Adulting Decrypted
We prepare young adults to be independent powerhouses for life.--Who We Are: The Adulting Decrypted team is composed of a Dad and his three sons: Roscoe(Dad - age redacted), Ashton(22), Gene(18), and Gideon(14). How We Started: As a family we have always tried to have at least one meal together daily. The meal that typically ends up being is dinner. One night in particular near the beginning of the COVID pandemic, our conversation started with Roscoe mentioning that he had recently read a news article stating that an Ivy League college was offering “Adulting,” classes. These classes were being offered in the hopes that they might be able to educate students who were struggling with common “Adult” tasks. It didn't make sense to us that someone would have to enroll in an Ivy League school to learn things that nearly every person has to deal with daily. To us it seemed that things like shopping, laundry, mental health, communication, taxes, loans, and so much more should be basic knowledge before taking on the substantial challenges of modern life. Eventually the idea was floated that there should be a podcast that can be accessed for free that would help people gain insight into these things that we thought we knew fairly well. Since COVID-19 had caused unemployment and school schedule changes for all of us we thought that there could be no better thing than for us to take on this challenge. Less than a month later, after several planning meetings and countless hours of research, we had recorded and uploaded our first episode.
Adulting Decrypted
Season 7 Prequel
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Update with All 4 of us Back together! We learn what we are all doing! Gene shares about his mission and how the podcast helped and things he can do better! Gideon shares that we are not in New Mexico, and how he likes going to College. Ashton talks about adulting as a band leader! Find this and many other episodes by category on our website! https://adultingdecrypted.com/episode-search/
Welcome to adulting decrypted. We have started season seven. We're talking to you from sunny Cabo. New Mexico. We're excited. What's that look for? Is that not where we're at?
GidIs it New Mexico or is it just
DadMexico? Oh yeah, it's new to me, so it's New Mexico. Sounds good. It might be so late that I'm just tired and, and over sun baked. So welcome to Season 7 everybody. We're excited to have you here. Thanks for joining us. Wanted to go through and do a quick update from everybody if we could. Gene, welcome back. Thank you. So where have you been? Tell us a little bit about what you've been up to. So I've
Genejust returned about a month ago from a two year service proselyting mission in Louisiana and basically half of
DadMississippi. Very cool. So that was a chance for you to be out on your own and start to do some adulting. Tell us a couple times you won as an adult and maybe a time you lost. I know
Genesome of the things that were definitely easier from doing the podcast was definitely starting off. One thing that has made it easier through doing this podcast and hearing all these different episodes helped me have a more open mind with those people that I, that I started off with, when I met these different people, I was able to realize their different backgrounds quicker. And so it's better to easily adapt to those people. For those who don't know, you're basically thrown with someone random that you've never met before. For roughly six weeks or longer for me it tended to be longer and more closer to six
Dadmonths than six weeks Well, that is a long time for most of
Genethem But some of them were just six weeks, but it was those different people and like hey I need to be open to problem solve one of the things that one of the things that was still difficult for me, or one of those things I need to work on is talking with those other people, working with the doctors and all those different types of things. It's hard for me to ask help from those people.
DadSo to recap you were successful. I hope to look and see how to work better with people in a different communication style, but still struggled with talking to other adults because they're with authority or speaking with other people, your age or.
GeneI think it would be the people in those higher, I guess, positions like the doctors or someone that's. I guess in that more authority perspective, even like the cashier or something, someone at the customer service, those, those different places.
AshtonJust that
Genearea.
DadI still kind of struggled with that. Yeah, no, good, good observation. Thank you for sharing. Can you do it? Awesome. What's your next step? So
Genecurrently my next step will be college. I am set up to start in January. So I'll start school in January. I have to. Be actually fully living on my own with no other supervision and perfectly I'm going to build a schedule and attend to it without anyone over there being like, Hey, make sure that you're doing more effective things with
Dadyour time. Perfect. Yeah, it is January 4th. So you'll actually have been at school a week before the first episode drops for this season. So very excited. Thank you. Gideon, tell us what you've been up to.
