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Growing Pains · A Time to Sharpen

• 0:09
  Is there anything worse than a dull blade?
• 0:11
  Well, yeah, lots of things, I guess.
• 0:13
  Poverty, war, forgetting to have your podcast partner record his
• 0:18
  intro before he leaves on vacation, and then having to
• 0:21
  come up with something all on your own that makes people laugh
• 0:24
  without having to think too much, and which maybe even
• 0:26
  provides A subtle lead into the topic without being cheesy or
• 0:30
  controversial or obtuse or mundane or pedantic.
• 0:35
  And anyways, you get my point. A dull blade is bad.
• 0:38
  It's unusable. In fact, it's downright
• 0:41
  dangerous. Knives need sharpening.
• 0:45
  From Whetstone Boys Ranch in Mountain View, MO comes A Time
• 0:48
  to Sharpen, a bi weekly podcast that examines how we can all be
• 0:51
  better versions of ourselves. Better teachers, better
• 0:55
  counselors, better parents, better people.
• 1:06
  Welcome back to A Time to Sharpen.
• 1:08
  This is Axel Imita. I'm here with Brandon Maxwell.
• 1:11
  Howdy, Brandon. How's it going?
• 1:13
  It's going good. Good to see you.
• 1:15
  It's going good. We were talking in Chapel the
• 1:17
  other day that not every day is good, but there is good in every
• 1:20
  day. That is correct, yeah.
• 1:24
  And it was, what do we call it, Grata Tuesday.
• 1:27
  That's it. Grata Tuesday.
• 1:28
  Tuesday. It used to be Thursday.
• 1:30
  Thankful Thursday, Yeah, switch things around and now it's Grata
• 1:35
  Tuesday. Yeah, it's always a popular
• 1:38
  Chapel. We've talked about it before,
• 1:41
  but some of the. And if you've been on campus and
• 1:43
  down in the school room, you see a bunch of the stick it or
• 1:48
  sticky notes, the post it notes that are pink and yellow and
• 1:53
  green and blue. And it's all over the walls.
• 1:56
  And they're all just gratitudes that the boys and staff have
• 2:01
  done over, man, I mean, really from the beginning, haven't we?
• 2:04
  I mean, it's like pretty much, yeah.
• 2:06
  First year or two, so there's like 13 years.
• 2:08
  Worth of 13 years worth of sticky.
• 2:09
  Notes right now. So it's fun going back and
• 2:11
  reading some of. Those.
• 2:12
  Yeah. And we even have boys who come
• 2:14
  back and visit the ranch and they go back and they find the
• 2:17
  sticky note that they did. Yeah.
• 2:18
  The thing that they were proud of.
• 2:20
  Maybe a time that they set for a two mile run.
• 2:23
  Yeah. An experience they had and yeah,
• 2:26
  we tried to say now, not later or before and then people, not
• 2:31
  things. So it's kind of our mantra.
• 2:33
  And I, I started to create a little like story on Instagram
• 2:36
  and Facebook. You know the stories, right,
• 2:38
  right. Took pictures of the post, post
• 2:39
  its and I took one and then I forgot about it.
• 2:41
  So I need to I need to get back to that.
• 2:43
  No, we need to do that. Yeah.
• 2:44
  The other thing I'm thinking about is, and maybe any
• 2:47
  listeners out there that may have some creative ideas, we've
• 2:50
  probably mentioned this a little bit before, but just doing some
• 2:54
  type of artwork out of all those post it notes.
• 2:57
  Interesting. Just thinking about, you know,
• 3:00
  we, we have a friend of ours that's doing a commissioned
• 3:04
  piece of art with the state of Missouri and it's going to be
• 3:06
  really custom bespoke cool piece of artwork.
• 3:09
  But that would be something I think would be really cool to be
• 3:15
  very colorful and meaningful and something that could.
• 3:20
  Kind of commemorate or like a Ebenezer thing.
• 3:23
  These are the things that we remember God's faithfulness for.
• 3:26
  And. Right.
• 3:27
  Yeah. So some type of, I don't know,
• 3:30
  some type of some artwork that we could do.
• 3:33
  It's like. A giant sticky note, like top
• 3:35
  art? Yeah, I like that.
• 3:38
  Well, like I remember Will for Beta, he did that origami.
• 3:44
  What was it? The big Flamingo.
• 3:47
  He did this origami Flamingo and he like folded like 2000 pieces
• 3:51
  of paper. Wow.
• 3:52
  It was unbelievable. Yeah.
• 3:54
  And he actually got second in the state of Missouri for like,
• 3:57
  what they, it was like whatever division that was in.
• 4:03
  I can't remember exactly what kind of art, like sculpture.
• 4:05
  I think is what it was thinking of.
• 4:07
  Like, you know, the Nelson Atkins Museum in Kansas City?
• 4:10
  It has the the giant shuttlecocks for badminton.
• 4:13
  Oh yeah, not. Four of them.
• 4:15
  OK, Have you seen pictures of them?
• 4:16
  I've not been huge. It's AI think Klaus Oldenburg.
• 4:19
  He was a a famous pop artist like Andy Warhol in the 50s and
• 4:22
  60s. And so they're they're pretty
• 4:25
  famous. But he's done other Pop art
• 4:27
  sculptures like that, where he takes small objects and turns
• 4:29
  them into huge, like these shuttlecocks are, I don't know,
• 4:32
  like 15 by 15. Oh wow.
• 4:35
  Out of like. What are they made out of?
• 4:37
  Like concrete and molded, molded stuff.
• 4:41
  And yeah, but they, they look very, very realistic.
• 4:45
  They're like hyper realistic but giant.
• 4:47
  And so I'm thinking like on the front lawn, a couple giant
• 4:50
  sticky notes with maybe hanging on the side of the building or
• 4:54
  something that's hilarious to remind us of how God is good or.
• 4:57
  Whatever. But yeah, if you have any ideas,
• 5:00
  shoot us a text or comment or whatever.
• 5:03
  We always like comments. Let us know.
• 5:05
  That reminds me of those big talking about the big
• 5:07
  shuttlecocks. Some friends of ours are from
• 5:10
  Bell Missouri and they live in Jeff City now but I saw in the
• 5:15
  Howell County news or the Howell county or no it's the Howell
• 5:21
  Oregon rural Missouri magazine. They have this big 8000 LB like
• 5:28
  cowbell that is commemorating Bell, Missouri and that was so
• 5:33
  they're on the map. Yeah, world's largest cowbell.
• 5:36
  You know, world's largest rocking chair.
• 5:38
  Like they finally. Yeah, that maybe that's what we
• 5:41
  need. To do it's, it's the world's
• 5:42
  largest sticky note. And then we could get we could
• 5:46
  get people to come to the ranch just to see the sticky note.
• 5:49
  And put their own gratitude. Maybe.
• 5:51
  Yeah, Yeah. So, yeah.
• 5:54
  All right. Well, let's get into what we
• 5:56
  were going to talk, what we are going to talk about today.
