Latest / The Wholehearted Enneagram Podcast / How to Navigate Gen Z and Technology | a conversation with David Eaton of Axis.org

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How to Navigate Gen Z and Technology | a conversation with David Eaton of Axis.org · The Wholehearted Enneagram Podcast

• 0:05
  SPEAKER_02: My name is Amy Wicks and I love to talk about the gospel message your heart was created to hear.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_02: All things Enneagram and helping you be confident that you are the best mom for your kids.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_02: I'm a mountain mama who somehow ended up on a cul-de-sac in the Midwest.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_02: I was alone and without family or community.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_02: But the Lord, He didn't let me stay there.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_02: He helped me turn my broken-hearted moment into a wholehearted decision to get intentional with my faith, my marriage, and my kids.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_02: I share broken-hearted perspective with story, but with wholehearted purpose and plans so you can live a life full of confidence and abundance.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_02: Think of this podcast as your on-the-go mom pal, mixed with a little bit of Enneagram coaching.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_02: So get to that pile of laundry or hit the treadmill or load up the kids in the car for that grocery run.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_02: And be ready to be encouraged and challenged while you listen.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_02: This is the Simply Wholehearted Podcast.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_02: Hey friends, I'm so glad you're here today.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_02: This month we are focusing on how we can make the most of our time, or as I like to call it, wholehearted minutes.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_02: One of the most important ways to make our time count with our kids is to be aware of the tech crisis that is happening in our homes.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_02: Even if you don't have kids yet, or kids that are yet asking for a device, they will be before you know it.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_02: And we as parents, well, we often struggle with figuring out how to not get lost in our phones or computers.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_02: So we focus on healthy connection with those in our home.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_02: So this is why I've asked today's guest, David Eaton, who is a founder and president of Access.org.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_02: I wanted him to share his insights on navigating technology in our homes.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_02: Because Access exists to help you as a parent to navigate today's culture so you can connect with your teen through meaningful conversations.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_02: They have amazing templates and plentiful resources that you need as a parent.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_02: I know that you will also want to get your hands on their new book, Smartphone Sanity.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_02: And David and I are going to talk a lot about what they offer and how you can get your hands on this content.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_02: So we're going to dive right into this conversation.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: So this morning I spoke at my daughter's school, which I've never done before.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's kind of it's kind of cute, right?
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um and how old is your daughter?
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: She's seventh grade.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: Or she's seven years old.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: Sorry, not seventh grade.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: So she's she's she's young and there were like pre-K kids there.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so it was kind of stressful because the technology didn't work, and they were like doing hand doing handbells, but they brought on the third projector it worked.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so then I so I kind of feel like I did my job for the day.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: Like I made I crossed that really strange finish line.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_02: You did the hardest thing right out the gate.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: So just making a Christian school's tech work is just like impossible.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: It is.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_02: It is.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_02: Oh man, but you did it, and what's awesome is then your daughter thinks you are the coolest because she's at that age where she still adores you, and you came and you spoke at her school.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_02: That's pretty awesome.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I was funny, and I put pictures of her and said I loved her in front of every, you know, just all the all the classic dad, just it's good to be a dad kind of stuff.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_02: It is, it is.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_02: It's so awesome to be a dad.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I I'm excited because this message of technology is something that I have been advocating or teaching or sharing with the moms in my living room and with my moms, my mom friends across the socials, just this idea of making our minutes count instead of counting down the minutes that we have with our family and with our kids.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I think one of the key ingredients is having better stewardship with our technology.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_02: So when your book came, when your book came across my desk, I was like, yes, I think I'm going to like this.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_02: But I also was really surprised because I didn't think that we had a broken system in our home.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_02: But a lot of the content that I've been reading through has made me look and evaluate the way we use technology in our home differently.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_02: So what do we need to know about smartphones and how it impacts our kids?
