First Hero

Is Your Daughter Really Manipulating You? (The Truth for Dads) | First Hero Podcast EP0010

• Rich Jacome • Episode 10

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0:00 | 35:12

Are you a Girl Dad struggling with your daughter's behavior? In this episode of the First Hero Podcast, we unmask the internal "stories" that are creating a wall between you and your daughter.

We often label our children as "manipulative" or "entitled," but these are usually just filters for our own discomfort and fear of losing control. Corey and Rich break down how to stop being the "director" of a scripted play and start becoming a present, conscious father. Learn how to separate your daughter’s identity from her behavior and move from a "Me vs. Her" mentality to a "Bench Analogy" approach where you tackle problems together.

It’s time to break the cycle and become the hero your daughter deserves.

TIMESTAMPS: 
00:00 - The story you tell yourself vs. reality 
01:40 - Why our internal "scripts" are harming our kids 
03:22 - Is it manipulation or an unmet need? 
06:15 - The science of the "Baby Brain" vs. "Adult Brain" 
08:12 - Unpacking the "Entitled" and "Needy" labels 
11:11 - Identity vs. Behavior: The crucial distinction 
11:42 - The Bench Analogy: Solving problems together 
14:10 - The Social Media Trap: Avoiding "Peacekeeper" parenting 
17:00 - Handling the "Boyfriend" stage with presence, not aggression 
21:15 - Why we panic when we feel powerless 
23:22 - The fear of raising a "weak" child 
26:50 - Master the Reframe: Changing your perspective
28:59 - Root to Bloom: Decoding her behavior 
31:31 - The Space: Your power to choose your response 
34:32 - Take the Girl Dad Quiz

Take the free Girl Dad Quiz in the link below. It is a five minute compatibility test that shows your strengths, weaknesses, and blind spots as a father of daughters. You will walk away knowing exactly where you stand and what to work on next.


🗡❤‍🔥 TAKE THE GIRL DAD QUIZ
Discover your fathering style, your strengths, and your blind spots.
Get a custom roadmap to become the Hero she needs.

► https://www.firstheroproject.com/fatherhoodquiz

SPEAKER_00

She's manipulating me. That's the story you tell yourself when the tears start. She's being entitled. That's the justification when you want to say no, but you feel guilty. I'm sure it's fine. I'm sure it's fine. That's the lie you whisper to yourself when you think about her social media or the boy she's hanging out with, right? But the real story here, the one you don't say out loud, is that having the hard conversation makes you uncomfortable. And deep down you know the truth. It's not about her, it's really about you. And the fear that if you get it wrong, you'll either raise a daughter who walks all over you or one you failed to protect.

SPEAKER_01

Your daughter doesn't need a perfect father. She needs one committed to being better. Welcome to the first hero podcast, where girl dads break harmful cycles and build impactful legacies.

SPEAKER_00

Welcome, welcome, welcome to the first hero podcast. I'm your forever gracious host, Corey Eccles. And this is my beautiful bald partner Rich. Good to have you with us today. Yeah, let's get into it. So today's podcast episode, we're going to talk about something that's happening in the background, always 24-7, while you eat, sleep, breathe. And this is the stories that we tell ourselves. This is the narration. This is the script. This is the movie theater. This is the movie playing inside of everybody's head. And you are the main character, right? You are the main character of the story. And everybody else has their scripts, their roles, and they're just actors in your play. Right. So uh this is very important for us because how we operate inside of the relationship with our daughter is very much dictated by the story we tell ourselves, right? So we're gonna talk about some key things today. We're gonna talk about um, you know, manipulation being one of them, being entitled. So really the labels that we place on our daughters, right? That's and the behavior as a result.

SPEAKER_01

They all stem from a story. Yeah. They all stem from a story. And usually the stories that we're telling ourselves about our daughters are similar to the stories we tell ourselves about the job that we're in, the wife, the partner we chose, the body that we have. Yeah. You know, there's no, there's not typically uh, there's not typically a uh a break between the stories that show up and dictate the other areas of our life and the stories that we put around our daughter and specifically their behavior.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_01

And they can be super harmful.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Well, they're harmful.

SPEAKER_01

They can be harmful or helpful.

