The Power of Presence: Why Your Kids Need YOU More Than Anything

Being a great dad isn’t about how much money you make or how many gifts you buy—it’s about showing up. In this episode of The Grateful Dad Podcast, we dive deep into what true presence looks like, why it matters more than you think, and how to break the cycle of emotional absence.

We’ll cover:

 ✔ The difference between time vs. quality time—and how just 15 minutes a day can change everything.

 ✔ Why your kids need YOU more than anything money can buy.

 ✔ A powerful story of a father who literally walked 30 miles through hurricane debris to be there for his child.

 ✔ My personal wake-up call after missing one of my son’s biggest milestones—and how it changed my life.

 ✔ A simple challenge to help you become more present starting today.

If you’ve ever felt like you’re too busy, too exhausted, or too distracted to be the dad you want to be—this episode is for you.

💡 Are you ready to make every moment count? Hit play now.

Transcript

Ryan: 0:00

There's always a train or an airplane every time I start this thing. Welcome back to the Grateful Dad Podcast, where we explore the journey of fatherhood, faith, and personal growth. I'm Ryan, and today we're diving into a topic that might be the most important topic of being a dad. The power of presence. No, not presence like under the tree. Presence. Presence, like being there. Funny thing, I told my kids that being present is more important than getting presents. So now every time they ask me for something, I just sit next to them in silence. They're not amused, but I think it's hilarious. Let's be real. Sometimes we think if we buy our kids enough stuff, they'll feel loved. But they don't need another toy. They need you. In this episode, we're going to cover what being truly present means beyond just being physically in the same room. Why our presence profoundly impacts our child's development, and why science backs this up. How to break cycles of emotional absence, especially if you didn't have a present father yourself. The role of presence in leading our families spiritually. Because spiritual leadership starts with just showing up. Plus, I'm going to share an insane story about a father who literally walked 30 miles through Hurricane debris just to be there for his daughter's wedding. This episode is going to challenge how you see fatherhood, but it's also going to give you real practical steps to start showing up better today. Let's dive. All right, so I have to start this episode off with this story. I came across it just by happenstance, but, man, it fits the bill on this thing. So we're gonna call this dad News. You can use highlighting fatherly dedication. So this story is about a father walking 30 miles through Hurricane debris from Hurricane Helene just to get to his daughter's wedding. So you think showing up for your kids is hard? Imagine driving for seven hours trying to get to your daughter's wedding, only to get stopped by a state trooper who tells you the roads are washed out and you're not getting through. Most people, maybe you, maybe me, they would turn around. But this dad, he got out of his car, left it there, and started walking. What happened next? He walked 30 miles on foot. And he explains in detail, climbing through seven story high mounds of debris, trudging through mud, and he had nothing but a phone, flashlight guiding him in the night. At one point, he almost got crushed by a backhoe. He sunk into, like, a mud area that was getting cleared out by a backhoe. And the backhoe was, like, moving back and forth and almost crushed him a couple times. And along his journey, he got like one of those, you know, those reflectors that people put in their yard because they don't want you to park on their grass. And it's like a white stake with like a red or amber circular reflector. He found one of those, and he was carrying that to kind of keep himself safe. So the. He had the phone flashlight and the reflector, and he's in the mud, and this backhoe is going back and forth trying to clean up mud and debris and almost killed him in this journey. And I feel like there's also like a faith metaphor here where, like, how often do we go through storms in life with nothing but a dim light and a hope that God will guide us? And this man just had like a reflector and a tiny phone flashlight, but he still stepped out in faith to move forward, which I think is pretty cool, aside from just how cool of a story it is. But, you know, the best part about the whole thing is he made it. He didn't even tell anyone when he got there what he just went through. He let the whole ceremony go through because he didn't want to be the center of attention. And at the end of the wedding, he handed his daughter and her husband the reflector and said, let this be a reminder to always be a reflection of each other and a reflection of God. Which was really cool to me. And, yeah, it's just something to think about, you know, lessons for us, dad, is presence isn't always easy. Sometimes you'll feel like you're pushing through a storm. A good lesson to take from this, I think, is that presence isn't always easy. Sometimes it's extremely difficult, and you have to walk 30 miles through Hurricane