Latest / A Time to Sharpen / Youth-Driven Culture

Transcript

Youth-Driven Culture · A Time to Sharpen

• 0:09
  Is there anything worse than a dull blade?
• 0:12
  Well, yeah, lots of things. I guess, poverty War ticks,
• 0:19
  applied of Mother Nature's, Wonder.
• 0:23
  Yes, it's that time of year again here in Missouri for those
• 0:26
  little bloodsuckers, unfortunately.
• 0:30
  Seriously though, a dull blade is bad and it's unusable, in
• 0:35
  fact it's downright dangerous. Knives need sharpening from what
• 0:40
  stone Boys Ranch in Mountain View.
• 0:42
  Missouri comes a time to sharpen a Bi weekly podcast that
• 0:47
  examines how we can all be better versions of ourselves
• 0:51
  better teachers. Better counselors better parents
• 0:55
  and better people. Elvis.
• 1:05
  Chuck Berry The Beatles young people flocked to hear them,
• 1:09
  sing boys and girls, bought their records by the millions
• 1:12
  lined, their rooms with posters, and told had lunch boxes with
• 1:15
  their image to school. Young man dressed.
• 1:18
  Like them moved like them and wore their hair like them.
• 1:21
  Young women, swooned at their feet.
• 1:23
  Corporate America, took note the money-making machine went into
• 1:27
  high gear and created an entire class of people that didn't
• 1:30
  really exist before. Then the teenager popular
• 1:34
  culture has never been the same today.
• 1:37
  There is a huge divide between adults and teenagers a gap which
• 1:41
  serves Wall Street. Well, but doesn't do much for
• 1:43
  parents teachers and counselors. Join us as we speak with Jeremy
• 1:47
  Thompson, executive director, and co-founder of Whetstone
• 1:50
  Boys, Ranch for a discussion about generational conflict and
• 1:53
  what we can do to make things better not worse.
• 2:03
  Welcome back to a time to sharpen.
• 2:05
  This is Axel Lima te. I'm here with Brandon Maxwell.
• 2:10
  Hello Axl. It's good to see you.
• 2:12
  Good to see you. We're in different seats this
• 2:14
  time. We are, but right next to you,
• 2:17
  instead of across from you, and why is that?
• 2:19
  That's because we have a special guest here today.
• 2:22
  And a couple weeks ago, we had Troy veteran for all of you.
• 2:26
  Sharpeners out there, sharpeners, you're going to make
• 2:30
  squeeze that down, will not to have tried.
• 2:32
  It on, see how it see how it feels, you know, run it up to
• 2:34
  flagpole see if anyone salutes it.
• 2:36
  All right, put it out on the porch, seat cat.
• 2:38
  Licks it up and see how it goes. So, any other Freddy is he's the
• 2:44
  guy that's actually from twelve angry men.
• 2:45
  Oh, that's okay. Yeah.
• 2:46
  So throw in a movie, right direction.
• 2:48
  But we're here with Jeremy Thompson, this morning,
• 2:50
  executive director of Whetstone Boys, Ranch co-founder of the
• 2:55
  ranch along with Brandon. And, and me, 2011, we started
• 3:01
  the ranch Actually opened up Whetstone for for residents,
• 3:06
  have been going on for many years before that with the two
• 3:09
  of you and Nate and other people who were along for the ride.
• 3:14
  And this is about our like 20th podcast, something like that.
• 3:18
  We had our anniversary. Well, yeah, Laura was looking at
• 3:21
  you. That's seen the what's the
• 3:23
  Facebook post? And she's like annual or the
• 3:27
  what did you put on that? It is and Newell Newell
• 3:30
  basically the one-year anniversary.
• 3:32
  Anniversary that we'd started this.
• 3:33
  I'm like there's like wow she goes as a already been that long
• 3:37
  and I said the same thing as like there's no way.
• 3:40
  Yeah it's it's crazy. It's been already a year.
• 3:42
  Yeah, but it's been a, it's been, it's been fun.
• 3:45
  It's been a ride. So, weird for a ride today
• 3:47
  because we have Jeremy with us and we thought we'd bring him in
• 3:51
  because the topic we want to talk about today is Youth versus
• 3:57
  adult driven culture and that's a passion of Jeremy's so we
• 4:02
  thought we'd bring them in and let him expound on that topic
• 4:07
  and tell us what he's learned about it.
• 4:09
  Because Jeremy's always been one to respect Elders.
• 4:16
  I'd say it went through a rebellious period Jeremy in high
• 4:18
  school but I can remember from the time we were really young,
• 4:22
  always wanting really looking up to your dad my dad.
• 4:25
  Had, you know, we joked about finding, you know, finding an
• 4:29
  old guy that you could, ya get to know it church and just
• 4:32
  listen to him talk and we weren't we'd find him funny in
• 4:36
  some ways but we always were kind of drawn to that I think.
• 4:39
  Yeah. We always talked about just old
• 4:41
  man. I remember sitting at the shore
• 4:43
  of Lake Superior and I'll Royal National Park and yeah I think
• 4:47
  we were probably like 11 or 12 and throws three old men sitting
• 4:51
  on a bench and they were just kind of talking and Laughing and
• 4:55
  enjoying their company with each other and yeah, that was just a
• 4:58
  part of me. I remember specifically like
• 5:01
  always remembering that. I'm aiming to be a man like
• 5:06
  that. Hmm, that that old, we're
• 5:09
  getting to the point where we're actually as older those got.
