growNman
growNman
161 Daily Discipline Beats Motivation
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Building Daily Non‑Negotiables
From Arguing To Articulating
Using Communication In Education
Environment, Upbringing, And Growth
De‑Escalating Parents With Empathy
Help Versus Support
Fixing School Systems And Mindsets
Routines Over Motivation
Separating Through Deliberate Practice
Hours, Mastery, And Opportunity
SPEAKER_00What up, Doe, and welcome back to I'm Growin' Man. It's your man John D in the building. My inner workings on how I operate. Uh it came up in a really, a really close-knit group of mine where we were speaking about somebody asks, What's your motivation? And they were playing off of each other, saying, What kind of motivates them? And along the lines I just said that I don't really have motivation. Guess I kind of misled them, but I don't, and my daily routine, my daily routine, I have some non-negotiables that have to be done every single day. No matter how I'm feeling, these are my non-negotiables. So whether I'm sick, I'm busy in a mug, these things have to be done. And I noticed that these non-negotiables have helped evolve me into a better person in the areas that I want to get better in, specifically communication. And there's no classes out here where we just, you know, like challenging each other on communication. So I took it upon myself to study and learn communication as if I want to become an expert in it, so that I could reduce the misunderstandings I used to have in the past. I used to always known to be the one to argue, and that is that was never my intent. I just didn't know how to articulate effective enough, effectively enough to de-escalate the the the sounds of an argument. And you know, it got to the point where it was just like, you know, that's just John, you know, he's gonna argue. And I know I've said this before, but that's not anything that you anybody want. Anybody would want following them. They could say that, you know, they like arguing, you do, but you don't want to argue when there's just a misunderstanding. And I think people misunderstand that too. You can agree, people say you agree to disagree, that's just so that you don't get into an argument. You don't want to ruin an occasion, a moment, an experience because you guys are not seeing eye to eye. So it takes a mature person to recognize, okay, this is going nowhere, and maybe I'm going to say some words where we don't have to go there. But it took me well over 41 years to realize that I was the denominator in all of the chaos that was going on. And I've said this too. You know, it's embarrassing to be that age and realize how immature you are in these certain areas of life. And you know, some people say you only know what you know. That's true, but it still doesn't take from the embarrassment because I feel like other people have these things. And I didn't. And it was like, I was the kid with the helmet, you know. And you know, my wife said, Don't say that, but I was. It was like people just let me be me. But I I enjoy working on my routine to become a better communicator. And I was telling them, you know, being in education, every educator wants to help children. Well, in their mind that the idea is to do that, and if they were good at it, that's the goal. Like, how can I help this child? And I was telling them, being that I'm working on communication the way that I am, I am I'm putting this effort in where I can actually practice it on a day-to-day basis. You know, being that I'm an administrator, I have to deal with behaviors where some students, they don't even know why they act the way that they do, but we're trying to figure out how we can reduce the behavior. So I feel like at some point I'm going to be able to put the right set of words together to help students change their behavior, regardless of the environment they come from, but because they believe that they're important enough to learn how to change their behavior. Because a lot of times we're just we're a victim of our circumstances. And if you don't have the best environment, not that nobody's not trying, it's just not the best environment you would want to come from. But I'll say this the toughest environments create the best stories. And if you have a story where you didn't deserve that lifestyle, the only way it's gonna become important is if you figure a way to get out of it. Because I'm gonna tell you, coming from where I came from, not saying that I grew up in an unsafe environment, like for the environment-wise, outside, but the inside was pretty abusive. Outside was abusive too, I guess. But it wasn't like I was worried about my life. It was more so I was they were creating a different personality. The environment was creating a personality that was going to moon everybody. Oh my gosh. But the environment I grew up in, whether it was, you know, inside my home and to the outside, I just I liked outside a little more than inside because my father was a handful. But I never learned how to communicate effectively. And I ended up becoming really this bully that was willing to fight. And looking back, you know, I give thanks to the uh to the Lord up above or whoever's making these decisions because I was messing up. And I and they say, you know, the Lord uh protects the ignorant, and I think he did because I just