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The High-Performance Parenting System: Conan vs. Sherlock Brain · The Parent Tap

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: The threats to your kids' focus and emotional regulation aren't just coming from the screen.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: They're hardwired into their biology.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: If you're still trying to manage a modern teenager with 1990s discipline, you're losing the PL of your household.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: We need an operational system to handle this threat.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: Today I'm breaking down the Conan versus Sherlock brain framework with Sean Dawson.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: It's the difference between parenting in total chaos and actually running a high-performing household.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: Let's get into it.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: You're a tech leader and a dad.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: What was the exact moment or the wake-up call with your own kids where you realized the old way of talking about raising boys was broken and you needed a new playbook?
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I love that question.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_01: It probably started for me when I when my son went to started going to school.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_01: And prior to that, he'd been in a daycare that I mean they loved him there.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: He thrived.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_01: He was thriving at home.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_01: And then he started going to um preschool.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_01: And it he really struggled.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_01: And he didn't, I mean, he's a very bright kid.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_01: He's also big.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: He, you know, at the time he was five years old, but he looked like he was about eight.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so you'd end up with these, if you took him to the park, parents kind of look at you askance and be like, why is your eight-year-old acting like he's a five-year-old?
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: And you'd be like, nah, he's actually five.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: And they were astonished.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: So he just, it just felt like, it felt like they were trying to get him to act outside of his nature.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: They want him to sit down.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: They want him to be quiet.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_01: They want him to concentrate.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: And with pre-K, it's a little bit less like that.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_01: But and all the girls, you look around, all the girls are acting exactly the way that all the parents want him to act.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_01: And all the boys are fidgeting in their seats and they're trying to make it work.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_01: And they're, you can tell that they're feeling this frustration.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't get that sense.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: When I was I was young, there was a little bit of that.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: And but that's what got me thinking about our culture and the way that we think about boys and the way that we think about girls.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I got to thinking about the what I consider to be a masculinity crisis in our culture.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: And the nature of that crisis in my mind, and it's not, this isn't, it's up for debate, right?
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I have my own opinion, but you have this left side of the political spectrum has spent the last 15 or 20 years convincing society that masculinity is bad and that men are a problem to be solved, as opposed to, you know, a as a resource.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: And as a result, there has been kind of a grifting class that has arisen, um, that's primarily right-coded, that is there to embrace our boys with open arms.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so you've got one side of them telling them they're they're bad and they should be more like girls.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: And then you have another side of them saying, no, all of that coarseness and cruelty that that those guys over there say is bad, no, that's actually a virtue.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's being a real man.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_01: And so where do you think our boys are gonna feel at home?
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: They're gonna feel at home over in that other place.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: And that's actually not a healthy place for them to be.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_01: There is a middle ground.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: There is a healthy vision of masculinity that we used to have in our culture that we've kind of lost.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not about performance, it's not about whining about how things are unfair.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's not about a lot of the things that those that those folks do.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_01: It is, it's it's a different thing.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_01: And those two things combined in me to realize that I needed to be real intentional about how I worked with my son and taught him to thrive in this culture.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: And so for some reason, I decided to do it in public.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, so that's where raising men, the podcast, came from.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and if you're just joining us, so we have Sean Dawson, tech executive, father of two, host of the Raising Men podcast.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: And he spent years interviewing top experts to figure out how to raise boys with intention.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: So, Sean, um, you know, you talked about masculinity.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: So, how do we, you know, as dads, like how do we teach that?
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: And what do you, what do you see as like a big mistake parents are making right now, or dads in particular?
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think that the big mistake most people are making is falling for that lie, uh, either lie, frankly.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: The lie that masculinity is bad, and so we need to suppress it in our boys, that there's something wrong with being a boy, or frankly, something wrong with being a girl, right?
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that there are natural, there are differences between individuals and there are differences that you can generalize to the genders, and those differences matter.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_01: And that doesn't mean they control everything or that they are the most important thing, but I mean it's there's a difference between Coke and Pepsi too.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: And it's we're not we're not doing ourselves a favor hiding our heads in the sand about it.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's one mistake that everybody made.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: And then the the mistake on the other side is mistaking performance for performative strength for actual strength, right?