SPEAKER_00

Right. A lot of a lot of the times they're harmful. Like to be honest. The ones we're gonna be talking about today are gonna be harmful because they they they show up the most. Yeah, and and this is why they're harmful is because you are the main actor inside of your play. You're the main, you're the main character, you're also the director. And what happens typically is unconsciously, we we hand people these scripts or here's the play, here's the script.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_00

And then we we we set these expectations. Hey, you have to follow the script to the T. And then when your daughter gets outside of those scripts, right, when she starts do doing her own thing, you're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. That's not part of the script. Hold on here. And then you start, you know, that's when you start catastrophizing, et cetera, et cetera. But this happens unconsciously, right?

SPEAKER_01

Let's talk about the two, let's talk about the two internal, like some of the most prevalent internal stories that you and I find in ourselves, and then in also talking with other fathers.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, definitely. Um the biggest one that I hear is manipulation. Manipulation is probably like she's manipulating me. I'm being manipulated. And Rich, I know we've talked before. I know you have um you have a story about this. You want to share that?

SPEAKER_01

I mean, I have a lot of stories about this. And you know, candidly, Corey and I are are we're in this fight together, which is why we started this whole first hero community and movement, why we're building all of this, because we realize that iron sharpens iron. And and uh Corey and I have that relationship where I can come to him and kind of share some of these, some of these stories that most men don't talk about that are running through my head, and specifically around manipulation. I'll share a quick story with you. When I first got into the real estate business, the sales business, um, I took a bunch of personality tests to try to uncover, you know, psychologically what how I how I operate, therefore how other people operate. And those, if you've ever taken a psych, if you've ever taken a personality test, you know how comprehensive the the results can be. And it's kind of like reading a fortune. Um in in the sense that like it's exciting and you start to you start to have that introspective view. Well, the results the results were pretty conclusive across the couple a couple different tests. And one of the fears as it breaks down, one of the things that it indicated to me or for me, my personality, that I that I feared was the fear of being taken advantage of. And I remember when I read that, it was like, damn. I had never really connected that before, but it put as soon as the words, as soon as I read the words, I was like, Yeah, that's a that's a fucking pain point, dude. Yeah. That describes that that hit on something inside of me. Yeah. And so I share that story because that story, that that trigger, if you will, or that programming tell writes stories in my life and specifically around my relationship with my daughters. It writes stories when they are being um, when they are when they are being, you know, challenging, when they are challenging me, when they are not conforming to my requests, when they are not being uh communicative, I start that little trigger on unmanaged, it starts to manifest itself into stories. And those stories usually result in something that sounds like she's manipulating me. And the same feeling starts. And guess what happens when that feeling starts? The actions follow. Yeah. And what do I do to someone? How do I how do I react to someone who I feel is trying to manipulate me? It's not positive. Right. It's not positive, and I find myself that story then being the front that my daughter is battling against instead of instead of having a connection with her dad.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, 100%. And and that's the filter that you see life through. Whenever you see a threat, there's a filter she's manipulating. And then pretty much that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because everything she does, you see that that filter is manipulation. When in reality, manipulation takes a lot of processing power, a lot of brain power. I always like to say this. I always like to test fathers when they come to me and say my daughter's manipulating me. I I always I always let them know it takes an immense amount of brain power. So if your daughter had the skill set to fulfill an unmet need and she wasn't using it, she was using a different set of skill sets that wasn't the most conducive way to get that need, then that is manipulation at its finest, where you possess the skill sets to get what you need, but you decide, you make a choice to use a different set of skill sets instead that um lead to uh lead to um false pretenses. Manipulation, right? So your daughter doesn't have the skill set to necessarily get what she wants. She's doing what she can and she she has the skills she's acquired to get what she wants, but we see it as manipulation because we have adult brains. But in a baby brain, it's like, or even a child, anyone 18. I mean, I know even adults who don't possess the skills to get what they want, and people think it's manipulation. It's like, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like, you know, some people don't know how to communicate, especially your your kid.

SPEAKER_01

For context, too. We're well, I'm specifically talking about my young, my young children, right? My my my daughter, my oldest is four. And so those of you with older children, if that's not a skill set that your daughter has sharpened, yeah, it could definitely be a struggle. I mean, shit, I've met adults well into their 30s who have not sharpened this skill set and they're still allowing, you know, their their they haven't yet dis discerned the difference between exactly what you described, which is which is yeah, I've never had it described that way, which makes a lot of sense. But to for context, we're talking about specifically if you have young daughters, young daughters. There's there's there is a there is an evolution of their brain that's they don't even possess the brain computing power to manipulate. Right. But our adult filters will look at it, the situation be like she's being manipulative.

