My guest today on Digital Podcaster is Tony Berardo. Tony Berardo is a podcast coach. He's also a UGC content creator and he makes a lot of content. You've probably seen it on social media before. Makes great videos. And what we talk about in this episode is a little bit different than what I have covered in past episodes. So what I originally planned to talk with Tony about on the podcast was UGC content, which stands for user-generated content, which is basically in Tony's case where he'll get paid to make content for brands. And he has also multiple companies as well. But Tony has a one month old baby girl. And I thought it would be way better to just keep the conversation going in that direction because that seemed to be what needed to kind of come up. So I wanted to give you that little backstory on Tony and also kind of frame our conversation because we haven't really talked in a minute about more just like personal mindset stuff here on Digital Podcaster. And that's what Tony and I dive into. Primarily, this episode will be helpful for new fathers or expecting fathers because that's a lot of what the conversation is about. If any of those subjects interest you, honestly, if you're like, I have no desire to hear about Maybe skip this episode, go to the next one. But if the idea of kids and balancing, you know, a baby and all of the stuff that goes into that and relationship wise and partner wise and running a business and making content, things like that is of interest from you, you'll find a lot of gems in this episode. Please enjoy my conversation with Tony Berardo. This is the show for digital creators by digital creators. Hosted by me, Dylan Schmidt, a Los Angeles based content creator loves to blend marketing, creativity, and business. Join in as we explore online entrepreneurship, creator best practices, and more. Each week, I'll bring you interviews with successful creators, tips and tricks for growing your online presence, and simple insights into the latest trends and strategies I'm seeing and using in the space. Welcome to Digital Podcaster. Let's hop right in. Tony, welcome to Digital Podcaster. What's up, man? Thanks for having me, Dylan. Dude, I got questions galore for you. But first, congratulations to you and your wife. Thank you. Thank you. You're talking about the kid, right? The daughter? Yeah, I'm totally talking about the kid. Thanks. Yes. Yes. Sorry. As a new dad too, I'm like, it's spaced out a little bit. But you seem right on your game. How are you doing? And how's your wife doing? And you're a busy man. So like, Like how's it going? How's the transition transitioning?- Thanks, man. I appreciate that. Yeah, it's, as you know, I mean the first, so she's a month old tomorrow, actually. The first couple weeks is, dude, it was tough. I mean it's still pretty tough, but it was tough to figure out the transitional phase of like is she crying because she's upset and she's seeing all these new things and she's not stuck in the womb? Or is it crying because she needs to change her diaper or she has hiccups or she's gassy? There's just so many things. Or is she sleepy? That's the worst.'Cause it's the only thing that I can remember that cries when it's tired. Right, 'cause us as adults when we're tired, we just go to sleep.- Yeah.- So, she--- I just cry internally. Exactly, which is what I'm doing now as a new father. But yeah, that was tough. That was tough. And we're trying to get on the schedule. Thankfully, I work for myself with the couple of businesses that I have, so I was able to take some time off. So I took off the first three weeks. I did some little things here and there, some consulting and stuff, but nothing crazy. And then my wife is on maternity leave, so that's great. So it was cool to figure out the schedule. And now we're in shifts. We were in separate rooms doing shifts. this week we started doing in the bedroom still shifts, which is kind of a challenge because we're also like in this weird phase of my wife will take the first shift, but then every time my daughter Camila, every time she gets changed, she freaks out like bloody murder. And then of course you change her and she's fine. So like me, I'm trying to sleep in the bed and my wife has changed in her. And it's like that 30 seconds of like, you know, is my wife twisting my daughter's arm? Like that's what it sounds like. She screams so loud. And then I wake up real quick and then I try to go back to sleep. And I'm such a whack when it comes to sleep that I sleep really good right away. But then if I get up during the, if it's 3 a.m. and I just spring up, immediately I'm like, I just need to work now. Like I can't reset for some reason. So that to me is the challenge. But my wife, she's sleeping like a baby. She's great.- That's probably most important, I guess, right?- That's right. I know they say the cliche, happy wife, happy life, but like the reality is, especially after something like as physically traumatizing as giving birth, you know, it's like to be able to sleep. It's like, hell yeah.- Oh, for sure. Yeah, I was doing everything I could to try to make sure she gets enough sleep.'Cause you know, also too, the last thing you want is, you don't want the wife or your partner, especially a woman who's had to deal with labor. You don't want her to deal with being upset because then that goes on the kid, but it also goes on the spouse too. So it's like, then you got like two upset people and you got the baby screaming and you got the wife screaming. It's like, you gotta make one of those happy.- Yeah, two versus one, yeah. Yeah, I'm the same as you with the Sleep Two. If it's like I'm up at 3 a.m., I'm like, let alone if I happen to look at my phone and start seeing like, oh, there's stuff going on, there's news or there's something interesting, you know, start going down a rabbit hole, next thing you know, it's like, well, it's, you know, whatever a clock. Um, might as well get going and, uh, and isn't it interesting to like, you know, we're so used to, as adults or at such, you know, a young age, we just use our voice to communicate. And now you have this thing that can't communicate other than like a couple different patterns, you know, you can pick up on a couple of them, but still picking up on them is so hard. And there's such a learning curve of like, what does this mean? You know, like my daughter is eight months old now and still it's like, um, my wife's better at recognizing the, the certain type of sounds better than I am, uh, at the moment. But I can, you know, but like you just go through like, and it's funny cause there's really not that many things like, you know, like you said, like what's eat once the, the diaper changed, needs to sleep, uh, is awake, but like they sleep so much too, you know?