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Grandparents make grand partners · Cultural Wars | America Out Loud News

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  Well, hello, everyone, and welcome to the 10 penny files.
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  Sherry Tenpenny.
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  So now let's get started.
• 2:12
  Today's conversation is with Lori Wildenberg about her book, Grandparents Make Grand Partners, a practical encouraging guide to becoming an intentional, spiritually influential grandparent.
• 2:27
  Laurie, thank you so much for being here.
• 2:29
  And thank you so much for being patient with our technical difficulties that we had at the beginning of the show.
• 2:35
  That's just such a pleasure to meet you in person and have this conversation.
• 2:40
  Well, it's so nice to meet you.
• 2:42
  Thank you so much for persevering through all the technical difficulties.
• 2:47
  You know, that is always the worst.
• 2:49
  So thank you so much for having me.
• 2:51
  This is going to be a great show because of that.
• 2:54
  You know, it will be.
• 2:56
  I mean, because that really usually doesn't happen, but I don't know.
• 3:00
  The gremlins were uh circling the circling my house today for sure.
• 3:05
  You know, your book, your book, it's even got a really cool cover.
• 3:08
  You know, this book is really super cool.
• 3:11
  And it's your book is fun, it's a fast read, but it's also very thought provoking and interactive because you have exercises and making lists and different things that you could do.
• 3:22
  How did you come to define the nine different grandparent personalities, which I found absolutely fascinating at the beginning of your book?
• 3:32
  Well, sort of informal observation.
• 3:36
  Uh, before I became a grandparent, I was watching the way a lot of people grandparented and and noticed how my parents and my in-laws were grandparents and even my own grandparents.
• 3:50
  And so I came up with nine different different types, and it's it's really the grandparent personalities are are more for fun to sort of determine where you land.
• 4:02
  Are you one that's that's more of the chum, the friend, or are you more like a captain?
• 4:08
  Are you driving, you know, are you the one that's really kind of make controlling the ship and so forth?
• 4:15
  And so um, who are you and how do you live out your role as a grandparent?
• 4:23
  And you know, the thing that really surprised me is once I became a grandparent, that a lot of your role, how your adult children see you plays into the type of grandparent you you are.
• 4:41
  So there are some grandparents who are like surrogates.
• 4:45
  Um, if they are there for they're not the ones that are functioning fully as the parent, but they may take on that role in some for some degree because of the fact that maybe they are the primary um daycare person, shall we say?
• 5:03
  And um, so there are some that are like that.
• 5:06
  There's a ceremonial grandparent who perhaps is more worried about passing along traditions and um manners and just kind of where do you fit and what I'm hoping for is when people go through and do the little informal quiz that they will come up with perhaps a few types of grandparents they are, but to really be motivated to realize hey, no matter what sort of grandparent I am, there's upsides and there's downsides to each type.
• 5:42
  And there we can weave being an intentional Christian grandparent into any of those particular types, and that is really the focus of the book.
• 5:57
  Um to really encourage faith in our grandkids.
• 6:02
  The subtitle is how to have an eternal impact on your grandchild's life.
• 6:08
  And so this is really it's a um faith-based book.
• 6:13
  But as we were talking, Dr.
• 6:15
  T in the in the green room when we were talking, we also talked about how really I mean, any grandparent could take this book and apply many of the practices and principles in it.
• 6:29
  You know, I like that beginning, Aaron, where you talk about those nine types of grandparents because you know, and I enjoyed reading this book a lot, even though I'm not I'm neither a parent nor obviously a grandparent.
• 6:43
  I don't have any nieces and nephews.
• 6:45
  I was an only kid when I came when I grew up.
• 6:48
  But you know, you could see how each people would fall into these separate roles.
• 6:53
  And I would imagine if you read like that you were the militant grandparent that you like, I guess the captain.
• 6:59
  The captain may maybe I should back that off a little bit and become one of the other ones.
• 7:04
  So it's really thought-provoking, and I really like your subsection, your sub your subsections.
• 7:10
  And one that really stuck out to me because I could really see how this would be happening, is the one you call grandma wars.
• 7:18
  Oh, yeah.
• 7:20
  Where you know, they're gonna be the one that wins the battle for the being the favorite grandma.
• 7:26
  Tell people how to navigate those situations.
• 7:30
  You know, we all cherish our grandkids.
• 7:34
  And um, and as women, and I think you might agree with me, Dr.
• 7:39
  T, is that we notice people's relationships and the depths that they have in relationship.
• 7:46
  We notice that with our friends, we notice that with um, you know, various colleagues at work.
• 7:53
  We we pay attention to that.
• 7:55
  Well, think about, you know, here we are as women where relationships are very important to us, and then we have this important cherished relationship with our grandkids.