• 5:11
  I know I said we're talking about something.
• 5:13
  It doesn't seem like that long ago and here we are getting
• 5:16
  older. Yeah, funny thing is, if we went
• 5:19
  back in time and looked at those guys, they were probably like,
• 5:21
  45, right? In my mind.
• 5:23
  They're like 70. 70 80, you know, gray hair with canes but
• 5:27
  I'm sure there are many old man kind of guy.
• 5:29
  Yeah, yeah. Butter, I would say since
• 5:34
  nobody's, this is the first time on the podcast and hearing your
• 5:39
  voice. Obviously we've said executive
• 5:42
  director, what does that mean? What is your role here?
• 5:44
  Why don't you explain that a little bit with your day-to-day
• 5:48
  duties. Yeah, great question Brandon.
• 5:50
  I'm still actually trying to figure that out and answer that
• 5:53
  question because it seems Seems like it changes a little bit
• 5:57
  every day. Some days, it's like the
• 5:59
  emergency. Everything's going wrong.
• 6:02
  What we going to do, kind of make make tough decisions other
• 6:05
  days. It's being able to really work
• 6:08
  on thinking about the future, and I'm sure all of you guys
• 6:11
  don't they're listening. We're pursuing a big campaign
• 6:14
  right now to build another house this year and take care of more
• 6:17
  boys and really double our capacity.
• 6:20
  Super, super excited about that. And there's other days where I'm
• 6:24
  just meeting, With individuals that I'm their direct
• 6:27
  supervisor. Sometimes I'm able to have boys
• 6:30
  up for coffee or take a boy home for dinner and have a great
• 6:34
  time. I try to bring my dog to the
• 6:37
  ranch on Thursday because I breathe all the boys love dogs.
• 6:41
  We don't actually have a ranch dog and so my dog Selby's kind
• 6:45
  of our Ranch dog right now I guess, but But yeah, that's a
• 6:49
  little sample of I guess what I do.
• 6:51
  Yeah, that's funny. You say that about Sylvie.
• 6:53
  I didn't I didn't realize that. It's a, it's a function of the
• 6:57
  having to work here. Sometimes we don't always know.
• 7:00
  The left hand, doesn't always know what the right hand is
• 7:02
  doing, so that's a cool idea to be intentional about bringing
• 7:06
  the bringing the puppy in. And just one of the just the
• 7:08
  other day, one of the boys was saying we need a ranch dog.
• 7:10
  Yeah dog. So now I can say, well, we have
• 7:13
  one on Thursdays Thursday. Yeah.
• 7:15
  So part thing we do in this podcast, Brandon As I wouldn't
• 7:18
  know some of what's happening in my own life.
• 7:22
  Yes. So but yeah, that's so what
• 7:26
  you're talking about Jeremy like what do you do?
• 7:28
  Like, it's all over the place. You never know exactly what
• 7:33
  you're going to be faced with when you walk into work every
• 7:36
  morning, right? Yeah, it was kind of a crazy
• 7:39
  week this week. We had a situation where three
• 7:42
  boys ran away and we're gone three or four hours and it
• 7:47
  somehow. I'll manage to make it about
• 7:49
  four or five miles down the road before.
• 7:53
  The, the policeman found them and escorted him back to the
• 7:57
  ranch. And so myself, and the program
• 8:00
  director. We were making plans at almost
• 8:03
  11:00 the other night, I've just like, all right, how we're going
• 8:06
  to safely get through this evening tonight, and we put the
• 8:09
  three boys that ran away on the first floor, which might have
• 8:13
  been the first time since we opened that we've ever had boy
• 8:15
  sleep on the first floor of the house.
• 8:17
  And then the other seven boys were upstairs with the door
• 8:21
  locked in between and that was and of our measure of safety to
• 8:24
  kind of get through the night. So it was a definitely in one of
• 8:28
  the things I love about the job. Sometimes, it's just that it's
• 8:31
  different every day, right? And that was definitely looking
• 8:34
  back. Now that I'm not in that crisis,
• 8:39
  I kind of appreciate it. I think versus just like coming
• 8:42
  in doing the same thing every day.
• 8:44
  Yeah, so that that that's kind of fun.
• 8:47
  Sometimes it's not fun to be in that moment, right then.
• 8:49
  But it right. It's fun to look back now.
• 8:51
  Righty is the spice of life. Yeah.
• 8:53
  Yeah I think it's pretty safe to say that we all wear a lot of
• 8:58
  different hats in spite of our actual, you know we all have job
• 9:03
  titles but you can't fit all the job titles on a On a card.
• 9:09
  So yeah, just with the nature of what we do and the chair said
• 9:13
  there's there's a lot of moving parts to providing 24/7 care for
• 9:19
  for teenage boys that are struggling.
• 9:21
  Yeah, so well. And if we can just pivot, no,
• 9:26
  no, we did Brandon. No, we're not gonna let me pick
• 9:28
  and reverse course but when you use the word pivot, I was gonna
• 9:33
  say pivot. Sounds like the name of someone
• 9:35
  else's podcast. Yeah and it's overused That was
• 9:39
  like on our first podcast and Axle keeps bringing well,
• 9:42
  Brandon, you had a parent visited the ranch, right?