debris. Sometimes you'll feel like you're pushing through a storm, but your kids, they need you to fight to be there. And this dad definitely did it. Kudos to you, dude. We can all learn from your story. So, presence, let's dive into this. So I'm a huge numbers guy. I love. I love numbers, I love data, I love studies. I know it probably sounds boring, but I'm gonna start this off with a study to kind of tie this whole idea in. Not just because it sounds all warm and fuzzy on the inside, but it actually has hard results attached to it. So the impact of fatherly presence on child development. Research from developmental psychologist Natasha J. Cabrera. Why does that feel like a mouthful? Anyway, Natasha found that children with actively fathers show a bunch of really cool things. They have higher IQ scores on average, children with actively involved fathers score 4 to 6 points higher than children with disengaged fathers on IQ tests. They have stronger language and reasoning skills, 30% increase in early vocabulary comprehension, better emotional security. Children are 40% less likely to suffer from depression, improved academic performance, grades improved by an average of 10 to 15% in school, and lower levels of anxiety and stress. Kids are twice as likely to handle stress in a healthy way when they have actively involved and engaged fathers. Let all that sink in for a minute. Just by being a present and engaged dad, you're literally changing your kid's brain for the better. So what does presence really mean? This is where the whole mindset shift comes in. So I'll talk about a few shifts. The first one I want to talk about is time versus quality. Right? It's not about the clock. It's about the connection. A little bit more about me. I currently work six days a week, like a lot of you do. I'm up early, out the door before my kids are even fully awake. And I usually don't get home until somewhere close to bedtime. And it would be so easy to just kind of go through the motions in the morning, like wake up, go in the bathroom, you know, start getting ready and maybe exchange a quick hug and a tired have a great day buddy with Carter. And a rushed kiss on Taylor's forehead and a quick have a great day to Shannon. And listen, I get it. Sometimes. Some days we're just exhausted and we tell ourselves, I'll spend more time with them this weekend or I'll make it up to them when things slow down at work. But let me tell you something. Kids don't measure love in time. They measure it in connection. I don't have hours and hours with my kids every day, but you better believe that the time I do it counts. Every morning. I start the day with music. Not just any music. I choose worship music. You don't have to choose worship music if you don't want to. I'm not saying that has to be your thing. I just like it because we go to church every Sunday. There's some songs that Shane and I sing together. And, I don't know, we wake up in the morning and, like, she's just getting out of bed and I'm in the bathroom getting ready, and she hears music going. And it's like, he never fails. And we're like, singing along in the bedroom and living room. I just gets us in the right mindset and helps us be there for our kids. I also will often jump back into the bed. Because Carter loves to sneak into our room in the middle of the night still, actually, he loves to have what we call a sleepover in our bed, in Mommy and Daddy's bed. So he doesn't get that as often. Typically on weekends, we'll give it to him. During the week, he's got to go to bed in his bed. But if he wakes up in the middle of the night and wants to come to our bed, he can come. And sometimes I'm still awake when he wakes up, but I can just hear, like, the little patter of his feet, like, coming across the tile in the living room. I just get so excited because I know he's about to come in and I, like, look at him and I'm like, hey, you're here. And he's, like, smiling, like, groggy, rubbing his eyes, climbs into bed and, like, snuggles me and goes back to sleep. I don't know, it just fills me with so much joy when he does that. So. So I hope he. I mean, it might be weird if he were, like, 40 years old and still doing it, but, like, I look forward to it happening for a long time and I know one day it won't happen anymore and that'll be okay, but it'll also. I'll miss it. So I enjoy every minute of it. But enough of that tangent. I will climb back into bed and snuggle Carter for a few minutes, usually, unless he wakes up before me. And then we'll snuggle before I get out of bed. Taylor, when she wakes up in the morning, most mornings, she's happy and she's like, daddy, Daddy. Or she's like, mama. Now, Mama, Mama. Now, now, now, Mama. It's just adorable. And we like to listen to it for a few minutes, but then I always try and rush over. Carter and I usually do it together. We run across and we try and see who can get into Taylor's bedroom door the fastest. And I pull her out of bed and, like, snuggle her and I'm like, good morning, beautiful. And change her diaper and take her out. And the music's still going, so we'll, like, go in the living room. And oftentimes I'll set her down and Shannon will be awake at this point. And we're all just kind of dancing in the living room.