• 5:58
  It's, it's about families, specifically growing Pains is
• 6:06
  what we were inspired to talk about.
• 6:08
  We were thinking about the, the TV show Growing Pains and we're
• 6:12
  thinking about everything we're going through here at the ranch
• 6:15
  with the new building, thinking about the families and, and
• 6:19
  phases that you go through as a family where you have to kind of
• 6:21
  like stick it out, what the boys have to do here in the program
• 6:24
  in order to grow. And so we have kind of a list of
• 6:27
  things that we're going to talk about that all are around that
• 6:31
  idea of growing pains. Yeah, we can't get the theme
• 6:35
  song out of our head. We we've listened to the same
• 6:38
  theme song before. There's a song bars for us,
• 6:40
  Brandon. No, Tom will play it.
• 6:42
  Come on. Tom will play it during the
• 6:43
  podcast. That's.
• 6:45
  True. But it will, yeah.
• 6:47
  When you listen to the song in the podcast, it will bring back
• 6:50
  some memories. If you were, you know, about our
• 6:53
  age in in the in the 80s in those sitcoms.
• 6:55
  Yeah. So.
• 6:56
  Oh. Alan Thicke.
• 6:58
  And they're probably like by the by the time they listen to this,
• 7:00
  we've probably already done the intro and he's probably played
• 7:02
  the music right. I'm thinking so that it's
• 7:04
  probably in an ear worm in there in their ear already.
• 7:07
  So you're welcome for that. He'll be singing it the rest of
• 7:10
  the day. Back in, the times were a little
• 7:12
  bit easier. Right back in the. 80s back.
• 7:16
  In the 80s during the Cold War. Yeah, I mean, it's like each
• 7:18
  other up. If you're living in the 80s,
• 7:20
  you're not really thinking that. But now that you're here and
• 7:24
  thinking back, you're like, oh, it was so simple.
• 7:26
  Right. So nice.
• 7:28
  All right, I I thought I'd start with a quote from Henry Ford,
• 7:31
  which has been misattributed to is it Tim Robbins, the
• 7:36
  motivational speaker guy? No, Anthony.
• 7:38
  Robbins, Tim Robbins, the actor, Tony.
• 7:40
  Tony Robbins. Yeah, but the quote is from
• 7:43
  Henry Ford originally. It's If you always do what
• 7:47
  you've always done, you'll always get what you've always
• 7:50
  got. You can hear you can hear
• 7:52
  Robbins saying that. How how would he say it?
• 7:53
  I I'm not a follower, but. Yeah, he's like, he's got that
• 7:57
  scratchy voice. If you always do what you always
• 8:00
  done, you're going to get what you always got.
• 8:03
  And there'll be some pictures, some motivational picture of or
• 8:06
  or him just flexing. Oh yeah, yeah, he's, I mean,
• 8:11
  yeah, I'm not like a Tony Robbins prostate type, but I
• 8:16
  mean, he's got yeah, he's done a lot of good work in his his day.
• 8:20
  So he's done and he's, I mean, I, he likes to from what I hear
• 8:26
  you, I'm going to his actual events.
• 8:27
  He likes to use some, some colorful language for effect,
• 8:33
  but I, I know that he is a, a Christian and and is spiritual.
• 8:39
  So he has some. Good.
• 8:40
  So, so let's start with this with the, the new house, right?
• 8:44
  We decided probably five years ago now is when we really just
• 8:49
  were like, OK, we're going all in.
• 8:51
  We can't, we can't keep operating in this house.
• 8:53
  It's not big enough. We can't grow.
• 8:55
  We can't get to the next level to where we can sustain what we
• 8:59
  do with the money coming in so that there's a a good balance of
• 9:04
  cash flow and everything and, and establish scholarship funds
• 9:08
  and, and really invest in the campus and, and build and
• 9:11
  improve. We can't do that in in this
• 9:13
  house, although it's been a great blessing for the first 14
• 9:16
  years, we decided we can't keep doing what we've always done.
• 9:20
  And so we decided we're going to build this new house.
• 9:22
  And it's been a challenge. And, and a lot of that stress
• 9:26
  has been on you because you're, because of your skill set.
• 9:31
  Number one, you have the ability to do these things.
• 9:33
  I would be way out of my depths if I'm talking to people about
• 9:37
  plumbing and electrical and, and problems and conflict management
• 9:40
  and you're just so good at that. But it comes with the cost and
• 9:45
  you've had a lot of stress and, and late nights or early
• 9:51
  mornings, However it affects your sleep patterns and
• 9:53
  everything. But we we feel like it's gonna
• 9:56
  be, you still feel like it's worth it, right?
• 9:58
  Make sure it's still a little check in.
• 9:59
  Yeah. I mean, it's like, yeah, thanks
• 10:02
  for the check in. Some days, you know, some days
• 10:06
  are better than others, I'll say that.
• 10:07
  But yeah, one thing that I have that has helped me in those
• 10:12
  times and just thinking about all of the, I mean, hundreds of
• 10:15
  hours collectively that the team, like you said back, you
• 10:19
  know, around COVID is really when we felt God kind of we just
• 10:23
  felt really we had nine boys here.
• 10:25
  That was kind of our sweet spot when we got more than that.
• 10:28
  And then all of the staff officing out of here and having
• 10:32
  to go away from the house parent model just because we needed
• 10:35
  that space for offices. It just was really cramped and,
• 10:39
  and creating some negative setting conditions.
• 10:41
  But, but just thinking back at those times and really
• 10:46
  petitioning God to be over all of those meetings, all of those
• 10:49
  discussions, all those ideas and the vision and trusting that he
• 10:54
  directed all those things and the, the design, the, you know,
• 10:59
  just all the things we, we didn't really have answers to,
• 11:02
  but just giving us enough of an OK to say, OK, this is, yeah,
• 11:07
  move forward, take this next step, do this.
• 11:09
  And so that helped me a lot of times through this process,
• 11:12
  through the growing pains of just knowing that, you know,
• 11:15
  it's not even though maybe more of that was on me, on my, my
• 11:19
  management, like the whole team was, we were all involved and
• 11:23
  invested in, in what we're doing here.
• 11:25
  And God above all that was, was in those discussions.
• 11:30
  And then just being confident that then he's directed us to
• 11:34
  this point and just keep so that that helped me kind of and
• 11:38
  continues to. Right, help me and and even for
• 11:41
  me when when things go wrong, I remind myself of that too.
• 11:44
  I'm like, hey, maybe the reason why this is going wrong right
• 11:46
  now is because it wasn't supposed to go the way that I
• 11:49
  planned it. And it's usually several like
• 11:52
  temper tantrums in before before that thought kind of clicks and
• 11:56
  I have to reset my thinking because I'm so stubborn.
• 11:58
  I'm like, I'm going to make this happen, right.
• 12:00
  And then finally, you're just like, you know what, Maybe it's
• 12:03
  not supposed to happen this way, right?
• 12:04
  And that's fine. And it's going to be even better
• 12:07
  this way. And I just kind of give it up.
