Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #604 Holiday Hot Seat - Daniel Pink

Transcript

#604 Holiday Hot Seat - Daniel Pink · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families Podcast.
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  Speaker 2: It's the podcast for the time poor parent who just
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  Speaker 2: wants answers Now Gooday.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: This is doctor Justin Coulson, the founder of Happy Families
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  Speaker 1: dot com dot a you, dad to six, daughter's husband
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  Speaker 1: to one wife and the parenting expert and co host
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  Speaker 1: on chang Lyine's Parental Guidance. Also the host of this podcast,
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  Speaker 1: that Happy Families Podcast. Thank you so much for listening
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: and allowing me into your life to hopefully be useful
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  Speaker 1: in making your family happier. Right now, school holidays in Queensland,
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  Speaker 1: which means that I'm doing my best to spend as
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  Speaker 1: much time in the sunshine with Kylie and the girls
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  Speaker 1: as I can. Today a lightning round with one of
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  Speaker 1: the most famous authors in the world, Daniel H. Pink.
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  Speaker 1: Dan Pink is the author of five New York Times bestsellers,
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  Speaker 1: including his latest book, which I absolutely love, The Power
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  Speaker 1: of Regret, and my other favorite of Dan's is Drive.
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  Speaker 1: Dan has won a billion awards, his books translated into
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  Speaker 1: a million lang book forty two languages, and has sold
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  Speaker 1: literally millions of copies of his book around the world.
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  Speaker 1: Los in Washington, d C. With his family and Dan
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  Speaker 1: joins me for a lightning round. I'd delight to have
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  Speaker 1: you hit Dan. You know the rules, quick, simple, snappy answers,
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  Speaker 1: a whole bunch of questions.
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  Speaker 2: All right, let's.
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  Speaker 1: Talk about it.
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  Speaker 2: I'm a little I approach this with some I fear
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  Speaker 2: I could have some regrets about agreeing to do this.
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  Speaker 1: But later on, tell me how many kids you have
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  Speaker 1: and how old they are?
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  Speaker 2: I have three kids. I have a nineteen year old,
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  Speaker 2: a twenty three year old, and a twenty six year old.
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  Speaker 1: And do you have a favorite child? Dan? Are you
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  Speaker 1: saying that because you have to say that or is
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  Speaker 1: it really true?
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  Speaker 2: No? I truly do not. It reminds me a little
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  Speaker 2: bit of people ask me whether I have a favorite book,
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  Speaker 2: and I try to explain that I don't have a
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  Speaker 2: favorite book of mine. I just because I love all
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  Speaker 2: my books in the way I love all my children.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, well that was my next question. So that's that's counted.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, great, so we got so. So this is a real,
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  Speaker 2: real rapid fire because I'm knocking up questions year for
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  Speaker 2: the one answer.
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  Speaker 1: Love it. Next question, who do you love most? And
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  Speaker 1: I think we can draw on some science here, Who
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  Speaker 1: do you love most your your wife, are your kids, yes,
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  Speaker 1: very good, ideal number of kids.
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  Speaker 2: Whatever for me, whatever people want. I don't think there
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  Speaker 2: is an ideal number. For some people. It's like like
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  Speaker 2: crazy people like you, it's a it's a half dozen
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  Speaker 2: for a sensible person like me. It's three for many
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  Speaker 2: sensible people at zero.
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  Speaker 1: Favorite podcast Dan all podcasts. If you can't narrow out
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  Speaker 1: down to.
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  Speaker 2: One besides this one, I would say I like the
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  Speaker 2: Happiness Lab by Lori Santos. I like Hidden Brain with
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  Speaker 2: chankraven Antem. And I'm a big fan of something called
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  Speaker 2: Autumn a U d M, which is an which is
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  Speaker 2: audio articles from magazines.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, I'm gonna look that one up. The other two
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  Speaker 1: are on my list every week. I love listening to
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  Speaker 1: them as well. You've done a lot of research in
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  Speaker 1: the psychological sciences. How do you write yourself as a
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  Speaker 1: parent average?
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  Speaker 2: I think, I'm I think i'm I think I'm in
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  Speaker 2: the median I think that half the world is better
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  Speaker 2: than me and half the world is beneath me.
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  Speaker 1: Then what's something absolutely great that your parents did that
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  Speaker 1: you've tried to continue in your dadding.
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  Speaker 2: That I tried to continue. That's interesting because The best
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  Speaker 2: thing my parents did was let me go to the library,
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  Speaker 2: and so I lived. I lived in a community where
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  Speaker 2: that had a very robust public library system, fortunately for me,
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  Speaker 2: and that was that was a transformative part of my childhood.
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  Speaker 2: Now and I think what I've done with our kids
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  Speaker 2: is sort of let them try to let them explore.
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  Speaker 2: It doesn't necessarily mean in a public library because we're
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  Speaker 2: now in the world or the internet, but leave them
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  Speaker 2: alone and let them explore whatever strikes their fancy at
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  Speaker 2: a particular moment in their childhood.
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  Speaker 1: One of the disadvantages of a lightning round is sometimes
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  Speaker 1: I really want to dig and poke in prad but
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  Speaker 1: I'm going to lay that be because it's such a
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  Speaker 1: wonderful answer, a fun one. Who's the better parent you
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  Speaker 1: or your wife?
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  Speaker 2: Wife?
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  Speaker 1: Not even close? And what's the hardest thing about being
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  Speaker 1: a parent?
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  Speaker 2: Seeing your kids struggle even though you know the struggle
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  Speaker 2: is ultimately going.