SPEAKER_00

She's manipulative, yeah. And when we really test that, most of the father's like, holy shit, dude, thank you. Like that was mind-blowing. Right. So that's cool. Uh story number two, another big one is entitlement or she's being needy. So again, these are label labels, manipulative, needy, entitled, right? These are all labels. Um, the story of being needy or entitled is probably the next, the next biggest one. So, Rich, I don't know. Do do you have a story about that one?

SPEAKER_01

Um, yeah, I mean, listen, I'm I'm an open book. I don't mean to put you on the spot. I'm an open book. Yeah, sure. Let's show everyone how fucked up I am. No, but the the reality is, is like I think if we're being honest with each other as men, we probably share a lot of similarities in this. But you know, she's being needier entitled, dude, a hundred percent. I I one of my greatest, one of my greatest goals for being a father and instilling uh instilling traits within my daughters is I want them, I want them to, I don't want them to be entitled. I don't want them to be needy, I want them to be resourceful, I want them to be gritty, I want them to be independent, I want them to be strong. Right. Right. And so when I I I have a little bit of a story around this too. It's probably not as prevalent in my life as the manipulation one. Yeah. Um, but dude, yeah, definitely. Like if if I have if I have Ro, my youngest, who's just constantly at my heels, like sometimes I do feel myself distancing because in my mind, I I recognize a story that starts to play where it's like she needs to learn to be independent. She she was a year and a half, guys. Right, she's a year and a half. She doesn't possess the brain processing ability, the emotion emotional capability to to learn independence right now. It's just me as an adult looking at her as if she's the same age and the same, the same experience as me, like, oh no, you know, I'm not gonna give you attention right now because you need to learn to do it on your own. 100%. I try to catch that because that's that personally, I think it's toxic. I feel toxic when I do that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Well, thank God you have this self-awareness. But to circle back, that's the that's the script. That's the unconscious script in your play that you're handing to your daughter, right? Whenever, whenever you the the label of entitled or needy comes up, you always tie it just to an unmet expectation, which is rich was saying, I want my daughters to be gritty, I want my daughters to be this, I want my daughters to be that. And when they're not, they're they're entitled. They're going off script. Holy shit. Okay, everybody, everybody cut. Right. We need to get you back on script because you're not being this certain way. Exactly. Makes sense, yeah. Behavior-based. Exactly. So that's the fear that kind of drives us in parenting. Because, and then we can stem it all the way back. It's like, well, if my daughter's not gritty or resourceful, she's gonna she's gonna grow up, be fucked up, she's not gonna find a relationship, she's not gonna have kids, she's gonna die alone. Shit. And then you're just catastrophizing, right? Absolutely. All at an unconscious level. So these are the labels we really have to watch out for. And and here's a caveat because what this is very important, because as a girl dad with your daughter, when you're labeling your child a certain way, when she's being needy, entitled or manipulating, what you're doing is you're placing that label on your child. And what happens is there's behavior and then identity, your child. What you're doing is you're collapsing the two, right? Your child is now the behavior. Your child is now manipulative, your child is now needy. And what happens is that closes you off to empathy, right? To really understanding. It closes you off to compassion, and compassion is really like giving a shit enough to help your daughter when in her time of need, it closes you off to that because now you're looking at your daughter like it's you versus your daughter, right? But what we need to understand here is we need to separate the two, your daughter and behavior. When we when we separate the two, something magical happens. I want you to picture a bench and you're sitting on this bench with your daughter side by side, hand in hand. When you separate behavior and identity, you're now able to open the pathways of empathy and compassion. And now it's you and your daughter versus a problem. And now you're in a problem-solving mode. And it and and the way and your behavior and how you handle those scenarios ultimately changes. This is what has fundamentally changed my behavior with my daughter. Hands down.

SPEAKER_01

That's beautiful, bro. And and I just want to take it a step further. For those of you fathers listening, if you are the type of father listening and you're you're plugging into stuff like this, because you want to be on your deathbed one day and you want the thought of the relationship and connection with your daughter to be one of the most important and meaningful things you've ever, ever had in your entire life, this is how.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

This is also how you avoid that. Yeah. Right? By by making every problem by collapsing, like you said, dude, collapsing the identity with the behavior and making it all one and approaching every situation like it's you versus your daughter instead of you and your daughter versus the problem or the challenge.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

So I love that, dude. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And pro tip, that's everything in life.