• 8:08
  We can't help but observe and and perhaps to reflect and maybe even to evaluate a little bit, you know, where do we stand in this particular relationship?
• 8:23
  And we've got to be really careful of that, because I think it's it's a natural human bent and particularly for us women to perhaps feel some twinges of jealousy if one grandparent is um able to spend more time.
• 8:43
  Perhaps another grandparent uh is able to give more stuff.
• 8:50
  And uh those those are things that can be kind of difficult to navigate.
• 8:55
  Also, um, when we think of our adult children, we're used to and they're used to the way we do things and they're used to the way we do things.
• 9:07
  What we're not used to is the way another family does something.
• 9:12
  And here our adult child has to navigate that.
• 9:17
  They have to figure out okay, this is where my in-laws are with this particular, let's say it's a holiday, this particular holiday.
• 9:25
  The grandma wars can really flare big during the holidays if they feel like they're not getting equal time or they're not getting the most special time.
• 9:36
  Um, you know, maybe the most special time is Christmas Eve, you know, and um it's really important for us to have a heart for our adult child and for our sweet in laws, our adult children's spouses, so that we aren't the ones to cause the issue.
• 9:57
  What we want to do to avoid
• 10:00
  Avoid grandma wars is to do our best to be flexible with things like the holidays, avoid being the one that makes has the problem, help them with a solution.
• 10:14
  Um, and try not to be so covetous of their their time and the way that they interact because what we know love grows, that's God's math.
• 10:27
  Love is big, love grows.
• 10:29
  We don't, it multiplies, it doesn't divide.
• 10:33
  So they're not dividing up their time.
• 10:37
  Um if if a grandchild sees you and they're so thrilled to see you because they haven't seen you for a little bit, and the other grandparent happens to observe this.
• 10:48
  Uh, one mom was or one grandmom was telling me that they live um a little further away from their grandchildren than the other grandparents, and the other grandparents spend quite a bit of time grandkids, and then if the other grandparents are around when the grandparents aren't in there, they get a great big hello.
• 11:15
  Big huge hugs.
• 11:17
  Well, that might not be happening with the grandparents that are there all the time, and to keep that sort of thing in perspective so that feelings don't get hurt, and you can remember love multiplies.
• 11:29
  There's room for everybody, we're not dividing it up.
• 11:33
  Uh, I think those are some of the things that can really help.
• 11:36
  Um, our adult children can help prevent some of the grammar wars.
• 11:41
  If they look around their house, are there plenty of pictures of both sides of the family?
• 11:49
  Are there plenty of um little things that might be sitting out?
• 11:55
  Perhaps things that have been given to the kids that maybe one grandparent or another gave are those things, are there enough of each of those things that are out so that one grandparent doesn't feel less special than another?
• 12:11
  So pictures are a very big deal.
• 12:14
  When you walk into someone's home and it's a relative, you tend to notice if they've got pictures of you know, their side of the family or your side of the family, or if there's a nice mixture, and as a as a grandma, as a meme, um, I am aware of this, and I make sure that we've got pictures of all of the grandkids and to remember that the ones that have been most recently born, because you get you get kind of busy, you know, you don't want to forget the one that was just recently born.
• 12:55
  We've got a little joke in our family because every time we add a new grandchild, we've got five grandkids now.
• 13:02
  We have to do another family picture, and it's always an event to get everybody together, and because we have one family that's in California, the rest of us are here in Colorado, but everyone's busy, and so when we get our California family with us, we if we've added a new, we've got a new addition to the family.
• 13:23
  I always want to take another picture, and my uh my son-in-law, who they've got three kids, and my my uh my son and daughter-in-law have two, and my son-in-law who has the three, he teases me about having these family pictures, and I'm like, well, if you wouldn't keep having babies, we wouldn't have to keep doing this.
• 13:48
  And so anyway, but you know, of course, it's all good natured, but yeah, to make sure that each each child and each family is well represented, just as what the adult children can do to make sure that each each family, you know, each of the grandparents and that each side of the family is represented.
• 14:12
  Those are small things to do, but important.
• 14:15
  And when you feel as if you haven't spent enough time or you'd like to spend more time and you're noticing that's happening with another grandparent, avoid saying they get to spend more time with you.
• 14:28
  It might be something you'd like to say, but don't say it.
• 14:32
  Rather say, we sure would like to spend a little more time with the grandkids.
• 14:37
  Yeah, there you go.
• 14:39
  Well, the opposite end of that stick, you know, the grandparents wanting to be the favorite grandparent is the idea of the favorite grandchild.
• 14:47
  You know, we've all got people in our lives that in our extended families and friends that are, you know, that we just like more than others, you know.
