The Real Dad Podcast
Each week, these four fathers cover a wide range of "Dad" related topics, from the joys of watching your child grow up to the challenges of balancing work and family life. With their unique blend of humor and authenticity, Dave, Joey, Brian, and Mark provide a refreshing perspective on what it means to be a dad in today's world.
Tune in for the laughs, stay for the heartfelt conversations about the struggles and triumphs of parenting. Whether you're a seasoned dad or a soon-to-be father, "The Real Dad Podcast" is the perfect place to connect with other dads and get the support you need.
Join us on this journey of fatherhood, and subscribe to "The Real Dad Podcast" today!
The Real Dad Podcast
The Echo of Our Inner Voice: How Parents Shape Children's Self-Talk
normally when I'm checking out at my house it's on my phone. Yeah, I don't feel rejuvenated when I check back in again yeah, it's like it just feels like I wasted time and missed time. The screen that does work for me is like on a saturday turning on a jays game right like watching the jays game with the kids.
Speaker 3:That's restful for me and I wonder if part of that is the interaction. Some same way, like if I can throw a sport on the tv. I wonder if that is the interaction, because I'm the same way, like if I can throw a sport on the TV. I wonder if it is the interaction piece. You're more present. Exactly, I'm more present, I'm able to interact, like when kids want to start wrestling, I can still be wrestling and the game can still be on.
Speaker 3:Yeah, when, especially if I'm on my phone specifically playing a game or watching something specifically.
Speaker 4:I'm like no, no, you're like I just want to hear what this person's saying, and then you like try to swipe back to it to start it back over again, and then it like refreshes and you've lost it, and you're like it's into the abyss this was the piece of personal advice that I was gonna get to make me a better father and you just f***ed it up, you little s***. If you got some time to relax your mind.
Speaker 1:Come have breakfast with the real dad podcast welcome to the real dad podcast.
Speaker 4:Hi, I'm dave and I can fold my tongue into like a three-leaf clover oh, you can do the wavy thing, you and I can't do that.
Speaker 1:No chance, no chance. Can I do that?
Speaker 3:uh, I am, I'm joey. Do we say joey fletcher? What did? What did? I thought that I did, kidding myself.
Speaker 1:No, you said, I'm dave but all of a sudden, where did you get a list?
Speaker 3:I forgot how to talk.
Speaker 4:I feel like mark last week chirped me for not saying my last name but now I'm like we definitely never say our last name, I think I. I just said Dave didn't.
Speaker 1:I yeah, I think you're good. I just panicked over here. Once or twice we've only said our last name, yeah for sure.
Speaker 3:Anyways, I'm Joey and my top front teeth are fake. They're a bridge, so if you think I have a good smile, it's made by dentists. I did not know that Front three teeth that knocked out with a level. I'll never look at you the same, or then re-smashed out with a slow pitch softball About a year later.
Speaker 1:This is why your wife doesn't want you playing baseball. You got it. I'm Brian. We're missing Mark. I'm Brian. My fun fact is I don't really like talking about this, but it's the only thing I can think of. I used to work at Aberercrombie and fitch like at night folding clothes yeah and I was recruited by a a model like a, a model recruit modeling agency, yeah, and I went and had like professional, like modeling photos oh, now we're to end up posting these for the Patreons.
Speaker 1:I'm pretty sure it was just a money grab, though I got taken advantage of. No, I just couldn't do it. I went to one or two auditions and it was just embarrassing for me really.
Speaker 2:I just like I didn't have it in me.
Speaker 1:I cannot take myself this seriously oh man, what could have been.
Speaker 4:Could you imagine brian's modeling career? What if it?
Speaker 2:had taken off no, no way.
Speaker 1:Um, but I think I have the pictures somewhere okay, and I have to track them down I'm really liking this because we're legit learning things about each other it's part of the challenge you have to think of something that maybe people don't even know about you yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4:So do you have dental trauma from all of this like front teeth action?
Speaker 3:I do.
Speaker 4:You said the first one was the level. That was when our friend john abraham dropped the level on your face.
Speaker 3:Well, he didn't drop it, he was just drilling at a post. But it was what he was doing, because then the deck was on a second story level. So then I went over underneath the deck to look up to see him come through the other side and could not have been better timed, with me looking up and the level coming down and hit me directly in the tooth didn't cut my lip, it only hit my tooth. A four foot level. It was impressive.
Speaker 1:I don't even know how that happens you can't see my face, but I am shocked. Yeah, it's one in a million.
Speaker 3:That's awful, one in a million moment anyway, so, yeah, I had that repair done and then, about a year later, playing slow pitch, one of our buddies, notorious for having to play first base because he could not throw the ball very well, would still warm up with the rest of us in a line throwing the ball back and forth. Uh, but bad enough that he can't hit his guy on the other side apparently. So I got hit with the joey heads up, which obviously everybody looks when somebody says joey heads up, and it just shattered the bridge that I had in there initially good times, uh. So, yeah, there was definitely a little bit of dental trouble.
Speaker 1:Now, does Joey get pissed off when that happens? Nah, Joey laughs about it. He goes kind of quiet at first.
Speaker 3:Yep, okay, just kind of like.
Speaker 4:It's the quiet assessment of like. Okay, what's going on Am?
Speaker 2:I okay, am I safe?
Speaker 4:Are we going to get through this? And then he probably goes into the fuck. Meg's going to be so pissed about this Yep and that and that's what's for some, like worrying on, like not mad at the person, just mad that he knows he's in trouble.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, mag wasn't super stoked about that and I didn't find out until after the fact that I could have had that one covered by the slow pitch league's insurance oh, wow but he didn't decide to tell me that until after the fact, and we knew the guy fairly well who ran the league.
Speaker 3:I was like you piece of shit, but anyway. So, yeah, a little bit of dental trauma in there for sure. Yeah, the one part of the process was wildly uncomfortable. The freezing ran out. I told him that the reusing ran out and he's like, yeah, I'm almost done and just finished. It was only like two more minutes, but still, last two minutes with no freezing wasn't, wasn't ideal but I'm slowly breaking it down the other way.
Speaker 3:So I'm I'm now back at the dentist for probably the first time since then, getting more work done and you're okay this time, like you're, yeah, walk through it, all right yeah, I was able to get it. The first like appointment was a little tough going in like just nerves, anxiousness, but now that I've been to a few now I'm good to go my youngest abby.
Speaker 4:Yep, she just lost another tooth yesterday. She's lost a lot of teeth. They have all just dropped out at once so like she had gone like the longest, like she watched all of like classmates losing teeth, like her cousins losing teeth, people younger than her losing teeth, and she just still had all of her baby teeth until like this month they have just been falling out, one after another, mass evacuation the tooth fairy is almost out of their budget. This is getting out of control.
Speaker 4:I swear it's been like eight teeth, like it's been one a week almost, like just dropping like flies. So yeah, the other night she still had this little tiny baby tooth just hanging on and you could see the adult tooth like coming down behind him. It was like how is that? Like there's just persistent, like those roots are strong but she kept. She was just playing with it, fiddling around, and then it finally popped out wow. So yeah, she's just. She looks like a hockey player.
Speaker 1:Brian saw her the other day when he came by just missing a grill she loves it.
Speaker 3:That would be a really funny thing to do to your kid and I wonder what the reaction would be if they lost a bunch of teeth that eventually you put a note under to be like you've hit your quota for two very money we'll see you in quarter two would not go over.
Speaker 3:Well, yeah, those are. Dental is one of those things that, like I'm trying to do better with my kids, but now, realizing how difficult it is to maintain and get really good habits right, it's like my kids brush their teeth twice a day, which I think is huge for me, because I never did that um, but the the morning brush is them like we just send them up to brush. So whether or not their teeth actually get brushed, that's yet to be seen. I mean, we smell their breath when they come down, but they can fudge that in a million different ways.
Speaker 3:And then even like the nighttime brush, more often than not, especially Murph, like she brushes it herself and we trust her to be able to do that. But now talking to dentists, they're like, no like. As parents, you need to be brushing your kids' teeth, they suggest, until they're 10.
Speaker 4:But they like, but realistically we know that a lot of parents aren't going to do that. So like if you can get till they're like seven or eight, I'm like well, murph's seven or eight, but not doing that anymore.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know I'm trying to think of leo's, do you? That's good? Yeah, just well, he fights me on it sometimes but, I usually end up saying like I need to just go over them yeah and make sure you did a thorough job like I'm not trusting you guys to do this properly.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but then even within that, like there's, they should be flossing every single night as well and doing mouthwash where it's like no, like we did mouthwash for a bit and then got away with it, we got the little like uh, whatever you want to call them flossers individual disposable flossers they use those for probably a week and then they get away from it and we don't push for it, or it's like man like I really wanted to be better about this, to get like a good oral hygiene habit into them dropping the ball a little bit
Speaker 4:I guess oral hygiene is very important it is yeah, but I guess it's like because your kids aren't okay maybe if you're doing it during the day, but it's something that you're doing in your bathroom that your kids aren't typically seeing, you do yes, or it's your own habit that you're doing outside of it, where with the kid, you're the one that's having to instigate it. And if you're exhausted and you're tired and you're burnt out, then it's like teeth just feel like they fall under the radar.
Speaker 1:It's like whatever, just go to sleep.
