Episode 48: Ambitious Dads - How to Chase Success Without Missing Their Childhood

Can you be an ambitious dad without missing your kids’ childhood?

In Episode 48 of The Dad Edit Podcast, we have an honest conversation about one of the hardest challenges many fathers face: balancing career ambition, providing for your family, and actually being present for your kids.

Dads are often told that being a good father means working hard, building financial security, chasing success, and creating a better life for their family. But what happens when the thing you're building for your family starts taking you away from them?

We talk about the pressure ambitious fathers feel to provide, build businesses, advance their careers, create financial stability, and leave a legacy while still wanting to be there for bedtime, practices, school events, conversations, family trips, and the ordinary moments that eventually become our children's childhood.

In this episode, we discuss:

• How to balance fatherhood and career ambition• Why providing financially doesn't automatically make you a present dad
• The difference between a demanding season and a damaging pattern
• How successful dads can pursue big goals without sacrificing their families
• Why your kids experience your availability, not just your intentions
• Setting boundaries around work, business, and personal goals
• Communicating sacrifices with your spouse and children
• Teaching kids hard work, discipline, resilience, and ambition by example
• Why small moments with your children often matter more than expensive experiences
• Building a definition of success your family actually gets to experience

We also share our own experiences with demanding careers, long work weeks, building The Dad Edit Podcast, pursuing businesses and personal goals, and learning how to make family the priority without completely abandoning ambition.

Because ambition isn't the enemy of being a good dad.

Your children can benefit from watching you work hard, chase difficult goals, fail, adjust, and keep moving forward.

But they're also watching what your ambition costs.

The goal probably isn't perfect work-life balance. It's making sacrifices consciously, communicating them honestly, protecting the things that matter most, and making sure your family gets more than whatever energy you have left at the end of the day.

If you're a dad trying to build a career, grow a business, provide for your family, become financially successful, or chase a dream without missing your kids growing up, this conversation is for you.

Ask yourself one question after listening: Does my family currently experience my ambition as love, absence or a combination of both?

🎙️ The Dad Edit Podcast is a fatherhood podcast built around honest conversations about being a dad, relationships, marriage after kids, parenting, men's mental health, personal growth, work, family, and the realities of modern fatherhood.

If this episode resonates with you, follow The Dad Edit Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you listen to podcasts and share it with another dad who needs to hear it.

📍 London, Ontario dads: Join us for The Dad Walk, held every third Saturday of the month at Kiwanis Park. Walk, talk, connect. No speeches. No pressure. Just dads having real conversations.

Follow @TheDadEditPodcast on Instagram for new episodes, clips, conversations, and upcoming Dad Walk details.

Topics: fatherhood podcast, dad podcast, parenting podcast for dads, ambitious dads, working dads, career and fatherhood, work-life balance for dads, present fatherhood, being a better dad, modern fatherhood, parenting advice for dads, balancing work and family, providing for your family, fatherhood and success, dad life, men's mental health, family priorities, career ambition, business and fatherhood, fatherhood advice.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Before we jump in, I have a quick favor. If you listen to this podcast and enjoy these conversations, please give us a follow. Wherever you're listening, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, wherever it is. This genuinely helps it push the podcast out and reach more dads who need to hear it. We really appreciate the support. We're also running a dad walk every third Saturday of the month at Kiwanis Park in London, Ontario. The walk starts at 11 a.m. sharp. Come out, walk, talk, and connect. No pressure, no speeches, no expectations. Just real conversations with other dads. Follow us on Instagram at the Dad at a podcast for the next dad walk and all the details.

SPEAKER_02 0:36

All right, let's get into it. Let's get it.

SPEAKER_01 0:50

Episode 48. Ambitious Dads. How to change success without missing their childhood. A lot of dads carry two powerful responsibilities. We want to build something, a career, a business, financial security, a better life for the one we've been the one we started with. We want our children to see discipline, purpose, ambition, ambition. But we also want to be there for bedtime, for conversations, for practices, for appointments, school events, difficult moments, the ordinary days that become their childhood. The problem is that ambition always asks something of us. More time, more focus, more risk, more sacrifice. And sometimes fathers tell themselves that every sacrifice is justified because they're doing it for their family. But does providing automatically make a father present? Can you build an extraordinary career without becoming a stranger inside your own home? Can your children admire what you created while still remembering who you are? In this episode, I want us to talk about ambition, work, presence, sacrifice, and how fathers can chase meaningful goals without making their families absorb the entire cost. A lot of ambitious go-getter want to be providing fathers who, you know, want to create legacy. But this balance is tough. I think, you know, starting out, what what do you guys feel ambition means? What is ambitious to you? What is what does chasing your goals mean to you guys?