GidYeah, for sure. So, I am currently in my senior year of high school, which is weird for me to think about because it doesn't quite feel like it. I spend a lot of my My time at a technical college, so I'll go to first two periods of high school and then me and a buddy from M tech fall from a neighborhood. We'll go to M tech, the technical college, and I'm taking a course on digital marketing and analytics. So that's been super exciting. I've actually remade our whole website. So definitely go check that out. And I've been telling a lot of people about it. So, super excited on where everything is going. And I love the opportunities that I'm getting and will get from this course.
DadSo Gideon, you mentioned the website. What's a big update for the listeners so they know what to look for? Of
Gidcourse. So, A big update is our whole website in general. So, I started from pretty much scratch and created a whole new adulting decrypted website with a, some blog posts that we've posted trying to get some more search engine optimization and get some more traffic to our website that way, as well as An episode search page where you can find all of the past six seasons of adult and encrypted through either different categories
Dadwe
Gidhave areas of practical, which has, you know, all the practical skills on it. Emotional health. All the episodes on emotional health. We have financial, and we
DadHave social. Fantastic. Awesome. Where do you feel like you've still got an opportunity growing to learn this season and season seven about becoming an adult? What do you think, you know, are some of the things that surprise you that you still might struggle with? Or? What do you think you have figured out?
GidI think a lot of my struggles are the same no matter what work I've necessarily tried to do with it. And so more work is always helpful. And I bring that up because the last episode of season six was about our goals and how that didn't necessarily work out for all of us. And so I know that's a big thing that I have to work on and I want
Dadto get better at. Great. Thank you for sharing. You know, we went back in Gideon. We were just listening to episode one, season one, you know, so listener, if you want to hear Gideon change from then till now, 13 year old Gideon to 17 year old Gideon is quite a different invoice and, and change. So awesome. Thank you. Ashton, what you been up to?
AshtonWell, today I went and petted a dolphin and then rode a pirate ship. That's
Gidactually sick, by the way. That is so cool.
DadIt was a pretty fun day. Yeah. So that's, yeah. And I was, yeah, that's a great answer for the listener. What about in your other part of your life? Yes, we've had a lot of fun at Cabo. We actually met a guy tonight.
AshtonHis Instagram account is ethereal in e saw him tonight playing His hand pan in in the streets of Cabo. It's pretty cool. Yeah, it was so
Gidcool. We're like, is that the guy? Oh my gosh, it's the guy and yeah, so our special birthday song Yeah,
Ashtonhe gave us, yeah, he gave us our special birthday song and sang to
Dadus. Had I been smart, I would have recorded it, but instead we let him live stream it. So there you go. It's
Ashtontrue. I, yeah as far as my normal life not much has changed since we've had our last little podcast. Still just Teaching at a local high school and running a couple different programs in the percussion space writing music and, and that's about it.
DadSo, and I think, I think something that's changed is you took more of a lead role on launching one of the winter drum lines. Isn't that a big development over the past little bit? Yeah, you've been on the sidelines, but you're actually putting together budgets. Yeah, that's fair. And trying to recruit some students. So you know about it, but the listener doesn't. Can you share us a little bit more about that process? Sure. I
Ashtonmean, well, there's an after school extracurricular program that I've been doing with one of the high schools that I teach. And so for like the past months, I guess that's why it doesn't feel new is I've just been doing it for so long, but just have been putting together budgets Itineraries, reservations, all these different things that are needing to be put together in order to operate a program. now the season has officially started. And so, it's balancing, you know, what students are actually going to participate. Getting contracts signed. Finishing up writing music for those groups. Just all the various different things that go along there. it's interesting because sometimes we like to try and take success from seeing something actually done. Like when you get, when you go to work and you get actually paid, you're like, Oh, Hey, look, I got paid. So I successfully worked. Sometimes there's a one to one transaction, but there's a lot of this. Behind the scenes stuff that I think doesn't get an official like payout until the long run or some stuff You just have to know hey I did the best I could and and where we're at is where it's gonna be and that's just it is what it is