didn't know any better. And and I've also heard that ignorance is no excuse of the law, but when you're dealing with the Lord, he looked out for me. So now I'm in this mindset where I was blessed to be here to talk to you guys and share this information. If you work on your communication, misunderstandings, arguments will decrease greatly. And I've learned that over the course of time. So as long as I work on it every day and I get to practice with my students, their parents, because you know, parents, that's a different animal right there. You know, parents are always gonna be parents at the end of the day. And being that I'm working on my communication, I realize, hey, what do you expect a parent to do? They're gonna go fight for their kid. And being that I know this already, this is like information that allows me to reduce any walls I might have, you know, because you know, parents will say whatever they want and they could disrespect you. And depending on how disrespectful it could be, you could recover a lot faster than them because you knew they were coming in. And I think that I've learned the art of that. Sometimes are more difficult than others, but overall, I must say that I'm teen parents because they're just fighting for their kids. But at the end of the day, if we can explain the situation, I feel like any adult is gonna say, hey, nah, my kid messed up. But you know, you'll have some parents that are just C red. But my job as the communicator, the person that's working on it, is to show the parent, hey, you know, I get you fighting. I think if you got to put this in consideration, if the shoe was on the other foot, how would you feel? And you know, sometimes you walk a parent back by just giving them an analogy or a different circumstance to make them think, like, okay, I'm tripping. Because there's no blueprint for raising kids. And at the end of the day, parents just want to be mama baron. Like they just want to do all of that. They want to protect, protect, protect, not putting into consideration that, hey, maybe your kid just made a mistake. If more people are working on communication, it makes for other areas to have less arguments, less disagreements. And not to say that you're just agreeing to be agreeing, but you won't disagree on stuff that wasn't meant to be misunderstood. Sometimes we get into arguments because we're talking about two different things, but we don't like the energy of the person, and sometimes we can't back down. But if you work on your communication, you'll realize who you're talking to where you can be like, okay, this person I have to respond this way, because you can't respond to everybody the same way. But if you don't work on communication, you don't know that. Like a person who's really good at communicating, they're going to be able to not manipulate the person they're talking to, but they're going to be able to use a non-threatening demeanor, including and or use of language, because sometimes we can use words that could offend the person you're talking to and you don't even know it. And you have to recognize it. So this is what I'm saying. I've been working on it where I know that things, these things occur. And being that I know that they occur, I can pre-plan before I meet with a parent because I don't want to offend a parent. I don't want the parent to think anything other than Mr. Lewis is on our team. Period. And you know, working on this part of communication. I've I could say that I've been pretty successful this year. Not saying that I'm keeping count or anything like that, but it's wonderful to be able to walk away from a tough situation and you walk together, like, okay, this is what we need to do. Because I only want to help. I'm here to help, you know, and you know, my wife says, you know, it's the difference between help and support. Help is uh the way you want to do it, support is how they want it, you know, and sometimes when you take over, you know, you'll get a little fallback, like, you know, because they don't they don't really know how to carry it out. And I'm saying that because you'll have family members that, you know, they say they need help and don't they they want help their way. So they really just want your support. Because help their way is probably how it got them there, right? So they need a different shakeup. But it takes a person with the intent on working on communication to deliver that message. So being in the school that I'm in, I don't I wouldn't say it's a tough school. I would say it's just a school with some broken systems that we are trying to create, right? Re-establish so that whoever comes through this school know that this is your best bet for the finest education in the area. So it's not just academics, it's social. It's just growing as a as a as a young kid believing that you're too important to be making foolish mistakes. Now, we do know kids are gonna be kids and maturity is real, right? But at the end of the day, we want them to make decisions that are not going to have them dead or behind bars because they were just having too much fun. And that's the reason why I work on this communication. Because if I can convince these students, because idle minds will find the most ridiculous things to do and and get a consequence that they just needed supervision. If they had supervision, we wouldn't have