Speaker 3:Oh, we have nights like that for sure, yeah they just end up chewing on their toothbrush, whatever, well, that's like, and it comes down to too like, if it's, I'm sure well, I shouldn't speak for all dentists, but I'm sure a lot of dentist kids do have those habits because the dentist would have them, or it's like, I don't have those. I don't floss I definitely should and like we bought in all the things like we have water picks that we bought, that we could do instead of flossing, that are supposed to do a really good job of cleaning out your teeth like meg and I have bought all of the things electric toothbrushes of every kind right, I still just have a bamboo friggin toothbrush that's probably too old and I shouldn't be using anymore and I brush with that twice a day where it's like I still have I have shitty habits, so I can't expect to create those habits for my kids unless I'm willing to do them for myself.
Speaker 3:Right to Right To your point, David. Like they don't get to see us and what we do before bed when it comes to that stuff, but like even if they did, it wouldn't be the example that I want to set for them.
Speaker 1:Do better yeah.
Speaker 4:We get to talk about dentists cause Mark's not here. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm just like I'm missing a dentist. Rant by Mark right now.
Speaker 3:I hope he listens to this back and he's just itching. I'm going to torn them apart. Let's talk about realtors next.
Speaker 4:So Mark isn't with us today because he is keeping the homestead going. They have been without power for quite a while now. The big ice storm hit them harder than some different areas and he's been without power, but he's got some backup generators that he is so happy about we are definitely you are going to hear a plug. Uh.
Speaker 4:Unpaid ad for that generator when mark comes back um because it's been keeping his house and his basement dry and he's, uh, keeping the family going. So we miss you, buddy, yeah, um, and we hope you get power back soon, I guess big.
Speaker 3:Uh well, I may as well hit this early big ice storm up near the coerthas oh yes, where the? Coerther group of home hardwares are who podcast. Who sponsored this podcast and we are so very thankful for both of our sponsors. But the coerther group of home hardwares cobaconk bridge north lakefield, lakefield, lind and.
Speaker 3:Millbrook. I would have remembered Millbrook, but I wasn't remembering the L's. Anyway, they got everything you need for your next disaster, if an ice storm comes through. Maybe you got tree branches down right now. Head over to your local core of the group Home Hardware. Grab yourself a battery chainsaw. Clean up the work yourself.
Speaker 4:Well, a bunch of the stores were down. Even so, the stores were down. Even so, the stores were without power. I saw a post that they posted today saying that they're working really hard to get the stores back up and running and be able to serve people as best they can and stuff. But it hit the north hard, so another reason to not move up there, guys.
Speaker 1:But if you are up there, you got some good home hardware to help you out, I guess, I wonder how the regal ideas.
Speaker 4:Uh, I was up during the. I was just gonna say jeff ryan, uh, one of our patreon members sent me some pictures and a video of his place he lives up in the haliburton area. Yeah, and I think he just sends me stuff as plugs to hope to be mentioned on an episode and it's working, jeff.
Speaker 4:It's working, so keep them coming, keep them coming but he sent me a picture of his railing that was like busted up and fallen off on the ground. A tree came right down and hit the railing and he said I wonder if Regal Ideas would have survived this.
Speaker 2:Because he doesn't have it. He just had a cheaper railing.
Speaker 4:I'm like, well, we'll have to replace it with Regal and see Yep yep yep but yeah, he said it looked like a tornado, went through like trees down everywhere like trees down everywhere.
Speaker 3:Craziness, yeah. Like gross, yeah, I don't like that. No, but thank you. Regal ideas for sponsoring the podcast and for making a railing that may or may not stand up to trees falling on top of it. We haven't tested it so we can't tell you actually one of our clients did remember sam fusey?
Speaker 4:oh yes, I do. We did an episode of disaster decks with him back in the day. He built a cottage up north, asked for some regal ideas railing. We hooked him up with some good pricing and he did, and they had a tree fall down during I think it was the other year the other storm that came through and it hit his railing and it did not break it.
Speaker 4:It dented it, of course, did some damage, but it did not snap, damage it at all, huh, and it had glass infill and the glass didn't even shatter.
Speaker 1:That is yeah, huh yeah, way to go regal there you go, it's tough stuff firsthand knowledge.
Speaker 3:There's your review. That's why it's the toughest and best exterior aluminum component railing on the market so if you're in the market for one this year. There's no other place to go railing and there's no other store than course group home you shut your butt, I made that up.
Speaker 1:You shut your butt, I made that up.
Speaker 3:That was a random news story I saw. That was wild. Somebody had a motorcycle. They died, but they fell into a sinkhole. They were just driving in their motorcycles, whoop.
Speaker 1:Sinkholes are scary man, that's a tough way to go.
Speaker 3:Sinkholes are scary. Yeah, they're the modern day's quicksands. We thought we'd have more quicksand in our lives. We won't, but we have sinkholes.
Speaker 4:Speaking of scary Yep, I kicked my son last night. Okay, super cool On purpose, no. Okay, good to clarify, so sleeping this is probably two o'clock in the morning. Okay, he came into my room and woke me up and I woke up and I just saw a silhouette. Yeah, and he, I just saw a silhouette. Yeah, and he's much taller now, so my first instinct was like, as my eyes are blurring and stuff and I just see a silhouette of a person, I just kicked my foot so it was on purpose he's like whoa and like jumped back and then like my eyes focused in and I can see him.
Speaker 4:I'm so sorry, buddy, don't come at me like that. But the kids know they have to go to mom's side. You can't wake me up in the middle of the night like that. I am so like I've learned because I almost punched my daughter once when she did it. So now she comes in and she just sends her like far away and she's like dad, dad.
Speaker 1:And like I wake up and she's like it's just me, it's just me, it's just me Waving a white flag.
Speaker 3:Okay, come here honey, come here, honey, I come in peace. So you're sleeping in fight or flight. I am sleeping in fight or flight.
Speaker 4:Because there's been times too we used to have in the kids bathroom above, like the tub, there would be this like suction cupped frog, I think it was. That was to the wall and you'd fill it with the bath toys and it would always in the middle of the night and it is the loudest like because like it's a hollow tub, right like yeah and you're not expecting that noise, so it just wakes you up, and I remember being up and out of bed in like seconds and like where are we going?
Speaker 2:what are we doing? Where's my?
Speaker 4:it's interesting to know that. That's my reaction, though. Yeah, is that like it's to go right into that mode? Is it protective dad mode? Is that what?
Speaker 1:I think so. That's what I would like to say here I think it's protective mode.
Speaker 4:Okay, yeah, my kids know I've told them that like because they're like what would you do if somebody broke into the house? I'm like I would unleash a strength that I didn't know was possible do you?
Speaker 1:want to know what this thing called adrenaline is yeah, well, let me tell you daddy would basically turn into the hawk I would spear them, that's right, yeah, the moral switch gets turned off in that moment, you guys, run through, oh, absolutely, scenarios you got to. Like what you would do. I know where all the weapons are.
Speaker 4:What you could use as a weapon.
Speaker 3:One of my old bats is by my bed, just for that reason. Just gotta have it.
Speaker 4:I don't know if that's something women are thinking about or the other partner in a relationship. Do you think there's always one person that's more protective? Because I remember when our kids were sleeping, I would sleep right through the night and my wife would hear all the little noises and calls from them. Yeah, and like the cries and the squeaks and the whatever, like every little noise would get them going yeah.
Speaker 2:I've talked to Meg about it.
Speaker 4:That is her plan is wake me up and go deal with that but. I wonder if, like I don't know, know whatever it is the person who knows things about our history and how we've evolved as people? Okay, but uh, a historian story no, there's like the one where, anyway, whatever, okay, there's a big word for it, okay. But uh, if, like instinctually, we are wired that way, right, women are wired like caregiving way, and then us in like that fight or fight, response mode or not I think probably something yeah, there'll be something to it, yeah speaking of kind of in the same territory of oh to be or shit about, or was that in a group?
Speaker 3:sorry, I'm all over the place right now, uh, but mark chirping you and howie for the whole course, thing but then how he's response I thought was really legit.
Speaker 3:Like reading through that I'm like that is great and like good information for people to have, because it made me go home because we had one of our um fire alarms go off randomly in the middle of the night like it was a issue with it.
Speaker 3:I've heard that apparently, like uh, spiders, if they can get into them, then that can set them off and like trip something. So anyways, I had disconnected it, um, because it was a plug-in, and I just put it in our linen closet there but I had not put it back in. So then, after reading that now we had bought a battery one and we put it in close by there but we still should have had that one up and running this whole time. But I went in and put it up because of Howie's message and I'm like no, that is important, like I wouldn't want to have something like that be the reason why we didn't wake up in this type of scenario especially through the winter time, when it's like we have several heaters that we set up upstairs where it's like those are kind of the high risk for something like that to happen.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that you read that. All I saw was yada, yada, yada it's like hair how he goes again.
Speaker 4:I love that he took the time to reply. So how, he is mark's neighbor and mark was chirping him about him promoting his kids taking the babysitter course and how great it is. Yeah, he definitely chimed in. In. Was that the spotify? Yeah, the.
Speaker 1:Spotify comments.
Speaker 4:Amazing. I love that. I appreciate your comment.
Speaker 1:I love that comment.