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: Smartphones are awesome.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: And you have to know that we're approaching two giant seismic shifts right now.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: And one is the smartphone and the other one is Gen Z.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: And as we think about the world that Gen Z is growing up in, as parents, caring adults, grandparents, uh, we get to be missionaries to them in their world.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: So they live in the same zip code, same language, same, they eat dinner at your table most times a week.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: But we have to appreciate and try to understand what are the artifacts that are going in the world and how does the gospel translate into the space and actually redeem it.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so I I've got a question for you, Amy.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: And that's in regard to regard to all this.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: And let me warn you, it's a it's a doozy.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, that's all right.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_02: I like being on the other side.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_02: It's good.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: Let's uh so let's say you're looking, I don't know how old your kids are, but um let's say you have a 17.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_02: 12 and nine, so we're teenage and about to be.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: Perfect.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: So let's say you have a 16 or 17-year-old, and this is a story that happened, my friend.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: He was looking for something in his son's closet, not in his son's closet, in his son's room, he couldn't find it, and so he kept looking, kept looking, kept looking, and then he decided to look in his son's closet, and he found a box in his son's closet.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so he's like, maybe it's in there.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: So he opens the box and something terrible hit him and happened, and that is he found a half-consumed bottle of whiskey and an open box of condoms.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: So if this was you, what would you feel, Amy?
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: And what would you do?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: And what what would you think?
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_02: That's such a good question.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I f I think I would feel like I got punched in the gut.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_02: I I I almost feel it as you say it, because I have a nine-year-old boy who's on the verge of turning 10, and you know, I could see that scenario.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_02: I would I would probably cry and I would I would call up my husband and simultaneously pray.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_02: Like, what what do we do?
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_02: What conversations did we not have?
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_02: So that that would, I mean, that would be my honest first reaction, and try to figure out how in the heck do I have a conversation about this with them?
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: And because it's like this is not what your family stands for, and how'd this happen, and why is this secrecy here, and this is high-risk behavior, and this is how did I fail as a mom, or how do we fail as parents, and just the tendency to shame.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, as a mom said to us, whenever she comes across something that's like super scary like that, she either becomes silent and just says, I'm tired of losing, I'm not gonna talk about it, or she has she might feel violent, like my son's gonna come home, I'm gonna yell at him, and I'm gonna take away his phone forever, and I'm gonna say, How dare you?
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: And etc.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: So the calling at Axis, and I'm the president and co-founder at Axis, is to help parents become confident, to become ready for the conversation.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: And the more that so this is a real story.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um the more that, but it was the more that we've thought about or I've thought about this box scenario is it's an incredible parable.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, who doesn't have a box, right?
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: Something that, you know, this area in your life that you're don't trust others to know about or for God to know about.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: And and then the the metaphor extends even further because what's the we all have these boxes that are in our pockets and they're our smartphones.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: And so, and then what's inside the box is whatever the cultural artifacts are of Gen Z.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so if you're raising a kid right now, and the thing that scares us so much initially is what's inside the box, the whiskey, the condoms, or the jewel for vaping, or the kids, our kids not wanting to go to church, or having doubts, or our kids having mental health challenges with anxiety because they're comparing their lives to kids on social media or depression because they're you know, maybe they're they're walking through that, or whatever, whatever it is, or them wanting a TikTok account or Instagram or Snapchat.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's the stuff inside the box that freaks us out at first.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but as we've continued to meditate on this uh this story at Axis, we believe that great parents and great mentors and great grandparents who are loving the next generation have to care as much about the box as what's inside the box.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_02: That's okay.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: So what's inside the box is the scary stuff, but the box actually represents the secrecy, the isolation, the hiding.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: And um and you know what, what's inside the box will kill your body, but the box will kill your soul.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: And it's that separation from community.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: And and that's the smartphone promises that it promises privacy.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and and you know what the Bible says, the Bible says we're better in community than we are in isolation.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_02: For sure.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the gift that one of the gifts that Jesus gives uh the world is the church.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: He gives us a new community and a new way to exist together.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, many gifts from Jesus, right?
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um but that's one of the and that's what forms us and that's what sanctifies us, is that community of believers and the Holy Spirit working through all of that.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: So I I wrote a book called Smartphone Sanity.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: I wrote it because uh I'm a part-time youth pastor, and I was just running into this wall with all of our kids in very intimate personal ways because I know their lives, I know their families.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: And then at Axis, we serve over 200,000 families a month right now, and we're just seeing this as being the common enemy.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: The common problem is what in the world is this doing to our families?