got to that point. So if I can put these words together, like when I was saying, like, I don't have motivation, like I want to be the greatest communicator ever. And I know all of you know that, and you was like, I'm tired of hearing that. But I'm telling you, and when it happens, or like in my mind, it won't be because I'm not working on it. All these years I've been trying to figure out how can I master the art of communication so that I can get the most out of any situation when I'm conversing with someone. Because I don't want to waste your time. And I'm pretty good at not allowing people to waste mine also, you know. Uh, and people might say that's selfish, but at the end of the day, I have things to do. My time is accounted for. If you find a way to get a few seconds and I find out that it's not in our best interest, I'll get out of it. But that's not to chase anyone away. I'm I'm just all about maximizing the time that I'm spending with you because you could be anywhere. And at that moment, if I'm there, I want to give you my undivided attention and I want to help you if I can. So working with students, I've developed these relationships with like, hey, I need you to get a five-minute break. If you feel like you're gonna crash out, come look for me. Come in my office and sit, try to figure out what you could have done differently, and go back, reset. Let's do it again. And at the end of the day, I think if we give our students a few options to reduce the immature blow-ups, the crashing out, it can it can allow other areas to grow. So doing my non-negotiaby, working on communication and practicing it, the hours are going to accumulate to the point where I'll be able to say a few things and kids be like, I didn't look at it that way. And they will change their family's trajectory. Now, I'm not there, of course, but I definitely have students that are in their I do. I have students in their 40s. I mean, from when I was in their life teaching or administrator, I have students that are in their 40s. I just want y'all to know that that's wild to me too. But I didn't give them what I'm giving these kids now. Like I didn't even know how to give those kids. And I have pretty good relationships with people from my past, like the students from my past. Like, of course, you know, and they have their families and they have their own journeys also. But the person that they knew then, the person that I am now, I've grown so much. Like I could have helped them in so many different ways. But even if I had all of this now, who's to say that they were ready to receive a message? But the whole point is I would have had a lot of hours of practice. And at some point, I'm gonna be able to say, like, not to motivate people, but say the things that it's like the the right tone and frequency and cadence and body language. And it's like, you know, I I believe life has its benchmarks in life where you look back and you'd be like, that was a good moment, or it was a bad moment, but it just lets you know that you were living life, right? Imagine having those often, like every day. Like we have to get in the mindset that if we work on ourselves every day, we will get better. And when we get better, our outcomes look different. Like, I know, like it's not even no pressure. Like, you know, I was telling my friends, like, I don't need anybody to check up on me to see if I did it. Because what I want only requires me to do it every day. And if I decide that I'm taking cheat days, then apparently I don't want to be what I want to be. But I've accepted that there are no day offs. Like, you know what I'm saying? If I can breathe and I can move, I can think, I can get my routine done. And I guess, you know, another group of my friends, I always say that I'm not rich. And they always say, brother, you are rich, and they tell me these things that I've done and what I have. They're right, but I'm I mean, I'm I'm typically, golly, I'm typically referring to financially. If if I was rich, like in people like, oh man, he's getting it all over. Like, my words would sound different. When when I find mastery and communication and I do become financially abundant, well, my family becomes financially abundant. I need you guys to know that this information will remain free. I know I'm all over the place, but I want to a friend of mine showed me, uh, it's this, I don't want to like talk too much bad about it. I thought it was a great idea, but the person is charging so much for things for men to learn. And I was like, I get this capitalistic idea, but I want y'all to know my information will always be free. There is not an amount of money that I'm willing to sell out for stuff that I think that should just be available for you. It's only gonna make you better and to charge somebody is, I don't know, like I don't want to become rich like that. I want to become rich where anybody can get it without because if I see you in the streets and we're talking, I'm gonna give you the same stuff I'm talking on this podcast. Because like I said, I'm not trying to waste your time. Using the idea of motivation to become this level of greatness, I don't, I don't have I just I just have nine negotiables I like to complete. And to give you a better idea of what I'm trying to achieve. So if you look at professional athletes, they pretty much start fairly