Speaker 4:So Brian sent me a few Instagram messages a little while ago and I think we need to break this down with Brian. I was a little worried about Brian after these messages Just come on, I was a little worried just about how much he cared about himself, how he thought of himself, because I think very highly of you, brian. Thanks, buddy.
Speaker 4:I think you're a very generous, kind, caring person, but sometimes I don't think that you think that of yourself. But anyways, let's play a couple clips and then break it down. This first one is from Zoe Blinkski. But anyways, let's play a couple clips and then break it down. This first one is from Zoe Blinkski and somebody else, I don't know. Here it goes.
Speaker 3:We'll give them credit.
Speaker 4:I mean one of them credit.
Speaker 2:Your children will not treat themselves the way you treat them.
Speaker 4:Dr Merth, I'm back.
Speaker 2:Your children will treat themselves the way you treat yourself. That's it. That's the clip. Your children will not treat themselves the way you treat them. Your children will treat themselves the way you treat yourself and you said that shook you.
Speaker 1:Well, you said you were ready to hear that just well, it's just like the uh, just the weight of responsibility, just like really hits you yeah. Just like the thought of your kids. Well, the fact that your kids are always watching you.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:And so it just feels like a very big responsibility. You have to like take care of yourself.
Speaker 4:Right, and we just started the episode talking about brushing our teeth. Yeah, it's true.
Speaker 3:Well, and that's the thing, right. Like it's easy to see the correlation between the things that you want to create habits with and the things you want to instill in your kids. But you don't necessarily think about the things that are subconsciously getting instilled in your kids, like that how you're treating yourself and like I even think about that with eating habits with my kids.
Speaker 3:Like that how you're treating yourself and like I even think about that with eating habits with my kids. Yeah, where it's like man. They both had great initial eating habits, habits established when they went to daycare because their daycare had a huge variety of a menu. They would eat pretty much anything. And then, as they get out of daycare and start having us make their lunches and only seeing us eat meals, both my kids now have not a very wide palette of things that they will eat yeah, it's like man.
Speaker 3:How did we lose that? Like we had it so that they would eat anything. But it is very much that, like meg and I don't eat a huge variety of things and my amazing wife picks apart her food and like pulls things out of it and like her plate has a bunch of stuff on it, at the end of things, she's pulled out of the meal. I was like now I see both the kids doing that where, like, they take the skin off their chicken nuggets because they don't want certain skin, but some other skin is fine anyway, but yeah, that just goes along with those things.
Speaker 1:Like we don't realize that we're setting the example for for them it's just interesting to think about, like when you break down your everyday life, like what are the things or like the parts of your day that you want to show your kids as like this is how I want you to treat yourself Like, because a lot of the day is just like random, like just stuff that has to get done every day. It's nothing like profound or like right, really life-changing stuff Like it's, but it's like when you think about the things that you want to teach your kids, it's like right, I want to teach them to be like good humans, so like doing things for other people, and like stuff like that, like just kind of grander things, rather than just like the everyday, like monotony.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it's like it just feels like like monotony. Yeah, so it's like it just feels like it feels like a lot of responsibility to like do more right than just your everyday type stuff. But what if your?
Speaker 4:kid grew up to be you right now or do you want them to be more?
Speaker 3:that's a good, interesting question. Do you want them to?
Speaker 1:be more than you or better than you, or mentally, physically, socially I mean, if I listen to other, the way that other people talk about me, then I think I would be happy with the person that they become right. Yeah, yeah, yeah uh, but yeah, I don't know, it's just, it's it just felt like a lot right do, because you, I guess sometimes you're not sure of uh, how, how much of maybe the negative, like the negative things that you think about yourself, how much of that is seen on the surface right?
Speaker 1:yes, so if you do have like negative thought patterns, like how is that coming out in your everyday life? Life and how much are your kids picking up on that and like owning that Right? So it's like it's just, it's big.
Speaker 4:Yeah, and because I think there are a lot of like subconscious thoughts that we have about ourselves that you don't think are visible yeah but how much of them are unconsciously visible, like things that you do, or and it's just how you respond to say yeah, yeah, yeah, oh, that's interesting true yes, how you respond to certain things like what the the amount of patients you have?
Speaker 3:um, it's, yeah, it's a lot well, I think so much of that depends on the person too. As far as the adult in the situation, where are you someone who does think out loud? Yeah, where, like that's a major difference between Meg and I Meg, my wife, in case you didn't know. So me I'm an internalizer. I think through everything pretty much in my head and I don't kind of explain what's going through, where Meg will very much vocalize what she's dealing with and vocalize what she's going through Now. Going through where meg will very much vocalize what she's dealing with and vocalize what she's going through now. I think where that comes into play is that how you treat yourself. So she will have, like, we just had this yesterday where she got back with the kids, set something up and then was like oh man, I'm such an idiot, I was supposed to stop and get this on the way back and then I was gonna stop makes it and I just missed it both. But that's a good example of someone who's beating up themselves.
Speaker 3:Right Out loud, out loud Exactly when like you're putting yourself down, yeah, where like? Thankfully I'm right there in the room with her and I'm able to like, obviously like that.
Speaker 4:That goes both ways, it's not always just her.
Speaker 3:But I'm able to say like nope, it's all good, Like you're not an idiot.
Speaker 1:It's fine, this land, but I think that's a situation where you can have that kind of out loud thinking happen, where now you're giving kids a visual and audible yeah, it goes back to me thinking about like the whole like am I enough? Conversation right as a person, like am I enough and am I doing enough? Because, like I know that that's a common theme in my discussions with Maddie, my wife, she a lot of the time she doesn't feel like she's like living up to her own expectations Right.
Speaker 1:So it's like, yeah, how much of that is your kid picking up on Right and like, is that where I get my feelings of? Is that something that I saw in my parents Like subconsciously Right? I saw in my parents, like subconsciously growing up, that I've kind of picked up as well, because I mean, uh, I, I know like I know some people that are really hard on themselves and my mom's really high on that list. I love you, mom, you're way too hard on yourself.
Speaker 4:Uh, Lori, that's not okay. You're a fantastic lady.
Speaker 1:She is, but yeah, like I can see the correlation there Right. So, yeah, it makes me a little bit worried about the things that my kids pick up on in that respect.
Speaker 4:That's a fun game Because for me, as you're saying that, I'm trying to think of like what are different traits of my parents that I've kind of grabbed onto? Yeah, and I think like there's a positive and a negative one. My dad always he had a harder time learning in school and was dyslexic and it was never really at that time through school system wasn't really there to help him, so he always felt stupid and he carries that around to this day. He doesn't feel like smart enough in a room of people. He doesn't feel like he can do things. He told me a story about I think it was like a history test when he was in school and my grandpa was quizzing him on it and he was answering them all, getting them all right, then goes in and writes the test and I can't remember if he said he failed it or got like 60 on it and his dad was like what happened?
Speaker 4:you knew all these answers and it's like I don't know yeah, but it's just like when, all of a sudden, you have to sit down and read it instead of somebody verbalizing the question to you and that aspect dwelling in him and making him feel dumb, and it's always carried.
Speaker 4:And that's something that I definitely have always felt. Even though I got good marks in school, I've never felt like one of the smart kids. I've always felt very much like I'm behind or I'm trying to catch up or trying to learn. And then my mom is very outgoing, very charismatic. She will just say hi to random people. She'll like be a louder person in the room, and that's something that I saw growing up and have also like taken on myself or it's like I have that characteristic of her. But it is interesting when you look at those aspects of your parent and see how you are mimicking what they're doing. And some of those things aren't necessarily physical or words that they say. It's things that they thought about themselves, yeah, and you think about yourself the same way because you saw them thinking of themselves that way.
Speaker 3:Yeah, man, this is a trippy concept. It's like how, how many parents have that Like? I have that a thousand percent of like the things you don't want to pass on to your kids and the things you're trying to change that are generational. But you think, how am I going to change this in my kid, where it's like I want my kids to have self-confidence? We've talked about that a lot lately yeah, what are the things I?
Speaker 3:can say and do and reinforce it's like. Well, what you have to do is build your own self-confidence and focus on yourself and be the example of that for them.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that is huge, because exactly what you just said, as far as like how I, because I've said that out loud- how can I instill confidence in my kid? How can I help them to see themselves the way that they do? But then how much do I walk around saying like, oh, my hair, oh this oh, that about myself, where I might come across confident in other situations but they might not get to see that.
Speaker 4:They get to see the at-home me where I might complain about things about myself, or I don't feel that confident, yeah. Body images.
Speaker 3:Yeah, leaning into your insecurities, and I know that's one thing that's huge for all of us, including Mark, where it's like all of us with daughters, it's one of the huge things that we want to be able to instill in them. And something that I'll say for myself is something huge that I want for my wife to be able to be better not be better, that's the wrong word but encourage her to focus on that for herself. Where it's like you want to be that example for our daughter, I can I guess I can do better for myself of being a good example of that too, of being a good example of that too. Um, but man, what a mind shift that is between what are the things that I can physically do and say to them to do this, rather than what are the things that I can adjust for myself to better myself as an example for them just yeah, leading by example, it goes back to that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, by example, but yeah, just like it just makes you. At the end of the day, it made me feel like I'm not doing enough.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 4:And that's where, like encouraging Dave would say that you are in the aspect of like, you do a lot that I think your kids do see. Yeah, I hope so, yeah, and how much you care for them and how much you do things for them and like, even like, your meticulousness of things, like the way that you will cook a meal that's a little bit more special than somebody else's.