- Right, yeah, it's not like they're crying about like they gotta pay their taxes, you know what I mean? Like they're just not, yeah, they don't really care about anything except those three things. Which, I mean, what a great life they must be.- Yeah, yeah, and it's like so awesome to be able to care for and give those things, but at the same time, it's like, oh, you wanna sleep again? Or, oh, wait, I just changed your diaper. We're gonna change your diaper again. It's so small, it's so fragile.- Dude, literally just before I came up here, I grabbed some coffee from me and the wife because I have to have five cups a day now. And my wife is pumping, thank goodness she's able to nurse. So she's pumping, she's doing her thing, so I grabbed Camila and I changed her. She had a poopy diaper, changed her, and then set her down, burped her a little, kinda getting her ready to feed. And the next thing you know, she starts screaming like crazy. And normally I could bring her outside and she can calm down, she loves outside. So I'll bring her outside for a bit and she'll just kind of fall asleep a little bit. And I'm like, no, no way. She's still crazy right now. Let me check her. Even though I just changed her. Sure. Shit. Now she peed and she's in this habit. Now this week in particular, where we'll change her diaper, show up a dirty diaper or a wet diaper, and one of the two will change her literally two minutes later. It's like, she waits for a clean diaper and then makes another mess. And I'm like, is she testing us? Is this she's like doing it on purpose. Oh, you know, it's so, it's so funny because I think it's just a the comfortability of like, you know, once you get in that clean diaper. Like I'm imagining myself in a diaper, I don't remember what it was like. But I imagine like a dirty diaper doesn't feel good.- Yeah, it can't. It can't feel good, yeah. And yeah, and then sometimes like them not even recognizing that it is dirty too, sometimes you just keep checking like, "What?" You know, well there's a whole lot of stuff going on in there. Like where did that come from?'Cause you were just chilling. It's so weird. And it happens so instantaneously, too. Like, it's the second it comes out.'Cause it's also, you know, it's probably just a strange feeling, I would imagine. You know, for us, it's just so normal to do those exits of liquids and matter. But yeah, for them, it's just something new. And are you finding, like, now that you're eight months in, have things gotten easier, I mean, progressively easier? Or is it about the same?- It's definitely changed and- I would say it's a bit easier.- No, definitely not easier, 'cause like, the less sleep, I didn't realize how much importance was around, I thought like, oh, parents don't sleep, but really so much of the importance around the baby sleeping. The less sleep and how much babies sleep, much they sleep when they're like first born. Um, and then so needing like less sleep while our daughter is like, absolutely an amazing sleeper still, like that's decreasing throughout the day. So just managing that, but for me, it's not so much like managing. Um, it's not like it's, it's like changing the sense. It's like, uh, because she can start to do just a little bit more and a little bit more the desire to like, like, to me, it's like more of the emotional and like things around like, oh, I wanna like enjoy absolutely every second, but there's only so much you can enjoy, you know? And then at the same time, it's like the dual feelings of like, okay, I'm absolutely exhausted from paying attention to this and holding her up because she can't quite do stuff on her own. And I'm exhausted like holding her up and just like giving the attention, like the amount of presence continually for a sustained period of time, mixed with when she's asleep, it's like, oh, let's look at pictures of her. We miss her so much, but also being like, all right, but go to bed. You know? (laughs)- Right, exactly, yeah.- Those two things are funny. Do you find your wife similar, like, oh, we gotta look at pictures of her?- Oh, for sure, 'cause you know, I'm a nut when it comes to content. So my phone's loaded, and then the second I feel like it's too much, then I transfer it to my Dropbox, And then I delete everything on my phone, so that way I never run out of storage. So I'm like a whack when it comes to that stuff. So my wife is always like, "Let me see your phone,"'cause I always capture a bunch of stuff. And even if you look at her story, she's the worst, because her stories, if it's, let's say there's 10 little dots, they're all me. Like she just re-shares my story,'cause she doesn't post her own stuff. So we do find ourselves doing that, but then, like you said, we catch, you know, we catch ourself real quick saying,"Or should we be sleeping?" You know, it's also just one of those hard things where it's 2 p.m. and you're like, you know, I don't wanna sleep right now,'cause sometimes you get caught in that thing where you nap for an hour and then you wake up and you're even way more exhausted. So sometimes for us it's good to just power through the day and then, you know, pass out at like nine, nine thirty. And then our shift, my shift starts at 3 a.m. and then I wake up and take the rest of the day and my wife sleeps 'til 9 a.m. But it is funny, like, as you're talking through it about being exhausted and I realized there was a difference between like not getting sleep'cause we've talked about this to where if we get up, it'll just work and I don't feel tired then at 3 a.m. Like I'm ready to go, usually. With this newborn, I'm realizing that when I wake up at 3 a.m. and like in the back of my skull, I hear like an echo of her crying, you know, like that screech is embedded in my brain, that sleep deprivation that you feel when you wake up at 3 a.m. to deal with that is like a different level. You're getting the same hours of sleep, right? Which isn't a lot. Let's say you're getting five hours of sleep. Before a kid five hours of sleep, I could conquer the day. I could do five podcasts, I could work out, I could go for a run. Getting five hours of sleep with a newborn is like, I didn't get any sleep. I'm so pointless, I'm walking around like a zombie, I'm pouring my coffee into my Yeti cup and then I'm putting Gatorade in the Yeti cup after that. I'm just so fucked up all day. It's a different level, it's so fascinating how your brain reacts to that type of stuff.