SPEAKER_00 2:58

You know, my goals are very much just around doing my best for the kids and the household. And like, I don't need I don't need a Lamborghini. I don't need a massive house. I want to have, you know, uh maybe steak once a month or twice a month kind of thing. But like my I'm not like looking to have a penthouse in New York because what's more valuable is making memories together with your family. Um, maybe going on an overnight trip to Niagara Falls, middle of winter, hotels are dirt cheap there, and and just getting some pizza and going swimming. That's a that's more valuable than the Lamborghini and the penthouse, I think. Because that's just that's what's that's the achiev that's the goal is to provide the kids with some provide your family with memories, a happy life. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 4:03

I don't I feel like a big part of it too is like self-evaluation of your goals. Okay, are you setting this? Are you setting this goal for self? Are you setting it this goal for the better good of your family? And if that's the case, don't lose track of why you're doing it. They shouldn't be at the end of the stick where all the sacrifices are on them while you chase your dream. You gotta reevaluate what what it's about, what you're doing it, what you what you're doing it for. You know what I'm saying? Will that penthouse in New York bring um a different type of level of understanding for your kids? Uh to let them understand that you gotta put in the hard work to get what you want. Or is that penthouse on Broadway strictly for you and your exact emotions and your ego?

SPEAKER_00 5:01

When I was younger, um, you know, the goal was to play music for a living, you know, make a make a living off of a passion, right? And that changes when you have a family, because I mean, how can you be a present dad when you're halfway across the world doing music kind of thing? Um but now the goal really is to set the set the kids up to enjoy their lives as much, support their lives. My son's going into high school. Okay, what's he need? He needs his uniform, he needs uh a working laptop, he needs support emotionally and and um like he if he has an idea, he needs somebody to bounce ideas off of I'm there, I'll support you. That's my goal is to provide the support now rather than my having my own goals to like I have my goals to you know, you know, have a standard of living for for the house, right? But my goal is now to support their goals, right? It's not a selfish thing. I don't I don't need to be playing music. I have no interest in that anymore. My goals have shifted and changed, the priorities have changed. My role in life is a support role, right? I'm not the main character, I'm a supporting character.

SPEAKER_02 6:31

And don't get us wrong, I'm not trying to shit on your dreams for the person, the audience living out there that is honed in and focused on something they've been passionate about for from when they were young to now in the midpoint of their family. But understand this everything takes sacrifice. So if you're if you have a certain goal that you are gun ho on, understand that you may have to take the difficult road to that goal to make sure that you're not sacrificing the emotional balance, the energy in the home. You know what I'm saying? I'm not saying that, oh, once you have kids, fuck, fuck everything that you had in your mind to make you feel like you're leveling up, but understand sometimes it may be more difficult chasing that goal and still living that family life, being the supportive husband, the supportive father, and know that it's not gonna be easy, but you can make it happen. Anything's possible. If you have a goal of making music and traveling the fucking world, I know there's people out there that fucking bring their families with them. Wherever they go, now it's a little bit more difficult because now you have to have the financial backing to include them in it. Whatever you set as a goal, it's obtainable with the standard that you have standard of life or where you're at in life with your family. It just may be more difficult.

SPEAKER_00 7:57

And and on the the uh like let's say it's something like you your dream of starting um a business, uh clothing brand, maybe, or uh just having to shop related to your passion, maybe owning your own gym kind of thing. You might have to be there from 9 a.m. till midnight every day. Um yeah, your kids come there after school, do their homework off to the side, train a little. Um maybe that's what what life looks like, you know, and that's that's great. That's that's different than I guess um traveling the world and all that, but so no matter both similar, yeah. So I guess it depends. So you so you have your goal and your goals for your family, and somehow you're gonna make them all work out together, kind of thing. So yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 8:52