Speaker 1:I'm just cooking that for Maddie, though, because those kids don't touch that.
Speaker 2:They've never heard that.
Speaker 1:But yes.
Speaker 3:I hear you.
Speaker 4:I think for me, one thing I struggle with with the fitness aspect of things is it's finding the balance, because I think there's a pendulum in both direction One where you don't care about it at all and it's not a part of your life, and the other where it's the only thing that matters and you have to fit that in and you have to become a certain physique or you're too geared towards that. And I find that hard part of dialing into the middle part, where you're still being healthy but you're not overly focused on every little aspect of it. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:It's to become part of your everyday life somehow. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you want to steer away from vanity.
Speaker 3:It's the same with with there's so many different subjects within that, like eating I already brought up right but like being an example of trying new things and switching up your appetite, and stuff like that. Like there's so many little nuanced things, yeah, and there's a lot.
Speaker 4:That develops as a kid too, yeah, where, like in those younger stages, they are just a lot, they're not seeing as much and absorbing as much as well. But as they become teenagers and you're getting into those teenagers, I think, is when you get start to see a little bit more of it kind of come out, or they're starting to notice situations, um, because they've even, like my son understands when my wife is on her period, right, and that like I'm not feeling well today, I need some extra help, like right I feel like crap and right now, like I can't deal with a meltdown, or I can't deal with you guys going through this like, and so he's more sensitive to those moments.
Speaker 4:Or my wife gets migraines, so if she's got a migraine then he's like very much more sensitive to that now than when he was. When he was younger it was like whatever, I'm still wanting to run and climb when, now that he's 12, he's starting to understand those situational times of like, ok, I do need to dial back now, or I do need to help in a different way, which is kind of neat to see start forming.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I would imagine that is the case as our kids get older and get into those teen years, like you do have a lot of an opportunity to be a present parent and to have more teaching moments where you're telling them not necessarily being the example, but telling them these different ways that they can be different or improve themselves or whatever else have you, but it feels like when they're in these younger years that a lot of our kids are in and like your youngest day, where it is more impression based yeah, not necessarily. Like you know, most of the words are in one, in one ear out the right, but it's more impressions of what they're seeing yeah, when they're older, you can.
Speaker 1:It can be more like. I wish I had have done this more yeah like you can explain those types of things like these are the areas that I I think I could have done better as a dad, right, I think that goes a long way. Uh, from a kid's perspective, those types of things yeah, but meanwhile like cooper, my son, we're like five.
Speaker 3:I can't have that conversation with them, right?
Speaker 4:yeah, do you find yourself labeling your kids in the things that they're good at, or not, I wonder. Or if you remember your parents talking about you, did you ever hear your parents talk about you to other parents? I was wondering this about you, joey, because you and your brother are so close in age. Yeah, and your brother, josh, is very academic. Yep, and you are very athletic, and I would have imagined that it was like oh, this is Joey, he's the sporty one. This is.
Speaker 4:Josh, he's the smart one. Did that ever like? Do you remember hearing yourself be described that way?
Speaker 3:I don't remember specific, like a specific moment or specific detail of somebody saying it, but I very much that is what was instilled saying it, but I very much that is what was instilled, whether it was I'm sure it was wildly unintentional. But I would be given praise as well for being athletic and for doing the things that I would do. And your kids are generally going to lean into whatever is they're being praised for, right. So I think for them, for us anyways, growing up that was very much the case, like we were, if you want to call it, like typecasted into those roles where, like, josh was a smart one and I was a sport one, like, and that was very much the way that we went through childhood and teenage years, um, where, yeah, I definitely wish that wasn't the case, because that, I think, lent to me having a much more difficult time through school and through things like that, because I very, I guess, kind of similar to you, dave, where it's? I had that thought in my head all the time that I was behind, that I didn't get it, that I wasn't going to be able to learn it. So then I just didn't lean into academics at all where, like, I just took all the easiest courses through high school and I never looked at post-secondary as an option, like it was. Just, I'm going to be the sports one and I'm going to get into something that doesn't require schooling, because that's who I am. Right, yeah, and like that's. Those are the things that we now I'll say for me that I fear now as a parent, because I don't want that to be my kids. I want them to think that they can do anything and be anything. It's like, how do you instill that, especially with this new information of like I don't think that for myself, so how can I expect them to think that of themselves? Right, right, I'd say I'm much different mindset than I was back then. For sure, I have a lot more confidence in my ability to understand and be that I'm an intelligent human being, but, that being said, I don't know that I always give them.
Speaker 3:The best example of that Rest is the other big one. Like. This was one that I went through in my most recent therapy session was learning how to rest, where it's like one of those stupid things that you don't think about very often. It's like, yeah, just sit on the couch, but like, are you actually resting? And now realizing that that's not again. Another thing that I don't think I'm setting a very good example of, because when we have a rest time, or it's a Saturday or it's a day that we're just kind of having a down day, it is just sit and play on my phone, and that is the example I'm giving of me at rest. Is me sitting on a screen, where I don't want that to be the case for them, because I don't and it's not working for me. I don't feel rested after I sit on my phone. I don't feel rested sitting. It was an interesting thing.
Speaker 4:Why do you feel guilty?
Speaker 3:uh, it's so. It's a little bit of both. So this was part of our discussion around it and which was started very interestingly because I said to her like I feel like I'm her your therapist, her my therapist about, um, I feel like I'm more distracting myself, that I'm actually resting. I said like I've got this new game that I really like on my phone that I've been playing more often, and her first reaction was like oh, that's great. And I was like what do you? That's great.
Speaker 3:Like I've been beating myself up over the fact that I have this new game that I'm like pseudo addicted to and she's like no, you need stuff like that that you can use to check out for your brain, but it's obviously it's the length of time that you give it throughout your day and it's how you're using it. Are you using it to distract yourself or using it to distress yourself, or are you using it as actual rest?
Speaker 3:And I was like well, mostly probably just the avoidant one, using it to distract myself, and I think that's more of the thing.
Speaker 3:It doesn't act as rest when you're not using it properly, and part of her thing around that was well, you need to first identify why you are stressed and why you need rest.
Speaker 3:You need to give that some thought and some breathing room so that you know if there's something you need to be actively doing to remove that stress. Or do you need to off from whatever is stressing me out, or if I just need a break from whatever I'm working on because I'm just stuck on something. Then, going to something like that where I have to focus, follow directions and accomplish something, that I have like kind of a beginning and end. I get something done. Now I can dive back into it. My mind has a chance to reset, where, often using a screen to distract myself, she's like now you're just grabbing a bunch of dopamine, getting those quick hits, and now trying to dive back into work where that's never going to be something sustainable or something that actually puts your mind at rest. You're actually quickening your mind because now you're giving it quick stimuli and dopamine and then trying to jump back into a stressful situation which does the opposite.
Speaker 3:Little things Learning how to rest.
Speaker 1:That makes sense, because normally when I'm checking out at my house it's on my phone and it doesn't like. Yeah, I don't feel rejuvenated when I check back in again yeah, it's like yeah, it doesn't feel good it just feels like I wasted time and missed time if the screen that does work for me is like turning on a Saturday, turning on a Jays game. Right Just like watching the Jays game with the kids.
Speaker 1:Well, they're not watching it, but like just chilling on the couch like that's restful for me, but it's just. Yeah, the phone is the big one for me. That just feels. It always feels like a waste of time.
Speaker 3:Right. It just a big one for me, that just feels it always feels like a waste of time, right it just and yeah not good for my mind and I wonder if part of that is the interaction some same way, like if I can throw a sport on the tv, then I feel like I wonder if it is the interaction piece. You're more present, exactly. I'm more present, I'm able to interact.
Speaker 3:Like the kids want to start wrestling, I can still be wrestling and the game can still be on yeah, where, especially if I'm on my phone specifically playing a game or watching something specifically you're like I just want to hear what this person's saying and then you like try to swipe back to it, to start it back over again, and then it like refreshes and you've lost it and you're like fuck this.
Speaker 1:This was the piece of personal advice that I was going to get to make me a better father.
Speaker 4:And you just fucked it up, you little shit, Wow, oh man. It escalated quickly. Mark needs to be here for that he keeps you in check. It is a good point, though, though, because our phone holds our work, our like it's trying to fill all of the voids too much yeah so it's not actually restful.
Speaker 3:You might think it might be, but it isn't actually well, it's just numbing right, like all it's doing is distracting you. Or she kept using distressing, but I don't know what that means. Maybe I'll look it up or maybe I'll remember to ask her Distress, yeah, cause I don't distress, not de-stress, cause it wasn't a de-stressor, it was a distress, it caused distress. Yes, so you're not actually de-stressing, you're causing more distress by just adding for me, because we were talking about it with politics, because a lot of my tiktok feed right now is politics where now one of the spaces that I used to go to rest or at least I thought I was resting is now causing distress, because now I'm just constantly thinking about okay, what's?
Speaker 3:exactly what are all the things? How do I need to get involved? How do I need to make a difference where it's like well, now you're thinking about big world thoughts instead of getting yourself away from what you're in the difficulty I have with that specific thing is, like my mind just get pulled in all different directions Right, and then I just, I'm just lost.