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, I've got um I've got a I've got a rotary phone, you know, we're video chatting, Amy, so you can see that.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: So behind me, I actually have a rotary phone in my office, which is kind of funny.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: It is.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it's a red one.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I use it from I use it for radio shows sometimes, but I remember when when I grew up, we had that in our house.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: And my parents taught me how to use it.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_02: There's there's no way imagining not having it when you were growing up.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_02: There's nothing else.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: And and we had rules.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: Someone called our home.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: It was like a race to the phone.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: You grab it and you say it's the eat it's the Eaton residence.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: Man ask who's speaking.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, they trained you well.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_02: We had the same thing.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's our parents training us.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: And now our kids are kids are training the parents.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_00: Like, dad, don't send that emoji.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: Dad, don't use that word.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_02: Oh man.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: Don't use that slang.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: Mom, like, it's not cool.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: I was with my I was with my dad the other day, and he called he called Uber a Uber.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: He's like, is that a Uber over there?
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, dad's holding Uber.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_02: That's great.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: I I want I don't want to throw you under the bus on this one, but you know, don't call it a Uber of my mom and somebody else, right?
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_02: That's great.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_02: That's so true.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: My mom's like, I just watched a YouTube, and I'm like, it's not called a YouTube mom.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's just like, and so there's this reversal of wisdom that's happening.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_00: And it creates it creates a lot of room for bad things to happen.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_02: You said a phrase in there about caring about the box.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_02: What does that look like for us as parents and people who are maybe mentoring other other Gen Z kids coming up in this generation?
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: Way to get the heart of the issue.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's about trust.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's one billion percent about trust.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: So when you read smartphone sanity, I'll help you understand all the way to social media apps.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: I'll help you understand how to make boundaries and how to create really the number one call to action you could ever have is to create a work in progress smartphone agreement.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's not like it's not a blood pact or anything like that.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's not a covenant, it's not you're not making, you know, you're not crossing your heart hoping to die, stick a million needles in your eyes.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: Just saying, let's try to get on the same, let's try to get on the same page.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_00: Let's just see if we can do that.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: Let's see if two different generations can get on the same page about this pocket rectangle.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but however, all of those things come back to trust.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: And so if your kid doesn't trust that you have their best interest at heart, if they don't know that you love them and you're not reinforcing that over and over again, um, even if it's all subconscious and nonverbal, because even in that situation where the kid was hiding the whisky and condoms, uh, when his parents confronted him calmly about it, he felt like they were gonna disown him.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: And he was scared to death of shame, and he was scared to death of being kicked out, and he felt trapped.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, you know, he he thinks he loves his girlfriend, right?
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so he's kind of stuck in a cycle there, but um all of a sudden, and he was just curious, and he felt like he was gonna be kicked out.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: So the box is all about trust.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so the smartphone is one of the greatest ways to disciple your kids, but it's also one of the greatest ways.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's a great one of the greatest ways to lose trust, which brings me to another great story is we had a 16-year-old in high school, and this was the impetus for starting the book.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: She said to me when I was trying to help her and her mom get along about their smartphones, she said to me, David, the stricter the parent, the sneakier the child.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_02: Wow.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I mean what a pet to the quick.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what it what it goes straight to, Amy?
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: It goes straight to trust.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because at first you're like, of course that's true, but what it assumes is it assumes that parents and their kids are adversaries.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: And if you and you're not on the same team, and so you don't trust your parents, and they're just trying to control you with all these arbitrary rules, and then you're just trying to survive as a 17-year-old in high school, and you know, you're traversing these multiple different universes of TikTok and Snapchat and Instagram and smartphones and gender and sexuality and politics and global warming and whatever the gun control, whatever the things that are like right in your face as a 17-year-old, um, you don't trust your parents, so you're like, I'm gonna tap out on this.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so the answer to that riddle, though, the stricter the parent, the sneakier the child, is I like two answers, and I've gotten them from two sets of like extremely wise parents.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the first one is are you raising a sin concealer or are you raising a sin confessor?