• 9:44
  Yeah. Who intentionally try to use the
• 9:46
  word pivot now, much, possibly back to have a few parents,
• 9:49
  actually, to with. I can think of that have
• 9:52
  listened to the podcast prior to bringing their son or thinking
• 9:56
  about bringing their son and they have had some funny, they
• 10:03
  were kind of discrete in using some terminologies or talking
• 10:06
  about like, if you guys have listened like that.
• 10:09
  Abel that where I this ran the screws too long.
• 10:12
  The guy was like, yeah, I'd like to can we pivot from this
• 10:15
  conversation and music table. Okay, so it's been some some fun
• 10:21
  banter. Yeah, well if we can transition
• 10:27
  from what you're really talking about the the how things were
• 10:29
  crazy at the beginning of the week.
• 10:31
  They by the way things are better.
• 10:32
  Now we're okay, everyone safe, we survived the storm.
• 10:36
  Yes. Praise the Lord, yes.
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  But these things happen They're not every week occurrences every
• 10:41
  month occurrences. I mean, even every year
• 10:43
  occurrences, were you have something that kind of comes off
• 10:45
  the rails, right. Right.
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  Like that. But speaking of Youth driven
• 10:48
  culture that evening was a very youth-driven evening and I think
• 10:54
  that's where we want to maybe jump into this discussion.
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  Is we want to empower young people.
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  We want to give them freedoms. We want to give them
• 11:03
  opportunities to make mistakes and learn.
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  We've talked about that a lot on this podcast, but it is And
• 11:09
  point you you cross the line into just handing over the keys
• 11:13
  to the kingdom, right? And at that point, you have a
• 11:17
  kind of you can get into a Lord of the Flies situation right?
• 11:21
  And you know at things things become pretty chaotic.
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  So let's talk about its kind of sit in that spot.
• 11:29
  I like to find a spot when we're talking about where there isn't
• 11:32
  there isn't a clear answer. There's a there's a gray area,
• 11:35
  there's a dilemma that we're faced with as a parent, right?
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  I want to give my kids. Freedom, I want to teach him to
• 11:40
  be an adult. Want to teach her to be
• 11:42
  responsible with their money, but in order to do that, I have
• 11:45
  to take some risks. So as an executive director who
• 11:48
  has to make, you know, where the buck stops with you and you're
• 11:52
  responsible for everyone's safety here but you're also
• 11:55
  responsible for growth and for guys being able to transition
• 11:58
  into real life and not become institutionalized.
• 12:01
  How do you navigate that area? While you know, keeping the
• 12:05
  focus on Adults being adults, right?
• 12:09
  You always have to have the adult in the room.
• 12:11
  Yeah, yeah, that's a great question.
• 12:14
  I think I'd start with the answer just that, that I'm so
• 12:18
  dependent on God as the ultimate all of our all of our Elder and
• 12:23
  kind of setting the course for all of us and showing us the
• 12:26
  path and trying my best and I feel every day.
• 12:29
  But try my best to follow the word of God to really Lead Me in
• 12:35
  the Holy Spirit. um, there's times definitely when the When
• 12:41
  we when it's one of those tempting to think that, oh yeah,
• 12:46
  it'd be a lot easier. Just to let the boys do what
• 12:48
  they want to do. They're constantly coming to us
• 12:50
  with ideas of what they like to do.
• 12:54
  How many times I'd like to call their parents or how much movies
• 12:57
  had like, how many movies I like to watch, or how many phone
• 13:00
  calls had like to get, they can't talk to their girlfriend
• 13:03
  at home and so a lot of those things that kind of come from I
• 13:07
  guess life wisdom, the answer becomes a quick know No, but
• 13:11
  then sometimes they have really do have a good idea and we try
• 13:15
  to consider creating kind of a not a culture where it's just
• 13:23
  constantly, no, but a culture where there's buy-in with with
• 13:28
  both the boys and with the staff.
• 13:32
  Yeah, we like to joke sometimes that our mission statement is to
• 13:37
  sharpen the character of young man, but we sometimes say it
• 13:40
  could also be. We will sharpen the character of
• 13:42
  young men by by saying no. Yeah, and I think you did a good
• 13:46
  job of balancing that because we want there to be buy-in, we want
• 13:50
  boys to feel like this is their program and not just something
• 13:54
  that's being, you know, foisted upon upon them run.
• 13:59
  So like, can you give an example maybe over the years of when a
• 14:03
  boy came with a good Yes. And was like you thought and we
• 14:09
  actually did it. Yeah one something that you
• 14:12
  write one of the policies we have at Whetstone is that we ask
• 14:15
  the parents to provide a kind of we call it the uniform stipend
• 14:20
  upfront. And with that money we go and
• 14:22
  buy all the boys clothing and so that none of the boys have the
• 14:28
  any cooler looking clothing or any more expensive clothing or
• 14:31
  better shoes or better boots. And I think that was a wise
• 14:37
  decision that we I think the three of us made that decision
• 14:40
  like 12 years ago. But one thing that came up from
• 14:43
  that is arguably, maybe we made it.
• 14:47
  We took their kind of personality away a little bit
• 14:50
  and I remember a couple of years ago, one of the boys came up may
• 14:53
  have been even three years ago, where they came up and said, hey
• 14:57
  what what can we do to get one of our personal items back, you
• 15:01
  know, and then the team here, kind of thought about At that
• 15:06
  prayed about it and really came to the conclusion of this would
• 15:09
  be a great incentive for the boys that are kind of walking
• 15:12
  through the three levels in the program that if they achieve a
• 15:15
  transfer to the next level, that would enable them to be able to
• 15:20
  get one of the items personally that they want.