Speaker 4:Yeah, right, yeah.
Speaker 1:I don't know what I believe, yeah.
Speaker 3:A hundred percent.
Speaker 1:I see like, yeah, this point seems to make sense, and this point seems to make sense and it just I feel like I end up learning nothing, Right. So I'm just like this is stupid. I'm just stressed now and I haven't fixed anything. I still don't know what I'm going to do, but Right.
Speaker 4:One thing I was going to say along the lines of that and I think we talked about it a bit on one of our drives together Right Was the fact that your household was very much like a busy body household and your dad like you would hear your mom almost putting your dad down when he would rest yes, of like oh, he's just playing solitaire.
Speaker 4:Yeah, like those like little things that your parents say so then it's like you form that like, oh, I can, I can't do that, then Like that's a bad thing to do, when in fact, that we do need those times right A hundred percent.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's something that we had talked about in my therapy session.
Speaker 3:Is that exactly?
Speaker 3:And that's something that Meg and I my wife have chatted about that within our relationship, because it's something that definitely was carried in and, like that was, became a concern of hers in the early years of our marriage, was of our marriage was how much I um, whether or not I was going to be involved with housework and stuff like that, because very much my, my upbringing was that my dad wasn't um.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, we had talked about that, we had had discussions around it, but it still leaked into our marriage where the nights that she would come home and I was sitting on the couch and the dishes weren't done. It became this point of contention between us where what we've come to and what we've learned about ourselves is just that communication piece of if I can let her know that I need an off night and I'm sitting down and I'm not doing any housework, that goes a lot smoother when she gets back. Now it doesn't mean it doesn't not going to happen and it doesn't mean that we have the perfect relationship, because when it comes to that stuff because it happened on the weekend where there was an expectation expectation in her mind and I was not thinking the same thing. And where wires get crossed and all of a sudden there's a whole afternoon of not talking to each other. And these things are still going to happen.
Speaker 3:Of course, yeah especially kids, yeah of course, yeah, but you just you work your way through them and, yeah, you figure that stuff out. But that was definitely an example that was set for me from my parents that I saw. That I definitely carried into my adulthood and my marriage, which was that concept of your father's just out there playing his game, where it's like, well, he was a lawyer and probably stupidly stressed and that was his de-stress. Now again, he probably didn't communicate very well. I need an hour to just decompress here very well, like I need.
Speaker 1:I need an hour to just decompress here. To me it's like anything that makes it feel like you're slowing life down for a second is a good thing, right, right. It's like our life is so fat, like unrealistically fast paced. Yeah, it's like go for a walk with your kids, just like go out and breathe some fresh air.
Speaker 4:Like sit on the couch and do nothing, like slow life down right and like that's where like being on your phone is is not doing that I think, it's also hard through the winter to do that right like because you just want to hibernate a little bit, like there is that aspect of just wanting to curl up and nesting yeah, exactly yeah, where.
Speaker 4:Now, like I think that is what is rejuvenating about spring is like it comes with the the longer days, the more sunlight, the more like it just makes you feel that little bit better about yourself to want to slow life down, yeah, um, in that positive way yeah, and then I think part of it too is like yeah, are you carrying on being yourself in those moments anyways?
Speaker 3:the the link happened to me just because of that game that I play and the reason why I do it and like slowing down and checking out, and that was one of the questions that therapist has. It's like are you interactive in it or is it just completely like you're gone and into it, like no, it's very much like a. It's all humans on there and there's a chat board and you chat with people and like that's part of what I enjoy about it is jumping in there and helping people. She's like you're still being yourself Then, you're still being out there and helping people and enjoying life, but it's just the amount of time and effort you put into it. I guess that can then become problem, because now if you're checking out of your real life stuff because you're checking into something else, then it can become a little bit more of an issue, that's for sure so it's an interesting conversation.
Speaker 4:Like I just like calling myself out and apologizing to my wife because she probably usually listens to these, um, but like I had come home from a consult, so gone to see a client, right, I went out for a couple of them and then came home and my wife was sitting down and she was playing Lego Fortnite, which she really likes playing because you can build and create and it's like a sim world type thing and it's a great place for her to kind of unwind and stuff.
Speaker 4:But I came home and was like, oh, you're still stuck on that, are you?
Speaker 1:And it's just like that comment of like why the fuck didn't you clean up while I was gone, without saying it?
Speaker 4:it didn't cause anything and nothing ever escalated from it. But like now, hearing me, like hearing you describe it from your side, I can hear.
Speaker 3:I can hear it you know like I can hear it.
Speaker 2:I'm sorry babe.
Speaker 4:Thanks for not being offended by me saying those things, though, which is kind of cool, um, but that communication aspect of it where it's like, how do you, as the other person ask, like, are you? Cause? It's not like an are, are you okay?
Speaker 4:moment, because you don't want to say that there's something wrong, that you're doing that right, but it's uh, I see that you're needing to check out like what is causing you stress right now, or because there is, like I think, within a lot of relationships, people who, whether there's like the busy body and the one that needs to check out more, and like one person, wants to keep more active or keep the house a certain way and the other one is more fine with it not, and just needing to take that break time for themselves. How do you bring that up to somebody in a positive way?
Speaker 3:Navigating.
Speaker 3:it is difficult, that's the thing right like I think so many of those conversations have to happen early on a relationship, hopefully to try to avoid some of those conflicts. But that it that is my to make scenario. When we first started, right like I couldn't have given less shits of what the house looked like, where she very much wanted to put together home um, as often as possible. Yeah, we had those discussions earlier, like her labeling the fact that that's something is that is very important to her and like, okay, like if I want you to be happy, then I will step up and help in this way. Now it's become something that's become important to me and something that we both kind of tag team on.
Speaker 4:But yeah, I think without the communication I feel like I'm the opposite, where I probably beat that out of my wife, not that I beat my wife but like I got you I think that, like she would say that she would prefer a more clean organized house and, like I'll often say, like I'm much more of a minimalist, like I would want nothing on counters or nothing on anything and she's like I would too, like I would love to have that I would love to have a clean house like that is the thing that would bring me the most peace is to have a clean house the amount of peace, that a clean surface, oh
Speaker 1:man, it's unreal it's like a weight off your shoulders that you didn't know was there.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's, but she's like been beaten down with it to the point where she like and I I get it from the times that, like, I've done a full kitchen clean or a full house, you vacuumed, you do all the stuff, and then like two days later it's like, oh my god, like you, little shits are just like. It doesn't take. Who left this kleenex here? Who?
Speaker 1:left that wrapper two days. Give it a couple hours, right?
Speaker 4:yeah, it's like how is there so much food on the floor right now Like? If you're not sweeping after every dinner it's disgusting under there and I'm not sweeping after every dinner at all Like, but it just like it builds up very quickly, so I get how you like the person who is typically taking care of the cleaning can get completely like bogged down with all of that of like the impossible task of keeping up with something like even laundry.
Speaker 3:You can do all the laundry in the world on a weekend and it's still going to be there on Wednesday when you need to do it again Like yeah, and that's the grace piece we always talk about, right, because at the end of the day, it almost goes in line with, like, the health and fitness talk, where it's like which part are you going to make your identity? Because it has to be your identity in order for you to keep up with it.
Speaker 3:It's like if you want the clean house, you have to do it every day. Meg and I did that right after coop was born, I think. So this is covid. So everybody's stuck at home anyway. And we got into a setup where we had a roomomba not a Roomba, doesn't matter what, it is robot vacuum. So every night, when we got both kids down, the two of us would come down and completely clean the main floor. We'd put everything up on top of the countertops and we'd let the little vacuum go around, vacuum the whole floor and we'd put it all back together before bed. So, like every single day, we'd completely clean it and like that was our identity. But that was covid.
Speaker 3:We were stuck at home and we wanted to have a clean home. We're like now you get back into the hustle and bustle. There's no way in hell. We do that every single night, like we literally cannot. But which thing is going to be your thing? Because you want to be healthy and buy and make all your own meals. You want to be healthy and you want to work out every day with your partner. You want to have a clean home. You want to make money you want to be a good parent.
Speaker 4:Tv and social media for establishing a false sense of what a clean home looks like, or even like because, even like what a fridge looks like, like, even like you think of shows or things where it's like a nice clean fridge, but like right, you've got your kids things and all the different like school events pinned and magneted to things on the side of the fridge and stuff like that, and sure it would be not much nicer to have it clean, maybe. But like why do we think it would be nicer? Is it because, like yes, when you're going to take a shot of your kitchen for social media or something, you're cleaning it up or you're taking a picture of your whatever morning shake that you're having and it's all tidied and cleaned or it's just like pushed off?
Speaker 1:camera. I can't blame social media for that, because none of my social media has. Is that at all? Okay like I, I don't know.
Speaker 3:That's not in my realm of your algorithm yeah it's in prim and perfect, but it's like.
Speaker 1:I feel like clutter in the house is clutter in my mind yes, that's the correlation. I don't know what it is. So can you avoid clutter with kids?
Speaker 4:no, I mean you can with a lot of work, but like yeah but it was clean at the end of the night, but what was it like during the day? While they were playing? Like you cleaned up and you put everything away.