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_02: So good, so important.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the that's the stricter, the sneakier thing is like um I've gotta hide.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: I can't trust.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, and then the other one is can your kid tell you anything?
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh because and they can't if you haven't told them that they can.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: And they can't, and they can't tell you anything if you haven't responded calmly, non-anxiously, and haven't screamed at them.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, and guess what?
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: If you make a mistake, what do you do?
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: You confess your sins to them.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: You confess that you overreacted, and then they have permission to confess their sins to you.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: And guess what?
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: You're a family now, right?
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, you're humans living together.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: And again, we're on this interview because I wrote a book about smartphones, but everything that Access does revolves around trust.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: And we just get to talk about all these things that are happening in their world that would cause that trust to be splintered.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but you're gonna be in their in their room, and so you have to tell them you're I mean, their corner, their room, their life.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: You have to tell them that they can tell you anything.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: Because if they can't tell you anything, they're gonna go ask Google, they're gonna ask their peers, they're just gonna just gonna keep it to themselves.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: And um and there's a lot of danger that can come from that.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: And really, what do you want?
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: You want the heart connection with your kid, and you need your kid needs your wisdom, and we need their wonder.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so that's the that's the world that we live in.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, no, I think that's really good.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_02: I noticed that in the book, uh, the idea of wonder.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_02: Uh because going back to your point just a little bit, is that I have, I mean, you know, since we had kids, it was, oh, just wait until they're teenagers and and all this sort of stuff.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_02: But I felt like it could be done differently where I wasn't going, oh, those teenage years, and telling everybody else, oh, just wait until they're teenagers.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_02: I I feel like we can do it differently.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm beginning to see the fruit of that.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_02: It's not been easy, and I'm I'm still not guaranteed because we're just in those early teenage years, but I I think some of the key ingredients and the best wisdom I got was exactly what you had said was learn how to apologize, learn how to say I'm sorry, and lead vulnerably and honestly by sharing not only the victories and how you've overcome, but when you didn't.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_02: And as a kid, maybe some of the struggles that they faced, it's really easy to not want to open up and share, oh yeah, well, me too.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_02: And this is how it didn't go well, but now I see how it can be better for you.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_02: I I those are those were the hardest conversations to have with my kids, but I've also seen the best fruit from being willing to go there and and pulling back the curtain, if you will.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not easy, and I think there's um, especially with your own story, I mean it's great to empathize and be like, I just found this jewel, which is a vape device, in my kids' backpack.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: Be like, you smoke cigarettes when you were in high school, like back off.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_02: Like right.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: Or, you know, whatever it was, and it's like remember what that felt like and so and empathize with that, and then enter into it from that space.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_00: But I tell you what, um, a lot of a lot of times the way that we, including me, deal with the shame of my past is to joke about it or to even celebrate it, and then our kids just hear that oh, sin must be fun.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_00: That's like no, and then I hated my life, and then I felt utterly you know broken, and there was no life in this, and then you know, through G's, but we just talk about the part where it's like, oh, it was so fun to do this or that.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, however, if you're also entering into this space, like you said, is like you you have to pray and have otherwise mentors help you know how much of your story to share with your kid and win.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because I think most of us think, or it could be easy to think that all of our parents are squeaky clean.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: And yes, every now and then you're like, what just happened?
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like, oh, this is this is really I'm having to experience the pain of the poor decisions that my parents made, you know, when they're sharing this with me.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't want to hear about what how they were hurting each other or hurting other people or hurting themselves.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and but guess what?
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: That's the greatest avenue for the gospel to show up, and to say, hey, you know, God can redeem, redeem us warts and all, terrible decisions and all.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: And this is this is part of my story.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we are often talking about that broken-hearted moment which led us to a whole-hearted decision.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_02: Because I think a whole-hearted life is birthed from did we lean into the Lord's grace in our brokenness?