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: For for performative masculinity for actual masculinity.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: And that's a place feel like if I if I think about the role models that I had as a boy versus the role model that's the role models that my son has um in the public eye, that's what I see a lot of.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: I see a lot of the poor performative stuff.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: And the performative stuff is is it's it's it's not it's not the thing.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: What's what would your kid say is their like role model or uh like someone they look up to right now beyond you?
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I know they can't say you, but that's a good question.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: And you've inspired me to ask that of my boy.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: He's old enough to have them.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: My girl, he's seven, my girl is four, and you're she's gonna say Pikachu or something like that, right?
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: My son might have a might have a good answer, and I honestly can't predict what he would say.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, that's good.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: You'll have to circle back with me on that one and see.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: I also have a four-year-old daughter, so that's our connection there.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we gotta get him hanging out, man.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure they'll love each other.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: I know my daughter's always looking for friends, and we just moved to this area a year ago, so we really don't have a lot of roots or connections yet.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, no, I'd love to I that's a good question for me too.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, I would want to know like who she actually looks up to.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, that's like that stuff's cool.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: Like, like I try to get into it and embrace it too, because I think you have to as a dad.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: Like you lean into what your kids like and no question.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's not my typical cup of tea, you know.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: My son is two or about to be two, and he loves ball to death.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: So for me, that's like I can't wait to get into a baseball game or get him to sports stuff and you know, kind of be his coach.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I foresee for myself.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'll tell you, this is another thing that we do.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: We should talk about that someday because this is something I really struggle with, because I have a very difficult time extracting my own ego from how my son performs in sports.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's a very frustrating experience for me.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: And it makes him enjoy it less.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: And I need him to enjoy it.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I I can't turn it into this thing where he's just doing it to appease his dad or to get my approval or anything like that.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I I I'm really, I'm really struggling.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I would too.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like I talk I just talked to a guest about this on my last episode I released, and like we're talking about the inputs versus the outputs, right?
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you can't get mad at your kid for striking out five times, for instance, in a game, if they are, you know, they are putting in the work with the batting cages or whatever.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I don't know exactly what your scenario is, but yeah, I mean, I could see like for me, and I I was talking to him about this, and I'm like, that's a major bummer for me as a dad.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: If that does happen, if your kid like just completely is not do not succeeding out there or whatever.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I would want to like intervene or give him advice or like, hey, we need to go to the batting cage and fix this.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: Because like I'm the same way.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: Sports for me was my whole life growing up, and that was the connection I have with my dad, and still probably the strongest connection we have is sports, man.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: We talk about the game, or you know, what this this stupid guy should have caught that ball.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, like that kind of thing, like it's easy from watching on TV.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: But they they go to my niece's games and she plays softball, and like, yeah, there he's always just so like negative on her, like she struck out, or like she swung at the worst pitches, or whatever.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm just like, it's tough, it's tough to separate yourself from that and not be like, is that what you're kind of talking about, or is it is it a little bit?