I think a lot of dads um aren't necessarily changing money. I think that we establish goals and success and ambition to a financial gain. Um, but I feel like what we're chasing deep down is that feeling of being enough. I'm providing enough, I'm financially in a position where I can be fully supportive of my children. You know, part of the podcast, being fully transparent, is to eventually monetize for me. It's so that I can replace my job with the podcast because A, I fucking love doing this. B, I want to help other people realize what they love to do. If if you've got a message and you want to bring it to two people, I want to prove out how to do that and then teach people how to do that. And I want to make a career out of that. In doing so, it will allow me more freedom to be there for my family. But there's gonna be a sacrifice in the beginning, and uh, you know, I think we we talked about it before. Um, that you can't lead your family on indefinitely for something that might happen, right? I can say to Nikki, uh, you know, this podcast is gonna take off, we're gonna get in sponsorships, we're gonna we're gonna start our business, we're gonna be making money, I'm gonna take care of everything, we'll get a house eventually. When does that happen? Like you said, what does Anto say? But what are we doing now? How are you present today? You know, your your kids don't uh they don't experience your intention, they experience your availability. Yep. Right? You may intend to I'm gonna make all of this money, and then once I make that money, I'm gonna be able to take them on trips and do all this fun things, but that that always gets pushed, it gets pushed, it gets pushed, it gets pushed. It's it's you have to, I believe you have to make some sacrifices. Do I want extreme professional growth right now in the manufacturing field and leadership? Or do I want to be more present at home? I can drive some growth, it's gonna be a slower brick-by-brick career trajectory than if I go and I run three tier one automotive plants and have to travel all over the world, go learn stuff overseas, come back here, run an American plant, come back to Canada, bit off around. But I'm now at the mercy of that facility. And my kid and my wife take backseat. Is that worth the money? To me, not right now. I would rather us slowly, organically grow this podcast, develop a media company, and just very slowly build those bricks. I think that's you know, ambition to me right now. Because I think it's more sustainable. Yeah. And I think that we have to look at sustainability and putting your family first. I think I've mentioned it before, you know, when we were we were on threads and I asked a question about um what people felt they missed out on in fatherhood or or or what were some of the mistakes that you went through. And it was chasing the bag. It was putting all their effort into a business, into an opportunity, and missing out on their kids' recitals and growing up, and when he, you know, missing out on your son having great ideas and wanting to bounce them off of you because you're tired and you don't got time tonight, and then he just kind of walks away. And they all said that they would give up everything that they've achieved to have that time back, and that's stood with me, stayed with me since having those conversations is everything else is irrelevant. As long as we got, like you said, a roof over our head, the bills are paid, everyone's comfortable. I can get him a laptop for school and his school uniform, and that stuff's okay. As long as I'm available, that's what matters.

SPEAKER_02 13:05

I think it's it's good to involve um involve your family. Well, like for you, you have a new uh a newborn, you know, Lynx, right? He's very young, so you don't really you can't really involve him in the conversation, but you could involve Nikki in the conversation. Look, this is my this is my goal. This is what makes me feel like I'm leveling up, like we're going the right direction. You think this is obtainable? Have the conversations of the sacrifices that are going to be made. So you guys are on the same page while you're going towards this goal. It's when you don't have those conversations and you're selfish and you're just thinking about self and you're not including your young adult, your 18-year-old, or your 20-year-old in the conversation of what you what your expectation in life is. You're a team now. It's not self. You cannot be selfish. Involve them in these conversations and see if it's obtainable, what role they have to play, what sacrifices they have to make. At least they have the understanding of what the big picture is. And they're not feeling left in the fucking dark while you're trying to obtain what you're obtaining.

SPEAKER_00 14:10

It's nice that you said evolve them in your goals because you do want your kids to see, oh, dad has a goal, dad has a dream, and he's shooting for that for you, right? So there's a balance then, right? Like, don't give up on your dreams because you're um fuck. What's this is a tricky one, right? Because you want to show them that if there's something in life that you want, you go for it and you work for that. But while at the same time, you're prioritizing your responsibilities, what you've signed up for, making sure your T's are crossed and your I's are dotted and everybody's okay here. And then every set Sunday morning you get together with the boys to do a podcast. It's like this. Wey cloud drink, energy drinks by by one o'clock, we're we're out doing our errands back to responsibility. Hell yeah. At least with our I don't know, yeah. Cause like when I'm editing some of this audio, my daughter's sitting right beside me, like giggling and my voice on on the audio, but like she's seeing me work on something that is kind is a goal for us. Yes. So with a balance of making sure your priorities are taken care of, and then with any spare time involving them.