Speaker 2:So you had a moment, whether it was at the end of the day in the end of the night, but what was it like during the day, while they were playing? Like you cleaned up and you put everything away.
Speaker 4:So you had a moment, whether it was at the end of the day, in the beginning of the day, where it was like, oh, everything's nice, beautiful, and then the kids come down and it's like toys start being played with.
Speaker 3:But honestly, like you picture doing it every day. It does stay cleaner because they take out the things they're going to play with you don't necessarily yeah right see the clutter when they're playing with it exactly. It's the accumulation that ends up seeing like the post that, uh, maddie reed did recently with the piles.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that could not have been more spot on yeah, I love little piles, so it's like just random shit.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so the whole post, the idea of like kid piles kid piles, stuff piles so it's like the amount of stress that a stuff pile brings just like you look at a pile that's like an hour because, like each thing, it's like this has to go here.
Speaker 1:Maybe this goes with those things, maybe that goes with that and I can't put that away until I put all this other stuff away and I gotta find all that, the other things that are in the other piles, that belong to this pile when I clean, I, just when I clean, I make pile, I grab like a laundry bin and all the stuff that doesn't have homes just goes into that.
Speaker 4:And then if you don't touch it or clean it or whatever, then it's gone. If you don't notice that something's missing, it's going to the value village or something like that.
Speaker 3:I'm a garbage guy for sure. The amount of things that I've thrown out, that my kids and or wife have asked for. A week later and I've just been like don't know. Don't know, take care of your shit. I'm like a thousand percent. I threw it in the garbage and I knew you still wanted it, but you left it out she go.
Speaker 1:Your living space, though, is a factor, yes, like how much space you have right, that's very true like our kids play area. Is the living room like yes so it's just maddie. Like I know she feels the pressure and like weight of it because so many times I come home. She's like you wouldn't know this, but I cleaned the house today, right, like I like I'm not keeping score, don't worry, right, but yeah it's, it's our house. Literally it's like a couple of hours and it's just back to a gone show again.
Speaker 4:Yeah, that's three kids, yeah three different ages of three different sets of toys. That's boys and girls playing with different toys.
Speaker 1:That's like oh yeah, it's just stuff.
Speaker 4:So like, yeah, if you had a big enough house that the kids had their own playroom in and that was separate, and you had like the adult living room where there was no toys allowed and stuff like that, then sure I could see that being more possible. But I think, like for what to expect when you're expecting, when you're having kids, like, yeah, have the best intentions to have a house, but you just accumulate shit from birthdays and christmases and any other holiday that grandma and grandpa or aunts and uncles decide to just drop off random stuff, like valentine's things. Who knows there's going to be stuff they're going to bring home from schools, like pencils or erasers and stuff and that pencil or eraser is going to end up or just rocks for outside just rocks from outside.
Speaker 3:Yeah, they just you accumulate so much and like little toys from fast food places too that's one of the like. That's an automatic garbage for me, like if I see it on the ground, it's gone, no chance, so garbage yeah, but now they're all like collectors, like, yeah, he's gotta have all the minions.
Speaker 4:Oh, the old ones like the old toys that you would bring home were like good, solid toys before. Now. It's nothing plastic garbage. Yeah, let's hit up this second one and see if it ties into what we're talking about. I think it is um laureate mo. I don't know.
Speaker 2:I was amazed by that jeff bezos one of the richest men in the world laureate says in his quarterly reports and loves to say monoc say in many settings that he tells all of the thousands of amazon employees who work under him he wants them all to wake up terrified every morning and that's the word he uses terrified and to stay terrified all day, because that makes them productive. And you know what, when you get really productive and you earn a lot of stuff, and that's still your only way of being, you still wake up terrified every morning. So a group of psychologists, I think in the 90s, decided to try to figure out why humans, of all animals, are the only ones who commit suicide on a regular basis, and what they found out? The answer is language. We humans have the capacity to use language to create an abstract vision of the future that is more horrifying than the prospect of our own death. We choose death over the story of fear that we carry in our minds.
Speaker 2:And then there's a story about how we have to control the world so that we won't be in danger anymore, and we have to control our loved ones so they won't be in danger. And we have to control. We just have to control. But we, honest to God, really can't control very much.
Speaker 2:So then we get worried, we get even more scared and that feeds back into these primitive brain structures that say fear and then it creates a bigger story and more control efforts and it goes up and up and up and it doesn't go down because that part of the brain, it has this tendency to truly believe that nothing but itself exists. What I always hear is people say well, there are real problems, we really should be afraid. My answer to that is if you were in a horrible car accident God forbid and you had many injuries, would you want the surgeons working on you to be in a state of panic or calm creativity? The only way we're going to fix the problems we've made with our fear-based behavior, the only way to solve problems this big, is to access the incredible capacity of human creativity.
Speaker 3:It almost feels like we've been trained not to listen to how we feel.
Speaker 2:A hundred percent, a hundred percent, as Sir Ken Robinson says. You know, we're trained to think of our bodies as mechanisms that take our heads to meetings, because the body lives in reality. The body is honest. Only the mind, and only the verbal mind, can lie to us and tell us things um that we we can believe, even though they're not true.
Speaker 4:I was amazed that was the martha beck on the diary of a ceo.
Speaker 4:Um, that was a longer clip than I was remembered trigger warning as well yeah, sorry but there's a lot of deep thoughts in that, yeah, and I often think that I'm one social media clip away from understanding the meaning of life.
Speaker 4:Right, because, like, there's so many people like that is like as much as we talked badly about sitting on our phones and scrolling.
Speaker 4:There is so much information and so many cool things that you can learn and gather from that and just that like her talking about the power of our language and the way that we talk and the way that we think, and as parents, especially like her talking about control, that is like a, I would think, a huge aspect for me, and I would imagine most parents were, even us talking about how we want our kids to grow up and that we want them to get the best parts of us.
Speaker 4:It's like we are somehow trying to control who our kid is going to be when they grow up. Yeah, because we want them, we want them to be okay. Yeah, we want them to be safe, we want them to have good lives and we're trying to control those aspects of things. And as a parent, I think you can especially find yourself in that negative spiral when if you think you're not enough, if you think you're not doing good enough and put yourself down into a mobile place where you're not active, you're not doing the things that you want to be portraying for them, because you get caught in this negative loop of yourself.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, I think the part of that, yeah just shook me was just the power that that your self-talk has over your body.
Speaker 2:Brain.
Speaker 1:And, yeah, the idea that you can convince yourself that continuing on with life is scarier yeah, right Than the alternative.
Speaker 3:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:It's just like. That is just so mind-blowing to me, but it's.
Speaker 1:You can see how that is the case, like with just the way, the things that you can convince yourself of in your mind, whether it's like right, I'm not enough, or, um, yeah, just like I'm not intelligent, like I'm not intelligent or like like you were talking about before, yeah, and how big of an impact that has on your life for however many years Right, like it could be your entire life, right, yeah, that was just alarming to actually sit and focus on for a second, and it's not necessarily because I this got into our conversation Dave and I were having about what does speaking or being kind to yourself look like, and I didn't really have an answer for that, but I was curious as to you, dave, if you had a practical thing that you do in order to be kind to yourself, or whether it's just yeah, what does that look like for you?
Speaker 1:Because to me, it's just like kind of confusing to think about, or it doesn't. It feels fake almost in a way.
Speaker 4:It's just like not a natural thing for me, I think for me it's being like giving yourself grace, yeah, as opposed to like beating yourself up for something, whether it's for the situation you're in, where you're at, like what you're going through, that like. I think we can tend to, as humans, beat ourselves up a lot in that aspect. Where I think being kind to yourself is like how you would treat other people and it's like would you talk about, would you talk to somebody else, the way that you talk about yourself and like those inner thoughts that you have about yourself. Would you say that about somebody else? Like no, you probably wouldn't. Like that would be really hurtful to say that thing to somebody else. Why would you say it to yourself and beat yourself up with that?
Speaker 4:Where I think it's that being kind to yourself is that positive self-talk of I can do this, I am good enough, I can conquer that, I can do.
Speaker 4:Like having that kind of a mindset is what I would say, but then also not beating myself up for going through hard times, because you're never going to be able to stay in that type of a mindset forever. Like you're going to go through times where things are hard and like I'd say like probably, like a week ago I was going through a rough time where I just felt very unmotivated, very down, very I was actually it was Monday, it was last Monday. That whole week until Thursday I felt very just like off. I didn't feel like myself. And then got a couple of messages from my Scott friends on Instagram and they sent me a couple messages from my Scott friends on Instagram and they sent me a couple inspirational message. One, scott Kelly was reading a book and he had a quote in it and it, just like it hit me and I think it actually even talked about the um. It was talking about a bit about leadership and how, how do you expect to lead without setting an example similar to what we were talking?
Speaker 3:about kids.
Speaker 4:And it really hit me as a dad of like how am I supposed to be a leader of this family and set an example for these kids without taking the steps to do the things and to care for myself? So then I did the things and went and worked out and felt so much better that I took the time to do that for myself and instead of I think some people can do something to try and get yourself out of the funk, but then you feel like shit for all the times.
Speaker 4:You didn't so it's like you only worked out one out of seven days.