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_02: And maybe we didn't, maybe that's part of our story, but it's part of our story we're sharing, so our kids can have this opportunity to learn from how to lean into their broken moments or the temptation for broken moments.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_02: And and maybe they can write a different story, a new story, even for the legacy of your family that they're they're coming from.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: Totally.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so at Axis AXIS.org, the organization that I helped found 13 years ago, if you're listening to this, our job is to be your culture translator.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: Our job is to be your cultural scout, your research assistant, uh, to help you stay connected to your child's heart.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: A great resource that we have is called the Culture Translator.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's an email and it's now a podcast.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's free.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: Podcast is like six minutes long, short.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_02: Perfect.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: Comes out uh every Friday and just says, here are three things going on in your kids' world and how to talk about it.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: So again, you don't have to be scouring the internet for this stuff or guessing, but yet you get to be you gotta be in the game on this and be the one who's actually having those conversations because you have what it takes.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: You can do it.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_00: And uh our job is just to be in your back corner, and then yeah, with this with the button.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Smartphone sanity, which of course is on Amazon.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's going to help you have some sanity with this phone because it will.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I just got two emails recently on this mom.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: She's like, she has a twin, uh, twin boys, and her straight and narrow son had been looking at some pretty incredibly awful pornography for the last three or four months.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: And uh this mom had had these assertive conversations with him.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: The dad had two.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they got him a very limited phone, and so he wasn't looking at it on his phone.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: He found an old phone in the house and just used that that was unmonitored.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: And so now, but guess what?
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_00: This is this is incredibly hard, and this these parents could be silent or they could be violent, but they were they were heartbroken and confident, they were calm, and they said, We're gonna fight for your sexuality, we're gonna fight for you.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we're in your corner.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: And the same mom, she but you know what, she doesn't want to tell anybody this, so she tells us because we're the safe third party on some level, but then one of her other girlfriends called her and said the same thing happened with her daughter looking at pornography.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so I asked a mom, another mom, I said, Hey, when do you think it's the right time to get your kid a smartphone?
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_00: And she said, Whenever I'm ready for them to start looking at porn, that's when I'll get them the phone.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, and she said she said that just meaning like it's there, yeah.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so just for us to like put our heads in the sand and pretend that there are there are incredible opportunities to phone for good and connection and just enjoying each other, but man, it just is the deepest, darkest aspects of human nature are also accessible and reaching out.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: As one mom said, she said her daughters weren't looking for the darkness, but the darkness was looking for them.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, and so and and it's if if you listen to this, just think of the smartphone like you think of a car.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: Don't get your kid a smartphone until you kind of helped train them into it.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what the book will help you do.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: Just like you wouldn't ever say, Hey, you're 16 years old.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_00: I know you haven't read any of the, you haven't done driver's ed class, you haven't done 50 hours with me behind the wheel.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_00: I know you haven't done any stuff, but you come on, like of course you can take your eighth grade or your eight, eight-year-old son to school.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: Here, here's the keys, go figure it out.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: You would never do that, right?
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but that's because the government's put all these rules around it because they they're interested in our best interest in that area.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: And it's the same thing with the smartphone, as if there's none of that, and so it's it's a giant experiment right now.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so if you're listening to this, I mean you're in a good place if you're listening to Amy's podcast, and just relax.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: You have what it takes.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: Access can be here to help you.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's everyone's kind of in the situation.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: Every now and then there's a parent or two who are preemptive, proactive about it.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: But most of us are like, whoops, that was a mistake.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and if you feel like you're just you have to like hit eject, don't.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: You can you can bring the conversation back around.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: You can do it um with your kid.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I was just talking to a good friend of mine the other day, and you know, they're dealing with some of this stuff and having to take away the phone and all of that sort of stuff.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_02: And I I like how you set up the books.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_02: I I'd like you to describe it a little bit more because not only does Access have the online resources, you can download all these sorts of agreements and these letters and and things like that to guide you in the process and you know, listen to the podcast, but you you kind of start off saying you may want to immediately go grab your kids' phones and say, you know, off limits, you're not allowed to touch them and you know, put all the lockdown on it, but you're like, well, back up, let's start elsewhere.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_02: And and it's really with that trust.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_02: So give us a little idea, walk us through the book, what that process would be like uh to get to a place that we are are thriving not only in a relationship with our kids, but technology is a blessing and not a curse.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: So there's four essential conversations in the book.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_00: The first one is understanding that um a phone is a part of God's world, and it's a very good world, it's a cursed world, and it's a world we've been invited to redeem.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so you got to invite that into that narrative.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: And like if your kid already has a phone, then just reading the book and then snatching their phone away from them is not gonna help you.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna lose.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um you have and so if if you're already down, if you've already opened up that Pandora's box, the best thing to do is to spend a month or so, a couple weeks, like self-reflecting on your own phone use and just saying, I'm just gonna learn about this, I'm gonna share what I'm learning, I'm trying to figure it out.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um and then after you kind of have your head wrapped around it, to say, hey, all right, we're gonna bring this back into some sanity here because I love you and I'm responsible for you while you're in my house and I want to teach you some wisdom.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the second conversation is what is it for?