young when they're introduced to some some sports, depending on who their parents are and how much exposure they're gonna have, they're going to have a routine just putting in hours of getting better in this sport every single day. Now, mind you, they're gonna be days off. This is a sport, your body needs time to recover, totally get it. But they're gonna put so many hours that's gonna separate them from other people that say that they do it, but these people have been really doing it because when somebody was on summer vacation and they went to band camp and they went to Kansas and they were doing all of these things, like doing family stuff. You weren't playing whatever sport it is, but there's somebody who was like putting in hours and they were just separating themselves away from you, you know, and I feel like by the time they turned 18, like, or 17, 18, they're just like this, they're so much better than everybody around, and people just expect them to keep going, their trajectory's so high. So I feel like now with me, my routine has everything to do with just the way that I think, communicate, you know, and my my my routine incorporates studying different languages and learning different forms of communication so that I'm not misunderstood, right? But if I work on this for the rest of my life, at some point, I'm going to separate myself away from everybody. And that's what I'm saying. Everybody can do that. You have the ability to separate yourself from any from and get paid for it. But you just gotta be that good. If you are not that good, it's because you haven't put the work in, not because you weren't born with whoever or what talents or what exposure. You can use your brain and become so good in whatever particular area that you will separate yourself. But you have to believe, you have to create the routine and follow through. So, like when you're a kid, depending on who your parents are, they're gonna make you do this routine until you can take it over, right? But Let's say you're an adult or you're not a kid that enjoys sports or whatnot. Whatever you like, whether you play an instrument, uh play video games, like if you put in the hours, you're gonna become that good. Like if you like you gotta put the work in, like you're gonna become an expert in that area. And if you become good like that, doors open up for you. They open up for any and everybody because everybody's trying to get on, right? Everybody's trying to get something from something. But when you're that good, they're coming for you. And you can say, hey, I don't want this. That's the reason why if you got the right people around you and you put the effort, you'll be rewarded. You just have to put the work in. And I think through this journey, I've learned that through professional athletes, of course, because shout out to them, they kind of gave the blueprint of how to become better than everybody around you. As many things that they share, you know, if you just listen, they tell you what they did at a young age. And now, wherever you are as an adult, you are the smartest person you've ever been. Now, I'm not saying you made the best decisions up until this point, but you are the smartest version you've ever been. You can create a routine of your own and you could put in the work that those young guys did. And by the 18, they became financially abundant, right? Just imagine if you start now. Now, this is the thing. They weren't put, but two or three hours a day. Max, in my mind, two or three hours a day from a little kid. Now, it's a lot of time, but I'm just saying two or three hours max every single day. Like I think maybe be the average. It might be more. I don't know. No, I don't think it was more than that. Not as a child. Uh, but you know, when you play the game, those hours, those days and an hour, I mean, those hours and the days can get longer and longer, and it'll just increase your average of how much time you're actually in your sport. And specific particularly, I'm talking about basketball. But just imagine, like I said today, like I'm in my practice zone with my students. So I'm I'm practicing eight hours a day. I come home, practice with my family to try to learn as much about them, create this relationship with my kids and my wife separately together. Like I get all of this practice. So eventually I am going to separate myself from people who really work on communication because I've been so intentional with becoming better in this that I will become an expert of it because I'm spending so many hours in this on purpose. And I enjoy it because I can see the fruits from it. And not only that, the better that I get at learning how to communicate, I'm single-handedly changing the mindset of these students and adults that I interact with on a regular basis. Because no adult wants to be talked to or spoken to like a child or feel anything less than. And at the same time, things like that happen. And I feel like when things get heated and you show them how to respond differently, they'll respond differently in other situations. And in and in turn, you'll find better communicators because people will have more options versus just flying off the handle ready to go off. Because a lot of the times it's just a misunderstanding. I did not wake up this morning to get in an argument about things that don't even have