- Yeah, and I like to think of it like, especially for the first one, they say, oh, after the first one, it gets easier, whatever. But the first one especially, it's like we're so used to doing things a certain way, and I feel like I've realized how self-reliant. You know, you think, oh, being in a relationship with a partner, and you've got all these responsibilities and roles and things like that, and then it turns into the shared responsibility of a baby, so then it's like way different. You know, it's because you're like, wow, I had a lot of freedom before. Being in a relationship is not any lack of freedom if compared to being in a relationship with a baby.- So true.(laughing)- And so like, wanting to have things how they were, but also finding a balance of how they are now, you know?- The new things, yeah.- Dealing with, to me that's like, fascinating to deal with that transition of like, obviously we can't go back to how things were, you know? And a lot of parents mess things up, you know? When they like go way too far on the extremes that I see on the news where like, They're like, oh, we left, and they had a monitor at home while the baby was sleeping. That's when a couple was arrested in New York or something a little bit ago when they were just outgoing to a dinner while their kids were on a monitor or something. Interesting. Yeah. And so obviously, that's an extreme. But it's like they're trying to find how things were. And it's like things just aren't that way anymore. But they're still good and great in finding that balance. Do you find yourself kind of going through a similar thing where you're like, all right, how does this fit? How do we fit everything together?- Oh dude, for sure. In fact, I even had this conversation with my wife the other day,'cause I did, my last podcast was about being a father, and it was just kind of a solo microcast that I did. And the one thing I'm realizing that we need to get better at, that we realized the first week, is that our lives are not gonna be, like you said, the same, but we also shouldn't revolve our life around our daughter. She should just be in our lives. And when we kind of realized that,'cause of course the first couple weeks are a challenge, but like, you know, we told ourselves, well, we're not gonna go out, we're not gonna have people over, we're not gonna do this, we're not gonna, and we're like, hold on, and we had to catch ourselves, we're like, why? We just need to go out, and she's just a part of our life. And I hate to compare this, but a lot of people could relate. It's like having a pet. know, you, you don't stop going to coffee shops. You go to coffee shops that allow pets. And that's kind of how we started thinking about things like week two, once like we started, you know, being calm to each other because the first week is a challenge, but then once we figured out, it's like, you take her, no, you take her. Like we're just not, I took her already. You got more sleep than me. You got 30 minutes more. Exactly. Like you're like have a chart comparing each other's like to do less. But then once we realize like you know this is just such a like we're we have such a great great relationship. We had a great relationship and we still do have a great relationship, but now our relationship is even better because we're adding just something to it. I think a lot of people unless you're responsible. I wouldn't say this to irresponsible folks, but if you're pretty responsible when you can handle mortgage and you can handle saving money and doing adult things like paying taxes and stuff. If you can handle that, I think you can handle a kid because a kid is a lot of work, it's a lot of money, but it's just another thing. And I think a lot of times we get caught up in over-analyzing what a kid is,'cause this is a big deal, I mean, you're raising a human, I'm not downplaying it. I'm just saying that if you're mature enough to handle certain adult things, it's just an adjustment. It's not really like this crazy nuclear bomb that goes off in your life. Like everyone thinks that like, you still hang out with friends, but if your friends have kids, you're more likely to hang out with them. It's not this thing where you don't have friends anymore and you can't have a drink anymore. It's just not the case. So we realized that early on to where we have to have a conscious effort to involve her in our life, not have her revolve around everything.'Cause that's where I think people start, like marriages in particular, people resent each other. because maybe like I couldn't work out'cause I'm big into health. So like if my wife says I can't work out because I have to take care of her daughter, there's gonna be a resentment there. So we just figured out a schedule that makes sense for both of us that I can do my thing, she could do her thing, and of course we take care of her daughter. So sometimes I'll bring my daughter in my gym and I'll just have her in the stroller and she'll watch me work out. She probably doesn't have any clue what I'm doing, but she's watching me and I do what I have to do to maintain my sanity and my life. And I think that's the key to parenthood.- Yeah, and I totally get that. And one thing I thought of when, especially earlier on, not so much at like now, just eight months, but I think like the first six months probably, I was like, I get it. I get why father, like you just go stereotypes or generalizations for a second, but I get why dad's just like, book it and take off. Like I totally get it. Not that I have any desire, of course, to do that, but never in a million years. But I get it because they're like, it's a lie, and they can't handle it. Or they're just like, I need some relief, whatever the reasons are. There's a bunch of reasons, but I get it. And I can empathize in a way with why they're just like, whatever I got to do to make this easier, because I don't even want to have this life. And I'm like, I mean, but at the same time, I would never do that because also I'm like, that's like the weakest way out too. And that's not at all. And I know that you're the same way too. Like we're super similar in that way. It's like we're not going to fall to like the challenges, we'll rise to the challenges. And so many men can't. They just like take off and they want a more relaxed situation. And the funny thing is, it's like, you can't escape it. What are you going to go do? Start the cycle over with another girlfriend in another state?