• 14:55
  There's people that we like, and then there's people we really like, and I think that that's probably true, particularly in very large families that have lots of lots of grandkids.
• 15:04
  Five is is a fair amount, but you know, some families are much much bigger than that.
• 15:10
  How does what are some of the things that grandparents can do to for to eliminate the idea of the favorite grandchild?
• 15:18
  Yeah, favoritism that really so breaks my heart when I see that happen.
• 15:23
  Um I think that's that's kind of a heart issue with I believe with a grandparent.
• 15:31
  Um you know, when the Lord loves us all big, and he has a different relationship with each one of us, and I think that's really our model.
• 15:43
  So it's important for the grandparent.
• 15:47
  I believe this is on the adult, not on the child, for the grandparent to find the thing where they can connect with each kiddo, and one of the neatest things that we had in our family.
• 16:00
  Um my mother-in-law was widowed for about 10 or 15 years, I can't remember.
• 16:08
  And when she remarried, her husband was the one who was the grandparent to our kiddos.
• 16:17
  They never knew my husband's dad.
• 16:20
  He died before they were born, and I have to say what an inspiration he was.
• 16:27
  He was so good at carving out relationship with each grandchild, and he did it with actually all the adults and the in-laws as well.
• 16:37
  He would sit down with each person throughout the time that he had with them and make sure that, and he would remember details, make sure he had a conversation with each person, and he would remember the details of each family, each individual.
• 16:56
  Um, we have to avoid the idea of having a favorite.
• 17:00
  There are people you more easily connect with, but gosh, that's just an opportunity for you to find how do I connect with with this particular person.
• 17:12
  And um to find that, and I think that's up to the grandparent.
• 17:17
  Having favorites is going to spoil so many relationships.
• 17:22
  It will hurt your relationship with your adult children, it will hurt your relationship with your other grandkids.
• 17:28
  Um, and I have, as I was researching for the book, I'm so glad you brought this up because there were many families, and particularly one that I can think of that voiced um a situation where the grandmother had one favorite and really didn't care that didn't appear to care that much about the other grandkids, and that was very hurtful, and then eventually the families kind of pulled back and really didn't want to spend much time with her because it was so painful.
• 18:00
  Wow.
• 18:01
  Well, you know, that's the really inspirational story about your father-in-law, you know, that came into the store about having those individual conversations and making each person feel like they each got time, and that's a way for him to get to know each person.
• 18:15
  There has their own idiosyncrasies and one plays drums and one plays the trombone, and you know, one plays soccer and one plays piano and those sorts of things.
• 18:25
  Is there anything that adult children can do to encourage a grandparents who are uninvolved to become more involved?
• 18:34
  Because he was obviously, man, I would love to have had a grandfather like that.
• 18:38
  Yeah.
• 18:40
  Because my father's father, so my grandfather on that side, he died when my dad was 16.
• 18:46
  So I obviously didn't know him.
• 18:48
  And my grandfather on the other side died when I was only seven.
• 18:51
  So I don't really know him much either.
• 18:53
  So it sounds like I'd love to have a grandfather like that.
• 18:56
  But if you have an uninvolved grandparent, what can what can your adult children do to encourage more involvement?
• 19:06
  So that's the personality I call the checked out.
• 19:09
  And perhaps they don't know that they can be involved.
• 19:15
  So first, let's assume the best.
• 19:16
  Let's start there.
• 19:18
  Assume the best that they can, you know, they maybe don't know that that's a desire.
• 19:23
  So I would say for the adult child uh to approach his or her parents and say, hey, you know, we'd really like to spend more time with you.
• 19:35
  The kids would like to see you more.
• 19:37
  Um put out those invitations and let them know that that's something that you value.
• 19:46
  With without them doing that, it's quite possible that the grandparent doesn't know that that's okay.
• 19:53
  Um, but of course, there are those that have really taken the idea of.
• 20:00
  Of grandparenting and thought, okay, I've parented, I'm done.
• 20:07
  There are there are those folks.
• 20:09
  Or I've moved into this realm of the age that I'm at.
• 20:16
  And now I'm going to do things that interest me.
• 20:21
  Um, there's this whole thing, and I I'm sure you've noticed this too, Dr.
• 20:26
  T, where parents or of adult children who have moved out of the house, or um, or the pair, you know, the grandparent maybe has moved into not retired yet.
• 20:42
  Um, many grandparents aren't, but there are those that have retired, and they're thinking, well, now this is the time for me to do all my vacations and uh, you know, play it, play pickleball, move to a retirement community, whatever.
• 20:59
  And none of those things are bad.
• 21:01
  And if my husband came home and said, Hey, you want to go on a river cruise?
