing language.
38:34
We have to be careful about that.
38:36
If from an interpersonal perspective and you got to
38:40
understand the dynamics and read the room and all that.
38:42
But from a, from a theological, like you said, spiritual
38:47
perspective, I think that's true.
38:49
I mean, we, we get bent out of shape a lot, a lot of stuff that
38:53
in the in the end doesn't matter.
38:55
And so keeping that perspective is, is so important and, and
39:01
having a community of people that help you to maintain that
39:03
perspective and to correct you, to sharpen you.
39:05
And we were, we talked about that verse in Chapel the other
39:10
day and I for some reason had a King James version, a large
39:13
letter translation, which I was very grateful.
39:16
Now, now that I'm fifty, I was like, Oh, now I understand why
39:19
these large print editions exist.
39:22
And the the King James translation of that was as iron
39:27
sharpens iron soul, one man sharpens the countenance of
39:31
another the countenance. And I was like, OK, I think I
39:35
know what that word means. But I did a little just brush up
39:38
on the word. And it's like your facial
39:40
features, like how you're looking at things, how you're
39:44
perceiving things like that's the the King James Version is
39:48
kind of like a transliteration. It's not a translation.
39:51
So we can understand a little bit more usually.
39:53
I mean, there are limits to this about what would the actual
39:56
Greek or the Hebrew was. So they were talking about a
39:59
person's and I've never thought about that sharpening someone's
40:02
face. That just sounds weird.
40:05
But chiseled Look. Yeah, it's like if someone's
40:08
downcast, then I come alongside them and I sharpen them by
40:12
lifting them up, not by giving them more criticism.
40:15
And sometimes this idea of like iron sharpens and man up
40:18
everything, put your big boy pants on.
40:19
That's a fine approach to take. And I think that I don't think
40:22
that's a misapplication of the verse, but it doesn't take the
40:25
whole context of the verse into consideration.
40:28
Like, mainly what we should be doing is encouraging and lifting
40:31
each other up, not ignoring problems.
40:34
That's that's not what we're saying.
40:36
But are is what you're doing edifying?
40:40
Ask yourself that before you jump in, and be critical.
40:45
Yeah, I've heard the same, you know, whether it's, I don't know
40:51
if it's a book or whatever, but it's like it takes 3 positive
40:55
things to kind of overtake one negative, you know, so whatever.
41:00
7 or. Whatever, but the point
41:03
obviously being that we do tend to be more critical of our
41:08
kiddos and just naturally. And so I think we and we
41:15
downplay really how much that affects them.
41:19
And so as parents, being aware of even small things, catch
41:24
them, catch them doing good things and take notice and be
41:30
verbal about it. Write them little notes or.
41:33
However, you got to put a bow on a turd, you know, you got to use
41:37
your imagination to find some some good things that or some
41:40
different things that are happening.
41:42
Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's you.
41:43
Know positive direction A. Lot here because you could bury
41:47
kids, you know, with if you're going to stick to the program
41:51
manual or whatever. I mean, you could bury kids and
41:53
work hours and consequences and obviously that's not the point.
41:57
That's not going to do them any good at all or anybody any good.
42:02
So it's being able to find the little things.
42:07
And maybe there's one word that they didn't say that they
42:09
normally would have. That was a smart aleck remark
42:12
that they held off. It's like, man, it's actually
42:16
good. You're making some progress.
42:18
Yeah, yeah. Just a couple other kind of last
42:23
things before we wrap up here. Like some things we've we've
42:27
heard before, but bears reminding is like avoid words
42:31
like always and never, you know, never use the word never, never
42:36
use as an oxymoron, but that that just distances people,
42:40
doesn't bring people together because it's hardly it never is
42:44
always or never situation. Avoid sarcasm and joking to
42:48
minimize someone's feelings. Guilty.
42:53
Yeah, and and you you can really tell your own temperament and
42:59
the temperament other people by seeing what their go to is, is
43:02
their go to to kind of use that language the always never or is
43:05
their go to to kind of, you know anyways like to underplay to
43:11
make another Nacho reference. Anyways, like let's get to the
43:15
real issue. What you're feeling is not the
43:17
real issue. It's.
43:18
Yeah, that's interesting thought.
43:20
Just I'm thinking about myself with just why?
43:22
Like sometimes sarcasm is used because you really don't want to
43:25
have the real conversation. You know, it's just it's a easy
43:28
out, it's a downplay or push it, kick the can down the road.
43:34
You don't really want to have the deeper, harder conversation.
43:37
Or maybe it's just not the right time for that anyways, and you
43:41
just have a sarcastic remark to kind of cover over the
43:47
situation. That's definitely guilty of that
43:51
at times. Yeah, so.