- Yeah. And as men, we're so, you know, we're just horn balls. So we don't think to ourselves, well, we don't have to deal with that if we just don't have sex or if we use protection. But then the guys out there are like, protection sucks, she doesn't feel the same way. And we're always making excuses to like, have unprotected sex. And then when that happens, we're like, fuck this, We're around now. I'm out. I don't do this. And it's just so funny how when we're stuck with that, it's, it is kind of eyeopening dude. At 25, I was a mess. I couldn't imagine at 25 like I'm, I'm 30. No, no, I'm, yeah, I'm 38 now. Yeah. Wait, you're 25. Wait a minute. I know I look young, but not that young. I didn't think you were 25. I'm like, wait,- But dude, at 25, I was a mess. I was still dating and still having fun and doing all that. So it's just, I couldn't imagine at 25. So let alone 18. Yeah, that's crazy. - Yeah, oh yeah. And even, and it's funny too, because age is also one of those things too. It's like, there's no real, you can wait, but it's so different for everybody and where they're at in life and whatnot. And to then match up two people on both partners, to be at the same, it's like, it's just, also one of those things is like, it just happens and you figure it out, which people told us before. I was like, all right, well let's just trust them. And I noticed that six months, or probably maybe after a year, like, let's see, but a lot of guilt and shame come up around like, what can do and how it can help and all these things. And I noticed for me, like, it pops up in weird ways, It's like, you know, I want to be doing more. I want to be doing more, you know? But I think it kind of goes back to that perfection thing. Have you noticed any of that for yourself yet? I say yet, but like.- Yeah.(laughing) Yeah. No, dude, I have, especially, you know, as in, you know, since I'm working for myself as you are as well. Or am I realizing that I need to make sure I'm more conscious of like the amount of time spend working versus being with my daughter and my wife. And I think that's important too is having that support the first few months and giving that support to your spouse, especially the wife like we've talked about where they deal with a lot. The one thing the guy can do, and I had this conversation with my buddy who was also a father, a new father, and we're like, do you ever feel bad like we couldn't give birth? And are we doing enough for the wife? And I think the answer is no, you're not. Because what we supply is similar to what they supply in terms of not the physical act of labor, but, and I've talked about this on social, the act of us helping them get through labor. And I helped, you know, my wife, I don't know if you were able to as well, at the hospital, contractions, you know, rubbing her back, being there for her, talking to her and calming her down. And that again is just like we can't have a baby without our wives, they can't really give birth without us. So I think, by the way, they're not even close in terms of the work. But I think ying and yang, it's important during that process, but also when the baby gets home. So if my wife, she never, never tells me that she needs to break because she wants to be with her daughter as much as she can, which I get. So occasionally I have to kind of get really good at reading her, which I have over the years. And I look at her and I go, you need a break? And she's like, no, it's fine. No, I don't want-- I go, babe, I got it. Go relax. It's OK. Let me make you a tea. Chill out. I got you. So I think the wives need that. Just like we need them to give birth, they need us to be with them for the next infinity years. And that's the key to a good marriage. And I think this also doesn't get talked about a lot, but guys, there is a lot of physical and mental stress that we endure these next 18 years or whatever when you do have this child in your life because the wives, I think there is maybe resentment and I can't speak for every woman, but maybe there's a little resentment like, I gave birth to this kid, do what I say. There's that, but there's also like the guy that's like, I work a shit ton of hours, I work hard for the money, don't spend my money at Target. So there's also that, right? So there's this constant struggle and battle, and if you could figure out not to push each other's buttons to find that median of like looking at each other when you're about to pop, identifying it, being honest and saying, hey, relax, let's take a breather, let's separate rooms, do what we gotta do to come back to earth. I think that's how you can kind of control the relationship so it doesn't spiral out of control,'cause that's, I think, a big reason why people get divorced, is resentment. Whether you have kids or not, it's just that resentment. When you're telling one person they can't do something or when it gets too hard for one person and they don't communicate it, that's where the issues come into play. So we've been really working on that these last few weeks. And I don't wanna say we've mastered it'cause I don't think we ever will, but we're gonna constantly work at that. And I think that's a good step.- Totally, yeah, I agree. That communication, I remember, I think it was like a month in or something, or maybe it was a couple weeks, I don't remember exactly when, but I remember at some point I was like, it felt like, 'cause my wife and I just care so much, and it felt like taboo to say anything bad, you know? Because we have this beautiful daughter that we're so over the moon with, and it felt like, oh, we don't want to say anything bad. Because at a certain point I was just like, like this sucks. Like something about, I forget what it was, but like something I was just like, I just gotta call it out. And I was like, and I'm not saying, obviously, she sucks separating the two. She's absolutely incredible. We're like, oh, perfect. And, but just like also just communicating, like it sucks not sleeping. It sucks this and that. And doesn't mean like it's the partner's fault. Doesn't mean it's anyone's fault really. Just the situation just sucks. And acknowledging that it sucks, started to make it suck less, Because then it wasn't like we were trying to hold this thing of like, no, we should be this, or we