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's a hundred percent what I'm talking about.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_01: It's um it is like when my boy, so he wants to be great at basketball, he wants to be the greatest, and to be the greatest, you've got to go out and practice.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: But he doesn't want to do any of that stuff.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: He just wants to go out and thinks by magic of being on the on the court, he's gonna succeed.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_01: And then he gets frustrated and upset when he doesn't succeed.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I have I've not done a good job of connecting the success to the work.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: And like they just what you need to do is enjoy basketball and you need to enjoy going out there, and you'll enjoy it more if you're capable of doing these things.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_01: So let's make you capable of doing these things.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: And then, and then when it comes down to doing that, he doesn't want to do it.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: So it's very frustrating for me.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: Then, I mean, the other problem is there will be stuff that I've told him to do that, then he doesn't go do on the court.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_01: I'll be like, uh, and then I I just have to let it go.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: And what I've what and I because I want the same thing that you do.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: I want, I want that connection with my boy.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: I want it to be, I want it to be something we bond over.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: It's not gonna be that.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: It's one of those things that you have to approach and obliquely.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: If you, if you try to make it happen, it won't.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: But if you if you approach it obliquely, it will.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: And it's the key to it.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I just have to internalize that and make it happen.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: And he's just getting into it, and we've got plenty of time, and it'll work out, but it's a real struggle for that.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I know, Philip.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I I'm reminded of like the LeVar Ball like kind of situation where you know he was so involved with his kid's life, and like I was like, I don't know if that's even gonna work out, and like how you you know intervene so much, but like I think you like you said, is just like getting them to enjoy that, and then hopefully they just want to improve with the love of it.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: And for me, basketball was my thing too, so I can totally relate to that.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: I was outside shooting hoops when it was 115 degrees in the Phoenix heat, like, because I just loved it, I didn't care.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_01: No more than we we deserve to carry the weight of our parents' expectations.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we that's so true.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: And and there's this there's this amazing thing that happens, and I and I'm sure that you've experienced it where it's so much this way for my boy, because my boy is so much like me that I can almost read his mind.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: I can I can tell what he's feeling, I can know, I know what he's going through, I know, and I see the way through it, and I can help him solve those problems.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_01: And but me solving them for him does not actually get the job done.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: What I have to do is enable him to solve him.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: I have to the extent possible I can I can show him, I can draw the line on the map for him, but he's gotta walk the path.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: And so when I see him struggling with these things, or you know, the sports thing and stuff like that, I know, I know how much of a role sports ended up playing in my life eventually.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I want him to get to experience that as early as possible because I wish I had.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't sports, I didn't catch on to sports until later, but maybe that's the way it's gonna be for him.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_01: And the fact is that what I really want for him is I want him to just have an amazing freaking life that he loves living.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_01: And if that means that he's an elite basketball player, great.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: If that means that he plays volleyball, great.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: If that means that he doesn't play sports at all and instead he goes, he's programming computers all day, that's fine too.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: That's fantastic.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_01: And the fact is he's he's he's gonna be really capable.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: And I just need to give him it is my role, my job as a parent, as a father, to give him the safety to the metaphor I like to use is as men, we're building a castle.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: And the castle, the way to measure the effectiveness of your castle, it's not how strong the walls are or how impervious to attack it is, because frankly, your your castle isn't gonna come under the kind of attack castles did 2,000 years ago.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: What you want to maximize is the area under which, inside of which your domain can thrive, the people who are protected by the walls of your castle.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: You want them to be able to thrive and you want that area to be as big as possible.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's when I sit down and I think about what is my role as a parent, what is my role as a man, what is masculinity to me?
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's that encapsulates it.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't, I don't, it's an intellectual exercise for me still.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: I don't have feeling I can't, I will still go to the basketball game and be frustrated when he's got his hands in his pockets.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: But I but at least I know I shouldn't be.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm striving to get to the point where where I'm not.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, it's not so bad because he does enjoy going to basketball games and he does feel like he isn't, I mean, he's having a good time.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_01: And so I haven't ruined it for him yet.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_01: But I will.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: If I if I'm not intentional about it, I will.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: And it's yeah, no, that's a good point.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: Cause like you know, if my my daughter's a grass picker playing baseball or something, I'm gonna be like, what are you doing?
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: Like, pay attention to the ball.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and it's it's it's tough because that's my instinct.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm well intentioned.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: I'm trying to help her be better at the sport, but like you said, maybe it's just not their thing, and that's okay.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I have to be as a dad, I'd have to be okay with that.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: But and the hardest thing is if she wants it, if she says she wants it, and then okay, well, here's how to make it happen.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: My kid is literally nine inches taller than everybody else on the basketball court.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_01: There is no reason anybody else should get a rebound, and yet he never gets a rebound.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yeah, but well, you know, we'll get there.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's all the learning.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, by the way, he just started, man.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, he's been playing basketball for two months or whatever.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's nothing.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_00: So let him do it.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: It'll click, it'll click.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: It'll click for me.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: It was always the motivation of like the smack talk.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you're if your son's wired that way, but whenever someone like tried to talk smack to me or like was like kind of physical, like they're physical with you on the court or whatever, it would just turn I would flip this switch, like this notch, and I'd be like, like it gave me like a superpower of being like so much better, yes, than than if someone was like nice to me on the court.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's just like like that competitive nature really came out of me when someone's like, and I actually use that too for like even the podcast.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, if if I get like a hate comment or something like that, I'm like, oh my god, okay.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna go this podcast.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: It just like feels me.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know why.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm so wired that way, but that's weird.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: So I wanted to get into your your son, you know, not just in sports, but like the discipline aspect.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: I know myself, I I tend to res resort to just like yelling and like, you know, like laying down the heavy punishment, carrying them to the room, like go have a timeout kind of thing, like like maybe our parents did to us.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: You know, how do we teach discipline without losing that emotional connection with our kids?