Speaker 4:It's like you beat yourself up at that or you can think positively about yourself and celebrate that you did do something and that you did take that first step, because it can be hard when you're just if. If. To me, like when I'm down, it feels like I'm in like a swamp, like a muggy bog and like taking one step just feels heavy, it feels sludgy, it feels unstable, like you're going to slip. But then as you take those next steps, you start to gain that pace and gain that clarity and then it starts to come back and then not allowing yourself to beat yourself up for not being that all the time right. So that's to me, I think, what being kind to yourself is where it's just treating yourself nicely, yeah, and treat yourself to to that McFlurry every once in a while, you know, oh, I do a lot.
Speaker 1:I'm really nice to myself when it comes to treats.
Speaker 3:I'm my best friend. It is so weird that that seems to be our human default, though, to beat ourselves up Like I haven't met a lot of people in my life that have said, or been able to say, like, oh, like, oh yeah, I'm super kind to myself in my head like most people that I know you beat yourself up I don't know if you're gonna go there with this, but I think we talked a bit about it and how religion has a place in that.
Speaker 4:Absolutely because, like I can remember being a kid and going to like different youth rallies or different youth like events and stuff like that, and one in particular, there's a guy called jack frost who would do this master, anti-masturbation talk and go about all this stuff on, like how you shouldn't be doing this and this is you're gonna go to hell and all these things and you're you come out of those like yeah, I'm not gonna touch myself again and you're a teenager and that doesn't happen.
Speaker 2:But you beat yourself up and you feel like shit and you're a teenager and that doesn't happen.
Speaker 4:But you beat yourself up and you feel like shit and you're like, oh, why did I do that? Now I have to start all over, like now, how am I gonna?
Speaker 4:I can never do this I can't make it through that, and I think even just those little things like whether it's this hat or whether it's something else, like not eating candy, and then you eat it and you, you beat yourself up about it. But I think religion holds a big place in beating yourself up about not holding yourself up to a certain standard or something it's the fear of it creates the fear of failure. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Because if you do fail, then you have to, you have to repent, and then right. It's like it's that concept.
Speaker 3:Well, I think that too, and especially them. Right, it's like it's that concept. Well, I think that too, and especially for kids. Yes, yeah, I think that too, in conjunction with the fact that you're starting off with a. I will say it this way we can have a lot of good discussions on here about religion, but everybody has their own thought and their own experience, so we're not saying that religion is right or wrong for anybody or any certain religion.
Speaker 3:My experience with it is that there has become this story being told that you're not good enough unless you have this. You aren't enough unless you have this.
Speaker 3:So you think about that with everything that we've talked about here on this podcast where it's like of course, that is a a concept that is ingrained into our minds, because that is something that was instilled into. I'll say for myself once a week that was reinstilled of like you aren't good enough unless you have this in your life and you are practicing this way and you have this foundation right now. Do I think that was meant to be the heart behind it? I hope not, and I hope that the people and the adults that were in my life when I was a kid didn't have that intention, that we're going to build an insecurity into you from day one courtesy of religion.
Speaker 3:I don't think that was the case with the adults in my life, at least, I hope that it wasn't it. I hope it was driven by. I want to teach good morals and teach these kids how to love and teach them how to be good. But I think that was the byproduct of it. In my opinion, in my life, that became the byproduct of I'm not good enough. Unless I'm living a good, clean life that is christ-like, that's never going to happen. We're humans. We make mistakes every minute of every day.
Speaker 3:Not that's aggressive every day every day we make some kind of mistake, right. And when you have this built-in thing of mistakes are wrong and sin is wrong and that is what's wrong with humans, then you're just going to get reinforced by that every single day, each time you do inevitably make a mistake exactly.
Speaker 1:I completely agree like this is that's part of the reason why I feel like I've kind of like drifted away from religion altogether is be especially what I was raised on Right Is was the exclusivity of it. Yes, and it's like I just like, the more you look around the world and you see all of these different religions and beliefs, and it's like to me it's it's impossible for me to believe that there's only one way to do things.
Speaker 1:Yes, A hundred percent, 100, yeah. So it's just like that, just that just caves it all in right there for me it's like in and of itself. I'm sorry, I can't believe that. So let's try something else. Yeah, uh, and I don't know what that something else is yet, but it might not be it. It might be like I'm not saying that I've rejected religion altogether, but definitely.
Speaker 4:A lot of the positive principles of like caring for others, yeah, oh yeah, but then not for yourself, like there isn't necessarily like I don't remember necessarily learning that of like like through religion, through my spiritual journey or whatever, of taking care of yourself within things. It was always care for others, but then you keep failing and feel like shit. But I'm making other people feel good. It's just like that. It feels like a little bit of like a push and pull.
Speaker 3:Well, and that's why I think you see a lot of people again, in my opinion within the Christian setting, that are just purely people pleasers. Because now for yourself, you've created this. My value is in how I make other people feel. If I'm giving the, bringing them happiness, if I'm bringing them joy or taking away their pain, then I have value that I'm bringing to the world and I'm being Christ-like and whatever else have you. But then now, if your value is only placed on what you're able to do for other people, then you're never going to be self-confident and you're never going to have the ability to walk yourself through hard times, because you've built everything on doing things for other people, not yourself. Hard times because you've built everything on doing things for other people, not yourself. Yeah, now there's not a lot of. Well, there's lots of things out there now that teach you how to be good to yourself, but there's also too many of those things the self-help books and everything in between that'll tell you how to build that self-confidence.
Speaker 1:There's also a difficulty in knowing what to do from that angle I think I've gotten better at certain things, uh, in terms of, like, self talk, like, I don't think that I worry as much about things as I used to. Um, I think that I, uh, I still really struggle with the fear of disappointing people or like the fear of failure. Whatever that looks like. It can look like a lot of different things.
Speaker 3:I relate to that looks like it can look like a lot of different things.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I relate to that. So that's still a hurdle that I'm trying to be more gracious with myself with and I think I'm getting better at it, but it's still very much. It makes things difficult sometimes when you're beating yourself up.
Speaker 4:How does the fear of failure for you connect to your kids as far as like? Do you worry about them failing, or I'm sure you are probably like encouraging them through different things, or they fail and you're you're able to speak into them, but not into yourself.
Speaker 1:I'm way better at supporting people who fail than I am at supporting myself through failure.
Speaker 4:Right Like why are we like? Why is that such a thing? Right, but then when we talk about like, being the example and living the example, to set the example, but yeah, it is way easier.
Speaker 3:I think it is just that right. It wasn't practiced. We aren't practiced in good self-talk and being self-encouraging. We've been modeled by those in front of us how to encourage other people, because we were encouraged but we didn't visualize or get to see them encouraging themselves and getting themselves through a situation. So now you think to yourself the only way I am going to get through this is if there is somebody encouraging me through it. If I do have that coach that's on my back pushing me to do better, then more often I think people that do have that mindset will say for myself I can do really well if somebody's on the sidelines telling me that I can do it because I'll hear their words and I can believe them. But maybe you don't. You're not as apt to believe them from yourself, right?
Speaker 1:So in your yeah, leave them from yourself right. So in your yeah, excuse me, yeah, I'm just thinking about like so, through therapy, have you learned the reason maybe you just talked about it, but like the reason why you struggle with that specifically.
Speaker 3:Uh, now I'm trying to think it's something that I'm getting better at. I'm trying to think if this's something that I'm getting better at, I'm trying to think if this is something that I've specifically talked about in therapy and I don't know that it is Okay, just that self-talk piece. I know we've chatted around it and about just literally practicing and it's something that I think I am getting better at. There's still, I think, when you're down in the dumps, you're down and I think it's really difficult to get to a place where you can pull yourself out of it without the help of a community, without the help of your partner, without the help of something. Just referencing, like you were saying last week, dave, with you being down and out, where it's like I think when you're in that I don't know you have to be some kind of like guru in self-talk to do it yourself, but I practice it just a lot just in the last year or so, um, consciously, and it it does.
Speaker 3:It's funny you said something earlier, brian where it's like it seems fake and it, does it still it still does feel fake, but it does help me get through it because, if any, if nothing else, it snaps you out of the cycle of negative thoughts where, like, I try to purposefully combat the negative thoughts. If I'm in a good headspace, if I feel something trickle in that's like you're not going to figure this out or man, you really shouldn't have done that, you fucked that up. I've gotten to a better place where I can be like nope, stop, you're good at this, you're going to be able to figure it out, just breathe, go through it. So when I'm in a good head space, I can do that and I can reverse my self-talk and I it almost has to be fake in a way, like I have to force myself to be positive with myself, which is dumb. But this is on my list of things that's going to come up in my next coming therapy session, so I'll report back then, because it is something for myself, like the.
Speaker 3:The mistakes that I've made are so loud in my memory, so, like I have a few random core memories that are mistakes that I've made that are stupid, like one of them is I don't know if I've shared it on here like motorcycle training that I did and one of the first things we did when we got the motorbikes was like you can't turn them on. You're going to sit on the bike off and put it in neutral and then somebody else is going to push your bike and you're just going to feel what it looks like to roll on the bike. But you had to like you had to push somebody else. One of the main things was there's gonna be a coach on the other side that says like, okay, ready, push them towards me now.