should just acknowledge the truth, and the truth is this frickin' sucks right now. And it doesn't suck all the time, every day, every second or anything, it was just like, there were certain parts. And that freedom to not have to get things, just to be able to fully express when something sucks without just being in misery and being like,"Oh, you know, it does suck, how's this?" But like, you know, just not being so attached to it definitely helped. So, and you work from home, so we're like so similar in that way too. How, and I just want to recognize too,'cause I'm also like talking back in a way, thinking of like myself just earlier this year, when if I ask you something, it doesn't, you know, especially it doesn't mean that it can't change look different or things like that. It's kind of more just like how you're thinking about it now, because I know for myself, usually if someone was asking me something, I have a pretty good idea around how I'm seeing things and what they'll look like and all those things. There has to be just an acknowledgement of if things are constantly changing and evolving and you're finding, figuring out new ways and how you want to do things and what works best for you. And so I say that because as I talk with you, it's an evolving process. And the same it is for me. If someone was asking me, on one hand, I want to say, "This is what I'm doing, and this is how it works and great and whatnot." But the reality is, it's going to change. Whether it's next week, later today, in a month or whatever, it might look totally different. So how are you kind of dealing with the work from home situation? Because I know for me it was like, I'm like, this is, this is taking another level of focus. I've never had to extract before. Yeah. Yeah. I definitely, I didn't think it was going to be as hard as what it is. You know, I thought, cause I've always worked a corporate job for, I don't know, up until maybe like four years ago. And then I started working for myself, but, um, I've always worked for a corporate job. And in hindsight, I think it might be more of a challenge working at a corporate job. However, there's this also level of difficulty that's added onto the cake that you don't think about when you work for yourself and have a child, is the fact that when you work for a corporate job and leave nine to five, you're not dealing with anything, except the work. So when you're working from home, you're trying to do calls or podcasts or emails, or in our case, we're creating content. So my, my studio is pretty much soundproof, but that baby cry, man, that goes through fucking zip codes. Okay. Yeah. Madness. So there's sometimes where I have to pause and not create content until she takes a nap and the nap is not that long. So there's that like level of added difficult that I didn't expect as well as like the sleep deprivation, which we've talked about, which is, has been a big factor. And I feel like you wouldn't necessarily have that at a corporate job if you just walked in and you know clocked in and clocked out not saying that corporate jobs aren't hard i'm just saying there's there's some stability there like i'm sure a lot of people could relate with this most of my friends actually 80 80 percent of my friends can relate to where you clock in and clock out you're probably hung over you're probably going on a couple hours of sleep you don't give a shit about your job and you still get paid the same amount no matter what And unless your boss is micromanaging you, you can probably get away with making your 50, 60, 70,000 a year job. When you work for yourself and you have these hurdles that we're talking about with having a newborn working from home, literally your money that day or that week dictates what you do. So there's this level of pressure added, but there's also this level of like, I want to take care of my wife, make sure she can sleep. And there's also a level of pressure of like, I want to spend time with my daughter because she's grown up so quick already. and it's only been a month. So there's these different layers that I didn't think about. I thought it was going to be like, I'm just going to create content and she'll be on my fucking arm and it'll be fine. And she'll be my co-host on my podcast. No, it's become more and more difficult as the days go on because I'm realizing that instead of making 90 grand this year, I think I need to make 70 and be able to spend more time with my daughter. So that's kind kind of like where my head's at now where I need to change my mindset of like getting rid of this hustle mentality that I've had for years and you still want to have that of course, especially working for yourself, but then there's also this thing where these these moments are so crucial and like my father worked his **** off and worked three jobs when I was a kid and then you know he ended up as I was getting old like in my five and six years old. He was able to hang out with me more at home and stuff because I have like really cool videos of like him videotaping me babysitting me and stuff not babysitting, but you know he's he's with me the few moments that he doesn't work these three jobs and that is so crucial, but talking to him and realizing that he did work so much and you know, I don't know how many hours he spent in total with me, but I bet he's regretting it and I wouldn't be where I'm at if he didn't work his ass off, but I also know that if I just be a little more frugal live below my means a bit more, don't want the coolest shit all the time. I'd rather spend more time with her and then just kind of cut back my standards a little bit. And then when she's maybe old enough and we figure out a good plan, maybe I kind of, you know, put it in sixth gear a little bit and go hard. But for now, I need to relax and I need to take a pay cut. And I just need to know that everything's going to be okay. As long as I keep working, I can't put that stress on myself because you put that stress on yourself and it oozes to the wife, it oozes to the kid, and it affects a lot more than just money at that point. So this is where we as business owners and men got to be a little bit more responsible, I think. Yeah, totally agree. And it seems like a couple things come to mind. Like one, it's hard to plan for. Like for myself, I'm like, I don't understand why I would need to take a lot of time off work because what is three months off going to do for for me if I work from home and I can make my own schedule. You