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, man, this is so tough.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: This is another thing I've struggled with, Ryan.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: I I'll tell you, because and strangely, it's because when I was younger, especially when I was younger, I'm not an angry person.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_01: I don't get mad very easily.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: I will get mad about certain things, but I just I'm very slow to boil.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I just like I just don't get that mad that quickly.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: And then when my kids came around, I found out that I could absolutely get mad quickly.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: And those kids know how to push those buttons.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's like they're inmates in a jail, and all they have to do all day long is figure out how to push my buttons, and and that's what they do.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_01: And so I would shock myself at how quickly, quickly I could get mad.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_01: It's never happened to me.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so I really had to struggle with that.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't have because I never was a mad person, so I didn't have to develop techniques to manage anger.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: And then I did.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_01: And the metaphor that I like to use is you know, we've all got two brains within us.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_01: We have what I call the Conan the Barbarian brain, which is our amygdala.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: It is the reactive part of our brain, it's the more primitive part, it's the part that you need when you're jumping out of the way of a bus.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: And then there's the Sherlock Holmes brain, which is the prefrontal cortex.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: And the prefrontal cortex doesn't fully develop until we're for men in our 20s.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: And that is the brain that allows us to analyze and think and and plan.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_01: And your job is to stay in the Sherlock Holmes brain when it comes to your kids.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: If you let them drop you into the cone and the barbarian brain, you have failed them.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: And you are eroding the connection.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: You are, and so you have to develop techniques to stay in that Sherlock Holmes brain.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: And the one that worked the best for me came from a book I found called One, Two, Three Magic.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: And basically the argument of that book was was they're trying to get you to freak out and you can't let them get you to freak out.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so you just calmly count the behavior and you say that's one.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_01: And if I get to three, you're going to your room for one minute per year of age.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: So for my boy, it would be seven, it would be seven.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_01: For my girl, it's four um minutes.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's one.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: If I get to three, where you're you're you're going to your room for four minutes.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not a timeout.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: Well, yeah, I mean, we're just gonna take a break.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna take a break, and which means I get a break from you and you get a break from me.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_01: The behavior continues, it's two.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: And if it keeps continuing, it's three.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_01: And at three, let's go.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: No, I don't want to go.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm gonna sit on the ground.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: All right, I'll pick you up and I'll carry you.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's fine.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I'll do it calmly.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: It's not, I'm not trying to hurt you, I'm not getting mad.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: It keeps me from getting mad.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: I can count to three without getting mad.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: If it continues, if it's never ending, if there's never gonna be a stop to it, then I feel like I gotta, I gotta put it down, I gotta put the stuff down.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: Well, by the time she's 25, if she keeps acting like this, she's gonna be an absolute failure, and that reflects poorly on me as a dad.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: Instead, like, okay, there's a stop to it.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: Like, we're just gonna take a four-minute break.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_01: And then, all right, I'll set a timer for four minutes and I'll come back.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: And in four minutes, we'll see if, you know, we're we're calm.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, we also give her techniques to calm down and stuff like that.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: But we need to teach her self-regulation.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: And um, I had to count my boy when we finally encountered this.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: I had to count him all the time.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: It was when he was three and four.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: I haven't had to count him in three years.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_01: He, I mean, it's not, it's just not an issue.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: I asked him to do something and I told him that like there'll be times he's on his iPad or something like that, and he'll nod his head and I'm looking away and I don't see him.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, Listen, it's really important to me that you acknowledge if I ask you to do something, I need you to acknowledge what I've said.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes you might not understand why I'm asking you to do something.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes you say, Well, when you say that, it comes across as defiance.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: It comes across like you're not, you don't want to do it.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: And so you're just trying to put obstacles in my way.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: I want you to ask why, but I need you to acknowledge what that I've asked you to do something and that and and express your willingness to do it.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: So here's what I need from you.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: If I ask you to do something, the first words out of your mouth, I want them to be yes dad.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_01: Just every time.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_01: Just say yes dad.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: And then you can ask me why.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_01: You can even suggest something else.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, Lake, go downstairs and get a water bottle.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, dad.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: Why do I need a water bottle?