43:54
All right. Well, we hope this conversation
43:57
has been helpful to you. It's been helpful to me to have
44:01
it so. But really what we're talking
44:04
about is like wisdom, spiritual wisdom and in this in this
44:09
thorny issue of mountains and mole hills and some of the
44:12
problems you can get into and and how to get out of them.
44:17
And so any last. Words, yeah, I just above
44:22
everything, just trying to simplify something that can be
44:25
difficult is just kind of recalibrating where like what
44:30
are your family values? What is your family believe to
44:34
be true and where do you guys kind of be cohesive on who are
44:40
the Maxwells, who are the limit is or who are, you know,
44:43
whatever your family, what's what's important to you guys?
44:46
Try to rally around that, however you decide to kind of
44:51
have that conversation. And I think that makes a lot of
44:56
other things we're talking about more clear.
44:59
You know, it's good to be consistent and clear as as
45:03
parents. And one way to get clear is to
45:05
if you can establish some of those foundational things that
45:08
you believe that are rooted in obviously our or our our faith
45:13
in Christ and who God calls us to be.
45:16
If we can kind of hone some of those core values into what our
45:20
our families believe, then it definitely helps to clarify, is
45:27
this a mountain or is this a molehill?
45:29
And so I just would encourage families to to do the work to do
45:36
that. And that's something that we are
45:38
have done a little bit in the past.
45:39
It's been a while, but we're trying to get back to.
45:42
We're working on some of that stuff.
45:43
Like a mission statement for your family.
45:46
Basically, however, you know, mission vision, core values or a
45:50
a Crest, family Crest and people go as far as to have and we did
45:54
some of that during the family, the father son thing that was
45:59
produced some pretty good fruit. So but all of that is just
46:03
having a clear direction. Yeah.
46:06
So it's helpful. Yeah, mission drift is a thing.
46:10
That's one of those mountains that you have to be willing to
46:13
die on. Is this something that's going
46:15
to pull us away from the what's what's most important?
46:18
Yeah. So in that regard, I would just
46:20
ask that you all pray for us because we're undergoing a lot
46:22
of that right now. Those discussions, making sure
46:26
that as we grow, we grow in the right way at the right speed,
46:31
that the people that come on board, you know, understand what
46:37
that mission is, that we communicate it to, to new
46:40
people. Clearly, the boys who are here,
46:42
the families we work with. And the bigger you get, the
46:45
harder it is to maintain that, like structural integrity,
46:48
because things that you take for granted, you know, that everyone
46:51
knows when your staff meeting is 3 people or five people become a
46:57
lot more difficult when it's 15 or 20 or 30 and some people are
47:03
at the meeting and some people aren't.
47:04
And you know, it's just all kinds of differences and
47:10
personality and backgrounds and all this stuff.
47:12
So we're undergoing some of those, some of those growing
47:15
pains now, but I think they're good.
47:17
Yeah. I think it's good that we would
47:19
be challenged in this way to make sure that we're prepared
47:22
for the boys That's that are going to be sent our way, you
47:26
know, hopefully 15 to 18 boys by the end of the year.
47:30
Yeah. So.
47:32
So bring thought. Keep us in your prayers.
47:34
Keep us in your prayers. Very good.
47:36
All right. Well, as always, thank you to
47:38
Thomas Brown for helping us out with this podcast.
47:42
And you bet. Yeah.
47:43
I hope he's he's doing. He's pray for him too.
47:47
He's feeling a lot of the phone calls that come in.
47:49
Yeah. And they're getting more, you
47:52
know, I hate to say it, but I don't know that our societal
47:56
problems are getting any better, regardless of all the hard work
47:59
we're doing here at Whetstone to to help out with the situation.
48:03
He's on the front lines. He's on the front lines and it
48:05
can be a it can be a hard job and and really wear you down
48:08
some of the difficult conversations with people that
48:11
you really can't help. You know that you have to steer
48:14
maybe in another direction. So but he does a great job of
48:17
doing that and we appreciate him doing it as well as helping out
48:20
with this podcast. Thank you, Thomas.
48:21
Yep. All right.
48:23
Well, thanks for listening y'all, and we'll catch you next
48:26
time on a time to sharpen. See you.
48:37
Whetstone Boys Ranch is a therapeutic boarding school
48:39
located in the scenic Ozarks of southern Missouri.
48:43
It was founded in 2011 to serve families from around the country
48:47
who are struggling with challenging behaviors from their
48:49
12 to 16 year old sons. Our mission is to sharpen the
48:53
character of young men. Please visit
48:56
whetstoneboysranch.com if you want to learn more about our
48:59
program or about how to contact us for help.
49:03
Thanks for listening and we hope to catch you next time on A time
49:06
to sharpen.