• 15:24
  It would be, you know, approved we wouldn't approve everything
• 15:27
  they wanted of course. But oftentimes the boys end up
• 15:30
  with their hoodie or, or their favorite baseball hat, or I
• 15:35
  mean, some of the boys even like a blanket from home that they
• 15:40
  really love and are attached to. And so I think that's been a
• 15:43
  great example of trying to create that culture of that.
• 15:49
  It's not US versus them that were really kind of trying to
• 15:53
  keep in mind their desires and their needs, as we do the best
• 15:57
  we can to manage the place here. Yeah.
• 16:00
  Yeah that's a good example. The word that came to my mind as
• 16:06
  incentives. We a lot of times we'll take an
• 16:11
  idea that someone has it's like well I don't think we can do
• 16:14
  that right now but maybe later, right?
• 16:18
  Or maybe we can work it into the program so that it gives you
• 16:22
  some motivation because a lot of these guys, what they need is
• 16:24
  some hope, you know, it seems like at the end of the day
• 16:28
  that's the they have that they can make it through the Program,
• 16:31
  when they lose that, then they tank and they just do everything
• 16:33
  they can to get out of the program.
• 16:35
  But sometimes hope is just that blanket or that t-shirt that I
• 16:39
  want to get or just making it to the next day.
• 16:42
  And so, if you're struggling with with your teenager, your
• 16:46
  son, your daughter. And you're finding that you're
• 16:49
  struggling to really connect. And you're having this constant
• 16:51
  friction this fight about, well, you can give me freedom and
• 16:55
  you're like, well, you show responsibility, I'll give you
• 16:58
  freedom, and they're like, we're going to be free to mode.
• 17:00
  Should be Born, you getting caught that conflict cycle.
• 17:03
  You can sometimes sit down and have a discussion about
• 17:05
  incentives, right? With some things that we can
• 17:08
  build in some carrots instead of just sticks.
• 17:11
  Right right. Yeah it's easy to just focus on
• 17:15
  the negative and we always sweep used a phrase here before just
• 17:19
  catching them doing something right?
• 17:21
  And that is you know the whole key to you know, especially what
• 17:26
  we do and as parents as our kids get into the team.
• 17:30
  In years is to really provide the environment for them to be
• 17:38
  motivated to make to own it themselves as you said and it's
• 17:41
  just really provide an environment to where it
• 17:45
  motivates them. And that's really the hardest
• 17:48
  part, I think of our job is every kids motivated by
• 17:51
  something different. We can Hammer them all day long
• 17:54
  on what they're doing wrong, but they just end up getting this
• 17:57
  defeatist mentality that there are You have said that they're
• 18:01
  here, they already feel bad about themselves and heaping,
• 18:06
  all of these consequences on them, even though they deserve
• 18:09
  it, that's not the right answer. You got to be able to have the,
• 18:12
  you know, the old love and logic rules without relationships
• 18:16
  equals rebellion. And so as parents with our
• 18:20
  teenagers, I mean the really is to set up those boundaries early
• 18:27
  24 for parents who are just now coming become and into the
• 18:31
  parent years. If you're listening to this that
• 18:34
  it's that's why it's so critical as a parent to set those
• 18:38
  boundaries up early because if not you're just going to be
• 18:42
  fighting and even more so down the line but all is not lost
• 18:46
  right Axl. I mean if you it, maybe you
• 18:48
  screwed up and you weren't ready to be a parent and you feel like
• 18:51
  you lost those years. But what are some things along
• 18:54
  these lines that how you can start to get some of that
• 18:57
  control back? With teenagers.
• 19:00
  I know you're in the thick of it.
• 19:02
  Yeah, you had some, some car issues.
• 19:04
  We've had some serious car issues over the last week,
• 19:08
  navigating some car totaling xand.
• 19:11
  Yeah, we had a car that was totaled and my son got his
• 19:17
  driver's license. You have driving culture, utha
• 19:20
  driven but it's been. It's been fun because the
• 19:24
  Caleb's just so excited. He's like, wow, it's like I'm
• 19:28
  so, like the joy that he has being able to just go somewhere
• 19:33
  and to drive himself around, and I remember that Jeremy and I got
• 19:39
  our drivers license together. We were born with him about a
• 19:41
  month and a half of each other. So, first day, we got our
• 19:44
  licenses, we did something together.
• 19:47
  Well, you came over with your little white, Ford Escort and
• 19:51
  pick me up and yep, just I remember the, the seatbelt thing
• 19:55
  almost choking me because it It the automatic likes he felt.
• 19:59
  Yeah. They never catch on the whole
• 20:01
  automatic seatbelt thing. Yeah.
• 20:02
  Oh yeah. Oh yeah that didn't work.
• 20:05
  But anyway it was a it was a special time of just that all
• 20:09
  that freedom that you had all the sudden one day later just
• 20:13
  because your turn 16, yeah, it seems like you've lost some of
• 20:17
  that these days, some of that, like the with, with a lot of
• 20:20
  kids, like know the joy of yeah, of getting your driver's
• 20:23
  license. It's like there's so many kids
• 20:25
  it seems like, obviously not your son but yeah. 16 17 and 18
• 20:29
  years. Is this?
• 20:30
  Like they're just a yeah. I think it's more in bigger City
• 20:34
  metro areas where, you know, they'll just take an Uber
• 20:38
  somewhere. Yeah.