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, because we're about to go to school and you need a water bottle from school.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, well, could I use, would it be okay if I used my other water bottle that I have up here instead?
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_01: Let's do that.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: So that's and that's the kind of exchange we end up having as a result of all of that training.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: But man, I mean, in the early days, they don't have a prefrontal cortex.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_01: They don't have any.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's developing.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: And it for my boy, it's not going to be developed until he's 25 or 26 or 27 years old.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's impossible.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: It is impossible to reason them through anything, especially if they're all hyped up.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so you just have to short circuit that, get everything calm, and then you can have a discussion.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_01: And by the way, you can't do it for yourself too, because you're all pissed off.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: You're like, ah, you know, you're not respecting my authority or whatever the thing is.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: That was an important tool for me, just to remain calm.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I find that if I can remain calm, everything goes great.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: Everything goes great.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: We all we have this wonderful time.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_01: But if I man, if I start getting agitated, things go really downhill really fast.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I love that.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: That's a genius approach and really just actionable stuff we can take away and do tonight because it's like I am very even killed, but then my buttons get pressed, I go the other way real fast.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I feel stupid as hell after, but every time I feel like a failure as a parent.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_00: Your kids know.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's funny the way that works, because the reason that you're getting triggered like that and drop down in your Sherlock Holmes brain, I think for me, this is this is what's true for me.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, I'm just I'm just a dad like you are trying to figure it out.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_01: But the reason that I get triggered is because deep down I feel like this behavior means I'm a failure as a dad.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: Challenges my sense of self.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's ridiculous.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: You are not a failure as a dad if your kid is pissing and moaning about eating his green beans.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um like so if you if you pull that into your conscious brain and inspect it, it's ridiculous.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's it it doesn't survive inspection.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's helpful to do that.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_01: But then if you uh if you if you can keep it in that conscious brain, if you can keep it in your Sherlock Holmes brain, then all that stuff dies.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: But if you let it drop down into your conan brain, the conan brain doesn't understand that feelings are just feelings.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_01: It thinks that feelings are reality and your and your Sherlock brain knows that they're just feelings and there's indicators of something.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's like uh it's like the spinometer in your car or the RPM gauge.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, that's just it's just telling you something.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_01: And and the Sherlock Holmes brain knows how to take the data and then do something about it.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: But the cone in the brain, all it knows is how to how to react.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: And if it starts to feel angry, well, then it's gonna react with anger.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_01: And that's not that's just not the best way to deal with stuff.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, there's a lot that that's deep, man.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot to take in there and and chew on.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I appreciate you explaining it that way because it really puts it in a new light for me of like, okay, that makes total sense.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: That's the exact way I need to approach this because nothing ever comes good out of us getting frazzled or you know, rattled or whatever you whatever adjective you want to throw out there.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_00: Nothing good comes out of it.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: Our kids then get more amped up, and then our spouses perhaps get more amped up, and then it's right, and then obviously we feel bad at the end, and then it's like then you have to do the repair cycle of it.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, which is itself its own opportunity, and so you kind of want to embrace that.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: But I'll tell you another thing, and this is this is something that I've really had to learn about myself is you need to give yourself a grace to understand that you're doing a great frickin' job.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: The very fact that you feel bad after you get mad means that you're in the 90th percentile.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I end every single episode of my podcast with the same sentence.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: I say, you are a great parent.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: And you are.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_01: If you're listening to my podcast, if you care enough about your kids that you're listening to a frickin' uh a podcast called Raising Men, then you're a great frickin' parent.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: And you're a great parent for for struggling with it.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: You're you're a great parent just worrying about whether or not it's okay to be mad because most people don't.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_01: Most people go on autopilot.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: And they're just they're just continuing the same trauma that they dealt with.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: So it's okay to look in the mirror and go, you're a great dad.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_01: And then and then go back to the struggle, right?