• 12:09
  Yeah. So that's, I think that's
• 12:11
  another thing to remember during those growing pains, like don't
• 12:13
  fight the process. Yeah, well, I mean, case in
• 12:16
  point is just all the rain we've been having.
• 12:18
  You know, it's just like we for a couple months now, it's pretty
• 12:24
  much the house is done and ready and we're at the mercy of the,
• 12:29
  the spring season and the rains. And we've just had an
• 12:31
  unbelievably wet spring. And as soon as we get a couple
• 12:35
  days that are dry, can maybe get some equipment in here and just
• 12:38
  downpours again. So we just, it's out of our
• 12:41
  control. There's nothing we can do.
• 12:42
  And as much as we want to force things and it's just, you're
• 12:46
  going to be, you know, going backwards 2 steps if you try to
• 12:50
  force it. So it just just can only control
• 12:54
  that we can control and have to be OK with it.
• 12:57
  And again, trust that God's timing is is different than ours
• 13:01
  and. Yeah, timing.
• 13:02
  Timing is everything. You can have too much, too soon,
• 13:05
  too fast. And in our line of work, that is
• 13:11
  particularly true. Like it's different if you have
• 13:13
  a business, you're starting a restaurant and I have too many
• 13:16
  people show up to order food. Well, that's a good problem to
• 13:19
  have. You can work through that.
• 13:20
  And you know, if if you don't solve it, people will stop
• 13:23
  coming because it's frustrating your food takes too long.
• 13:26
  But that's a good problem to have.
• 13:28
  The problem that we would have if we had a bunch of troubled
• 13:31
  boys show up all at once. I mean, in the short term it
• 13:34
  would solve some of the money problems, I guess, but the, the
• 13:37
  wheels on the bus would just come off and we would have, we
• 13:41
  would have runaways, you know, we would have proper
• 13:44
  destruction. We would have the police
• 13:46
  literally would we would have to call the police.
• 13:49
  Certain, certain things would arise.
• 13:52
  We don't even need to go into all the things that would arise
• 13:54
  that would necessitate the involvement of law enforcement.
• 13:57
  But and that's come that's. Come from learning from previous
• 14:02
  growing chains, right? Because as we started and got
• 14:05
  going and we've talked about the tornado and getting boys after
• 14:08
  the tornado, that's what we learned from that experiences.
• 14:11
  We got like 5 boys all at once. And it was a very difficult
• 14:16
  season because they, and you know, it was almost like a
• 14:18
  mutiny. It was like US versus them
• 14:20
  mentality and really having to fight through kind of getting
• 14:25
  those boys invested into the program.
• 14:27
  And so we we learned from that that we really need to stagger
• 14:30
  our intakes. And so like you said, from a
• 14:32
  conventional standpoint, it's just like, and we all fight this
• 14:37
  too, from our own conventional thinking.
• 14:39
  It's just like, oh, we got this big new house, we got to get
• 14:41
  everything filled up and going and it just doesn't work that
• 14:44
  way. And so, so God does not make
• 14:47
  sense. God is not conventional, I guess
• 14:49
  I should say. So we have to keep that in mind,
• 14:51
  even though from the outside, a lot of times I kind of feel it
• 14:55
  and I'm probably you, you probably do too, but just the
• 14:57
  perception of like, what are y'all doing out there?
• 15:00
  Why is it taking so long? And why isn't that house filled
• 15:03
  up yet? And it's like that's, you know,
• 15:06
  just don't don't fully get it unless you're in here.
• 15:08
  Yeah, you can you. Can take those comments and you
• 15:12
  can be like, well, they don't fully understand the situation
• 15:15
  and you can kind of just move on.
• 15:16
  And. But sometimes the, the IT can
• 15:18
  put pressure on you to do things sooner than than you know you
• 15:21
  need to do. Yeah.
• 15:22
  And you can you can worry too much about what other people
• 15:24
  think. And so, I mean, we're not,
• 15:27
  we're, we're serving God, we're his servants and we each we have
• 15:30
  a call about the way we do things here at the ranch and not
• 15:34
  everyone would do it the way we do it.
• 15:36
  That's fine. Like what, like when you guys
• 15:38
  first were before I became involved in the the middle mid
• 15:43
  2000s, we didn't have ranch, we didn't have program, we didn't
• 15:46
  have really anything other than like a brand and some T-shirts
• 15:49
  and some masks, right. And you and Jeremy and and Nate
• 15:53
  were meeting and a cool. Booklet A Cool.
• 15:55
  Booklet yeah yeah and you got a lot of advice that was like what
• 16:00
  y'all need to do is just buy a place and just what did they
• 16:05
  say? Just just get.
• 16:06
  Started just get some boys. Yeah.
• 16:09
  So yeah, I mean, yeah, that may have been good for some.
• 16:12
  People, but that wasn't the the the call that you guys received
• 16:16
  from God, which was the low ratios, the quality, the
• 16:19
  Whetstone way, you know, and that's.
• 16:23
  I mean, I just know the only way I can say it is that like you,
• 16:27
  we are all called to different things.
• 16:29
  Yeah. And that's good because we all
• 16:30
  have different personalities and God works through us in
• 16:33
  different ways. And so we need to be aware of
• 16:36
  that when we're thinking about God's call for our life.
• 16:38
  And we also need to remember that when we're looking at other
• 16:40
  people and rushing to judgement about the way that they're doing
• 16:43
  things like they are. Yeah, God has called them to
• 16:47
  something different. You know, their journey is
• 16:48
  different than yeah. And even in with these types of
• 16:51
  facilities, there's a lot of people that like have gone and,
• 16:54
  you know, maybe they, they built up a business and they sold it.
• 16:57
  And God spoke to them about how, you know, they really wanted to
• 17:01
  do something a little more impactful.
• 17:02
  And so they're like, well, you know, they sell, sell a business
• 17:06
  for a few $1,000,000. And it's like, well, I got some
• 17:08
  capital. I'm going to go, I, I really
• 17:10
  want to start a camp or a boys ranch or, you know, whatever,
• 17:13
  some a nonprofit, you know, so God speaks to them in different
• 17:17
  ways and at different times. And sometimes the facilities,
• 17:20
  like there's facilities that operate that way and they have
• 17:24
  just more, you know, cash flow, but there's grassroots people
• 17:27
  like us that just scratch and claw and, you know, God just
• 17:31
  puts the people in together and resources at the right time.
• 17:35
  And it's always been that way as as tough it is as it is
• 17:38
  sometimes. And but it's just to your point,
• 17:42
  God's working on different people, different times in
• 17:45
  different ways. And we can't get too wrapped up
• 17:47
  with with all that. We just got to stay kind of
• 17:51
  focused on our relationship with him and what he's doing on this
• 17:55
  ministry and right, be good with it.
• 17:58
  Yeah. And so one of the specific ways
• 18:01
  in which God, we feel like God's timing is has been providential.
• 18:04
  You were mentioning the reins and some of the delays that are
• 18:07
  inevitable with with construction.