SPEAKER_02 15:31

Exactly. Yeah, presenting, presenting it to them because they're it they're in this ride too. You know what I'm saying? They're down for the ups and they're downs for the downs too, or they're gonna have to be involved regardless. So it'd be nice if they know what they're signed up for.

SPEAKER_01 15:46

But I think you still you I mean, you're you like you're saying, the the the struggle there is like, do I show them that you go after what you want and you you see it through the end and you be relentless in that? Or do I show them that you know you put family first? And I mean, this podcast is based off family first, right? Like there, I don't think any of us would be in a situation where we had an opportunity, but it meant that like you two had to miss out on your kids' graduations. Ain't happening. We would say that doesn't work for us. That doesn't either someone's going alone to still hold you know, toe the line, or we're not doing it because it doesn't fit our family. Most important to me, you know, that I hope my son sees is you you only get one family, respect it. The only people there to pick up the pieces when you fall down is gonna be your family. Put them first. I if I'm on a chase a podcast and it becomes too much and I'm sacrificing too much, then it's not the fit for me. If that means I gotta pivot and go into a leadership business and that fits my family life more because I can travel and do it on my own time, which hopefully the podcast we could do that, then that's a better fit. But you know, you I want to teach my son, absolutely be relentless in what you want to go after, but you have to make decisions about your priorities. Yes. When I was going to the military, my priority was the military. I understood at that point I didn't want a partner, I didn't want children because I didn't want anyone to have to worry about. You know, I only camped with a rifle. I'm not claiming that I was looking rah-rah in the military. But if I were to be fully in and deployed, I didn't want to have to think about what my kids and my wife were up to and if they were okay and if they were taken care of. You have to make priorities. And at that time, my priority was no family. I'll make sure my mom knows I'm okay. That was my whole life. Coming out of that, having a kid, having a beautiful wife, they're my priority. I'm gonna try and fit ambition and everything else around it and do whatever I can and and push it in my own spare time, as long as it's not sacrificing their time. Yes, um, that's what I'm gonna do. Yeah. Right. And I think that that's that's a tough balance.

SPEAKER_00 18:16

Yeah, and it's not like taking resources away from them. Like you're not, I'm not starting this clothing brand that's completely failing and and taking food off the table, doing anything. It's uh yeah, focusing on those priorities, like you said, it's good.

SPEAKER_01 18:30

You gotta be careful. There's risks that you have to take, and I think that a uh something that I haven't experienced yet is you know, we're bootstrapping all of this ourselves right now. There's people who okay, I'm gonna go out, I'm gonna collect money, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna push for investors, and you know, could we drum up tens of thousands of dollars for equipment in a studio and all this for sure? Maybe that puts us on the hook for having to like succeed, but that's now all this fucking stress that if if we don't succeed, you put your house up for us against these these loans, and if it flops, you sacrificed your family, you sacrificed food on the table. And you know, I think we've taken an approach with this podcast of like, we don't want to be inconvenienced, we want it to work for our family. Family comes first, the podcast will organically grow. If it takes us 10 years and we're just still doing this every couple Sundays a month, then it is what it is. Um I think you have to be cautious. And if you're I haven't come across too many fathers who are ambitious individuals who don't regret missing their kids' childhood, you know.

SPEAKER_00 19:46

I um I have experience with one fella who's comes from like his legacy is to build something to leave behind, right? And that does come at the expense of driving the kids to soccer or um taking an hour or two off work to go to their track and field meet. And then I actually got through to him though, because I was like, imagine this. So his daughter had uh Dance Fest, um which if anybody doesn't know is when the school makes the kids in their classes perform a dance to a song, it's a whole school thing, it's fun. Kids like to do it, I think. Um but uh parents are invited to come and watch. And I I know personally when I've come to the school and kids are all sitting in their groups. Every kid is looking, scouting the crowd for the people that they know and love for their audience. Like they don't, it doesn't matter that there's 500 people there, they're just looking for their their parent. And when they see you, they light up, they start waving, they get so excited. And his plan wasn't to go, and I'm like, you gotta go. And I told him, like, they light up, they light up. It'll make her she'll remember that when she's older. He ended up making it happen. He's so grateful that he went. Uh, and I think that's uh maybe something 100%. I don't know, but there's something there, man.