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: Because it's not easy.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: No, I love that affirmation of just like letting people know.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: Cause like you're right.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: Like if you if you are listening to your podcast, um, or people are listening to your podcast rather than Joe Rogan, for instance, like like obviously they care about their kids, obviously they care about being better parents, obviously they want to be better dads.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so man, that that makes total sense to me.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: And you mentioned the iPad thing.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I gotta get into this because you're a tech dad.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: How do you handle screen time and how do you handle um the online dangers, perhaps?
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe not with your four-year-old, but more with your seven-year-old right now.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: I I hope.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: So, first of all, if you have a kid who's 14, man, you're in the thick of it.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: And if you have a kid that's 16 or 17, you've like, you're like, what's done is done.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_01: We are in the process of doing the largest uncontrolled experiment in humankind with our kids by giving them access to social media and these supercomputers in our pockets.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: It is insane.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: And it I don't know what the answer is, but I'll tell you what I'm doing.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_01: And both of my kids have iPads.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_01: They we use screen time on the iPads to control the amount of time that they are allowed to do stuff.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_01: And it's locked down pretty tightly.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: They really can only use their iPads for whatever they want to use for about an hour and then they start having to ask for more time, which the iPad makes easy.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_01: I get a text message that says, Would like more time on this app.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: I can now have conditions under which he is allowed to ask for more time.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_01: So, okay, yeah, you can have one more, you can have 15 more minutes on Roblox, but I want you to do this educational app for 15 minutes first.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: That's one thing that that's something that I can do.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: I can just say, no, it's time to go read a book.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: I can just, or I could just say, yeah, okay, he can have another hour or whatever.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_01: It's very tightly controlled.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: But by the same token, I try to default to being able to say yes.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: I want him, I want to have a good reason to say no to things.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_01: We had a this happened this very morning.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_01: We had a situation about two months ago where like my son has a morning checklist.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: It's about eight things on the checklist that he has to get done before he's allowed to mess around on his iPad.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so about two months ago, he came and he gave me the checklist.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_01: And then it was time to go to school.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: And um, a bunch of the things on the checklist weren't done.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: He had checked them off, but they weren't done.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: And so that was a real problem with trust because he lied to me, man.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: And it created the stuff wasn't done.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so now we're scrambling to get to school and all that stuff, and that's always a nightmare.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: And it turned out that the reason that he lied about being done with his checklist was because he really wanted to watch YouTube.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_01: He's addicted to these certain Minecraft videos on YouTube.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so a couple days ago, he asked if he could watch a particular video on YouTube again.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, tell you what, I think we could start introducing this back and we're gonna use this other device to watch YouTube, only this device, and you have to ask for it specifically, and I will okay each individual video.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: And so we did that for a couple days.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: And this morning we were walking to school and he didn't have a water bottle.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the things on the checklist is the water bottle is in his backpack.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: He didn't have it.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_01: So, same thing.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: He didn't have the checklist done.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_01: He said he did.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_01: He didn't have it done because he wanted to watch YouTube.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, and you know, it was kind of this sort of almost tearful moment because it's like we've eroded our trust again.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, it's less of a trust thing, man.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: I just think YouTube is a problem.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_01: I think you can't do YouTube in the morning.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_01: And he goes, Yeah, okay.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_01: And it was a sad thing, but he got it, and it all made sense.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_01: And it wasn't just me imposing this penalty or consequence on him from on hand, it's us working as a team to try and get the best outcome.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: And he recognizes that the first time I took YouTube away, it was like it was a consequence imposed from on high.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: And that was it was a real problem.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: But now it's like it's a collaborative thing.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_01: And and I don't know, that's my experience.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know where it's gonna lead.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know what's gonna happen.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, he's not getting access to social media until he's 15 or 16, at the very least.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_01: But YouTube is a kind of social media, and I I want him to be able to watch educational videos, I want him to be able to watch Minecraft building.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: He's unbelievable at Minecraft.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: He's unbelievable.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: The stuff that he builds in these virtual worlds is incredible.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: I want him to learn how to do that stuff.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: I want him to be able to experience that, but we can't have this outcome.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: And so if I can tie it back to the negative aspects of it, and then then he'll get it.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I can I can trust him.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: Even at this young age, I can trust him to actually, you know, to to at least understand what the right thing is.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, we can create a mechanism to make that happen.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, no, there's no easy answer to that question, but yeah, I mean, it's who knows what we'll see over our kids' lifetimes in terms of tech and you know how it's gonna evolve and it's an experiment though, man.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it is just purely it's it's a little scary, honestly.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I'm not even ready for the the the social media age of our our kids being there.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I'm definitely like gearing up and trying to learn what other parents are doing with the screen time thing and all that.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: And and so what other like you know, you've interviewed a lot of great people over the years.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what what other like habit do you think we should practice tonight to help raise better kids?