• 20:39
  You know, but I've talked to multiple people whose said that
• 20:44
  their kids friends are like, they're not even there, 17 years
• 20:47
  old, they're not even really thinking about getting a
• 20:49
  driver's license. Just thought that was we Ya
• 20:50
  Allah, lots of reasons. Yeah, some kids are just more
• 20:53
  comfortable staying at home and you know, I don't want to blame
• 20:56
  video games for. Nothing certainly video games.
• 21:00
  Give you an opportunity to live a voyeuristic lifestyle to where
• 21:04
  it's more exciting than real life.
• 21:07
  But yeah, it is it is kind of sad but back-to-back.
• 21:13
  Yeah. Back to the question.
• 21:14
  How if you've lost your son and how can you our daughter, how
• 21:17
  can you get them back? How can you incentivize things?
• 21:20
  You know, I think the first I where you start is you don't
• 21:23
  have to be their friend. Yeah, Charles Barkley was going
• 21:27
  off about this on the halftime show for March Madness.
• 21:30
  If you guys are watching that and he's always the guy who will
• 21:33
  just he'll say it, he'll go there, he'll address the
• 21:37
  elephant in the room. And there was this, there was
• 21:39
  the spot on the halftime show, where they were showing us a
• 21:42
  father, and his son, and the son was just thankful.
• 21:45
  That his dad was was tough on him and Berkeley right
• 21:49
  afterwards. He's like, yeah, that's great.
• 21:51
  It's a great story. That's, that's what's wrong with
• 21:53
  America. That's what's wrong with this
• 21:54
  country is All parents. They don't want to be their kids
• 21:57
  friends, you can't be your kids friends.
• 21:59
  At least that can't be your focus.
• 22:01
  We're not saying you shouldn't be friendly or that.
• 22:04
  That's Altima goal is that you do want to be their friend.
• 22:06
  But during those years, when there's this friction where
• 22:09
  they're wanting freedom, and you're wanting to teach
• 22:11
  responsibility, you can't be afraid to make them angry,
• 22:16
  they're gonna just sometimes hate your guts and that's okay,
• 22:22
  right? Yeah, Stuart Smalley.
• 22:24
  Cuz you're gonna Good enough. You're smart enough and doggone
• 22:27
  it. People like you, and sometimes
• 22:29
  our identity and I, this is, I didn't realize how hard this was
• 22:32
  going to be as a parent. Your identity is wrapped up in
• 22:35
  whether or not your kids like you.
• 22:38
  It can because they love you so much when they're growing up.
• 22:42
  Right? And then it turns any like, what
• 22:44
  the heck is going on? What is wrong with me?
• 22:46
  I thought I was actually a pretty cool person.
• 22:48
  I thought I was, I had some things to offer this child.
• 22:51
  Yeah. And then all of a sudden
• 22:53
  overnight it feels like That and this is not your fault, but you
• 22:57
  feel like it's your fault sometimes.
• 22:58
  And so I guess that's where I start is, you know, you can't be
• 23:02
  afraid to say, no, Jeremy? Like you were saying, you know,
• 23:05
  because you, you realize, in order to do my job, as a parent,
• 23:08
  I have to keep that distance, right?
• 23:12
  I was reminded of the list when you guys worked at shelter,
• 23:14
  would didn't you have a guy who give you a list of like, 100
• 23:17
  things that needed like the 95 Theses?
• 23:19
  Yeah. Nailed to the wall and some of
• 23:22
  the Ridiculousness of the things that he wanted right there.
• 23:25
  He thought would improve the program.
• 23:27
  The program there was some of those things you remember
• 23:28
  because there's nothing there, but pretty hilarious.
• 23:31
  Yeah, you know, if we actually gave way to what they wanted,
• 23:35
  what would that live, right? Yeah.
• 23:37
  I mean, it was bad girls on campus, you know, it was like,
• 23:41
  letting them date on campus was one of them.
• 23:44
  It would be a fantastic idea. Yeah, that's a, that's a great
• 23:48
  idea. I don't know what we're thinking
• 23:50
  letting them, you know, just switch rooms whenever just
• 23:55
  Luckily play more video games and watch better movies which we
• 24:00
  know what that would go right into essentially.
• 24:02
  Those are a few of the things on there.
• 24:04
  I was remember this just I gotta give the guy credit though for
• 24:07
  real. Yeah.
• 24:08
  Reference to Martin Luther we did this.
• 24:09
  Yeah. Oh yeah, he got said a voice.
• 24:17
  Yeah, I think there's just such a big difference in my opinion
• 24:20
  between Being a parent and being a friend, I think part of being
• 24:25
  a parent, and I'm not one myself outside of the boys that we have
• 24:28
  here but soon, but thinking of my parents, like, I never really
• 24:32
  thought of them as friends. I thought of those is my parents
• 24:35
  as people that that loved me unconditionally, but that they
• 24:39
  really love be enough to say no, you know.
• 24:42
  And that's I've seen such a big shift of that over the many,
• 24:46
  many years and in oftentimes have just really witnessed even
• 24:51
  on the phone with the parents that call in of how if my son
• 24:57
  says is then that'll be okay. Or if it's okay with my son,
• 25:02
  I'll come here or even like oftentimes they'll be like can
• 25:05
  we can we bring our son out to the campus Because we want to
• 25:09
  let him decide if this is a good thing for him and then I always
• 25:14
  let them kind of remind them that you guys are the.