• 18:09
  Yeah, and some of the impatience that we feel about wanting to
• 18:12
  get the program going and serving more boys and all these
• 18:15
  things that are on our heart is that God has has brought to our
• 18:19
  doorstep literally people to fill roles that that we need
• 18:24
  fulfilled, right? So like we've needed a program
• 18:28
  director for about a year now, right?
• 18:31
  So we've been operating with, you know, contracting counseling
• 18:35
  services and, and kind of filling in the roles as best we
• 18:38
  can amongst ourselves. But God has delivered a program
• 18:41
  director just in the last month or so.
• 18:43
  And, and he starts in the next few weeks.
• 18:46
  He and his wife are moving here and we're super excited about
• 18:50
  about that. And then a full time therapist,
• 18:53
  counselor, we've been missing since January.
• 18:56
  Like I said, we've been contracting out those services
• 18:58
  and so that person is coming in a week and then we have a part
• 19:02
  time counselor who's also kind of found us, you know.
• 19:06
  Yeah. And some of the stuff is we've
• 19:08
  been proactive and posting on Indeed and, and recruiting and
• 19:11
  visiting places. And some of it's just like God
• 19:13
  just says, here you go. But we've been.
• 19:15
  Doing that for a year, yeah, for a long time, we've had like
• 19:18
  hardly any interaction. Yeah.
• 19:20
  And the couple that we did have are just obvious, like, no,
• 19:24
  yeah, right. That's not going to work out.
• 19:25
  Couple failure. Failures to launch, so yeah,
• 19:28
  you're. Just like, OK, you know, can
• 19:30
  again, going back to conventional wisdom, we're just
• 19:33
  like, gosh, we got this huge house and we're getting close to
• 19:35
  the end and we need to start filling this up.
• 19:38
  And we have all of these physicians that are open and
• 19:42
  it's like, God, what is going on?
• 19:44
  Yeah, it's like we're looking. At God like tapping our foot,
• 19:47
  pointing to our watch. OK, it's it's time now.
• 19:50
  It's time. And he's like, OK, I I got this,
• 19:53
  I got this and cause all that. Happened like literally in like
• 19:57
  a two week span. Really.
• 19:59
  Yeah, something like that. I mean, it was just as far as
• 20:02
  those people coming to the table and having interviews and and
• 20:07
  working through all that. So that's been.
• 20:10
  A huge blessing. And then just yesterday I get a
• 20:14
  call from a friend of mine who used to be the mayor here.
• 20:19
  And Jeremy and I were just talking, talking about growing
• 20:23
  pains. OK, we got the new house.
• 20:24
  We're going to be operating in two locations.
• 20:27
  Like we need another golf cart or side by side or something to
• 20:32
  get back and forth just from a practical standpoint because
• 20:36
  it's just, it's far enough over there.
• 20:37
  And just some of those logistical things.
• 20:40
  And we were trying to figure out how to squeeze something out of
• 20:42
  the budget to get something used and make it work.
• 20:45
  And I get a text yesterday with a picture, the brand new side by
• 20:49
  side and he's like, hey, could y'all use this?
• 20:52
  It's like, are you serious? It's like it's got 8-8 miles on
• 20:57
  it. And I was like, I just can't use
• 20:59
  it. And so it's just like, you know,
• 21:02
  it's just unbelievable the timing that, you know, God
• 21:05
  throws that stuff. It's not coincidental, you know,
• 21:08
  and he knows what we need when we need it.
• 21:11
  And in spite of our, you know, scratching and clawing and
• 21:16
  trying to force things, he'll, he'll just drop it a lot.
• 21:18
  Well, and you got a. Phone call right before we
• 21:20
  started this podcast from the new program.
• 21:23
  Oh yeah. Right.
• 21:24
  Who's? Bringing his exercise equipment.
• 21:26
  Yeah, he's like, we're, we're scaling down and I'm going to be
• 21:29
  there at the ranch. I might as well.
• 21:30
  I could exercise with the boys or whatever.
• 21:33
  And so, so yeah, I've got. A whole gym and workout and
• 21:36
  stuff got donated. Yeah.
• 21:38
  So so yeah. So it's very yeah.
• 21:44
  Through those growing pains is the growth.
• 21:47
  And I really when we face those and we really are have the
• 21:52
  attitude of like and not being like, OK, God, what's going on?
• 21:56
  But just trust is like, God, you got this.
• 21:58
  I know you got this. There's a few times I would say
• 22:02
  there's more times I'm on the other camp where I'm just like,
• 22:04
  gosh, God, just please come on. Like, let me see it.
• 22:09
  But there's been a few times where I just, I've seen God show
• 22:11
  up enough and he's like, God's going to do it.
• 22:14
  You know, he's, he's going to do it and then he does it.
• 22:17
  And then you're just like, that even bolsters your faith more,
• 22:19
  you know, when it's just like seeing here it is again.
• 22:23
  Yeah, You know, Yeah. But that's what he requires of
• 22:26
  us is that that faith and that movement that's based on things
• 22:30
  that we can't see, that we don't know we're going to happen yet.
• 22:34
  And, and he just has built us that that way.
• 22:38
  And in his Providence, he's designed us to to need hope, to
• 22:44
  need trust, to need to put our faith in, in things that we
• 22:49
  don't understand because we can't understand everything
• 22:52
  about our world or ourselves or even the smallest little thing
• 22:55
  that exists. You can't understand it
• 22:57
  completely. You spent your whole life just
• 23:00
  trying to study one thing. You would just by the end be
• 23:05
  more aware of your ignorance than the rest of the world.
• 23:08
  That's what it boils down to. And so, yeah, so growing pains
• 23:15
  to kid you with that concept. So new house, new staff of the
• 23:19
  new program, we're going to be doing things a different way.
• 23:21
  We're going to make mistakes. We're going to, you know, when
• 23:24
  do we move the the upper level boys to the new house?
• 23:27
  What does that mean regarding school and community service and
• 23:31
  work days and, and field trips and who, who's going to work
• 23:36
  best with the upper level boys and who's going to work best
• 23:39
  with the, the, the I don't want to say lower level.
• 23:42
  I'm going to say like just level one guys, level one guys and
• 23:47
  communication issues. Like we don't know what we don't
• 23:49
  know at this point. They're going to be problems and
• 23:51
  hiccups and bumps in the road. And I mean, we're going into
• 23:55
  this fully aware that it's going to be a difficult transition and
• 23:59
  exciting and filled with possibility and, and, and really
• 24:03
  believe better care. We're going to be more
• 24:05
  successful than we than we have been already.
• 24:08
  And yeah, maybe. Talk through a little bit of the
• 24:13
  a little of the specifics with the schedule just 'cause I know
• 24:16
  we have some parents of boys that are existing in the program
• 24:20
  and maybe thinking about sending their son here.
• 24:22
  But maybe talk about when that transition happens probably in
• 24:26
  about a month. Like what is that going to look
• 24:29
  like on the how's that going to change from the schedule that
• 24:32
  we're doing now? Yeah.