• 21:04
  I'm saying, yes, I sure am.
• 21:07
  I sure do, right?
• 21:09
  None of those things are bad at all.
• 21:11
  It's just the priorities.
• 21:14
  What is your priority?
• 21:15
  Do you want to see your kiddos and your grandkids in heaven?
• 21:19
  I do.
• 21:19
  I want to pour into my grandkids.
• 21:22
  I want to enjoy them and let them know that they are, you know, they are valuable and worthy and so loved.
• 21:33
  We want them to know this.
• 21:35
  So I would say first start with a conversation and do the invitations.
• 21:41
  And then if you are a grandparent who's a little bit checked out, I would say check the prior, check your priorities.
• 21:48
  What are you pouring into?
• 21:50
  It doesn't mean you can't do all your fun things.
• 21:52
  Everybody likes to do fun things, but remember your priorities.
• 21:57
  There are these little humans that that really need your influence.
• 22:03
  And this is another thing I discovered as I was researching for the book.
• 22:08
  It blows me away.
• 22:10
  Grandparents are second only to parents in the influence they have over their grandchild's faith, morals, and um, yeah, so their faith and morals and values.
• 22:24
  It's incredible to me that that is the influence we have.
• 22:28
  Sometimes we think it's teachers or peers.
• 22:31
  Grandparents are second.
• 22:33
  Well, you know, I think that that's really important.
• 22:35
  And sometimes in broken families or difficult families, it is really the the grandmother, one or both of the grandmothers that sort of uh move the faith forward and try to tie the tie the families together.
• 22:49
  I happen to know when one of my friends actually um is a dot adopted and is raising her grandson.
• 22:57
  I think that she fully adopted him because dad's in jail and mom's a drug addict, and you know, she didn't want him to go into CP, you know, into CPS and all of that nonsense.
• 23:09
  And so um she you know had him for a couple of years, I think, as a guardian, and then she went ahead and fully adopted him, strong Christian faith woman.
• 23:19
  And so she's you know, really, in fact, she cut way back on her job just so that she could have more time to spend with him.
• 23:27
  He's like 12, and so is in one of those really difficult ages with the history of you know, with his parents and everything.
• 23:35
  And I think that that's really true that parents or grandparents can have just such a stabilizing effect on their grandkids if they can become their grandkids' confidant, you know, they can come and say, Mom, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, you know, and they can really they have a sounding board with grandparents who can help to smooth that over, hopefully, a little bit.
• 23:58
  So I think that that's just lovely.
• 24:00
  You know, and all those things said, we're living in really difficult times, you know, that's challenging times with parents with their jobs and some one parent maybe travels a lot, one parent may be in the military, and there's also difficulties sometimes with grandparents that one of them or more than uh both of them may be ill and early dementia and you know, things like that.
• 24:23
  You know, what are some of the greatest face challenges you see in your work and all the contribution that you're making for parents and grandparents today?
• 24:32
  And how do you tell them to navigate that to maintain unity inside the family unit?
• 24:38
  Oh gosh, that's a great question.
• 24:40
  Well, I think some of the cultural issues that we see sort of rising up right now would be um, oh gosh, identity is huge.
• 24:54
  And who would think something so basic would be such a big issue?
• 24:59
  Anxiety and depression are also things that have really reached epidemic proportions.
• 25:07
  So I think those are some very big things that parents need to navigate and they can have the support and help from the grandparents to help them do this.
• 25:20
  Uh, one of the things that I do regarding identity, uh, to help my grandkids understand that they are created in God's image and to know that, and they are created either male or female.
• 25:35
  God and God picks, He's the creator.
• 25:38
  So I talk a lot about God being the creator.
• 25:42
  Now, my grandkids are young, seven and and under.
• 25:47
  And so I am very aware of um making sure that we talk about identity.
• 25:54
  And one of the reasons is my oldest daughter, uh, she has struggled with identity issues, and that keeps it very front and center in my brain to work through any of that with my grandkids.
• 26:11
  So we for birthday parties, um, and in the book, I have a way to celebrate a birthday party having identity being the theme.
• 26:22
  And so um, I talk about identity and how they are created, and I pull out different Bible verses, and we've done a scavenger hunt regarding identity, and like um, you know, maybe they'll get some slime.
• 26:39
  They love slime that's kind of like Plato but slimier, and uh, and talking about how God's the creator and how we, you know, he made Adam from you know, from dust, and we'll we'll talk about that, and then I'll I'll print out and laminate some of those Bible verses so that when they go home, they have something in their hand that they can talk about.
• 27:05
  And even my adult daughter who wrestles with identity issues, has one of those printed forms that she puts on her mirror in the bathroom and rereads that to remind her of who she is and who God created her to be.