know, like I didn't understand that. And then at the same time, I'm like, I don't even know what I would do with the time because I can't even rest when she's sleeping. Cause I'm like, do I need to do something? Do I need to sleep? Do I need to work out? Do I need to like do fix something? I don't know what to do with myself. I would just need to like sit and meditate or something, but just trying to figure out like a sense of self. I did hear a quote that I think about often from I think it was like a psychologist or something. I've heard it a couple different places, but basically it was like, if you mess up the first, I forget if it's three or five, I'll just say five, but if you mess up like the first five years, then you'll spend like the rest of the years trying to fix them. And I think that's super true. And I think it's like, okay, not that I'm gonna relax after five, because I think it'll be such a habit anyways that I'm present and all that, but like, I really wanna put an emphasis on the first five years of being so present and doing the things you said where it's like prioritizing presence over trying to make money for presents. Because it's like there's so many toys and all this stuff is just, there's so much stuff regardless. And the last thing, that's never gonna replace. Um, you know, just the the memories and catching these little things that you don't get especially for us We're planning on just one. So it's a same This is yeah, it's like let's dive in yeah, and you know you also get a um, I don't have you ever been to like, uh, we have a lot of them in florida But have you ever been to like a landfill like a dump? So if people haven't you should check it out because We have one just a few miles away and there's one side that's a hill because you know that's what they do. They cover with soil and irrigation and then they make it into like the stinky hill. Especially in Florida, they're everywhere. But when you see a landfill in person with all the shit that's in a landfill, depending on your perspective on life, which I made this realization years ago, But it's very fitting to what we're talking about, because you realize that when you look in your attic, or you look in the landfill, or you look at everything that we throw away in time. Just talk about our business in particular, a content perspective. So I have a bunch of pod mics from Rode. The mics that I had before, Audio Technica's and some of the older mics that I had, I either sold those or I threw them away, because I couldn't get sold. But at the time I needed it. But you don't. Because everything-- I forget who it is. I think it was Jerry Seinfeld that said, everything ends up in the garbage. Everything ends up in the-- that's not a blanket to say. Everything ends up in the garbage. Because when you buy something today, this black shirt that I'm wearing, this v-neck, eventually it's going to end up in the garbage. It might change locations a few times. So it might like be in my dresser drawer'cause I wear it all the time, and then it moves to my closet, and then it moves to the back of the closet in a tote, and the tote goes to the garage, and then the garage goes in the attic, and then after five years, I throw it away in the trash. But at the time, this shirt was like I needed this, I needed to spend $10, $12. But when you realize that everything ends up in the garbage one day, whether it's a year from now or 10 years from now, you start thinking, is this purchase really important? doesn't matter that much. And the answer is no. The answer is always no. It doesn't matter that much. You might need it at the time, sure. And unless it's food, you really don't have to buy something. But we kind of get stuck in this mode of like, we need it, we need it, we need it, and we want to fill our lives with new and exciting things. Some people fill those voids with materialistic stuff. Some people fill with kids, which isn't always the answer. But at the same time, it's like when you start realizing that, and then you start looking at your bank account and correlating the numbers and like, wait a minute. So if I just stop buying this shit, then I can have all this money and I won't be so stressed out. Now I could spend more time with my family. And when we realized that we wanted to start having a child, which we've been trying for years, people could listen to my podcast if they want to hear the boring story, but we went through IVF and IUIs and it took about almost two and a half years to get to where we're at. Lot of money, I mean we're talking, lot of money. And I realized that we had to do this, so I had to start saving and being fruitful, and that's when I started kind of identifying these factors and these bad trends that we were getting involved in. So then once we cut back and realized that, now I'm kind of in this mode of like, I've been doing it for so long because we wanted to have this kid, where I'm like, I just, I like doing it now. I don't like to splurge anymore because it's just less stress. Because when you want the new iPhone and you want the new this and the new that. It's like you work to buy those things, and that's crazy. Now I'm working because I want to take my daughter to Italy when she's two, you know? And people are like, she's not gonna enjoy it when she's two. Yeah, you're right, but I am.- Yeah.- I'm gonna enjoy it, my wife's gonna enjoy it. The only reason we want to bring her is because she's part of our life now. You know, it's not-- - Yeah.- We're not doing it for her, you know what I mean? Like, we'll go to Disney or the aquarium when she's able to understand images. But now it's, you know, we want to save up and do those things. So it's like, do you want to do those trips and do you want to experience life or do you just want to buy, you know, new things all the time? So.- Yeah, like what is she, what do you, yeah, what are you supposed to do? Like, oh, she won't remember. It's like, okay, but what are you supposed to do in the meantime by that line of thinking? Are we just going to just sit and watch TV?- Yeah.