• 24:34
  So we've already started making the transition to some extent.
• 24:38
  Even though we're in this house now, we, we kind of do have two
• 24:41
  separate programs because the new guys are in school on Monday
• 24:45
  and Tuesday and then Wednesday through Friday they're on work
• 24:50
  program, some vocational training.
• 24:53
  There's some. Adventure Therapy.
• 24:55
  Maybe field trips, although level 1 don't they don't go on
• 24:58
  as many of those because they're kind of like a reward, right?
• 25:01
  And you have to trust guys more. You bring them off campus and
• 25:04
  things can happen when they're off campus.
• 25:06
  If if they're not like further in the program, we can't we
• 25:09
  can't really fully trust them yet.
• 25:10
  Yeah. And then there's certain
• 25:13
  privileges that that guys get on level 2 and three that that
• 25:17
  they're getting to experience while they're kind of in the
• 25:21
  same house with the lower with the new guys.
• 25:24
  And so that can create some jealousy and some tension and,
• 25:28
  and things. But we feel like when, when
• 25:30
  they're in that new house, they they won't have that, but
• 25:32
  they'll hopefully the guys that are new here will will grow
• 25:37
  dissatisfied with some of the restrictions that they that we
• 25:39
  have to keep in place, right, and really work harder to get to
• 25:43
  that upper level house. And so that upper level house,
• 25:47
  we imagine being, you know, just a nicer environment.
• 25:50
  There's not as much turmoil, there's not as much tension.
• 25:53
  There's more, there's more trust, right?
• 25:56
  You know more space can. Give people more.
• 25:59
  Freedom when they demonstrate more responsibility, more space.
• 26:02
  If you get to visit the new house, you'll see this gorgeous
• 26:05
  big new room when you walk in. Yeah.
• 26:08
  And it kind of, I've heard people say, you know, sometimes
• 26:12
  make comments that that are that are kind of like complimentary,
• 26:17
  but kind of like, like they haven't used the word opulent,
• 26:21
  but that's the word that comes to mind.
• 26:22
  They're like, whoa, that's a nice like why do we spend so
• 26:27
  much money on this really nice space?
• 26:29
  And I know you have a good response to that, so I'm gonna
• 26:31
  let you take that like why is that space so big?
• 26:34
  Why is it so open? Why is it so nice?
• 26:36
  Well, that. Goes back to the hundreds of
• 26:40
  hours that we were talking about around the table and just even
• 26:44
  though this house has been great and it's a good sized house,
• 26:47
  obviously it's a 10,000 square foot house, but we're out of
• 26:51
  space And when we think about space with boys and just us in
• 26:58
  general and creating relationships, we wanted
• 27:03
  something with higher ceilings and just a really just a
• 27:09
  especially the great room to have nice big space.
• 27:11
  What we call to allow a space to allow relationship to happen and
• 27:18
  we try to create that in all aspects of the program.
• 27:21
  I mean the the cabin out there is is something that is along
• 27:26
  those lines like that is a space that allows solid relationships
• 27:30
  to happen. The loft in the the new house
• 27:33
  and the living room and the fireplace and just everything.
• 27:38
  Yeah, 285 acres. All of that is specifically
• 27:43
  designed or was talked about to allow relationships to happen in
• 27:49
  that space. And so that was something that
• 27:52
  was intentional and to be able to.
• 27:55
  The other part of that is just when we think about the boys and
• 28:00
  the families and the facility itself, I think when a parent or
• 28:07
  donor comes on campus and they see something that is solid and
• 28:14
  that is well taken care of and well thought out and all that
• 28:19
  stuff we believe speaks well to the end product that we serve
• 28:24
  our boys is that we take care of our boys because we care about
• 28:29
  where they're going to be living.
• 28:30
  We care about creating the home environment and it's not shoddy
• 28:34
  work. It's not just hey, we're going
• 28:36
  to do it on a shoestring budget. We want to be able to have a
• 28:40
  good, good amenities for the boys and something that is going
• 28:45
  to last. I mean, that's the other part.
• 28:47
  Boys are tough on things. So you got to have things that
• 28:49
  are strong and tough. And it also just is is grand.
• 28:55
  You know, all those things kind of speak into the we're doing,
• 28:59
  we're doing. Big things here at the ranch,
• 29:02
  like the, the, the work that you do in in someone's heart and the
• 29:06
  seeds that you plant and what grows thereafter is, is, is
• 29:10
  about as big as it gets. We don't realize that sometimes
• 29:13
  we look at like stadiums, you know, Major League Baseball
• 29:17
  stadium and we're in awe or we, you think about governmental
• 29:20
  buildings or statues and they're like awe inspiring or, or even
• 29:24
  nature, a mountain, you know, the majesty of a mountain or an
• 29:27
  ocean that how huge it is. Like all that compares and pales
• 29:32
  in comparison with like a single soul, like a soul is eternal.
• 29:36
  It's going to outlast all those things.
• 29:39
  And so I think that's what we're trying to say.
• 29:41
  Is it like the what we do like matters what we do.
• 29:43
  We want it to last. We did a podcast on the
• 29:46
  Whetstone way and what that means.
• 29:48
  So I think that helps to kind of understand our mission.
• 29:50
  Again, this is the way we do it. There are other ways to do
• 29:54
  things and to operate and, and different personality types.
• 29:59
  And, you know, people in, in foreign missions, you know, who
• 30:03
  are trying to get, they're looking at different like
• 30:06
  metrics and ratios. They're trying to eliminate
• 30:09
  world hunger, for example, like you want the greatest good for
• 30:12
  the, you know, greatest number and you're squeezing every penny
• 30:16
  that you can to try to reach as many possible people as you can.
• 30:19
  Like that's one way to do it. And that's important to do,
• 30:21
  especially if you're dealing with something like survival and
• 30:24
  everything. We're also dealing with survival
• 30:26
  because our guys, I mean our parents speak to us all the
• 30:29
  time. We get 5 to 10 phone calls a day
• 30:31
  from parents talking about how they don't think their kid is
• 30:35
  going to last another week or two.
• 30:37
  And so and so point being like Our Calling is to that quality
• 30:43
  and that investment in that relationship and that takes time
• 30:46
  and the building itself kind of speaks to that is what I would
• 30:49
  say. All right, So with gross growing
• 30:53
  pains, with new staff, with new program, with a new house, new
• 30:58
  boys, I, I would say one of the thing about new boys about like
• 31:02
  growing too fast, like I mentioned earlier, like we get a
• 31:06
  lot of phone calls and we do get a lot of phone calls, but it's
• 31:10
  not, it's a complicated process figuring out if a boy is right
• 31:14
  for your program. It's not like we just just
• 31:17
  accept any boy like the, the family has to be involved for
• 31:20
  one, right? And we're not, we're not just
• 31:23
  going to take a boy just because the family can afford it.
• 31:26
  Like, it has to be a family that understands what we're trying to
• 31:29
  do is going to be committed to working on their marriage in
• 31:31
  their home so that when the boy returns home, he has a better
• 31:34
  chance for success. OK.