SPEAKER_01

That's everything in life. But this is we're really drilling down on dads and daughters here. So the next thing I wanted to talk about is let's talk about external stories too, right? Because those are two of the most, I think, important internal stories. But external stories, those are the ones we we we sometimes let off the hook uh because we think that they're maybe going to take care of themselves, they're gonna work themselves out, or so maybe even somebody else has somebody else is is gonna be able to uh to kind of help step in on that. And I want to share a little bit of background. We've been fortunate enough to coach one-on-one with Bedros Coollian, who, if you don't know who Bedros is, shout out to B. We've coached with him for about four months now, one-on-one. And uh he is amazing human being, amazing human being, an incredible leader and and really a beacon of light in the space of men, self-mastery, and the pursuit of individual greatness and collective greatness, to be honest with you. So if you don't, if you've not subscribed to him, uh the Badris Coollian show, it's amazing. Badris puts out some incredible, incredible content. But we talked with him about this episode and we asked him, B, what are what are some stories that men and fathers are talking are telling themselves that are harmful and have a harmful outcome? And he had two stories that are external that I think are really important to kind of weave in here. So the first one is gonna be he said, fathers tell them stories tell themselves stories to avoid stirring the pot, to avoid what they think will become a confrontation. And so let's talk about story number one. In the day and age that we live in with social media, this is a super prevalent story. Now, I'm not there yet, we're not there yet because we have younger kids, but people listening, like fathers listening with girls that are of an age where social media, all their friends are on social media, and depending on where you're at with your daughter and social media, this could be super, super important. So I want you to listen up here. The story that we tell ourselves, and I can foresee myself getting here and other fathers, the story you tell yourselves in regards to social media and and and your daughter is I'm sure she's being safe, right? The story we tell ourselves to I trust her, right? I trust her. She's she's got it. I've taught her well, right? I uh so I the story that we're telling ourselves to avoid looking at her phone or her DMs, her posts, right? We tell ourselves this to kind of keep the peace. And we say things like, I'm sure her mom is checking. Right. Yeah, I'm sure her mom's got it. Mom's got it, right? And then never checking with moms, which is kind of this unspoken thing.

SPEAKER_00

It's an unspoken thing. You're just you're making an assumption. That fucking happens about the garbage can in the trash, bro.

SPEAKER_01

100% or the dishes, bro. Like it's happening with social media, dude. A hundred percent. And it's such an important one in today. What about I don't, I don't want to be the dad that is, I don't want to be that dad, right? I don't want to be the overbearing.

SPEAKER_00

The overbearing, protective dad, blah, blah, blah.

SPEAKER_01

I don't want to get on her bad side and make it awkward for her.

SPEAKER_00

That's so dangerous. That is such a dangerous belief to adopt because the the internet nowadays is so fucking dangerous. It's so dangerous. Roblox for kids, it's run by it's run by people who do not have the best interest for your children. You know, so like we like it's so dangerous out there to have that belief. Anyways, I don't mean to cut you off.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, 100%. No, I I don't even know what that is. It's a game or something.

SPEAKER_00

It's a game. The kids are getting on, and you know, there's there's there's there's predators out there that are luring these kids in these in these chat rooms and getting them to commit suicide, getting them to run away from home, and you know, kids are going missing. Like, dude, it's it's not good. Bro, social media is scary just because of the influence.

SPEAKER_01

And you and I both know that like influence in your first 20 years of life are like it's it's hyper hyper sensitive. Yeah, your brains are hyper hyper sensitive.

SPEAKER_00

You're aware of it because you're figuring out who you are and what what you like, all your identities are being formed. I I want to be a part of something. So like you're just you're malleable. You're flex you're a piece of clay.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, dude. Yeah, and you're kind of your subject. You know, social media is opening up the floodgates of information and uh beliefs that that's could be incredible and could be uh detrimental. Yeah. Like, you know, super, super detrimental. So that's one external story. Let's talk about external story number two, the boyfriend story, right? I'm sure he's a nice boy. I don't we don't have daughters that are at the age that we have to worry about this, but I know there's men listening who do.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Right? How many times have you be honest, Dad? How many times have you heard yourself in your head think, maybe I should step in and have a conversation, or maybe I should meet this boy and you make up an excuse. I'm shit, I gotta work, or I'm too busy, or you know, I don't want to be that overbearing, Dad.