• 27:24
  So, identity is a big one.
• 27:28
  Hold that thought, hold that thought for a second.
• 27:30
  Um, Lori, because it's it's time for us to take a quick quick uh station break here of what we need to do at this break in time.
• 27:37
  So hold that thought.
• 27:39
  We'll come back to more things that we can talk about about things that are are really big deals inside of families.
• 27:46
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• 27:50
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  We'll be right back with more from Lori Wildenberg about her book, Grandparents Make Brand Partners, a practical and encouraging guide to become an intentional, spirit-filled, influential grandparent.
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  Well, welcome back, everybody.
• 34:44
  Lori Wildenberg is here to talk to about her day about her book, Grandparents Make Grand Partners.
• 34:50
  And I want to read you the subtitle, How to Have an Eternal Impact on Your Grandchild's Life, which is the most important thing that you can do for them, better than Easter baskets or Christmas presents.
• 35:02
  Let me tell you a little bit more about our guest today, Lori Wildenberg.
• 35:05
  Lori is a licensed parent family educator and a coach, award winning winning author and a national speaker and co-founder of First Corinthians 13 Parenting, a faith-based ministry to equip and empower parents to raise children faithfully in a difficult world.
• 35:23
  And it's located in Morrison, California.
• 35:26
  I'm sorry, Morrison, Colorado.
• 35:28
  Morrison, Colorado is where she's located.
• 35:31
  Lori speaks at conferences nationally and writes for a number of online magazines.
• 35:35
  She's uh if when she's not traveling, she's at home with her hubby Tom, nestled in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains.
• 35:43
  Lori, thank you so much for being with us today, and welcome back to the show.
• 35:47
  Your book of faith is faith-filled and written from a from a Christian perspective and from a perspective of a Christian brand grandparent.
• 35:56
  What if the actual parents are not believers or of another faith, or maybe even agnostic or atheist?
• 36:04
  Oh, that is really hard.
• 36:07
  And I do address this in the book because that is something that grand many many grandparents are facing today.
• 36:15
  Um, a lot of young people are deconstructing their faith.
• 36:20
  And they may have been brought up in a Christian home, but now they're deciding.
• 36:24
  Well, maybe they're agnostic, maybe they're atheist, maybe they're exploring something else.
• 36:30
  I don't know.
• 36:31
  But that's that is heartbreaking.
• 36:34
  The first thing to remember is God isn't surprised by this.
• 36:40
  And to trust him with that, that all the good stuff that was poured into your children when they were growing up, it might be dormant, but it's there.
• 36:52
  So first of all, trust God with this.
• 36:55
  Um, it sounds trite, but it isn't.
• 36:59
  It's as Oswald Chambers says, prayer is the greater work.
• 37:03
  So to remember that you need to pray, pray about this.
• 37:08
  Now, if the there are various levels of um how people get upset about passing along faith.
• 37:18
  So there are some situations.
• 37:21
  One family I interviewed, their daughter, they raise their daughter in the in a Christian home.
• 37:28
  Faith is very important to the parents who are now grandparents.
• 37:33
  Their daughter is raising her children with her husband to be agnostic, maybe atheist, but definitely agnostic.
• 37:45
  And so they have a good relationship with their daughter, in spite of differing worldviews, biblical worldview versus just a secular worldview, but they still have a great relationship.
• 38:01
  And because of that, when the grandchildren are over at their house, they are able to pray before dinner.
• 38:09
  Um, and maybe have a few faith-based conversations.
• 38:12
  Now, this has all been approved, and this is the key by the parents.
• 38:18
  The parents have been respected and they've had these conversations before they went ahead and um prayed or did any of those things with their grandchildren.
• 38:31
  They are very respectful.
• 38:33
  Respect is huge.
• 38:35
  To remember that these are your children's children, and you can still be who you are, but perhaps you don't quote a scripture verse, but you can still talk about um the golden rule.
• 38:50
  You know, treat others as you would like to be treated.
• 38:52
  You don't have to quote scripture, you can you can talk like that.
• 38:57
  You know, you can still use those same principles.
• 39:00
  You can still be who you are, but perhaps don't quote scripture again.
• 39:07
  Talk to the parents.
• 39:09
  Now there are others that'll say, if you talk about religion, I'm not gonna bring my kids over to your house.
• 39:16
  I mean, there are those that put a pretty hard line.
• 39:19
  Relationship is the way in.
• 39:23
  Relationship and humility to have the humility to honor what your adult children are saying, be who you are, but have the just again have that humility so that you can continue to build that relationship bridge and pray, pray, pray.