SPEAKER_01 21:26

And it's I think that there's a difference between um demanding seasons, you know, there's gonna be this podcast could take off. We can have extreme growth, and we really need to fucking hone in so that we can dial this in, create the systems, create the process. That's okay. There are times where demand is okay as long as it's not a problematic pattern. If our whole life, the three of us, forget our families, we're chasing the bag, we're gonna be fucking famous. 10 years go by of us just throwing ourselves. And our money into this, regardless of if it's successful or not, our family's gonna be gone and we're gonna be the divorced dad podcast, right? We don't want that. I got no kids podcast, the child support podcast. We don't want this shit. I wanna I want something that's organically built, and and like we always talk about, if there's times where we gotta hunker down, communicate. Think, buddy. You know, I've I've got dad's got you know this this opportunity in this city in the states. We're gonna go be on a podcast or we're getting featured here. I'm really excited, but I'm not gonna make it to your baseball games this week. But I promise when I get back, we will hold that fucking promise. Yep. Right? Yep. It's one thing to oh, I'm sorry, buddy, I'm not gonna make it, but next time, you've seen it in um Jim Carrey's liar liar. Oh, yeah, I love that rule. When he always told his kid, I'll play, I'll play, I'll play catch with you next week, next time, next this. You're always the problematic pattern there is you always let your fucking kid down. That's where you have issues once in a while. It's okay. Communicate, yep. But for sure, for your friend, he's creating this beautiful life, this legacy. He's probably 20 times more successful than I am. But he's at what sacrifice?

SPEAKER_03 23:22

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 23:23

And at how often is he gonna sacrifice that? And I promise you, at the end of that legacy, his kids aren't gonna care about the legacy, they're gonna know whether he was there or not. Yeah, and talk to them, see, you know, and I'm not trying to bash anyone, you you have to do what you have to do, and you're doing it for a reason. There's something internally why you're doing this. I get it. I I grew up broke with nothing, with feeling like you don't have the same thing as everyone else. Like it is a big pain point for me to be broke and to be poor. I don't want that, I don't want that for my kid. He's gonna give he's gonna be spoiled, I'm sure. But it's not gonna come out of sacrifice to his and my time. Because I also grew up without a dad. Yeah, and that shit's far more important than us having fucking endless money and going to Disney World. If the fridge is stocked, I feel wealthy. That's it. If I open that motherfucker up and I can always have a snack, I'm I'm wealthy. Yeah, right. So I think I think that's a great story. I appreciate you sharing that. Are there I think when you have busy times and and I shit, I can lean towards Ryan. When you guys were in Alberta, yeah, you probably worked a fuckload. Hell, that's long hours, six days a week, six days a week. So, did you guys create rituals with the kids? Like, how did you reconnect? Because you're you're busy. I imagine you were probably working long ass days, 14, 16 hour days, six days a week. The seventh day, what are you guys doing?

SPEAKER_02 25:06

Brother, I'm gonna I'm gonna say it like this. We made sure that we had the understanding. Uh, me and my wife both, um, opportunity was presented to us to be financially stable. Okay, we know that's what we need, that's what we wanted. But we also said to ourselves, the same way we are going to dedicate our time and our our efforts and our sweat and tears to these companies, to these people that we work for, we need to make sure that we have that same level or even beyond that level when it comes to our family. That was priority. So on the tired weekends, even though we were fucking tired, we're packing up, we're gonna make a trip to the lake and we're gonna do some barbecuing for the kids. A sacrifice you have to make. Simple as that. We were very conscious of the understanding that we wanted to provide a better life for each other and the families, but not at the sacrifice of our kids. And that communication through the earlier years is what created such a beautiful thing when it came to raising our kids. Traveling two hours to Edmonton from Athabasca after working five straight days, 12-hour days, my wife working graveyard shift. We knew when Saturday came, no matter what, we are gonna pack these kids up and we're gonna have a moment. We consciously planned these things out. We came with a plan. And that's what it's about, straight up. That's what got us through our younger years. And we didn't miss a fucking beat. You know, those those long road trips, they appreciated that. You know what I'm saying? So the sacrifices we were making at the time, we made sure that we had the equal amount of time spent with our kids. Simple, plain, that's what it was. Everything was balanced, right? It was balanced. We spoke about it. We had an expectation before we left Montreal, we knew what we wanted, but the their goal is our kids. We could obtain what we want. It might not be as easy, but we chose uh to to create this family, and our number one priority was building memories for our kids, building up, building up two at the time two respectable young black women, and we knew what we had to do through our dream chasing to not to not sacrifice that goal, and we just made it fucking happen. Thank goodness we decided to have kids and create this life in our younger years because I don't know how the fuck. Shout out to my boy Chosen, shout out to my cousin Q. I don't know how the fuck they do it now in their 40s with young young toddlers, but they're doing what they gotta do to make sure that those toddlers, my nieces and nephews, are experiencing the best of life for them right now when it comes to family.