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like, is there anything else like you think busy dads should implement at their own home tonight?
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, there's a couple of things that come to mind.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_01: And um I think the most important one we've already touched on, which is stay in your Sherlock brain.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever you gotta do, stay in your Sherlock brain.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: That's when you're your best self.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_01: But then that second one that we also talked about is is by the way, that's so much easier said than done.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_01: You have to have mechanisms for stuff.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_01: Anytime you sit down and you go, Oh, I'm just gonna try harder to be calmer, that will never work.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: It will never, it will not work for staying calm.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: It will not work for working out, it will not work for dieting, it will not work.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_01: Force of will, there is a finite amount of will that you have in your brain.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_01: And if and it is easily exhausted, you cannot depend on it for anything.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: So you need a mechanism.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: So, what's the mechanism?
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: What's the mechanism to stay calm?
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_01: One, two, three, magic, that book.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: I highly recommend it.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: That's a that's a pretty good mechanism.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_01: That's the one that worked for me.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it'll work for you and your kids, maybe it won't, but come up with something.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: And once the kids get old enough, they can help you come up with mechanisms.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: And that, by the way, that's an important lesson for them to learn too.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but the second thing is just give yourself the freaking grace, man.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_01: It is so easy to just beat yourself up over, man, I just screamed at my kid, and so now he's ruined for life.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: That's not true, man.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: You're doing a great freaking job.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_01: You are a great parent.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: Remember that.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: And if you need to hear it, listen to my podcast.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: I'll tell you.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_01: I'll tell you every single episode.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: No, yeah, no, I have, and I like I said, I'm a fan, and and you know, that's kind of the next segue, man.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: Where, Sean, where can people find out more about your podcast, um, your other works that you got going on, connect with you?
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um, do you want to give us a little bit of a blowdown and actually tell us about your podcast too, a little bit?
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, Raising Men is the name of the podcast.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: We've got a website at raising.men.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_01: You can reach me at podcast at raising.men.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_01: I'd love to hear from people.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: I love to have discussions.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: Please, yeah, absolutely feel free to reach out.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_01: We're on, but and we're also on all of the socials at raising men or uh or raising men podcast.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yeah, I mean, please, but please definitely connect with me.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_01: And uh yeah, the podcast is I'm just trying to have an authentic discussion with people who know a lot more than I do about parenting.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm uh I am trying to, it's for it's for parents of boys, both fathers and mothers.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm just trying to get as smart as I can about how to how to how to raise an excellent man.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_01: And uh so it's an excuse to have these conversations and and um and meet with a bunch of people who have a lot to say and some good insight into what it takes.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I love that, man.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I mean this is my excuse to get to talk sports for 20 minutes and kind of hang out with with the buddies.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I'm so glad we met and connected and I can tell you're, you know, as an aside, I can tell your dad was a broadcaster.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_00: You got that very you got a nice, you got a nice voice.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_00: I'm very jealous of your broadcasting voice.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_01: He was uh he was a world class sportscaster.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_01: He was a world class sportscaster and uh he's retired now, he's still around, but and he's helping me with this.