Latest / Man In Your Corner with Shaun Tucker / Ep. 25 | Overcoming Dad Guilt: Mental Fitness Strategies for Founder Dads to Refill Your Cup
Transcript
- Shaun: Welcome back to the reset. name is Sean Tucker. I am your host. This is episode 25. If you are looking at the screen right now, right now I'm holding a cookie. If you don't know what cookie this is, this is a triple chocolate cookie. And I was thinking, should I eat this or should I not eat it? I know many dads out there right now, many people are listening right now or viewing are thinking this guy surely knows better not to eat the cookie. And in my head I've got Arnold Schwarzenegger saying put that cookie down, no. But should I feel guilt that I'm gonna eat this cookie or should I pleasure? Or should I really just ignore my feelings, eat it, realize that every action has a consequence? And whether I burn it off, whether I don't burn it off, does it really matter? What really matters is, did I enjoy it? And can I leave all the negative emotions, the heavy weight of eating this cookie somewhere else? So just excuse me while I take a bite of this. a very good cookie and now it's not a homemade one it's one I just bought at the grocery store but So many people right now, they're doing things that they know they shouldn't or that aren't in their plan, but they're feeling guilty or they're shame that they're doing the thing that they're not supposed to do. And you might be on a weight loss journey. You might be trying to save money for a house or trying to budget with your business. and for whatever reason you're just spending it for whatever reason you're eating the cookie and you're on a weight loss diet. I'm not against dieting, I'm not against saving. But what I'm more for is actually having a purpose. And if your purpose is to punish yourself for not following the plan, well that's gonna hurt you a lot. Because that's saying that it's not okay to feel pleasure and that it's more okay to suffer that you felt pleasure. and maybe even joy whilst eating that or consuming that or spending the money, right? and I think as a father. You know, how we model ourselves is ultimately what our kids pick up from us. And I have a two year old daughter. I know that oftentimes the patterns that I do in myself or things that I do in the way that I behave, even what I say, she copies me. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree. And it's no surprise because, well, she is half me, but not only that. genetically she's half me but also I get to take care of her when I get to take care of her. and she will model my behavior because I am her role model, I'm her dad, right? She calls me dad dad. And I bring this into the conversation or the episode today because... None of us have really grown up from our childhood. And what I mean by that is if you look from a psychological development point of view, a lot of the formative years from 0 to 7, 0 to 12 have actually just gone in repeating cycles. And in those very formative years, if you were someone who grew up in a family that didn't have a lot of money, and you might be a middle child, you might be the eldest child, whatever. A lot of those patterns are still happening now inside of you. So if you're a middle child and when you were younger you felt like your voice wasn't heard, like you weren't really cared for, you were kind of forgotten. I am a middle child by the way. wasn't really my case but I have heard and I did experience it a little bit as a child. Looking back, it was hard to lead, it was hard to take the step and really, yeah, take the lead and do what I wanted to do because I always felt like my needs were less important than the people older than me and the people younger than me. I must repeat it in school because... you know, my friends that I had, I would say that, you know, I put their needs in front of my own. I was in the habit or in the behavior of letting them choose what they wanted to do rather than giving myself permission to do what I wanted to do. And it's not that I didn't have a voice, it was that I didn't have the courage or the confidence to say what I really wanted. And when it comes to raising kids, when it comes to leading your own life, if you're not specific about what it is that you do want in your life, you will always get in the direction of what you want, but you'll probably get what you do not want because you're not specific enough. And I mentioned that quite a lot of times in the recent few episodes. But the other side to that is if you're getting what you don't want then maybe because you are not specific enough you're actually sabotaging your own growth by eating the cookie because you feel like maybe you're not deserving enough and it's easier to escape to comfort and pleasure than it is to actually take the lead and put yourself in a position where maybe it's a little bit uncomfortable but you're actually asking for what you want. And I'm not saying that you don't have to, you don't get to eat the cookie. You can have the cake and you can eat it too, or you can have the cookie and you can eat it too. but it's understanding where it's coming from. If you're asking for what you want and you don't get what you want, well that's okay. At least you asked for what you wanted. If you're not asking for what you want, and you keep getting what you don't want, no one else is to blame. Having the expectation that you get exactly what you want is also a false promise. Because that's not going to happen either. Life wants you to win, but more importantly, it wants you to be fully involved. And being fully involved, this goes for everything you do in life. So how you do one thing is how you do all things. And if you change that one thing, you change all things. So the more involved you are with life, the more involved you are with your kids. your work, the more intense you are, yes you'll feel like you're burning a lot of energy, but that's kind of the point. Life has this cycle of Give, receive, give, receive or life, death, rest, recovery with intensity. So you're pushing and pulling. This is how life is, it's very dualistic. And so relating it back to your own sense of worth, your own sense of asking for what you want, playing all out, is not about winning. It's about. being fully in the game and playing with full awareness as much awareness as you can muster as much intensity as you can put yourself into as much as you can sprint as fast and as hard as you possibly can and almost forget that you had a body. Right, that's the kind of level that I'm talking about. Is it hard? Is it challenging? Yeah, it is, yeah, but that's the point. Life only feels alive when you make it feel alive, when you are alive, right, when you feel alive. you reflect back at the times you felt most alive, it's probably when you were having very intense experiences, very intense moments. The birth of my daughter was overwhelmingly intense for me because I knew this was the death of one part of me but the birth of something else, the birth of fatherhood. And I'm so grateful to have had that experience. And I know many of my listeners now, they've had the same experience. But I invite you to instead of saying I feel really tired, I feel like I'm burning myself out. Am I fully involved in what I do and am I intentional enough to ask for what I want? Whether I get it, whether I don't get it, it doesn't matter. If I ask and I work towards where I want to go. It's the pursuing of the goal that helps us bring joy to the situation and the experience. If we are pursuing the goal with only our toes dipped in the ice water I'm sorry but you're probably just not going to make it. You're not going to cut it. It's as simple as that. So if this episode has resonated with you, if you like to eat cookies and not feel guilty about it, if you want to be the best dad you can be, if you want to be the best human being you can be, I invite you to play your life as if it's your only life, because it is your only life. So let's do this. if you have found value in this episode, I encourage you to share it with just one friend today. I look forward to seeing you in tomorrow's episode. Thank you so much for tuning in.