SPEAKER_01 28:16

Right, and that's it's I it the only regret I have about parenthood is not starting sooner. I know I've talked about like I was a maniac as a younger, but like it's it's true, you're going into this phase now, you're still a young man. Like you now you have this time to dedicate at a much more mature stage of your life into uh a business or your career or what have you. Like it's just it's such a cool opportunity now. As opposed to like, I'm just starting to to parrot because I'll pissed away my twenties, but I'm very starting to.

SPEAKER_02 28:55

I'm very calculative, calculative of how how I spend my time too. You know, through the wisdom and the growth, I understand, okay, I see the future with the podcast, and I'm willing to sacrifice the time because I think that, you know, it'll be positive. It'll give me more time to spend with my family, more time to do the things that I want. But I'm very calculative with my time. I'm not just wasteful, oh, I have this fucking thought, I want to chase this, or that's not working out. Okay, I'm gonna go. No, no, no. I'm very calculative of where I'm gonna invest this thing that I call life.

SPEAKER_00 29:31

And at the end of the day, you have a finite amount of energy to point towards things too. So you gotta find if you're at 100% when you started the bay and you've got 10 things that need 10% energy, then you're drained by the end. You can't take on 20 things, right? So you gotta choose, pick and choose where you put that energy idea.

SPEAKER_02 29:49

100%. And this is why what we're creating is great, because we're taking the knowledge that we have, the wisdom that we have in different points of our lives and we're we're throwing it out there to help the individual that's just confused, but to let them know they're not by yourself. People go through this is that we we talk about real life that they can implement in their lives. Yeah, you may know what to do, but you may be scared to do what you got to do by hearing it from others and getting that encouragement of you know regulating your self-talk and and and communicating more. This is part of the growth to get to where you want to go. Uh, that's why what we're doing here is such a beautiful thing, like to just put it out there to help others. Yeah, you know, finding those communities and those outlets. You know, it's not for the lazy man, bro. It's not for the meek, it's not for the lazy. Not everyone can be a father, you know what I'm saying? You have to be willing to learn, willing to fail, just like you know, like you have to have the willingness and to have those tools out there.

SPEAKER_01 30:51

But understand is normal. Yeah, bro. Fail, fail, and fail fast, fail forward. It's okay to make mistakes. And you know, my biggest hope with the podcast is that guys understand like you're not alone. The thoughts that you're feeling, the the episode we did a uh a couple episodes ago about I love being a father, but I don't always love being a father is just your inner monologue. And know that you know, for three guys that fucking love being in dads, that that thought comes up, yeah, and it's okay. But you have to move past it, you have to repair, you have to look at how to get by that. You have to decide what family commitments are non-negotiable, you know. Like you said, you worked 12 to 16 hour days, six days a week. On Saturday, though, regardless of what if you worked all night, I worked all day. We got in the car Saturday and we drove to the lake and we gave them an experience.

SPEAKER_02 31:55

And they didn't notice because of their age, they didn't notice the tireness, they didn't notice that part. They don't need to notice the part. What they need to notice is that we're fucking carving out time regardless.

SPEAKER_01 32:05

Yeah, so your legacy is not just what you're leaving behind, it's how people felt while they built it. Yes, right. Your kids may see, like, oh, we got a house, we got all this, but if they felt shitty the whole time, you guys have this life, they don't appreciate it, but they're like, Man, mom and dad were so hard, and we still did these things, and like I mean, I guess part of parenthood is them not realizing how difficult it was, but they still had all these experiences. Right.

SPEAKER_00 32:34

What what what do you want to imprint on them in their later years when they look back on how it went? You want them to be like, oh, dad, dad took us. He sat down with me and helping me with my homework, and that was a moment, right? That was, oh, um, my dad took me to the park and uh play play basketball with me. I remember that. That was nice. It's not a grand thing, that's an imprint little, uh, it's that's good stuff.