• 25:16
  You guys are the parents and you guys need to be able to make
• 25:19
  this tough decision as to what It's in his best interest right
• 25:23
  now. He doesn't have the capability
• 25:25
  of doing that. Yeah.
• 25:28
  Yeah, it's is young people. You know that thinking back, I
• 25:32
  might experience. I didn't know, I didn't know
• 25:33
  what was best for me. I thought I did.
• 25:35
  I was super confident or at least it was it was a show of
• 25:39
  confidence that I knew what I was talking about.
• 25:41
  And a lot of that stemming, from just your own insecurities
• 25:44
  ironically is that you really don't have any clue and so to
• 25:48
  deal with that fact you you display this overconfidence
• 25:51
  right and knowing what you're doing.
• 25:54
  I've got it. You guys follow.
• 25:55
  What's going on with the Grizzlies?
• 25:56
  The Memphis Grizzlies. Right now, No, no, that's all
• 26:00
  changed our pleasure. Dart player, Abraham, yeah, Jean
• 26:04
  Morant and they have a very young team, super talented.
• 26:07
  And at the end of last year, everyone was just so excited
• 26:10
  about where they were at, and they're a lot of fun to watch
• 26:13
  and have fun, and they play his Dynamic brand of basketball.
• 26:16
  But it's, there's so many young guys on that team, that it seems
• 26:20
  from the outside, we don't know. Everything's going on that
• 26:23
  things have kind of run amok and there's just too much, partying
• 26:27
  going on is do. It's just making decisions that
• 26:30
  an older person who's had more experience would know not to do.
• 26:36
  And a lot of sports commentators are saying what that team needs
• 26:40
  is an adult in their locker room.
• 26:42
  They don't have an adult to say, hey guys, maybe we shouldn't go
• 26:46
  out and club tonight. We got a big game tomorrow.
• 26:49
  Maybe we shouldn't post as many different things on social
• 26:53
  media. Yeah, right.
• 26:56
  So that was a real A good illustration of yeah the youth
• 27:00
  driven culture and of how things can get out of hand really
• 27:03
  quickly. Yeah I think when we look at on
• 27:07
  me that coaching situation like that or parents and the whole
• 27:11
  friend thing we have to have a pretty strong conviction,
• 27:18
  ourselves and know who we are. Because I think out of if we're
• 27:22
  if we're doubting who we are innately and Really struggle
• 27:29
  with our kids, not liking us. That's more of a confidence
• 27:34
  issue. And really who's we?
• 27:35
  Are we here that with, like, where's our relationship with
• 27:39
  Christ? And like, where are we getting
• 27:41
  our information from? And where is our identity rooted
• 27:44
  in as Jeremy alluded to earlier on with just running what stone
• 27:51
  and our ultimate Elder in Christ and God the Father who he is and
• 27:57
  what he calls us. To be like, we have to be rooted
• 27:59
  in that and know what the Bible says, and who God calls us to be
• 28:03
  his Godly men and godly mentors to these young boys.
• 28:07
  And if we can be confident in that, then, you know, we're not
• 28:12
  worried about the fact that maybe our kids in all of our
• 28:17
  kids, friends are making fun of us because we're the dad that
• 28:20
  doesn't allow our kid to watch even PG, movies, or they can't
• 28:24
  have a phone until they're 14, you know, when you're In all,
• 28:28
  these cultural things and who wants to be you know knowing
• 28:32
  that all your daughter's friends are talking about you know your
• 28:35
  dad, so strict, your dad such a loser, if those things are going
• 28:39
  to bother you then you need to maybe check check yourself from
• 28:43
  where where you're at because that's where you start getting
• 28:46
  them to start. Letting that line slides ago.
• 28:48
  I want to be the cool dad. Right.
• 28:50
  You know. Yeah.
• 28:51
  Cool mom. I want to be gained respect with
• 28:54
  all these people but at the end of the day as you get older Are
• 28:58
  you're going to have those relationships, they're going to
• 29:01
  have a lot more respect as your kids get older and are able to
• 29:05
  look back and say man I'm really glad they set these bound round.
• 29:09
  That's a really good point is that it's not forever that
• 29:12
  you're having to be the villain the bad guy.
• 29:14
  Right? You know that this too shall
• 29:17
  pass, this too shall pass. Well, Jeremy been chomping at
• 29:23
  the bit over there. Waiting to give us a word from
• 29:25
  the Lord. I think it looks like wrought in
• 29:27
  survive. This is so yeah, let's just have
• 29:30
  a habit of because there's something here.
• 29:32
  I was thinking before we jumped on the podcast they just
• 29:36
  thinking of a Biblical example of eldership.
• 29:40
  And just thinking the role, the elders played traditionally and
• 29:45
  in the in the church has all the way from when the churches were
• 29:48
  established. And thought of the first Timothy
• 29:51
  chapter 3, verse 1 through 7 really talks about the
• 29:55
  qualifications for elders and I'll read that.
• 29:58
  At real quickly. Here's a truss trustworthy
• 30:01
  saying. If anyone sets his heart on
• 30:04
  being an elder, he desires a noble task.
• 30:08
  Now, the Elder must be above reproach, the husband of one
• 30:11
  wife, temperate self-controlled, respectable, hospitable able to
• 30:17
  teach not given the drunkenness, not violent, but gentle, not
• 30:22
  quarrelsome, not a lover of money, he must manage his own
• 30:26
  family. Well, And see that as children
• 30:29
  obey him with proper respect. If anyone does not know how to
• 30:33
  manage his own family. How can he take care of God's
• 30:37
  church? He must not be a recent convert
• 30:41
  or he may become conceited and fail under the same judgment
• 30:47
  fall under the same judgment as the devil.