This is all at, like, I don't know, 6: 11:27

00 in the morning. I haven't had a cup of coffee yet. And yeah, we're just in the living room dancing and singing. And then, you know, we'll spend a few minutes as we're getting. And we're getting ready while we're doing this, too. So we might be dancing in the kitchen, but then we'll talk about our days or our mornings and how we're going to have a good day and what we're going to do to have a good day, especially with Carter and gearing him up to have the right mindset, going to school for the day. And then it'll wrap all up with me leaving to go to work. And as I'm pulling out of the driveway, Carter will follow me on his bike. And don't worry, it's in a safe manner. I'm not going to run my kid over. But when I get to the end of the driveway, I stop and I open my driver door. And every time, this is like every morning, he climbs into my truck, gives me a big hug, says, I love you, daddy. Have a great day. I say, I love you too, Carter. Have an amazing day. You have so much fun at school. And I close the door and I drive torque. And this doesn't take a lot of my time, maybe doesn't take a ton of time at all. It takes 10, maybe. Probably adds 10 minutes to my morning, if you like, accumulate for the time where I actually stop and I'm not getting ready and I just do something. So it adds 10 minutes. But does it make a difference? 1,000%, yes. Because here's the truth. Your kids will never remember that one time you stayed an extra hour at work to send another email they want. They're not going to remember groggy dad getting ready in the morning and shooting out the door and going straight to work. Like, make these moments when you can. I choose to do it, you know, when I'm home getting ready for work or when I get home from work. It may not be a whole lot of time, but, man, it counts. And I truly believe that they will always remember the moments where we were truly present with them. The next shift is material versus emotional presence. So this one, you know, we're not just paychecks, guys. I don't know how else to put it, but, like, candidly speaking, you're not just a paycheck. You're not, like, we're not meant as fathers to just go to work. A lot of us grew up with dads who showed love by working hard and providing, and that's admirable. But sometimes it felt like the only way they knew how to show Love. Maybe your dad wasn't at the baseball game, but he was working hard, so you had a roof over your head. Maybe he didn't say I love you often, but he never let you go without. And while providing is important, it's not enough, right? We're not just paychecks. If you got fired from work tomorrow, your company would replace you in, like, less than a week. But to your family, you're irreplaceable. Let's be clear. Being present doesn't mean you stop working. You don't hustle. Dude, I'm a hustler by nature. Any of you that know me is, like, I'm always out trying to hustle and do better, especially in business and personal growth. I just, like. I'm not saying don't work. I'm just saying don't let work replace your role as a father. They're two separate roles, and you can be great, really great at both of them. What's the real measure of success? A full bank account or a full heart? And a connected family. Here's the perspective shift. You can always make more money, but you can never get back the moments that you missed. And you can't create more time. So let me ask you a question. Are you sacrificing your present for a future that might not even come? The third shift is showing up when it's hard because our kids need us in every season. It gets really hard sometimes, you know, Showing up when. When life is easy. That's not presence. Showing up when you're tired, stressed, worn down. That's presence. Let's be real. Sometimes we're just not in the mood. We've had a long day. We just want to sit on the couch and scroll through our phones or zone out onto tv. But that's when presence matters the most. Our kids don't just need us when we're at our best. They need us all the time. Even when you're tired, you can still be present. Maybe you don't have the energy to play tech. Or in Carter's instance, he loves to play bad guys. And sometimes I come home from work and I'm just wiped. Just absolutely wiped. And I. Or. Or I did some heavy lifting. I pulled something on my back, something to that nature. And Carter, I kind of said, can we play bad guys? And it crushes me when he asked me to play bad guys. And I can't. And sometimes. Sometimes I say I can't when I actually can. And every once in a while, Shane will nudge me. She's like, I think you can play bad guys. And as. As