• 31:35
  So that's one thing. It's another thing is like, we
• 31:38
  need boys, but it's more important that they that they
• 31:40
  need us. So this is the right place for
• 31:42
  them. Yeah.
• 31:42
  Because we've been through it enough times to know if if that
• 31:45
  match isn't right, it's not only is it not going to be
• 31:48
  necessarily good for that boy, it's going to be hard on the
• 31:50
  other boys in the program and hard on staff.
• 31:53
  And like, that's just not a good, not a good situation, so.
• 31:57
  There. Are growing pains with figuring
• 31:58
  out what that looks like moving forward.
• 32:00
  And so we're working on things with our website and the out
• 32:05
  recruiting and creating funnels online and working with experts
• 32:09
  and people who have the skills that we don't have when it comes
• 32:12
  to like being good at the Internet.
• 32:14
  That's an important part of it and marketing ourselves
• 32:16
  correctly and all those things. So all right, so now let's move
• 32:20
  into something that's more maybe on the minds of some of the
• 32:24
  listeners who tend TuneIn because they're wanting some
• 32:26
  like tips on how, how to struggle with my, how to, how to
• 32:30
  work with my struggling teenager.
• 32:32
  You know, if, if I don't want to send them to Whetstone because
• 32:37
  believe me when we say we don't want families to have to send
• 32:40
  their boys to Whetstone, right? We, it's kind of an ironic
• 32:43
  situation to be in to try to, we're trying to recruit boys and
• 32:46
  their customers and clients and families and everything like
• 32:49
  that on one sense. But we really don't want people
• 32:52
  to have to send their their son to Whetstone.
• 32:55
  And this applies also to boys and girls, right?
• 32:56
  Some of the things we're about to say.
• 32:58
  So I thought we'd talk a little bit about like growing pains
• 33:03
  like in in families. We've talked about health crises
• 33:06
  in previous episodes. We talked in the last one about
• 33:10
  marriage and difficulties that you go through in marriage, but
• 33:12
  there are other things in the life of a family that where you
• 33:17
  experience growing pains. And so I'll I'll do one and then
• 33:22
  you do one. We'll just talk about a few of
• 33:24
  them. So maybe one that you're in the
• 33:26
  middle of right now. How about how about that?
• 33:27
  How about we, we both share like a personal experience.
• 33:30
  So mine would be, I'll give you time to think about yours while
• 33:33
  I, since I sprung this one on you.
• 33:36
  I have three adult children at this point, right?
• 33:41
  I have an 18 year old, a 19 year old and a 23 year old.
• 33:45
  And they are all at different, they're in different stages of
• 33:52
  becoming independent adults. And this summer actually, we're
• 33:58
  all together back home for a summer once Emma gets back from
• 34:02
  Spain. So we're all going to be living
• 34:03
  in the same house together, bumping up against each other,
• 34:07
  you know, enjoying each other's presence and appreciating who we
• 34:10
  are, but different, like adult individuals living in one rather
• 34:17
  small space. It's a cabin.
• 34:20
  And so we're going to have to figure out like what that looks
• 34:23
  like moving forward And, and where are those boundaries
• 34:26
  between, you know, like Caleb, he's going to be living at home
• 34:30
  the next year, at least as far as we can tell right now.
• 34:35
  That's the plan right now. We might be talking on the next
• 34:37
  podcast about how he has, he is seeking alternate living
• 34:40
  arrangements. But for now, he's going to be
• 34:42
  taking some classes at the Community College and working
• 34:45
  towards engineering kind of focus and, and working hands on
• 34:49
  stuff. He loves to work with machines
• 34:52
  and engines and construction and landscaping and it's all great
• 34:55
  and he can save money and everything, but we're going to
• 34:57
  have to establish some of those boundaries and, and what are the
• 35:00
  decisions that you get to make for yourself?
• 35:02
  And what are the decisions that you don't get to make yourself
• 35:05
  because you're living here? And what are the consequences?
• 35:07
  This is more to my point. What are the consequences that
• 35:10
  I'm going to let you experience because you are now an adult and
• 35:14
  I will not be stepping in and, and saving you from whatever
• 35:19
  thing you chose to do or not to do right.
• 35:23
  And so we talked just this morning in our staff meeting
• 35:26
  about baby birds and baby rabbits and, and things.
• 35:30
  And at the ranch here, we see a lot of that.
• 35:32
  We live out in the country. So Mama Mama rabbit dies and
• 35:36
  there's a clutch of it's a clutch, right, of baby rabbits.
• 35:39
  That's the word. Gabe, that's what he used.
• 35:41
  So we'll just say it's a clutch of baby rabbits.
• 35:44
  And yeah, even in the best situation like his, his
• 35:49
  statistics were like one in five or two in 10 are going to
• 35:53
  survive. And nature is going to decide
• 35:54
  which of those are the best. And you can't save them.
• 35:58
  And you shouldn't try to save them because it's going to be
• 36:00
  bad for them in the long run. They're not going to develop the
• 36:03
  skills they need to survive. And it's going to honestly, like
• 36:06
  from the ranch perspective, it's going to be bad for us because
• 36:09
  the boys are going to get attached to this animal that at
• 36:12
  some point has to be released into the wild.
• 36:15
  And they're going to fight over who gets to feed the baby
• 36:19
  rabbit. Other boys are going to threaten
• 36:21
  that rabbit, what seems like. An innocent thing at the
• 36:25
  beginning, yeah, To get AT. And annoy the other boys that
• 36:27
  that care about the rabbit. Who gets to name the rabbit?
• 36:30
  You know who gets bragging rights for having named the
• 36:33
  rabbit? I mean, you go on and on and on
• 36:34
  about the the ridiculous things and scenarios that arise when
• 36:38
  when you decide at a boys ranch to to try to raise a baby wild
• 36:42
  animal. It's just so we have a rule.
• 36:44
  Don't do it. But not everyone gets the memo.
• 36:46
  And so and the boys can be very persuasive and make you feel
• 36:50
  like a cold heartless. And when you see the ranch dog
• 36:55
  carrying a baby rabbit in its mouth that is about to crush and
• 36:58
  it's like you just feel obligated, just like I need to
• 37:02
  do something here. So it's like sometimes you're
• 37:04
  forced with the decision and it's just like all of a sudden
• 37:07
  it's like in your lap and you're here.
• 37:09
  You are taking care of this baby rabbit.
• 37:11
  No way. So so back to my point.
• 37:13
  About the The Wild Things need to learn how to live on their
• 37:16
  own, yeah. And you have a.
• 37:18
  Period of time as the adult, as the parent to show them how.
• 37:20
  And then eventually they get out of the nest.
• 37:23
  You don't let them come back in the nest.
• 37:24
  It's not going to work. They're not going to learn to
• 37:26
  survive. Don't do it.
• 37:27
  So yeah, what they're going to be there have already been
• 37:30
  situations, I'll say that have arisen in our household where
• 37:34
  where that has come up and we've had to navigate that as parents.