SPEAKER_02 33:07

I say like beauty, I don't want my kids to miss out on the beauty of the struggle. So I'm gonna make the struggle look as beautiful as it can be. They see we're tired, they see what we're doing, but they also see that, hey man, daddy's making sure he comes home and uh reads that book. Whatever. They're seeing the beauty in something that's hard. So then fast forward 15 years later, they have the understanding that it's not all pixie dust, right? You're gonna go through some things, but it doesn't mean it has to be super negative while you're going through it. Yeah, you can make it what it is, and it's funny because now I got my daughters working in the summertime right now because school's out, but working full time at where I'm at. And I got HR coming to me, I got other leaders coming to me and be like, damn, I think your girls are like workaholics. It's just like, hey, they've seen how mommy and daddy did it, they understand that they want nice things, they understand what they gotta do to get to where they gotta go. They see the beauty in the fucking struggle, and they're not fearful of it. Yeah, and they're great a great representation of my legacy.

SPEAKER_00 34:25

Do you feel like you reached your goal? Or do you think you're still working towards shifting on it's still?

SPEAKER_02 34:31

Ooh, I want to say I'm doing like lateral movements all the time. It's shifting, it's changing, it's forever um developing, to be honest. You know what I'm saying? With every different season that comes to watch these beautiful young women grow, I adjust what the the I don't change scope, but I I I I adjust it and I manipulate it a bit.

SPEAKER_00 34:56

You get close and you're like, oh, we can go this is that or that.

SPEAKER_02 35:00

There's different routes to get to where you gotta go. There's not only one fucking path. And I know they see that. What I don't want them to see is which they've seen too, and it's a good learning experience, is me not putting my my all into something and just giving the fuck up because of circumstances. You know, the feeling that I got when Iana came to me and be like, Well, I'm doing this because I saw you this, and like in a negative aspect, it got me to check myself and be like, oh man. That lesson was learned, and I don't want that to continue. So if I'm gonna open my mouth to a goal, I'm gonna make sure I follow fucking through.

SPEAKER_01 35:38

Bro, that's one of the biggest uh motivators for me to you know eat healthy and get healthy. Is like I want my kid to see what I do and reflect that. And I can't be like, oh buddy, if you want to get big and strong, you ought to go to the gym. Dad, I never see you at the gym. Oh that'll hurt. Oh, make sure that conversation never happens.

SPEAKER_00 36:02

Yeah, your calves are tiny.

SPEAKER_01 36:04

Yeah, that you got little ass calves. We'll be fighting. We'll be fighting. But I'm a thick boy, that'll never, that will never be the comment. I always get caught big back. Yeah, yeah, big back in Arabic. But you know, it's it's those conversations. It's that's you know the goal. I don't I don't want my kid to see me give up or or or sacrifice something and be like, Well, you don't care to do that, so I don't care either. You know, I want I want them to pivot if they don't like something for sure, they need to be able to articulate that. Um, but I gotta start accepting that it's different than Gary. No, you don't like you're saying lateral movements in your goals rather than like fuck this, this was hard, I'm not doing it anymore.

SPEAKER_00 36:54

Or football, it'd be ideal to just run straight down in their own field to the other end. But you got dodge got in the way, you gotta, yeah, you gotta jump over guys and shit. You're gonna get knocked down, but then you you set yourself back up and you go again.

SPEAKER_02 37:07

Hell yeah. Show the beauty in the struggle, you know what I'm saying? Yep.

SPEAKER_01 37:13

So I think um uh a closing refract reflection here. Ambition is not the enemy of presence. Wanting to build, provide, grow, and accomplish something meaningful does not mean you are a selfish father. Your children can benefit from seeing you work hard. They can learn courage, discipline, resilience, and purpose from watching you pursue something difficult, but they also learn from what your ambitions cost. They're learning what receives your attention. They're learning whether your work always wins, they're learning whether your success requires sacrificing every relationship around you. Maybe the goal is not perfect balance. Perfect balance probably does not exist. The goal is to make sacrifices consciously, to communicate them honestly, to place boundaries around demanding seasons and to ensure families experience more than the exhausted remains of us. It's to build a version of success that our children do not only inherit one day, but actually get to experience. Share this episode with a dad who's trying to build something without losing the people around him. Then ask yourself one question: Does my family currently experience my ambition as a love, absence, or a combination of both? Follow us on Instagram at the dad edit podcast. Watch for our next dad walk announcement. I think. I don't know when this one's coming out. This should come out in August, so the next one will be in September. Um, come check us out on Discord. Uh, we're creating a community on there. We're talking about food, fitness, relationships, the general stuff, work. Uh boys, we is all we got. Thank you.