uncomfortable it makes me feel for her to call me out for that. I'm grateful for it because I always feel better after I do it. But there are a few times that I come home from work and I am genuinely physically and mentally exhausted, and I do not want to get up from the couch, right? So that's when I'll just look at Carter and be like, hey, come here. Let's snuggle. Can we, you know, watch a show? Or let's talk about our days. Or he's not glued to his tablet or anything, but he has a tablet and he has some cool games, especially, like, some learning games and such that he likes to do. And I'll be like, let's play a game together. And it may be a game that I've never done. He's got to show me. Or it may be a game we've done together and we just have fun. But then I. I'm still spending the time with him. We're talking, but I don't have to chase him around the house and play bad guys because that's very physically taxing at times because I'm a competitive person by nature. So, like, I'm, like, jumping up on the couch and, like, running around and hopping over, like, the kitchen island. I take it to a level I probably shouldn't, but it's a lot of fun when I do. But, you know, we can sit and talk to them about their day. We can. Maybe we're mentally exhausted, but we can give our full attention to them in some fashion for 15 minutes. And maybe we don't feel like we have all the answers, but we can still show up anyway, because here's the thing. We aren't just raising kids. We are raising future men and women of the world. Our kids are watching how we handle exhaustion. They're watching how we show love even when it's inconvenient. They're learning what it means to be committed. And listen, I'm not perfect at this. There are days I've failed. But the key I keep showing up and shameless plug here. I told you guys last episode that I ordered something and I was waiting for it to come in, and I wanted to give it to people. So here's what I ordered. I made Grateful dad shirts that say the Grateful dad on the breast on the front, and, like, little letters, and then on the back it says, show up, be present, stay grateful. And they're gray, and they're not a sponsor or Anything but shout out to rush order tees. They were pretty cool and quick and cheap and really nice quality shirts. But yeah, I ordered them, they came, everything was great. So shout out to them if y'all want to sponsor me and give me more shirts so I can give them away. Rush order tees. Hook it up. Anyway, what I want to do with these shirts is I don't remember how many I order them. I feel like I have like 20 or 30 of them. But the first, I guess 20 or 30 people to email me. As long as I have the size, your size, your name, phone number, and your address. I want to send you one of these shirts completely free. Unless you're local. If you're local to me, just like shoot me an email and tell me where you're at and I can. If you don't know me personally, you can come by my office, I'd love to meet you and I'll give you the shirt. Or I'll drop it off to you, or we'll figure it out. Or I'll mail it to you, it doesn't matter. And I'll cover the entire expense of all of it. Like $0 out of your pocket for shipping, handling the shirt, any of it. Just because I'm grateful to have you guys here and I think it'd be really cool to have these shirts starting to float around and I'm gonna get more shirts made as time goes on. But this is version one of the shirts, which I think is pretty cool. I'll save one for the future. So that way, I don't know, some sort of memorabilia. Anyway, so if you want a shirt. Helloratefuldadpodcast.com send me your info, drop me a line and I will get the shirt to you. If I don't have your size or I run out of shirts and you're still sending stuff, that's cool. I'm gonna save your info because I'll send you stuff the next time I get. I got some pretty fun ideas of stuff that I wanna get. I just wanna give it away. It's not about making money. It's just about building this community. And I think that's a cool way to do it. So shoot me an email and I'll ship them out until they're all gone. Anyway, back to this. Presence isn't about being perfect, it's about being there. Let's wrap up this whole mindset, shift into these following thoughts like, you don't have to be the perfect dad. You don't have to have all the answers, you just have to show up. Your kids, they won't remember the toys, they won't remember the extra hours you worked, but they will always remember that you were there. So here's a personal story that kind of drives this whole idea home for me. There was a time not too long ago, about three years ago, when I thought I was