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: Because the first one is about the gospel, how's the world good cursed and can't how can we redeem it?
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: How are the phones about that?
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_00: Second one is just saying, what is this for?
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so if a phone is supposed to connect us, um, which I think most of us would just would answer, but yet we haven't had a tech-free dinner in a month, and we haven't had a great conversation, and we're we haven't had a good night's sleep in months because we're sleeping next to our phone, right?
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: Then we're I think we're missing the purpose on it.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: The third conversation is about trust.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_00: We're on a journey of trust with a destination of independence.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's basically saying, like, look, I want you to be able to exist in this technological world, but I want you to love the right things.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: So as you show that you're responsible, like, for example, there's this mom who's just like, I'm never gonna give my kid a Snapchat account.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what this kid's saying to her under his breath, I can't wait to leave this house, you tyrant.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_00: Right, I can't wait to leave, and I'm gonna get him and do whatever I want.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_00: And two years from now, when he leaves, it's gonna be some other app, but he's gonna do whatever he wants.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: And what you want to do instead is say, like, look, you want this app really bad?
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to have it too.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_00: This is what it takes.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: This is what I want to see in you for you to have it.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, I want this to be life-giving for you, and um, I need you to, as one dad, one dad said, he's like, You want social media on your phone?
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: Write a paper for me about why you want it.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_02: Or I knew another that's the best piece of system.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's so good.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: It took his daughter months because she didn't want to write a paper, she didn't want to learn about it.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um, or another dad said, Yeah, I want you to have social media, you have to read this book with me.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, he's like, I already read it.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_00: Or actually, he's like, I listen to it.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_00: Let me know when you read it.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna talk about it.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: And it it was it was more about the how dopamine works in your brain and how these things are trying to make money off of you.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes just when you like look behind the curtain and see the Wizard of Oz back there pulling, you know, levers and stuff like that, you're like, okay, this doesn't have the same like of allure when I know that they're just profiting off of my attention.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_00: And the fourth conversation is you can tell me anything.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: So the fourth conversation is uh again, it's all about the heart and about trust.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_00: Again, you can tell me anything, and um, and how do you build this?
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_00: Again, this phone agreement.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's what you gotta have.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: You gotta have this piece of paper.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: Because guess what?
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you may assume that your kid thinks that sexting is wrong because you think it's wrong.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_00: And you also think, why would any 14-year-old boy want to see a naked picture of a 14-year-old girl?
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like, or or young, like that's dumb, you know, like why would they ever do that?
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh well, guess what?
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_00: Your son does, and he's very curious, and kids might be training trading pictures at the school, and you know what?
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_00: He might not ask a girl for a naked picture, she might just send it to him.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: Or or he might send her something.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: How would you respond?
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: Or his friend might send a picture that he got from another girl to your son.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: And and so then he's at this moral dilemma because you haven't told him what your family does.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_00: And he's like, Well, do I well, you know what?
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to be a snitch.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and you're like, I don't want child porn to be on your phone and on the phone that I own of a naked 14-year-old.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: And also, I want you're a sexual being, and that's awesome.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_00: God made you that way.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_00: I want what's best for that.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_00: And staring at naked 14-year-old girls in your class is not gonna help you at all.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and in the meantime, it's gonna totally potentially destroy this girl's life.