• 30:50
  You must also have a good reputation with Outsiders so
• 30:53
  that he will not fall into disgrace and into the devil's
• 30:57
  trap should have brought my reading glasses, but I think I
• 31:00
  got most of that, they're a lot to chew on their.
• 31:04
  Yeah that's chew on. And just add example I think of
• 31:09
  like if there's somebody of that high of character that really
• 31:14
  should be kind of like an elder at a church.
• 31:17
  How much more so should our it's have that high of character and
• 31:23
  that ability to be that example, for their, for their children, I
• 31:30
  think that's where that speaks such volumes to me of, of the
• 31:35
  of, really the changing in culture since the time I was
• 31:39
  born and I can't even remember if thinking about things, you
• 31:44
  know, it used to be back in those days where parents were
• 31:48
  kind of like the people that Drew the line, you know, even my
• 31:53
  friends parents that I went over and spent the night with or
• 31:55
  spent time with or My Boy Scout leaders, or my soccer coach, or
• 32:01
  basketball coach. Those were kind of like the the
• 32:04
  people that set the set, the set the line and we knew where where
• 32:11
  to go, we knew where that line ended and and we knew that we
• 32:15
  were going to be disciplined. We kind of cross that line, you
• 32:20
  know, and then we came a long way from that and to just wasn't
• 32:25
  too long ago, I was at a family holiday event and one of the
• 32:29
  extended family members was attending the Thanksgiving
• 32:33
  dinner and they had a couple children and one of those kids.
• 32:38
  I mean, we're sitting down to this beautiful Thanksgiving
• 32:41
  dinner with all kinds of amazing food, all around us and then
• 32:45
  I'll send that boy. Probably seven or eight year old
• 32:48
  boy. Started throwing a fit about.
• 32:52
  I want chicken nuggets and I mean literally had an emotional
• 32:55
  Outburst to the point where his mom drove to McDonald's and got
• 33:00
  him some chicken nuggets while the rest of us had this amazing
• 33:04
  Thanksgiving dinner. Yeah.
• 33:08
  Yeah, it's it's that and that's a good illustration of what we
• 33:12
  are, how we're depriving our kids if we give in right.
• 33:16
  We're in that situation which I think is analogous for any
• 33:20
  situation where you given to Adam and right and silly or
• 33:26
  unwise demand from a from a child or a teenager there.
• 33:30
  What they get is so much so much worse and less than what God has
• 33:36
  designed for us. All to get out of Life, right?
• 33:39
  If we get what we want in our, in our, in our personal lives,
• 33:43
  we pray to God, and we pray for something we really want.
• 33:45
  And he says, no later on, we realize he had a better plan for
• 33:49
  us. How many times has that happened
• 33:50
  over the years at the ranch here?
• 33:52
  Oh yeah, we had one plan and God gave us.
• 33:55
  Something else that we didn't didn't foresee.
• 33:57
  Didn't want an end up being so much better than what we could
• 33:59
  have done, right? Well, I think it makes it such a
• 34:04
  harder Challenge on that point on waiting.
• 34:08
  Because with again with our phones and our technology, it's
• 34:11
  everything at our fingertips now and our kids cannot see past
• 34:16
  their nose and they get instant gratification on whatever I
• 34:21
  mean. You want a pizza?
• 34:22
  Let's do you know, what is it doordash?
• 34:26
  Or let's grab an Uber, let's go over here, I'm going to order
• 34:31
  this. I mean, Amazon, I wanted to get
• 34:33
  this piece of information. I mean, everything's right at
• 34:35
  our fingertips. And to have this, understanding
• 34:39
  of waiting, and Working towards something and really just being
• 34:46
  patient. I mean, that's we are as parents
• 34:48
  were fighting more of that, we find ourselves because we have
• 34:53
  technology to, and we have phones and, you know, those are
• 34:56
  all personal battles we have to fight ourselves but even more so
• 35:00
  with trying to teach our kids to be patient and it's like you
• 35:04
  don't have to you can wait, it's okay.
• 35:07
  It just those are extra challenges that were not there,
• 35:11
  you know, you know, 15, 20 years ago.
• 35:13
  Go. So to sum up, say no to the
• 35:16
  chicken nuggets, don't get Gin and Elders.
• 35:19
  While slow and dangerous behind the wheel can still serve a
• 35:23
  purpose, silver or purple got it in.
• 35:24
  We got it. Got don't go dying on me now.
• 35:27
  Yeah, and just remember that that adolescents or young
• 35:31
  person's brain is not really fully developed until they're
• 35:36
  between 23 and 25 years old. You know, I'm not really does
• 35:40
  speak to the The need for older people to be good examples.
• 35:47
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 35:48
  And if her boys, it's longer could be even longer right?
• 35:51
  Yeah, that's sobering thought. Yeah and going kind of capping
• 35:57
  off and coming back to circling back.
• 36:00
  Surprising back to the third bike.
• 36:03
  That one either. I know I really don't like that
• 36:05
  one transitioning. But to the 30 by 30 and as it
• 36:15
  relates to this elder driven culture.