doing everything right. I worked hard. I worked really hard. I put in long hours to provide for my family. And I told myself, I'm doing this for them. I'm doing this for them. I was convinced that the sacrifices I was making, most notably missing almost all my time at home, being exhausted, constantly working. I was convinced they were all worth it. Because in my mind, that's what a good dad does, right? I didn't realize how wrong I was at the time. I was working seven days a week, 10, 12 hours a day. Most days, I'd leave before my family was awake and get home just in time to see Carter's sleepy eyes right before bed. This is before we had Taylor. And even when I was home, I wasn't really home. I was on my phone checking emails. I was still on work calls. When my son sat next to me, I was mentally just not there. I was somewhere else. And because I was busy chasing success, I missed so many moments. Moments I can never get back. But there is one moment in particular that still haunts me. Carter's first steps. You see, Shannon had been telling me for weeks, he's so close, any day now, he's going to take those steps. And every night when I got home, if I got home before he went to bed, I'd sit with him for a few minutes and be like, come on, buddy, show Daddy those steps. Let's see him. Carter. He just smiled and laughed and kept on crawling away. And I told myself, it's okay. I'll see it when it happens. But I didn't. Because the day finally happened. I was at work. Chance sent me a video while I was at work, and I watched Carter take his first steps on a tiny screen, sitting at a cubicle in my office in between work meetings, without me there to cheer him on. Let me tell you something. That video is not the same as being there. I should have been there. I should have been the one holding out my arms as he took those wobbly first steps. I should have seen the look in his eyes in real time, not on a replay. And as much as I wish I could, I can never get that moment back. That was my wake up call. Because if I Kept going down that path. I was going to miss so much more. And for what? More work, More stress? A few more dollars. Mm. Mm. That day, I made a choice. I stopped letting work be my entire identity. I stopped believing the lie that working harder meant being a better dad. I stopped sacrificing my present for a future that might never come. Because here's the thing. My job, it can replace me tomorrow. But my kids, they only get one dad. And you know what's crazy? Since I made that shift, since I started focusing on faith, family, and presence, my professional life actually got way better. My relationships became so much stronger, and I finally started feeling like I was living the life that God put me here to live. Here's what I realized. You don't just wake up one day and have a great relationship with your kids. You have to build it every single day. Presence is a choice, and it's one we have to make before we run out of time to make it. All right, dads, let's get real. We have covered a lot in this episode. We talked about what real presence looks like. We talked about why our kids need more than just our paycheck. They need us. And we talked about why showing up, even when it's hard, is the most powerful thing that we can do as fathers. But now I want to challenge you to actually apply this to your life. Ask yourself, are you really present? Ask yourself that hard question right now. When was the last time you were fully present with your kids? Not just in the room, not just half listening while scrolling through your phone, but truly deeply engaged, making eye contact, listening, laughing, and connecting? Can you even remember? Because if the answer is I don't know, then this challenge is for you. And even if you think you're doing okay, I can promise you we can all do better. So here's the 15 minute challenge. For the next seven days, I want you to spend just 15 minutes a day fully engaged with your kids. That's it. Just 15 minutes. And let me break this down for you. There are 14, 40 minutes in a day. You can't give 15 of them to the people that you love the most. It's like 1% of your day. And if you're sitting there thinking, I don't have time, then you need this challenge more than anybody. But what do I do in those 15 minutes? Good news. This challenge is insanely easy. You don't have to plan some elaborate activity or spend any money or clear your entire schedule. All you have to do is be present. And if you need ideas Here are some super simple ways to knock this challenge out. So if you have kids that are toddlers to 5 years old, get on the floor and play with their toys with them. Have a