- You know, like what, we going to pause everything until she gets to her niche? I recently moved and I'm right, I think I'm on the path of Route 66, which it expands so far and it's been decommissioned for so many years. But I have been exploring it a little bit and just probably an age thing, a kid thing, just a life thing, state of America at this point. But I've been really into consumerism and just kind of like, how things are and where things were because Americans especially have such a fixation on like the past and Route 66 in particular like I drove down it a couple weeks ago. Just like I'm gonna go as far as I can go and In the time I had and just so depressing seeing like all these buildings that just are just basically kind of rotting because it's not You know parts of route 66 It's just like a snapshot into how things were and looking at like what the American Dream that you know that was kind of like not promised, but they were trying to build things up as, and then where things are now, there's such an emphasis on flashy and buy this thing and have this thing. And the reality is now life is just a sense of normalcy. Even just the white picket fence, just a sense of balance is, people would be so excited about that, let alone. So just to go on a trip and all these little things, finding the gratitude and just the little things versus like you know um some huge thing. I don't know if that makes sense. Well, and you know the American dream you say that cuz II even um I was shooting the **** with my buddy who's who's from Italy, but he lives in America now. He was on my podcast a few episodes ago and um he was talking a lot about the American dream. He's remember he's from Italy. He just moved here like 5 years ago and I go I get what you're saying, but would it be an American dream if people didn't talk about it? You know, like, so think about it. So we're told it's the American dream. Why?- Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like where does that come from?- Yeah, 'cause they told us it was the American dream. No, no, that was a way for us Americans to bring people over so that they could pay taxes and so they could work for us and that we can grow be the best country in the world. The American dream is whatever you want it to be. You know the the the American dream that we think it is if you ask people that are in their 70s now if they accomplish their American dream, the answer is probably going to be no because at the time it was one thing and now it's another. You know like my buddy who's my buddy who is from Italy now he's a TikTok star like he's got a half a million followers. He's making money off TikTok. He's making like four grand a month off. It's six figures. He's making off Tiktok. He lives in America. He couldn't do that in Italy. So his job to open up like a brick and mortar VHS shop and you know get 30 grand a year and buy a house white picket fence and all that. That's not the American dream anymore. So it makes you think what is the American dream because it's not that anymore. So what the American dream changes constantly, but America didn't like relocate. What do you mean? Well, it's whatever we decided to be as Americans. So that to me is the fascinating part. Like if your American dream is you become a content creator, you open up maybe your own business, you make a lot of money, you save money, and then you move to Europe, that's not a bad American dream'cause you wouldn't be able to do that in New Guinea, right? So there's certain levels you just gotta figure out what you wanna do. And I don't think there's a right or wrong answer. America gives us a lot of opportunity, but it's just so funny how we always put this idea of what the American dream is. But nowadays, I don't know if America's the best place to be because you could do a lot of the stuff, like what you and I do, I can't speak for your business as a whole, but I know you're doing well, but I think you could do that in Australia or Canada.- Oh, 100%. - Right?- Yeah. If I was single, I probably would be all over the world too. I'd be like, "Where is he now?" I don't even know where I am. I'm just somewhere.(laughs)- What I look, and I don't want this to be like, the next five minutes of me bashing America, it's funny because I talk a lot about it on my show where you could do whatever we do now somewhere else but I think you'll have more money because shit's not as expensive. Like totally. For example you would make more money working for yourself from Florida than you would in California. Why? Totally. Right? Taxes like price of living like it's just it's no-brainer. So it's not far-fetched to think that if you go over to Italy and open up a business online or in e-commerce, you'll have more money and maybe a better quality of life too, right? Because the views, the people, the food, I mean, Italy was just, I think the first country that just banned artificial ingredients and all their food. Like you can't have any, no company can have food that has synthetic ingredients. It's banned in Italy. It's the first country ever to do it. So that just goes to show you like, okay, so now I'm spending less money on food. I know it's better for me. I might live longer. So I don't know do I want to open up a brick and mortar in New York City anymore? No. So it's like what is the American dream? I don't know. It's it's it's yeah. It's a thing to think about. Oh yeah. I love this too and I had something I think a lot about it. Oh, because I think it's you know so much is tied to identity personal identity but personal identity was such a thing and I've been advanced Packard has wrote a few really good books in the 50s on this idea of like the consumerism and basically like how did this all start? Basically, like, you know, like a lot of it's just to sell more stuff after World War two, you know Because personal identity wasn't people didn't have extra money to be spending on personal identity Like it was function and yeah, it was class and all these things But really it was like, you know, this, it served some type of purpose or some way of thinking, not like I need to express my individuality because we're like, we're trying to like turn butter and figure out a light bulb, you know? Yeah. Uh, so after World War II, people had more, you know, expendable income and that's when like you started seeing, cause you know, also think about cars. This is something I've been thinking about a lot lately and reading a lot about is cars where you didn't refer to like the car model as much. Yeah, they had the model T. But like if you look back at like cars, especially in the 30s, it was like, this is a 39 Ford, like Ford, what is a 39 Ford. And then after World War Two, really in the 50s is when it started to like, pop up in designs. And it was like Cadillacs with the fins and every year, they needed to make more money. So what did they do? They introduce new colors