SPEAKER_00

Like I'm sure she's got it. Okay, you guys are like, I checked him out of the okay. You guys are doing okay, right? Yeah, yeah. It's dude, I mean it it's and it goes both ways. There's the super protective dad where the daughter likes, like, I have to hide it from my dad, and that's just as dangerous as I'm sure he's just a nice boy, I'm gonna let my daughter do whatever.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, we're not to that's a good, that's an important distinction. We're not talking about being a hyper aggressive, like over the top protective dad. But having like, listen, when it comes to boys, here's my philosophy. If you're a dad who's willing to show up and be present and shake the hand of the boy and have a conversation, even though it's awkward, and force eye contact, that boy's gonna get it. Yeah, you don't have to show him a gun, you don't have to fucking threaten him, you don't have to come out with a baseball bat. That's dumb as fuck. Don't do that. All you need to do is be imposing as a father. That's it. You don't have to be verbally aggressive or anything like that, but you need to shake his hand firm, you need to look him in the eye, and you need to have a very serious, you know, connection with him and let him know without saying the words, you will let him know that I'm present, I'm here, I'm involved in this.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. And and something will change. He'll he'll he'll come hopefully conform. If not, then you know, might have to take some procedure procedures. But then we got bats for you. Yeah, then we got bats and kids. Uh but but just a caveat to that, um, you know, I read an article about a prolific child predator um who did horrific things that we can't discuss on this podcast. And and one of his deterrents was when asked, like, hey, how do you pick your how do you pick your, you know, your victim? And he says, I I I stay away from the I stay my victims, I stay away from the ones who have presence, uh, present fathers.

SPEAKER_01

Dads who look like a threat. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

I remember seeing that. Dads who look like a threat, blah, blah, blah. The same thing goes with boyfriends, dude. Like, your presence is felt and make it felt, but don't be overbearing. Yeah. You know?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, you gotta, you gotta, you have to show some respect for your daughter in this as well. When Bedros was sharing the story, you know, he would make it an intention that uh when his when his daughter was going to meet up with some friends and there were some gonna be some boys there, she would always make it a point to go and say, Oh, I wanna, I want to meet this boy. And so, you know, obviously he mentioned there was there was some pushback for sure. His daughter wasn't like super excited.

SPEAKER_00

She's not gonna be jumping up for joy, dude, but she was gonna respect you. But she respected it, right?

SPEAKER_01

And he even said, you know, he would get in the circle, introduce himself, talk, you know, you guys are gonna, what are you guys gonna do? You guys should have a great time. I'm excited for y'all to hang out. And then he would he would shake the boy's hands, right?

SPEAKER_00

And he said, These girls are your responsibility now. As men, you're responsible for these girls' safeties, right? And they're just like, yeah, yeah. Exactly. That's setting the standard, right there.

SPEAKER_01

That's setting the standard, and it's also having some accountability without saying, I'm gonna beat your ass right if my daughter gets hurt, right? You don't have to go there, but you can have that same effect.

SPEAKER_00

But most importantly, like you're influencing these kids. You're you're putting a seed, you're planting a seed in this little boy's brain. And and and and now and you're saying exactly, and said, okay, and then because I know for me as a young man, I would, I would, I would take that to heart. I'd be like, Yep, I'm the protector now. Cool. But you're pre-framing, you're putting that in that position. I I love it. There's so many good things to that. But absolutely, really honestly. So, whether the story she's manipulating me, whether you know you're saying, I'm sure it's fine, all that good stuff, they all serve the same purpose. They're not truths, man. They're just shields, they're filters to make you feel comfortable, right? They're they're to protect us from discomfort, right? Absolutely. So let's move on. Let's talk about some fears underneath all these stories.