Speaker 3:My mind turned off. I just wanted to be helpful and be a people pleaser. So I'm like okay, I'm not gonna get my bike, I'm gonna go help somebody. So there was a woman next to me. So I'm like cool, I'll be your helper. I got behind her and she like rolled out 10 or 15 meters and fell over on the bike. She didn't know what she was doing.
Speaker 2:It was kind of funny but in my head, so she fell she fell over.
Speaker 3:This big day the coach came over. He's like what the fuck was that? I'm like my bad dude, like I didn't look up. I was just helping her and I pushed her across, you got it. Nothing happened. Now, the next day she didn't come back and she didn't end up finishing out the weekend of the motorcycle course. So then, of course, in the back of my head, I'm like well, the reason she didn't come back is because she started there.
Speaker 3:But it's those memories that, like, I hold on to and I think about that probably once a month for no stupid reason, where it's like, why do those things that are mistakes speak so loudly when I've done a lot of amazing things and supported a lot of people in my life? But I have to consciously think of those where some of these little missteps will just jump into my brain sometimes, where it's like something is correlated to it. That happens whatever else happens, and it just finds its way into your memory banks, just like oh yeah, I remember that. Yeah, so I love inside out. For where it's like they do such good imagery around that stuff, it's just like a memory can just pop up and also be lit for no reason.
Speaker 4:Who popped that in there? Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3:I was like that I am very interested to talk through this stuff because I think it is something that a lot of people do struggle with.
Speaker 4:I wonder, as, like parents too, I think it's a lot easier to talk about negative things than it is positive things, because it feels fake negative things than it is positive things because it feels fake.
Speaker 4:But like I wonder if, like it's easier than like, a lot of parents are like, oh, how's it going? Oh, you know the fucking kids like, oh, they did this, oh, they do that. Like, how many times are your kids picking up or hearing you talk about them like, yeah, they're just crazy, they're just doing this and you're describing them in negative ways. But it would feel weird to answer another parent of like how I was going, like, oh, like, oh, great, you know, my kids are a lot of fun.
Speaker 2:Like I was playing cards with them the other day and be like well, I didn't think it was going to go that way the negativity is almost more relatable.
Speaker 4:But like, even negatively. You'll talk about yourself negatively out loud. But how often would you positively reinforce something of yourself out loud? Like you might look in the mirror and be like I look good today. But are you gonna say out loud, man, I look good today, right, but like your kids going to hear you that. Or like, oh, this isn't fit. You would say that out loud and you would go change. You're like I hate the way this looks on me and you would go and change. But you wouldn't come out and be like man I am, I'm fired today. This fit is lit is that what they say.
Speaker 3:Still, that's probably. I think.
Speaker 4:No, it's true, like we or coaching yourself through an anxious moment, like we coach our kids through anxious moments. But how often do we coach ourselves through an anxious moment out loud, so that they can hear us how we are working through that in our mind? Yeah, yeah, it's true. Or saying you were scared about something. Yeah, I was scared about that, but it ended up working out really well because, like, I changed my mind and it was like you know what? We're gonna have fun with this. Right, I think about it when we go on breakfast television. All the time. I'm super nervous every time we go on, even though it we've done it a bunch and it's old hat, but it's still.
Speaker 1:Every time you're, the anxiety comes in, you don't know what to expect.
Speaker 1:It's such a good metaphor for yeah, yeah I scared every time, but it's always a blast yeah, you love it and you know you're gonna be fine yeah so, like I feel, like I can, I have those conversations with my kids, those types of conversations, and I can explain it to them. But it's still like I think that just the idea of like fear is just an emotion which we talk about a lot, is a big one, and like that emotions are are just a thing that we can combat with something else, like bravery or something like that, yeah, I think that helps a lot, uh, and it makes it easier to work through for me, uh, just having that realization. I don't think I've ever, I don't think I thought about fear that way growing up, that it is just an emotion. I just I think I was just consumed, consumed by it a lot of the time and that's where like worry and stuff set in a lot growing up.
Speaker 3:So well, it feels like fear gets imposed upon you, right, especially when you are a kid where it's like oh, are you afraid of that, are you afraid of that, where it feels like an outside source, where it's like fear is very much something we conjure up ourselves.
Speaker 4:Yeah, another clip I saw today was a person talking about how every morning, they heard the story of someone who every morning they wake up, they say this is going to be the best day ever, and you go throughout your day finding things that make it or qualify it as the best day ever, and it's the concept of if you're always looking for it. Yeah, it's like what we, what do we look for in life? Right, like what are you looking for? And like that's kind of what she was saying, and the fact that your words have more power than you know and your thoughts have more power than you know. And if you're going into a day, if you're going into a meeting, if you're going into a test, whatever it is thinking, this is going to be amazing. I got this.
Speaker 3:I'm going to crush this yeah.
Speaker 4:Yes, I'm sure there's a negative too far to swing on the optimistic side of things Right, like the.
Speaker 4:But just having that mindset of saying and like this is going to be the best day, and looking for the positive things, like one thing we say with our kids when we're putting them in bed and one of the prayers is like help them to see the good in the world and help them to be the good in the world, because I truly just want my kids to see the good in the world. There's a lot of people out there that just go around looking for negativity and looking for all the bad things that are happening to them or are happening around them, and it's like I don't want that for them. I just want them to just see the goodness in the world because there is so much good, like there are good people, there are good things out there. Yes, it looks scary on the outside when you look at a lot of social media posts and stuff like that, but there is still so much good about the world is it just because the negative things linger and it's like something you have to get over?
Speaker 1:absolutely all the positive things are just positive, they're just there, yeah, yeah it's like why you don't learn from a win in hockey.
Speaker 3:You learn from a loss yeah, so that the obstacles right, yeah, and you see obstacles where, like the goodness, is the nature and the trees, in the sky and the air around that's why it feels like, yeah, the negative just but do we see obstacles as negative things, or can you see an obstacle?
Speaker 4:I guess that's the key thing right, like there's still a, I think it's when you're only focusing on the obstacles is when it becomes negative.
Speaker 3:When you're walking around and you're looking off your own path and you're just finding obstacles because that's all you're focusing on, then you miss out on all the good, where it's like if you're walking through life being optimistic and you're met with an obstacle, now you see it as just that it's an obstacle and I can get past this, or I have an opportunity to learn something. How often do we get hit with something and we're like all right, here's my opportunity to learn something. It's like fuck, here's a step backwards, but I talk about that as, like the bro laws difference yeah right, we're like.
Speaker 4:That is how we have always operated our business, and why, we have not had conflicts with clients, because when we do get met with an obstacle, whatever that is, we it's not a people pleaser side of us we legitimately are looking at like cool, like what's the solution? Yeah, what is the takeaway from this? Like I remember our first kitchen. We didn't make any money on that and it's like, yeah, that sucked, it was a big obstacle, but we learned a good lesson from that. It wasn't something that like kicked us down and didn't harp on it, yeah, yeah. And I think that comes back even to like that failure aspect of things right Of like learning how to fail with grace and being able to like see the obstacle for what it is and not let it pull you back, but let it like still be positive throughout it kind of thing, or find the I don't know yeah.
Speaker 1:That also links into what do you consider to be failure, but that's a different topic do you think that, like, uh, the way you encourage other people, or like, if you're projecting positivity, do you think there's a direct correlation between that and how you talk to yourself, or they can be two completely different things, because I feel like I can try to project positivity but still be really negative towards myself but I think one definitely can influence the other yeah, I would be interested to know.
Speaker 3:Yeah, if there's, if there's science behind that I just picture. That's the opposite of like if somebody's negative all the time and like putting down everybody else, although I almost think of those people as the ones that probably do speak pretty highly of themselves in their head, but is it real?
Speaker 1:that's true well I just think about like a conversation I had with somebody on instagram, like somebody we know uh, kevin, I forget his last name, but an fda yeah yes and I he's always very encouraging towards me and I was just letting him know how much I appreciated him for that and he's like yeah, just like, just start by like encouraging other people, just start encouraging one person a day and see like how that affects your life, kind of thing. And I'm like, yeah, but I don't know if it would. I love the thought. Yeah, like yeah, I don't know if there's like more work that needs to be done.
Speaker 4:I think it does. From the standpoint, and this is all like to not go into things with expectation, yeah, but at the same time, when you are encouraging people, I think you're more likely to then be encouraged as well. So I think it's something that feeds and where, if you're constantly putting somebody down, they're not going to be like you sucked at that and they're like well, you were really great, today it doesn't feed that, but I think in life.
Speaker 4:I think more that, like we build people up and make them feel good about themselves, the more that they're then going to see the great things that you did right. How often does somebody say like oh, I love your hat, and you're like, oh, thanks.
Speaker 3:And then you try to find something to compliment them about as well, like there is a little give and a take, I think, with that yeah, the more you're being encouraged and fed positivity, hopefully that means that it's going to impact the way that you're feeding yourself in your own head. Right, that's a good point. Yeah, interesting Some things to talk about.
Speaker 1:Well.
Speaker 4:If you don't notice that something's missing, it's going to the value village or something like that.
Speaker 3:I'm the garbage guy for sure, Like the amount of things that I've thrown out that my kids and or wife have asked for a week later and I've just been like don't know.
Speaker 1:Don't know, Take care of your shit Meanwhile my head.
Speaker 3:I'm like a thousand percent. I threw it in the garbage and I knew you still wanted it. But