• 39:43
  You could maybe even keep a prayer journal of how you're praying for each grandkid and have that perhaps you could give to them maybe on their 18th birthday or something, you know, when they're when they're a
• 40:00
  Adults and the uh the adult children, their parents are not necessarily dictating how they are spending their time as much.
• 40:12
  So you have to be respectful, have the conversations, ask them, is it okay?
• 40:19
  How do you feel about it?
• 40:20
  If I'd really like to, and then you know, pray before meals with the kids, just like we did when you were growing up, things like that.
• 40:29
  Um conversations are very important, respect is huge, and coming with the idea of humility, I think really helps build the bridge.
• 40:41
  I totally agree with that.
• 40:43
  I mean, because you know, I've operated my entire business life since I've been advocating for problem or talking about problems associated with vaccines for the last 25 years.
• 40:54
  I do it from a perspective of a parable of the sower, right?
• 40:58
  So the parable of the sower is you know, your job is to sow seeds.
• 41:02
  The uh some are fall on rocky soil and the birds pluck it away, some are choked out by the weeds, some are scorched out by the sun, and one in four lands on good ground and grows up to bear fruit.
• 41:14
  So 25% of your effort is probably as good as it's going to get, because I don't think you're going to do better than the good book, it's just not going to happen on a routine basis.
• 41:22
  But you are if you continue in those situations to sow little seeds, you never know which seed is gonna is going to be the one that sticks in their head.
• 41:33
  I remember my when I when they get to be, you know, 15.
• 41:36
  I remember my grandma said to me, blah, blah, blah, blah, you know, and you'll never know where the good soil is, and you have no response, no responsibility at all over how long it takes to sprout.
• 41:47
  So just by being present and being in those conversations and being able to live the life and show by example, you know, to your grandchildren, that makes so much sense about respect and conversations.
• 42:00
  What do you advise for paper for parents that have um blended um spiritual families?
• 42:07
  You know, you've got a Protestant and a Catholic or a Protestant and a Muslim, you know, and they're equally as strong in their faith as a grandparent.
• 42:17
  How do you navigate that?
• 42:19
  You know, that that's pretty tough.
• 42:21
  I think um one of the best things you can do is, you know, when within the Christian faith, and you know, all the various denominations, find the thing, find the thing that brings unity, and within the Christian faith, the unity is brought through Jesus, the belief in Jesus.
• 42:46
  Now, in terms of, let's say, the the Muslim faith and the Christian faith, I think the best thing to do is to really focus on your relationship with the other family where the beliefs are different and have opportunities to learn from each other, to have conversations, uh, not debates, to be able to listen and not lecture, to be able to dialogue, not have a monologue.
• 43:16
  If we can talk to each other, I think we have really come very far.
• 43:24
  We've we're living in a culture that is starting to cancel people out because people don't think exactly the way we do.
• 43:31
  That actually that's very emotionally immature.
• 43:36
  We should be able to have a conversation, listen to each other, learn from each other, perhaps agree to disagree, but have the the conversations be respectful and a conversation, not a debate, not a lecture, a place where we can exchange ideas and to even say, you know, I'd love to hear what you have to say, and then when you're done, um, I'd like an opportunity to say something too.
• 44:09
  So we can be, I think even the word could be the true sense of tolerance to be able to be tolerant of one another's view, whether or not we agree, but to agree on the fact that we are family and we love each other, and this is not something that needs to divide us.
• 44:35
  You know, it's interesting.
• 44:36
  I'm glad you brought that up about uh about questioning.
• 44:40
  You know, we used to teach a course uh called that mastering vaccine info, and it would, you know, it was a six-week course, and one one week I would talk about vaccines, and the second week, my partner who is a language specialist would talk about how do you broach the topic about vaccines with a pro-vaccine person if you're very anti-vaccine?
• 44:59
  So that would be the same thing about like a Christian and a Muslim or whatever.
• 45:03
  And the cornerstone of the of that of that educational process was about asking questions.
• 45:09
  It's not about telling people, because telling people you almost feel like you got your finger in their chest, you know.
• 45:16
  Yeah, and if you're asking them like, why do you think that way?
• 45:19
  Or tell us, tell me about your belief systems and yeah, tell me a little more.
• 45:22
  Uh-huh.
• 45:23
  Exactly.
• 45:23
  Tell me a little more.
• 45:24
  Tell me how you think about that.
• 45:26
  And that opens the dialogue.
• 45:29
  Questions open the dialogue.
• 45:31
  We're just giving facts about you're wrong and I'm right, or this is why you're wrong, or those sorts of or this is why I'm right.
• 45:38
  Those sorts of things, they they cause more divisiveness and they don't encourage more communication, which what you're saying is so true about staying in the conversation.
• 45:48
  You know, we're staying in the conversation.