SPEAKER_01

This is where it gets really, really good. And so we're gonna run through this because we got to go a couple layers deeper because it's not just about her behavior, it's really about our fear as fathers, right? Because that spins the story, and then the story dictates our results or our actions, I guess I should say. So let's talk about these stories real quick. She's manipulating me. There is a very good chance that this is showing up as a fear of I don't know how to handle her emotions, and that makes me feel powerless. Powerless. Powerless, right? I have a lack of control. And what do most of us do when we feel out of control? We start to panic. Yeah, we want to gain control, and then we do, we start acting in ways that that are not serving us or overbearing, increasing our voice, increasing our aggression in the way we treat, you know, emotionally, verbally, physically, did it can manifest in a ton of different ways. But I can tell you when I feel out of control, I'm in a I'm in a manic state. I'm in like a, I'm in a, I'm in a, you know, I'm in a chaotic internal chaos. Same time. And dude, that shows up for my little girls, man. They they start to they start to fire at a different frequency. And it's not a positive one. It's not positive. And I see how my I see how my energy sets the tone for my little girls. And like a a a situation that comes up for me is like we now live an hour away from school. And so on the days I have to take him to school, it can be a mad dash, especially if dad is like rushing the whole time and like I'm hungry and I didn't wake up on time. So now I'm kind of like behind the eatball. Yeah. And I feel that pressure and I feel that chaos and being out of control. And I'm rushing the girls and I'm short and snappy.

SPEAKER_00

And then before I know it, this, you know, all the like the girls are pissed too. And then their behavior comes out, and then you're like, what the fuck? These uh like you're you know, it's like, dude, you are you were at the center of that. You caused that storm.

SPEAKER_01

It's extreme ownership, dude. We have to look in the mirror, dads. We have to look in the mirror. Like this, the stories that we tell ourselves about our daughters come from a place within us first. Yeah. That's where they that's where they manifest. What about the story? She needs, she's needy, she's entitled.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, that's a good one. So that one's that one's a fear of first of all, fear, fear dictates and operates all of our behavior inside of parenting. Like all of pretty much our parenting today in this culture is fear-based parenting, right? Cave caveman brain. Caveman brain. It's our it's our reptilian brain, right? It all of it stems from that. And we're not gonna get too deep into that, but this one specifically, the the needy and entitled one, is that she's not gonna be able to handle the world without me. Right? I'm creating a weak child. I need her to be strong, I need her to be resilient, I need her to be resourceful. That's that's the fear under there, right? That's the beliefs, the belief set that causes that label to surface.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Make sense? Absolutely. Yeah, and this is this is shared. This is one that's very close to me as well. Um, what about the story of I'm sure she's fine on social media? Yeah, that one's conflict.

SPEAKER_00

Uh, I don't want to be the bad conflict avoidance. Conflict avoidance. That's very much a fond cycle. That's a uh that's a people pleasing. I don't want to, that's like the peacekeeper. That's the uh permissive style of parenting that we cover. That's the I don't want to step on any toes, so I'm gonna kind of let her do just to just to keep the peace and to and to maintain the relationship at the detriment of your daughter putting yourself in potentially violent or deadly situations. Make sense. Which that's an extreme, you know, deadly and violent.

SPEAKER_01

That's potentially I mean it could be, it can manifest that way depending on how out of touch you are. But what about uh he seems like a nice boy? This kind of coincides with the same one, right?

SPEAKER_00

Same one, dismissive. You're dismissive, you're dismissing. And maybe he does seem like a nice boy, and maybe you are saying that, but maybe maybe it could be helpful to take it a step further.

SPEAKER_01

But you gotta audit it. Yeah, you have to audit it.

SPEAKER_00

He seems like a nice boy, yeah. He is he is great. And then I was a nice boy too to most parents.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, but I also but I was not, yeah. I mean, not in all situations, dude. Boys are boys, you know, we make mistakes. But we're girl dads now, dude. Yeah, yeah. But like let's just look at the underlying fear, right? He seems like a nice boy. This could easily be, you know, a fear of having having hard conversations with a teenage boy being awkward. Awkward, right?

SPEAKER_00

The situation with not being confrontational with Pedros, right?