• 37:37
  And it takes a lot of wisdom and not every situation's the same.
• 37:41
  And you're you still bear some responsibility to them.
• 37:46
  They're still your children even when they're adults.
• 37:48
  And so it's going to be some growing pains as we move forward
• 37:52
  and our kids get older and as they leave the nest, we're going
• 37:55
  to have things that we have to deal with as a as a couple,
• 37:58
  husband and wife. And our marriage will be
• 38:00
  affected by all that. Yeah.
• 38:01
  But in the end, we'll, they'll be better, more equipped to
• 38:05
  survive and make their own decisions and, and we'll be
• 38:08
  stronger as a result of growing closer to each other through
• 38:12
  through that period of turmoil. So, yeah.
• 38:15
  So that's mine. Family growing pains.
• 38:19
  Still got the song now that we got each other.
• 38:23
  That's what that's it. You you said each other at the
• 38:26
  end of that and reminded me of the song again, man, mine's not
• 38:31
  that far off as far as the space.
• 38:33
  Again, talking about space like I got, you know, Will is.
• 38:37
  I mean, he just, they're just bigger, man.
• 38:40
  It's like he's big and Evelyn is growing and they just take up
• 38:44
  more space and, and they just, they are louder and he walks
• 38:51
  louder. I mean, just everything is like
• 38:54
  they're, they're more expensive. He's about to drive.
• 38:56
  So we're going to be, you know, entering that phase of just
• 39:00
  figuring out the insurance and what he's going to drive and all
• 39:04
  of that. So there's going to be some some
• 39:06
  growing pains navigating through all of that.
• 39:11
  But yeah, it's just the, we've talked about it before on here,
• 39:16
  but the it's just the clutter. We don't, we were always trying
• 39:20
  to pare things down, you know, and try to declutter stuff.
• 39:24
  But it just when you got eight people living in a relatively
• 39:27
  small place, it just gets like we talked about the negative
• 39:31
  setting conditions here. You know, especially as
• 39:33
  teenagers, they kind of have get more, need more autonomy and
• 39:36
  want more autonomy. And when they have their little
• 39:40
  sisters or little brothers, you know, share in the same room, it
• 39:44
  gets annoying to them. And so it's like you're always
• 39:48
  trying to navigate like, Hey, you need to be a good example.
• 39:53
  They're always looking up to you.
• 39:54
  But then you're it's like, I, I get it.
• 39:56
  I understand why you're frustrated A.
• 39:58
  Specific example like a. Little nitty.
• 40:00
  Gritty a little. Maxwell.
• 40:01
  Household about one of those the well.
• 40:05
  Older versus. Younger, so yeah.
• 40:07
  I mean, Evelyn really loves to be neat and tidy and have
• 40:13
  everything all together. And Anna loves to play with
• 40:20
  about, you know, 8 or 10 stuffed animals and has all these little
• 40:25
  toys all over the place. And she's not great about
• 40:29
  keeping all that stuff clean. And I'm picking up after
• 40:32
  herself. And so Evelyn will come home
• 40:35
  from school and it's just like she, you know, she spent some
• 40:40
  time, but Evelyn's not, you know, she'll leave her stuff
• 40:43
  around the house too. But she really likes to put it
• 40:47
  in her little sister's face when they, you guys are always
• 40:50
  messing up the room. And I already clean everything
• 40:52
  up, you know. And so there's a lot of
• 40:54
  contentious attitudes around just keeping things clean and
• 41:00
  neat and tidy. And so that's, that's one
• 41:04
  particular one. And it's it's.
• 41:06
  Good to remember too. This is my advice.
• 41:10
  One of my go to advices pieces of advice for parents, for what
• 41:14
  it's worth, is when you have conflict among your kids or
• 41:21
  you're having conflict with your kids, it's good to take a step
• 41:25
  back and to realize like that conflict is good.
• 41:28
  Like they need to learn how to manage conflict.
• 41:31
  If you lived in an environment where there wasn't conflict,
• 41:33
  they would not learn how to be a good parent when they have
• 41:38
  conflicts with their kids or when they get married and they
• 41:41
  realize, wow, this is not a cakewalk.
• 41:45
  This is going to be hard. This is going to be a grind at
• 41:47
  times, and I'm going to have to figure out some things about how
• 41:50
  to get through this difficult time.
• 41:52
  And if I'm just expecting it to be nice, I'm probably just going
• 41:55
  to be like, well, I guess it wasn't a good match.
• 41:57
  You know, I guess we weren't meant to be.
• 42:00
  I guess we're not compatible. You know, all of these excuses
• 42:03
  that the world gives us about how we should be able to, like,
• 42:05
  get out of these, the duty responsibilities associated with
• 42:09
  marriage. Yeah.
• 42:10
  I've. Been really convicted of that
• 42:13
  recently of just because I don't.
• 42:15
  I know I can get short and I can see that some of that has
• 42:22
  impacted will or he handles some things the way sometimes that I
• 42:27
  handle things. And I've noticed that like,
• 42:29
  especially for us as parents, like we have to, to have that
• 42:33
  perspective to know, you know, it's OK to, to be frustrated
• 42:38
  and, and we're going to get frustrated, but it's like to be
• 42:41
  able to have the foresight enough to, if we need to go, not
• 42:46
  act out of emotion and be able to collect ourselves.
• 42:50
  We all kind of have our own ways that that we can do that and
• 42:53
  talk ourselves off the ledge before we approach a situation
• 42:57
  like that. But it's so important to keep
• 42:59
  that perspective and know that like the growth that is
• 43:04
  happening that we don't see and we want to be different.
• 43:08
  And we're just like, if, if all of this, if we just had more
• 43:11
  space, everything would be OK. Or, you know, whatever we tell
• 43:14
  ourselves, it's like, that's not the case.
• 43:18
  It's like the, there's, there's growth that's happening and we
• 43:22
  need to be able to guide our kids through that journey.
• 43:27
  And that's a really important thing that to be on the same
• 43:31
  page with your spouse, that's like crucial.
• 43:34
  And it's not that you have to agree on everything, but you
• 43:36
  have to, I mean, some of those discussions about how you handle
• 43:40
  certain things or if you guys disagree on something, some of
• 43:43
  that needs to be done away from the kids.
• 43:45
  So, you know, you guys are in unison that the kids can see,
• 43:49
  hey, mom and dad are in agreement.
• 43:51
  They're not freaking out about all this stuff.
• 43:53
  And they're cool, calm and collected most of the time.
• 43:59
  You know, that just helps speak to us like, hey, we're not.
• 44:02
  It's frustrating. But you know, the security mom
• 44:05
  and dad love each other, they love us.
• 44:08
  We have a family unit and every family kind of goes through
• 44:11
  this. I think those are some key
• 44:13
  things to really the under undercurrent of like the
• 44:17
  security element that that kids feel when mom and dad are really
• 44:21
  like at each other's throats and we're not having not on the same
• 44:24
  page discussion. So over here and that's.