• 30:36
  unknown: Right.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_00: And her parents need to know about this too.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: So it what that's what an agreement does.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: It just says, hey, here's a here's a baseline.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna talk about this, and uh what you talk about with your kid, they will talk about with you.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, how you handle the awkwardness.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you're the adult, you got this.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_00: Parents are listening to this, you got this.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: Don't forget.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_00: And that's one of the greatest miracles that happens at Axis is when we help parents and their kids talk about stuff.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: It always surprises me, it always makes us nervous.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like, oh my goodness, what's gonna happen to the action of the talk?
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what happens?
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit moves in these families.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's one of the most precious experiences ever.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, again, that's kind of the you know, the book is all about all the kind of inside track stuff with a smartphone, but the key message is about building trust with your kid and talking about the things that matter.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: Because we had uh we had a we had a 30-year-old say to us, um, Amy, she said, I've only had one real conversation with my dad.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: And we heard that, we're like, uh, that's not good, that's terrible.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_00: Lots gonna be lost in translation.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: Like, oh no, this is this is why we exist for that not to happen.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_00: But then she smiled and like, I don't understand why you're smiling right now because you just told us something really bad, and now you're smiling.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: And she said it again, and she added a sentence to it.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_00: She says, I've only had one real conversation with my dad, and we've never stopped having that one conversation.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_00: So that's good.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_02: That's good.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: She's saying, I've we started a conversation before I was could use words, and we're gonna keep having this conversation.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're a parent on here, you're gonna have a 60-year conversation with your kid.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_00: Whether they might be in present prison someday, they might be the next president.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you're still gonna have that conversation, right?
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna spend money on them, you're gonna love them, you're gonna care for them.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, grandparents, you can have a 30-year conversation with your grandkids.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so Axis is just looking for one conversation parents.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_00: Looking for parents who are like, yep, that's me.
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_00: I don't have to win all the time, I don't have to do everything perfectly.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_00: If I make a mistake, I'm gonna confess my sin to my kid and bring it to them.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna ask for my forgiveness.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_00: But guess what?
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna be there and I'm gonna do my best and I'm gonna mess up a lot, but I'm gonna have one conversation that lasts a lifetime with that kid.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're one of those parents, access axis.org is here for you.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: We're here to be your research assistant and help you with that one conversation.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_02: I love that, David.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_02: This is so good.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_02: I think this is one of the most valuable resources that we could get our hands on to make sure we're making our minutes count with our kids and that we help them make their lives count.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_02: So thank you so much for your work.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you to Team Access for this resource and all the resources that you continue to create.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_02: I know my listeners are gonna want to check it out because we want we want to be those kind of parents who are having the real uh lifelong conversations that will make a difference and help our kids love the Lord with all of their hearts.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_02: So thank you.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I know I learned a lot in my conversation with David Eaton and in his new book, Smartphone Sanity.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_02: I know you'll want to check this out.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_02: And of course, as he's mentioned, all the different templates that they have available on access.org, including their weekly email, which I really think any parent navigating technology with their kids is gonna want to have on hand.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_02: And not just the technology, but the conversations happening in their home, the culture that we are in and amongst as a parent that need all the help we can get.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_02: And Access is generously giving a lot of their content for free.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_02: So hop on to access.org for all of the resources that David mentioned today, and even to learn more about smartphone sanity.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_02: I hope that you've enjoyed this episode and found it helpful.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_02: I imagine that as you listen, you may have a thought of someone else who would really appreciate hearing this conversation.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_02: So if you want to share this or chat with David, it'll take you less than a minute.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_02: Just look at your podcast app in the upper right-hand corner and hit the share button to text, email, or post this episode to friends and family.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_02: Next week, we will continue the conversation about making the most of our opportunity with my new friend Rachel Sweat.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_02: We chatted all about using our Enneagram knowledge to be more aware of the obstacles holding us back from stepping out with a God given courageousness.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_02: It was a good one that you won't want to miss.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_02: So until next time, let's invite others to join us to pursue perspective, purpose, and plans for us assembly wholehearted life.