• 45:51
  That's one thing that people say a lot is that I just want my grandkids to be happy.
• 45:58
  What's wrong with that perspective?
• 46:02
  Well, everyone likes happy.
• 46:04
  We can't argue with happy, right?
• 46:06
  Right.
• 46:06
  But if we think about that, if we unpack that a little bit deeper, what does that look like?
• 46:13
  If we only want our grandkids to be happy, they don't have an opportunity to um experience fear where they can show some bravery and courage.
• 46:24
  They don't have the opportunity to experience sadness or grief, and how do you ever build empathy or compassion into a person that's never had that?
• 46:37
  So, and anger, you know, anger is not a bad thing.
• 46:43
  It can be sinful, but if you use it to be a problem identifier versus a problem solver, you are in a good spot.
• 46:54
  So we want our kids to live a full life, not a fourth of a life, not just happy.
• 47:00
  We want them to have opportunities to feel angry so they can problem solve.
• 47:06
  We want them to have opportunities, although it this is hard, but for them to have a little sadness so they understand how to care for somebody else when they're feeling sad to have that empathy, and the opportunities to be brave and courageous.
• 47:21
  That's a good thing.
• 47:23
  That's a very good thing.
• 47:25
  So when we say we just want them to be happy, I feel like that's a pretty darn low bar.
• 47:31
  We don't want just that.
• 47:33
  We want them to live a full life with all these experiences so that they can grow and learn.
• 47:41
  You know, one of the cool things about your book about this grandparent makes grandpartners is all the examples that you give in the end of the book about things like Christmas and Easter and birthdays and celebrating, you know, though that just really really is a great.
• 47:56
  You you jump off on things that then you even say things like you call them grand reflections and grand verses and things and brand partner trips and tips and grand prayers, and so this book is just full of it's it's a little book.
• 48:13
  Like I said, it's a fun book, it's an easy read, but very thought-provoking.
• 48:19
  Uh, tell people a little bit about your some of your ideas for holidays and birthdays, and that will encourage them that they need to go out and put this in their bookshelf.
• 48:28
  Yeah.
• 48:28
  So we've got um Saint Patrick's Day is kind of right around the corner, and there is an idea.
• 48:35
  There are ideas in there for your grandkids who are older and your grandkids who are younger.
• 48:42
  You can talk about the shamrock and how that represents the father, son, and holy spirit.
• 48:48
  Um, you can talk about Saint Patrick, and um, who actually was not Irish and and talk about um his story and how the Lord used him when some pirates actually um kidnapped him, and it's a fascinating story, and I think some older kids would really get a kick out of that.
• 49:14
  Um, you can do uh a true and false kind of a narrative with them, like, do you think this is true or is this false?
• 49:21
  Is St.
• 49:22
  Patrick's day um when Saint Patrick was born?
• 49:26
  Well, that's false.
• 49:27
  It's when he was when he died, and so just some little things that really will help jumpstart a conversation.
• 49:35
  So the first half of the book is all about relationships, and and that's kind of how our our um conversation has gone, hasn't it?
• 49:43
  We've talked a lot about relationships first, and then the last half is all about being practical and how do you weave faith into your holidays?
• 49:57
  And um, and then also
• 50:00
  Organic ways to weave faith in conversation starters, things that we can do right in the moment.
• 50:07
  So the holiday ones and the birthday ones require some planning.
• 50:12
  And there's ways, there's ideas in the book, and there's also a planning chart that you can use in the book to help you with that.
• 50:22
  And there are ways to just do it organically.
• 50:26
  For instance, um, I went to the birch aquarium in um San Diego, La Jolla, actually, with my grandson who was three at the time.
• 50:38
  And on the way over there, we talked about God being the creator.
• 50:41
  This is just an organic conversation that we had, and God being the creator and how he made Owen and He made Owen's mom and dad, and how God, as creator, made made me and Papa made Mimi and Papa.
• 50:59
  And then when we got to the aquarium, we were looking at the craziest looking fish I've ever seen.
• 51:05
  It was laying flat on the bottom in this sand, and it was flat itself with its eyes, like one eye.
• 51:12
  Oh, was the weirdest looking fish.
• 51:15
  And I thought, how strange is that fish?
• 51:18
  And there was a man there with his son who was his son was probably about three as well.
• 51:23
  And I could tell they'd been to the aquarium a lot by the way they were talking.
• 51:27
  And I said, What kind of fish is that?
• 51:30
  And he said, It's a halibut.
• 51:32
  I had no idea they looked so goofy.
• 51:34
  And I said, Oh my gosh, that's crazy.
• 51:38
  And then he said, Isn't evolution interesting?