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  Speaker 1: To be good for them. Yeah, that is hard. That
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  Speaker 1: is hard. Imagine you could spend an hour with your
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  Speaker 1: children at any age of their life. Dan. You could
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  Speaker 1: go back and hold them as newborns for an hour,
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  Speaker 1: or you could have them as fifty year olds or anything.
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  Speaker 1: In between. What age would you choose to spend an
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  Speaker 1: hour with your kids and why?
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  Speaker 2: It's a great question. I would say probably, first of all,
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  Speaker 2: I would take if that offer is on the table,
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  Speaker 2: I'll take any I'll take any.
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  Speaker 1: Age in the past.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, So I'm not even going to negotiate that one
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  Speaker 2: if that's if that's a real possibility. But yeah, if
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  Speaker 2: you if you push me to the wall, I would
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  Speaker 2: say about age four or five for all of my kids,
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  Speaker 2: because around age four or five kids are able to
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  Speaker 2: really express themselves and are just so incredibly and beautifully unabashed.
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  Speaker 2: So I would like to I would like to see.
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  Speaker 1: That, Dan, I've asked this question of so many people.
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  Speaker 1: That's my favorite answer in both cases. But I love
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  Speaker 1: that you said any age. I just that's melted my heart.
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  Speaker 1: You've become my favorite interviewee Ever, I'm.
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  Speaker 2: Sorry to hear that.
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  Speaker 1: What's the ultimate joy for you as a.
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  Speaker 2: Parent seeing your kids become independent?
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  Speaker 1: What's the correct age for kids to have a cell phone?
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  Speaker 1: I get this question all the time, draws me crazy.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, it's an interesting question because when my kids
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  Speaker 2: were kids, cell phones were evolved over time, so I
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  Speaker 2: think we had it in our house, very different answers
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  Speaker 2: for different kids, partly because of what self how important
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  Speaker 2: cell phones were. So I'll make up I'll make up
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  Speaker 2: a number. I'll make up a number. Ten. You got
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  Speaker 2: to have double digits before you get a cell phone.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, you're the lowest of everyone I've ever interviewed. Dan.
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  Speaker 1: My estimation of your Yeah, my estimation has just dropped
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  Speaker 1: off you again. I'm so sorry. What are you reading
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  Speaker 1: right now?
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  Speaker 2: What am I reading right now? I am you know what?
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  Speaker 2: Curiously enough, it's about kids. I'm just I mean literally.
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  Speaker 2: It's the galleys of a book coming out next year
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  Speaker 2: called a Minor Revolution. It's by a professor here in
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  Speaker 2: the United States. It's about sort of how we should
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  Speaker 2: reorient public policy toward prioritizing kids. That what we don't
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  Speaker 2: do enough in our public policy, especially here in the States,
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  Speaker 2: put kids at the center of our public policy. And
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  Speaker 2: if we do that over time, that takes care of
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  Speaker 2: all these other kinds of problems that we're trying to solve.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I say it all the time. Society is not
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  Speaker 1: kid friendly. What's your children now that they're older, what's
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  Speaker 1: your children's favorite thing to do with you?
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  Speaker 2: Depends on the kid. I think that our favorite thing
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  Speaker 2: as a family, all five of us, is is just
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  Speaker 2: to eat together. We sometimes have the funniest conversations when
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  Speaker 2: we just gathered around eating, you know, not you know,
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  Speaker 2: not like going on some fancification or anything like that,
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  Speaker 2: but just simply gathering around the table and seeing what
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  Speaker 2: crazy stuff comes up.
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  Speaker 1: When you think about what's in the future, what are
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  Speaker 1: you looking most forward to as a parent, then.
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  Speaker 2: You know it's weird. I guess what I'm looking forward
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  Speaker 2: to is being a spectator, cheering on the sidelines as
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  Speaker 2: I watch our kids find their path.
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  Speaker 1: You could go back to you as a young dad.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, you've written a book called The Power of Regret,
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  Speaker 1: So this is the young dad. Yeah, this is the
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  Speaker 1: perfect question for you. Go back to you as a
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  Speaker 1: young dad. You're having one of those really tough moments.
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  Speaker 1: You're inexperienced, You've got these kids running around, you don't
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  Speaker 1: know what to do. What advice would you give yourself?
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  Speaker 2: Freak out way less. Most of this stuff doesn't matter.
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  Speaker 2: Don't get so blown out of proportion about like small
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  Speaker 2: things about something spilling or someone not being ready or
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  Speaker 2: that kind of stuff. That kind of stuff doesn't matter.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, great stuff. And the last question of our lightning round,
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  Speaker 1: Daniel Pink, what's been your biggest win as a dad?
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  Speaker 2: Now my kids still talk to me even though they're
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  Speaker 2: moving on in their adult lives.
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  Speaker 1: I kind of want to say that's a really low bar.
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  Speaker 1: But at the same time, having a daughter who's moved
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  Speaker 1: out and married and the second one who's in the
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  Speaker 1: process of moving out as well, I actually get what
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  Speaker 1: you mean there. There's something so delightful about when they
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  Speaker 1: come back right that they want to come back right.
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  Speaker 1: I agree with that, Dan Pink, thanks so much for
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  Speaker 1: joining on a Happy Family Lightning Round.
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  Speaker 2: What a pleasure I enjoyed it.
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  Speaker 1: The Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin Roland from
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  Speaker 1: Bridge Media, and Craig Bruce is our executive producer. If
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  Speaker 1: you want more information about making your family happier or
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: about the upcoming Happy Families Hot mess Summit, visitors at
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: Happy Families dot com dot you, or check out our
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  Speaker 1: Facebook page Doctor Justin Colson's Happy Families