• 44:28
  True with the boys here at the ranch too.
• 44:29
  We have to remind ourselves of that.
• 44:31
  Like sometimes we just want to step in and OK, enough is
• 44:36
  enough. Everyone shut up, you know, be
• 44:39
  quiet, you know, make it go away.
• 44:43
  Because I'm the grown up and I'm the authority figure and I can
• 44:46
  by the force of my, my own will just solve all these problems.
• 44:50
  And you do this and you, well, that might, that might be
• 44:54
  necessary sometimes to put the foot down and, and be
• 44:57
  authoritative, but all that does is just kind of like solve it
• 45:01
  for the, for the moment. And you have to see conflict as
• 45:06
  teachable moment. That was a buzzword when I was
• 45:09
  coming up in education. You don't hear that one as much,
• 45:11
  but it'll come back around as everything recycles.
• 45:14
  And people like teachable #teachable moment.
• 45:16
  You're like, that's a new phrase.
• 45:18
  No, we were saying that back in the 90s, teachable moments.
• 45:21
  And so we need to see, begin to see situations as like
• 45:27
  opportunities to instruct. And like that's your curriculum.
• 45:31
  And we spend all this time thinking about if we're
• 45:33
  homeschool, what are curriculums going to be?
• 45:35
  Well, your curriculum is figuring out how to live
• 45:39
  together and how to work through conflict.
• 45:41
  And that's a built in curriculum that God's given us that is like
• 45:44
  priceless. It doesn't doesn't cost
• 45:46
  anything. Yeah.
• 45:47
  Well, I've heard a number of boys that have left the program
• 45:51
  and have talked about really you're just forced to live in
• 45:58
  the environment here with a lot of stuff going on, A lot of
• 46:01
  boys, a lot of staff just programs, you know, specific
• 46:05
  things, all you know, from the time you wake up, the time you
• 46:08
  go to bed, it's structured things.
• 46:10
  And a lot of times there's can be a little chaotic and loud.
• 46:13
  And if you can learn as they learned in to navigate and go
• 46:17
  through the program and deal with that, they realize like how
• 46:19
  much they can actually take at home in their own homes and feel
• 46:24
  like it's, oh, this is not chaos.
• 46:26
  This is this is nothing compared to trying to navigate 9 other
• 46:30
  boys in the house or something like that.
• 46:32
  So there's a lot of learning that they don't realize when
• 46:37
  they're here in in the middle of all of it that just the
• 46:39
  environment itself gives you that that helps if you.
• 46:44
  Can show like if you're dealing with a really a boy like the boy
• 46:49
  that we deal with and he goes home and he creates the chaos,
• 46:53
  right. That's a little different than
• 46:55
  chaos that arises naturally in friction, everything like that.
• 46:57
  But even then, if that boy or girl is adept at creating chaos
• 47:02
  and they almost do it without even trying, like you still have
• 47:06
  to show that that whatever the chaos that child is creating is
• 47:10
  not going to control you if you're choosing to not enter
• 47:15
  into that chaos and, and let him or her control the situation.
• 47:19
  And so to have that level head and to see the big picture, like
• 47:24
  we were talking about early on in the podcast, to realize that
• 47:27
  God's in control, to let go and to keep calm is like like
• 47:33
  pivotal if you have to be able to do that.
• 47:34
  And we're not always the best of doing that or even capable of
• 47:38
  doing that sometimes, especially when we get triggered in our own
• 47:41
  issues come to the forefront and everything.
• 47:43
  But you know, when you're unpacking how you how you
• 47:46
  handled the situation and try to think about how to do it better
• 47:49
  the next time, that thought will be comforting to you.
• 47:52
  And you can learn from your mistakes and, and maybe do it
• 47:54
  better the next time. Yeah.
• 47:57
  And growing pains are good. Like I said, it's like we don't,
• 48:00
  we don't have to protect your kids, let them be bored or let
• 48:05
  these, I mean, that's all natural things that are good
• 48:10
  circumstances to learn from. And so I think a lot of parents,
• 48:13
  we just try to protect them from all that stuff and make sure
• 48:18
  they don't feel those pains or they don't feel that
• 48:20
  frustration. And it's it's not all about the
• 48:24
  kids. All right, Again, it's your
• 48:26
  relationship with your spouse is relationship with God.
• 48:30
  First relationship with spouse takes precedence over the kids
• 48:33
  and then then deal with the kids.
• 48:36
  You know, if you get those things out of whack and things
• 48:39
  don't work and they end up calling Whetstone, yeah, that's
• 48:44
  what we're here for. We're.
• 48:45
  Here to help but yeah, all right Brandon.
• 48:47
  Well, thanks for making the time to do this as always.
• 48:50
  I know you're a busy man with with the new house and excited
• 48:54
  to get that going Appreciate all the work you do with that Thank
• 48:58
  you to Thomas Brown for helping to edit this podcast and kind of
• 49:04
  spice it up with his Thomas Brownness Yeah.
• 49:07
  And just to to kind of tag along to what we've said in this
• 49:11
  podcast, like Thomas is particularly skilled at conflict
• 49:15
  management. He's kind of our our fireman
• 49:18
  that we call in if we have a conflict with, with a boy in the
• 49:22
  school room or a guy who's just showed up here and is really
• 49:26
  struggling. Yeah, his.
• 49:27
  His duties have changed a lot. He's on speed.
• 49:29
  Dial Thomas Brown, get here. I need to, I need help with this
• 49:33
  guy and he'll take that kid out and talk to him and he's really,
• 49:36
  really good at that. And so we appreciate all the
• 49:39
  work that he does with the podcast, obviously, but all the
• 49:41
  other ways that he contributes to you bet the ranch as well.
• 49:44
  So all right, well, I think that's it.
• 49:49
  Look forward to talking to you in a couple weeks, Brandon and
• 49:52
  sounds good. We'll catch you all next.
• 49:54
  Time don't wait, don't forget. To give us some some feedback on
• 49:58
  the artwork for the post, it notes make a.
• 50:00
  Comment. Yeah, comments are really
• 50:02
  important to the algorithm. If you can just put a little
• 50:05
  comment in the section or if you open the podcast in Spotify and
• 50:10
  and leave a comment there or rate the show or something like
• 50:12
  that, it's all good stuff. Wild.
• 50:15
  Wacky. Stuff.
• 50:17
  So we'll catch you next time on a time to sharpen.
• 50:19
  See you. Whetestone Boys Ranch is a
• 50:29
  therapeutic boarding school located in the scenic Ozarks of
• 50:33
  southern Missouri. It was founded in 2011 to serve
• 50:37
  families from around the country who are struggling with
• 50:39
  challenging behaviors from their 12 to 16 year old sons.
• 50:43
  Our mission is to sharpen the character of young men.
• 50:47
  Please visit whetstoneboysranch.com if you
• 50:50
  want to learn more about our program or about how to contact
• 50:53
  us for help. Thanks for listening and we hope
• 50:55
  to catch you next time on A time to sharpen.