• 51:42
  And then he turned around and walked off.
• 51:46
  And I thought, oh gosh, well, it wasn't the time for me to have any sort of a conversation with him.
• 51:54
  My focus was on my grandson.
• 51:56
  And so when he walked off, I said, Look, God created that halibut just perfectly for what it needs to do and how it needs to eat.
• 52:04
  And we talked about that a little bit.
• 52:06
  And then we went on and looked at all the other things.
• 52:08
  And um, when we got back to his house, he wanted to pray before lunch.
• 52:13
  And he said, Thank you, God, for being the creator.
• 52:17
  He remembered the organic conversation that we had at the aquarium and in the car.
• 52:25
  So I do think that the consistent messaging that comes from organic conversations is even more important than doing some of these things that require more planning.
• 52:40
  But also the things that require planning can also be things that you can use as traditions, and traditions are a wonderful way.
• 52:50
  And God used this too throughout scripture.
• 52:53
  You know, how to celebrate various holidays and things like that to remember.
• 52:59
  They help us remember our faith.
• 53:01
  And um, so those are important too.
• 53:05
  And I think the consistent messaging perhaps even trumps that but having the having the things where we can pass along traditions are important.
• 53:16
  My one of my grandkids um who was six at the time, he's seven now.
• 53:23
  He said to me, Mimi, I love it when you read Pops's poems before we um have dinner at the holidays.
• 53:31
  So my dad was a poet, and they were all faith-based poems, and I have them all in a book that I had put together.
• 53:40
  And I will read one before, you know, like Christmas Eve and Thanksgiving and other various holidays.
• 53:46
  And I I didn't realize that that was really getting noticed by the grandkids that we would do that, and he really liked it.
• 53:56
  Now, my dad has passed away, but he has a glimpse into what his great grandpa was like because of the poems, and the poems are all faith-based, and that's something that is touching my grandson's heart.
• 54:11
  Wow, how cool is that?
• 54:12
  Well, we've got about a minute and a half left.
• 54:15
  In the minute and a half, I want you to briefly briefly talk about first Corinthian 13 company.
• 54:22
  Yes.
• 54:23
  So we work with parents and grandparents, and I do parent and family coaching, and it is faith-based.
• 54:32
  And actually, a lot of my um my clients are now who have adult children because this is where issues seem to be happening with their adult children and and trying to work through um things that are strained or even estranged.
• 54:54
  So that's that's kind of where the ministry is sitting now, but also speak to parents of young kiddos, really all the way through parents of adult children.
• 55:05
  Um, you can find information at Laurie Wildenberg.com, L-O-R-I-W-I-L-D-E-N-B-E-R-G dot com.
• 55:14
  You can also find um my books on my website.
• 55:17
  I don't sell them there, but there's places where you can click and you can hop over to either the publisher or um to Amazon and get the books.
• 55:28
  Very cool.
• 55:29
  And if you have a stroke, not only can you buy them directly from Lori there, we created a bookstore for all of our authors.
• 55:36
  So we've got a bookstore that's uh bookstore.dr tenpenny.com.
• 55:41
  So all the authors that we we interview on the show, the 10penny files.
• 55:45
  Um, there's a whole collection of them there.
• 55:47
  So you can get a whole bunch of great books for your bookshelf.
• 55:51
  And we have great conversations with great authors.
• 55:54
  So with that, Lori, I want to thank you so much for your work.
• 55:57
  Thank you so much for this delightful book because it really is delightful.
• 56:01
  This really is it's a workbook.
• 56:03
  It's a you know, it's really really interactive.
• 56:06
  So all of you should jump off and go to bookstore.dempani.com.
• 56:10
  We will have Lori, your website in the show notes that will be there.
• 56:14
  So I want to thank you so much for being here.
• 56:16
  I want to thank all of our audience who comes and listens to us, hopefully every day.
• 56:20
  And we're going to close out with one of the my favorite verses from the Bible that I close all of my podcasts with, whether they are live or prerecorded, which is Romans 12, 12.
• 56:30
  Rejoice and hope, be patient in trouble and be persistent in prayer.
• 56:34
  Remember to lean into God, trust him for everything.
• 56:36
  He will never let you down to go to DR10penny.com and check out all of the podcasts.
• 56:42
  You can find them there by going to the podcast tab and scrolling down where it says all podcasts.
• 56:47
  Pretty pretty straightforward, right?
• 56:49
  But you can find all the podcasts that we've done.
• 56:51
  So thanks for everybody being here.
• 56:52
  We will see you tomorrow or the next time at 3 p.m.
• 56:56
  Eastern, Monday through Friday on the 10 penny piles.
• 56:59
  Goodbye.
• 57:00
  God bless everybody.