SPEAKER_01

He even said like it was super awkward. Chloe wasn't exactly thrilled about it. However, um, it needed, it needed to be done.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, and he set the expectation beforehand with Chloe so it wasn't out of the blue. Like Chloe knew, which is also very important. Always talk to your daughter first and let her know what you're gonna do. Don't ever do shit that's bringing things around because that transition is gonna be pretty fucking messy and she's gonna be pissed.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, she wants you want to include her in the why so she has somewhat of an understanding. The last thing I wanted to tarp on here with the with the with the boys is uh this fear is really rooted in a place that I think is gonna hit a lot of fathers in the chest because I know that it did me. And and it just just how powerful it is. The fear can be rooted in in a a thought of I'd rather risk my daughter's safety than my own discomfort. Ooh, that's actually a good one. Because that's truly where it comes from. Right. You know, we might we're not going into the situation saying, nope, I'd rather be comfortable and you know, daughter, you're like that's not looking, that's not on like the forethought of your brain. That's not the thought. But there's a trade-off. But that's the underlying, that is the underlying processing that your subconscious mind is doing. It's it's it's analyzing, okay, if I go in this situation, it's gonna be highly discomfortful, it's gonna be highly uncomfortable. Um, if I don't go in this situation, my daughter could potentially be at risk. And we know which one, if you're choosing avoiding that conversation, you have now made an unconscious decision.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, there's on and that's the unconscious cycles we're talking about, guys. All this shit is connected, bro. All of it. Like, listen, pay attention to our episodes.

SPEAKER_01

Yep.

SPEAKER_00

Watch them all because they're all connected. Yep. So let's talk about story and signal, dude.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, let's talk about that. So um, you want to talk about the reframe?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, so her, so reframing. So reframing is such a powerful tool. Again, you know, it sounds so sterile. It sounds like black and white, like, oh, you just need to reframe. Like, but it it's it's most people don't know what a reframe is. It's simple, right? But it's not easy. Reframing is just taking in a an event happens, it's filtered through your belief systems, right? Your current belief systems. And fears. In fears, right? Fears b fears stem from belief systems, right? Fear is a fear is a is a symptom of a belief. So it has a belief, then you interpret it. You interpret that, that the the the situation that's happening, right? And then you apply meaning to it. And that's when fear happens, right? So there's pauses in between all of these, right? It may seem it may seem automatic, unconscious, but I promise you, there's there's space between each one of these, right? That gives us the ability. And and what we do in first zero is we mast we get a master of these spaces, right? These very milliseconds, right? But it comes with self-awareness. Now, reframe is when you take in a a certain uh event, if it gets filtered through your beliefs, you create an interpretation, that fear hits you, and then you say, Okay, but what if this, right?

SPEAKER_01

The fear is the trigger or the signal, by the way.

SPEAKER_00

The fear is the signal, exactly. The fear is the signal, that's the symptom. Now you take that interpretation and then you just reframe it to something positive. My daughter's doing this, therefore X. Well, what if what if she's doing it to, you know, I don't have a try and spin it to a to a positive of her behavior, her negative quote unquote behavior, try and spin it to a positive result, right?

SPEAKER_01

Well, here's here here's some good here's some good context that I was thinking. This will probably help. Like thinking of your daughter's behavior not as a problem to be solved, right, but as a signal to be decoded with her. Yeah, it's the bench need. Exactly. It's exactly like your example with you sitting on the bench.

SPEAKER_00

So a reframe would probably be like, hey, she's doing this thing. I'm I I wanna I want to react this way, but hey, what if what if there's a need under there? What is the unmet need? What does she actually really need? We call that root to bloom. Uh, you know, there's roots on a flower, there's roots, and then there's a bloom, which is the flower. The the flower, the bloom, that's that's that's the behavior. That's the symptom. That's her actually acting. Down in the roots, there's unmet needs. So reframing yourself to saying, okay, there's an unmet need. Let's let's try and meet the unmet need here, right? That's a that's a powerful reframe that I use. I used last night, dude. I had one of the worst hours with Hillary and Tatum last night. Holy shit, what a roller coaster, dude. And the whole time I was reframing. I was a reframe fucking Jedi, dude. Reframing constantly, dude. And and to avoid blow up, to avoid blow up, dude. Oh my God. Hillary and I, and we're we're we're getting really good at this, but woo, like it was a it was a ride. And then, you know, but I knew it was at the end of the day. She's been sleeping like shit lately. Her stomach's not really feeling well. So then, you know, this no, no, this I'm talking about Tatum. So this is the route. This is me. I'm I'm actually walking you through an exercise. This is the this is the route. This is me walking through the exercise. She's tired, you know, she's been having stomach problems. I don't know, her, you know, her poops have been weird, she hasn't been sleeping well. Um, all these things, you know, she's tired, it's at the end of the day. So these are all the things I'm telling myself, like, hey, she's having a hard time. She's not giving me a hard time, right? Because she's she dropped her plate of food on the floor and went fucking ape shit. And then Cora, our dog, came and started eating it, and then and then it just went nuclear.