dance party in the kitchen or the living room while making breakfast or dinner. Sit and color together while asking them about their day. Or lay on the floor and play peekaboo or bad guys or chase or tag anything that makes them laugh. For elementary age kids 6 to 12, go outside and throw the ball. Play tag or jump on the trampoline together. Let them teach you something from their favorite video game or TV show. Trust me, they will love being the teacher. Ask them one simple question. What's something really cool that happened at school today? Take them for a drive with no music, just talking. Carter and I did this on Sunday and we didn't even intend to do it. We were going to do something and then the place we went was closed because it was. It was reserved for a birthday party. And Carter was really sad about it. But then I took him in the truck and we went for a drive and he's. And then he. We were talking. We've been talking about God a lot with Carter, and Carter's kind of learning about faith a little bit in God. And he always asks, like, why God this, why God that? So he's like, why? Why would God not let us go to Poppet Project? Like, I prayed to go to Poppet Project and we couldn't go. What does that mean? I mean, as. As childish as the question is, it. It does open up a very big point about faith. So I use it as an opportunity to talk to him. And I was like, you know, sometimes Carter, sometimes God, he doesn't always give you what you want. He'll always give you what you need. And you don't know what you need. God does. So just because you think you need to be at the Pop Up Project right now, you might not, right? God might have a bigger plan than you going to Pop Up Project. God probably wants us in the truck right now having this conversation so you can build your faith and learn more about God and Dad can spend some quality time with you. Maybe we didn't need to be making slime at the Poppit Project. Maybe this conversation is what we needed to have. And this is God just putting us in the right place, us not going to the Pop Up Project. And, like, having that conversation was crazy. And I'm just. I'm grateful for that and used the opportunity of not being able to go to Puppet Project as an Opportunity to, like I said, go for a drive with no music and just talking. And that's what we talked about. We talked about a bunch of other things, but it was really great having that conversation. So that's your elementary kids. You know, go outside, play a video game with them, ask them how their day was at school, or go for a drive with no music. Preteens, teenagers, sit down and watch something they love, which, I mean, I don't have preteens or teenagers, but I can go by what Carter watches. Have any of you guys ever heard of Skibidi toilet? It's as baffling to watch as it is to just hear the name. It's a toilet with, like, a head sticking out of it that, like, just goes around and does wild things in society with this just horrible song. It's just, yeah, look it up if you dare. And so, anyway, sit down and watch something they love. Hopefully it's not as bad as Skibidi toilet. Go for a walk together and just talk, make food together. Hopefully you're a good cook or they're a good cook. Otherwise you can just, you know, make it just for the fun of it. But. Or it could just be like throwing a frozen pizza in the oven. It doesn't even have to be like making something from scratch or just asking you to sit down, talk. I say, tell me about your friends. Tell me about school. Tell me about your life. And when they tell you, like, actually sit there and listen and look them in the eyes and engage and listen to what they're saying. The bottom line, it doesn't have to be deep. It doesn't have to be serious. It just has to be intentional. Your kids don't need perfection. They just need you to show up. Let me tell you what's going to happen when you start doing this challenge. You're going to notice your kids start opening up more. You're going to see their faces light up when they realize you're truly present. And here's the best part. Once you start doing this, you're not going to want to stop, because you'll realize this is what it's all about. Not work, not money, not success, not the car you drive, not none of it. This. The little moments, the ones that seem small but actually mean everything. So are you in? Because this could literally be the most important 15 minutes of your day. Now go make it count. Thank you for joining me on this episode of the Grateful dad podcast. Remember, your presence is the greatest gift you can give your kids. Be intentional. Be engaged. And stay grateful. I'll see you next time.