and new designs and the new designs and colors were really only there to make the old ones look outdated So people wanted the new ones, right? But that is you know, just a trap and that kind of became part of the American dream, you know marketing 101 Yeah Have a message and get out to as many people as you can and that's that's what drives capitalism is You know the Jones effect is get you have it giving you something that you know you can't have, but you're going to work your ass off to do it. And that's the difference between our country and others to where I keep bringing up Italy only because it's fresh in my mind. But when my buddy was over here, he flew over back home to see his family in Italy. And the whole time he was there, he's rebuilding fiats. And he's just messing around in the country. And he's hanging out with his grandmother, picking vegetables and stuff. And people kept messaging him, like, hey, do you miss it? like I love America, but there's just some specialness of like disconnecting and you know being in the land and using your hands to build things and create things and you know that's something that we we maybe had instinctually but somewhere on the lines maybe it was after World War II may you know but there's something that happened to us where we would rather sit at home and be consumed with things coming to us versus us going out and experience life. And I think we forgot what life is all about a little bit. And then when we're talking about this, people are like, well, you know, but tik tok so fun, and the new iPhone is so great. And, you know, I love this new restaurant. And listen, if that's how you want to consume, that's how you want to use your life. That's okay. Nothing wrong with that. But don't be don't get a twist. That's not what life's about. And I think when we full circle going back to to having a kid, it kind of all changed because I looked at my screen time on my phone these first few weeks. Dude, I'm barely on my phone. Like, just for business, I post and ghost. You know, I just post, I don't even look. But I'm just, every moment, I'm staring at my daughter's eyes and I don't think about comments, I don't think about the Kardashians. Nothing is going through my brain except her. And I don't wanna say having kids is what life's about, But I think finding a purpose that makes someone's lives better could be the purpose of life. Like if you just have a spouse and you spend the rest of your lives making each other happy, I think that's beautiful. You don't need a kid. If you have a kid, I think if you devote your all to that child and making them the best human they can be and give them a better world than what you grew up on, I think that's beautiful. But there is something involved there with the purpose of life of giving yourself to something else.- Totally.- I think if you can get away with that answer needs to be a device or a materialistic thing, that's not your purpose. You gotta get out of that. You gotta get out. Like you said, Route 66, go travel. Go do something on your own. If I was single man and I had the perspective I have now, like you said, I'd be doing some things. I definitely want to be married with a kid right now because I probably would have left in my 20s and I don't know if I would have been back. Because it's so, like when you leave, man, you leave your like, your home base, and you realize like, you know, you go in a place with no wifi and shit, things change, man. Like I was up in North Carolina for my bachelor party, and woo, it was just, it was cool to get disconnected, and you're sitting in a hot tub, and you're looking at like the forest, and you hear nothing but birds, and there might be a bear in there that you heard, like it's just, it's cool. It's wild, man, and you start thinking to yourself, man, all that stuff on the device is not that important, but somewhere along the line, I think we spend so much time on it, we lose track of it. And it's hard because it is fun on those devices, but you gotta break away every now and again.- Yeah, yeah, and we all are like, our phones are listening to us, and the reality is it's like the algorithms know us better than we know ourselves, you know? Like we haven't caught up, you know, people, it's like we're like, oh, we're so great. It's like you're great at knowing yourself when you're off your phone, but to be on your phone and to say that you know yourself better. I don't trust that statement about myself. I don't trust that this algorithm can't predict what my future ideas will be better than what I can, only because of the complex systems it's running. And so it's like that break is everything, that disconnect. And I think for us, it's nice to have that reminder and that perspective shift, because it sometimes takes a big thing to come along and not everyone has to have a kid of course to have that, but whatever it is, it's like those things shift in a way that like,"Well, I'm just going to journal." That might help, but it's not going to do the thing as some major event, whether it's the death of somebody unfortunately or some health thing. There's all these things that happen. But I know we're like a little bit over time too and so I'm respectful of that Tony I got I got all the time. I got all the time in the world, bro Well only so much too because we got to get yes right back to our daughters. But Get trouble. Thank you yeah, and and and and just for like Full purposes. I actually wanted to talk to you about more UGC stuff which we'll have to save for another episode in the future because Uh, it was like there was what I wanted to talk about but also leaving room for what we were going to talk about So we'll try again. We'll have to try again. Um To get around to that ugc stuff because you're experiencing that and i'm not and I would love to to To hear your thoughts on it and and share those with uh, the audience. Um, thank you tony. Where can people find you? Um Yeah, where do where do you want people to connect with yet? Yes. So I mean, you could find me anywhere at the burrodo, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, all that jazz or X, whatever. And then you have my podcast, the burrodo podcast, where we talk about health, wellness and social interaction. And my wife and I own a company called meet cute box, which we just launched a couple new products. So check that out. But yeah, everything's on at the burrodo. But thank you for having me on brother. I appreciate you. Thank you. Thank you.