anything to do with us. So how can I get out of this without feeling like a punk and feeling embarrassed like I'm gonna like stand on mine even when I'm wrong? How can I stand from stand on mine without offending somebody, making them seem like I'm willing to go there because I'm not really willing to go there, but I don't want you talking to me like I'm a punk, but I'm not willing to go there. You know, there's so many different ways. And I'm just and I think about how me working on communication when things get hot, and like I normally like, who you talking to like that? I'm like, man, you you out here, man, my bad. Like, nor maybe that was that kind of almost sounded condescending. And I'm trying to work on that too. Like, but I want to say, like, you know, somebody snap on you, you was like, What did I do? I didn't, my bad. How did I like I didn't expect you to respond that way? It will diffuse everything, you know. But the way that you sound will ultimately get a response that you didn't expect, but it'll be the best response because if a person responds to you crazy, it's because you probably tricking them and didn't even know it, or you walked into something that wasn't yours. And I was telling people, if you knew enough information, you wouldn't overreact. So we have to learn to control our emotions. That's one of the four things I told you guys you need to focus on anyway: communication, activity, diet, and emotional intelligence. So focusing on your emotions, if you can control them and then you get all the information, you'll be like, man, I'm glad I didn't overreact. I didn't know that part. But typically I would have overreacted. And if you self-reflect, or how can I have done something differently, it will change how you look at other people. Because most people don't even be about that. You will run into people to be about that, but if you're mature enough, you can get out of it because you already know they're about that. So you just have to say the right things and let them know. Like, I don't want any smoke. So it has nothing to do with being a punk. It has everything to do with they're willing to lose everything for nothing. And I don't want to give them nothing. So I'm gonna chill out. You know what I'm saying? So that's the way that I'm looking at things, and that's how I keep myself accountable on a daily basis. I want to be a great communicator where I could change my students' lives. Like just because of my practice of working on communication, over the course of time, those hours are gonna accumulate, and my students are going to get the best version of an assistant principal that they can get because I want to be that person. I want them to look back and be like, I remember when I started to mature because Mr. Lewis was telling me this, I need to look at communication. You know, I talk about the same things I talk with y'all, I try to give them in small bites because, you know, their attention span is really small. But at the end of the day, they want to learn and grow too. And if I could give them everything that I've gotten the way that I am, and I keep getting better at some point, these students are going to change the way this area looks. Because imagine becoming financially abundant in your 20s because you just created a routine in your elementary or middle school life and you just did it every day. And then by the time in your 20s, it matured and you're like, wow. And then you could, you know, because I'm gonna tell you, once you master these things, you have to know how to protect it. But even if you do fail, this is one thing that I do know, and this is shout out to Dave Chappelle, and then I'm out of here. He the one taught me this. When he came back from Africa, and I've talked about this. He came back from Africa, him and his friends just got in a car or a little van, and he just went to different comedy clubs. He had no money. They made money off of him just doing stand-up. And he did it so much he just got really good at it. And then he realized what people wanted to hear. And I was like, I'm not good in anything where people would want to hear me, right? So I was like, man, he just got that good at it. And I'm watching people all over the place just pop up, mastering certain things that people are willing to pay them for. And I was like, I am going to become the greatest communicator ever by being the best husband and the best father ever to walk the earth. And I'm going to try to give my students everything that I can. And as I'm walking, I'm realizing that there is a process. And once you complete the process, and when I say complete the process, complete the process of becoming addicted to becoming better. Because when you work on yourself, you create different doors, different opportunities where you can be like, I'm not interested in this, but you have to be that good. And if you're not that, if you don't get those opportunities, it's because you're not really good enough for people to know that you're there. But when you put that work in, people talk for you. And I know sometimes people want it immediately, but if you're patient and you put the work in, it'll come at the right time. Y'all make today better than yesterday. Don't worry about anything you can't control. G A T A. Get after that action, or that action will get after you. Be great on purpose.