• 36:18
  One of the things that we are wanting to add to the
• 36:23
  development. There is a cottage or two for a
• 36:26
  grandparent couple just because we real, we've had that with
• 36:30
  Papa, tuck and and his wife Kristen that we're out here for
• 36:35
  two years man. What an unbelievable.
• 36:37
  Dynamic that provided excuse me for two years that he did.
• 36:41
  What shop? With the guys and they would
• 36:43
  have guys over to dinner, just to go, you know, grandparents
• 36:46
  they just spoil and love on grandkids.
• 36:49
  It's that same idea and there's teaching there.
• 36:52
  So that is something that is very important to us from the
• 36:56
  beginning. This this elder driven culture
• 36:58
  and I know that word Elder has kind of taken a negative
• 37:01
  connotation in our culture today but it's just the idea that
• 37:05
  there are a lot of life lessons through experience that Elders
• 37:13
  have and there's some untapped resources are that that we want
• 37:17
  to tap back into and be intentional here at Whetstone
• 37:21
  with making that happen and creating that Dynamic.
• 37:24
  And we saw what it did for the two years.
• 37:26
  Unfortunately, we're getting back to the pointer again
• 37:29
  building these Cottages in the future to really do that
• 37:34
  perpetually and have that as a dynamic.
• 37:37
  Yeah because it's so important, right?
• 37:38
  Yeah. And if you haven't seen the
• 37:39
  video that kind of lays out this And it's on our website.
• 37:43
  There's a tab called 30 by 30 where you can you can watch
• 37:45
  Brandon actually if you're wondering what he looks like
• 37:48
  because we don't have any pictures of us.
• 37:50
  Yeah on podcasts. Yeah, we don't like things set
• 37:53
  up. Yeah.
• 37:53
  But see Brandon it does a really good job of laying it out and
• 37:58
  you'll see some pictures and drawings and things like that.
• 38:02
  Well, we're about out of time. I hope this has been helpful to
• 38:07
  our listeners out there and just just my parting.
• 38:12
  Thought is just that it's about that balance.
• 38:14
  You know we're not trying to say that adults are always.
• 38:16
  Right. If you listen to this podcast
• 38:18
  you know Brandon I make lots of mistakes we're trying to say
• 38:21
  that there is there's a given there's a take and right now we
• 38:25
  feel like and people listening to this podcast, I feel the same
• 38:28
  way. There's a there's been a swing
• 38:31
  and too far in One Direction. So there's a course correction.
• 38:34
  And I would encourage everyone to go out and see Jesus
• 38:37
  Revolution because I think that movie need you guys.
• 38:40
  Haven't seen it yet. So go out and see if this.
• 38:41
  Weekend for it's not the theory more.
• 38:43
  That movie does a really good job of showing how those two
• 38:46
  different demographics, the elders and the young people can
• 38:48
  come together and create something that's better than
• 38:51
  either. The either of them could create
• 38:53
  on their own and of illustrating how God worked through the
• 38:58
  hippies to bring love and, and sense of justice to the church
• 39:04
  that that it had grown complacent with and kind of
• 39:08
  Forgotten. And the older people are able to
• 39:11
  say to the hippie To hey you know maybe every once in a while
• 39:14
  you should take a bath you know her comb your hair maybe you
• 39:17
  should you should think about some structure here because this
• 39:20
  this is great right now. But let's put some stuff in
• 39:22
  place. This is only going to last for a
• 39:24
  couple months or a year. And so that had an impact on
• 39:27
  culture that just lasted decades because of that partnership
• 39:29
  between the two generations. Hmm, I think it's a good point
• 39:33
  just the unity. Mmm, they're just, that's
• 39:36
  really, I mean, who got is these, a unifier?
• 39:39
  You know, and being able to see E it other people's perspectives
• 39:44
  and that's, that's what it really is for parents to see the
• 39:47
  kids perspective and the kids get a better understanding of
• 39:50
  the parents perspective. And that's what really we do
• 39:52
  with our therapeutic team in in our what do we call them the
• 40:00
  just drew a blank on or intensives our phone family.
• 40:02
  I'm since now intensives is to really help them see each
• 40:07
  other's perspective and and gets down to a better Foundation to
• 40:11
  start building these relationships, back helps that
• 40:16
  way. So all right.
• 40:18
  Yep. Thank you.
• 40:20
  Jeremy for making the time in your schedule and coming in and
• 40:23
  talk in. And we'll have you back.
• 40:26
  I'm sure it was just a job, guys.
• 40:28
  Thank you guys. I'll call, right?
• 40:30
  Welcome. Take care.
• 40:31
  So, we'll see you in a couple weeks.
• 40:33
  Yeah. We often have some Adventure
• 40:34
  week stories for you all next time.
• 40:36
  Some too. In and hear what happened?
• 40:38
  Okay wait, alright, talk to you next time.
• 40:40
  Thank you, guys. What's Down, Boys, Ranch is a
• 40:51
  therapeutic. Boarding school located in a
• 40:53
  Scenic Ozarks of southern Missouri.
• 40:55
  It was founded in 2011 to serve families from around the country
• 41:00
  who are struggling with challenging behaviors from their
• 41:02
  12. To 16 year old Sons.
• 41:04
  Our mission is to sharpen the character of young men.
• 41:08
  Please visit Whetstone Boys, Ranch.com if you want to learn
• 41:11
  more about our program or about how to contact us for help,
• 41:15
  thanks for listening and we hope to catch you next time on it.
• 41:18
  Time to sharpen. Time to sharpen.