SPEAKER_02

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And it was like that for like fucking an hour, dude. And then we're like, Hillary is like, okay, dude, like, we need to get this girl a bath, we need to get her in bed. And all while she's fucking emergency protocols, she's going hot, she's going cold, she's laughing, she's crying, she's laughing, she's screaming, we're having fun, we're screaming. Like, you and I couldn't do anything right as a father. No, you know, like everyone's gonna be a little bit more. And the more you try to solve it, the more exactly. So I'm like, let's just keep pushing this through. And and and I'm constantly reframing, master the reframe. Whereas like three years ago, bro, dude, I would have fucking been screaming, I would have been throwing shit. I probably would have punched a hole in the wall, I would have thrown her in her ass in bed without a shower and food and said, fucking go to sleep. That's how I believe that would have been.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, that's that's powerful. That's a great segue into our into one of our upcoming episodes. So let's uh let's start to land the plane here. Yeah.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Let's do a hot take. Yeah. Let's do it. Cool, man. So hot take for those of you who do not know. If you're new to the channel, what I do is I read a read out a quote that has hopefully some sort of relativity to the the the the episode. Sometimes not always not. Rich doesn't know the no the quote that I'm gonna be giving him, so he's got to give a hot take in his own words. Cool. Okay, I think I have it here somewhere. Okay, so this one's cool. And this one's from my boy Victor Frankel. Um wrote an amazing book. He he he spent time in Auschwitz. Um and don't want to get too deep into it, but this is this is actually a very relevant quote to this. So, and I just kind of alluded to it in the spaces in between our reactions. But between stimulus and response, there is a space. And in that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, it's um the first place that my mind goes on this is like I think for us girl dads listening, I think that space is where this first hero concept lives. It's where the standard needs to be raised. And it and it's about awareness of just that space being in our control. It's an it's taking an extreme ownership. First, there's an audit that has to take place. There's an awakening that takes place, which hopefully most of you men and fathers listening, you've you've you're in the awakening state or maybe even beyond it, but and you're understanding, man, this this perfectly describes that space that I know that it is that I'm aware of now. How do I do it? Right. And so that's where my mind immediately goes. And and I agree, dude, if I look at every growth opportunity in my life, every challenge that I've been that I've been fortunate enough to be uh given and an opportunity to overcome, and specifically as it relates to daughters and being a girl dad, dude, it is a it is a it is a minefield of challenges and they're incredible, they're all gifts. If you're willing to find the space. Yeah. If you're willing to find the space and take and you're bold enough to take extreme ownership that you dictate what happens in that space. You don't control the stimulus, but you control that piece, and then what you do in that piece dictates the results afterwards. And so that's where the first hero ideology plugs in. Yep.

SPEAKER_00

I love it, dude. And and to harp on that, that's the space, the activating event, the trigger you can't control. You know, but there's a lot of different steps and spaces in between that filter down to how you respond to that triggering activating event. There's so many spaces, and that's where we live. That's where the first hero lives inside of those spaces, making those tiny choices. Yep, right. The big small hinges swing big doors. Those small, those small changes of living and making those choices inside of those spaces is exactly where we live as a first hero. That's the exact definition, Rich. That's fucking beautiful. You nailed it. Nailed it. Well, cool, man. So if this episode hits you, if this, if this any of this stuff rang true, if you're like, dude, holy shit, my mind is blown. This podcast is for you. You're a cycle breaker. You're you're on your way to designing. Uh, some of you are drifting. I know all most of us are drifting uh in some area, facet of life, but this is for you. You're on your way to being a designer of your life and a designer uh of the relationship with your daughter. So uh we have one request from you. We have a girl dad quiz. It's a girl dad type quiz. Go take it. It takes five minutes. Really, what we're gonna do, but what it does is it finds your compatibility with your daughter. Uh, it has your your parent, your your girl dad type, your your blind spots, your weaknesses, and it gives you some really cool free stuff to help you with that to create an irreversible and unbreakable bond with your daughter. So it takes five minutes. It's somewhere in one of these links below on our show notes somewhere. Yeah, it's somewhere around here. So um, yeah. So remember distraction is the enemy, breaking the cycle is your duty, and legacy is the only thing you leave behind. And remember, you are just one decision away from becoming the hero your daughter deserves.