DadYeah, I think you hit on something pretty interesting there Ashton payout and the timing of the payout you hit on something very interesting there Ashton payouts and timings of payout I believe as you become an adult, they do change as a CEO or an, as an executive, I might see a payout within two, three, four years, you know, on some of my ventures and other stuff pays out fairly quickly to your point one to one. But most of it has a long term play, and when you're younger, most of your payouts are pretty quick. You go to a soccer game, within 90 normally you get feedback pretty quick. Right? We won or we lost. We, there's no in between. But on these bigger programs, you're finding out the payouts a little bit longer. Yeah,
AshtonI mean, it's true, cause like, once you leave a competitive space or a transactional space, it becomes harder to determine, you know, success versus failure. And, and, there's this interesting middle ground that I haven't explored all that too much. Because, like, part of teaching is preparing for concerts. And, recently, we just had our Christmas concert a couple weeks ago. And there was a lot that went into preparing it, and the concert happened, and it was done, and it was just kind of that's it. It was a successful concert, I mean, it was fun music, I think the kids had fun, you'd hope they do. The parents that came and watched it, you'd think they had fun, and that's kind of it. I mean, there's not a, there's not a competition where it's like, Oh, you won the concert, you
Dadknow? But you still got the payout, right? You got to see the joy on the kid's face. You got to see the payout on the parent's face. You're like, okay, that was my payout for that endeavor, right? For the work we put in. And those are awesome experiences. But, but to your point on adulting, they have different cadences. And I think of mom payout, raising children is totally different than a payout for, business transaction or a business deal. And the feedback and the timing and the loop of that might be longer. So great points, Ash. And I really appreciate it. Thanks for sharing where you're at. What's the biggest thing you're still trying to figure out as being an adult?
AshtonBeing a hundred percent with it, it's probably just figuring out what exactly I want to do, how I like, what I want to do and how I want to do it. Trying to make sure I'm working towards something that I find the most fulfilling because I just don't know if I'm a hundred percent, Certain with what I'm with what I'm at and what I'm doing. And so it's just kind of a little bit of discovery needs to be made this year. I'd say
Dadperfect. Thank you Good point. Anybody gonna ask me? Oh, I mean this is supposed to be a dialogue, not just me interviewing you guys. Sure. You guys can cross ask questions.
AshtonDad, what has been some of the successes that you've enjoyed this year?
DadSince we've last recorded, we got Gene home from a mission that was a huge payday for, for your mom and myself. We also had a pretty rough month in October, started probably really just about before my birthday. October, I turned 50, which is a milestone birthday for me. And, and it was a pretty rough month. I'm not going to lie. Not just the fact that I was turning 50, but I was taking the youth group up to do a camp out, and on my way up the truck started to overheat again. So this truck was down in the shop for two weeks. Another turbo went out, so I had some money go on out there. I've yet to replace the full income that I had previously when, before I got laid off due to the economic changes then on the way down to go to the shop, Michelle called me and said, I found a leak where the floor was buckling and why it was buckling. Call their insurance and they drug their feet to try and get that to us and get that taken care of and so we're there with the broken truck a tore up house I busted one of my front teeth bottom teeth broke where I had a crown and and snapped it off and so I had an implant put in so it's just a lot that piled on and there was a time you know where I'm starting to feel like Wow, it woes me, right? All these things are happening and I can't catch a break and there's, there's a cycle I think that we can catch ourselves in. We can always look for the bad thing and, and one night when I was laying there, I turned to your mom and said, you know, really the fact of the matter is we've got a lot of good going for us if we're willing to take a step back and take a deep breath and look around and say, okay, we're going to be okay. Yeah, this all sucks. You know, and then when we're finally got approval from the insurance company about how much they were going to spend. We couldn't get an appointment booked with the general contractor to get it done before Jean got home. We decided we're going to do most of the work and still trying to fight the money side of it. Which still hasn't been totally solved, but you know, whatever, four months and somebody hit my truck and I'm like, okay, this is it. Nothing else bad can happen, you know. But, but it did, you know, there's still rough times. But as you step back and you look, I'm like, God, I still have my health. The, the, the inputs I can control are only the inputs I can control. That, that was the biggest lesson for me over the last month is sometimes we have to look at our inputs and say, okay, am I putting in what I want to, to get out what I need to? And one thing that really helped me is in 2023 for this year, my goal has been mobility. Physical fitness and I was able to keep going to the gym and go to the gym every day and try and stay strong Physically not just emotionally but physically and I really believe that that helped me. That's cool. That's
Ashtoncool. Yeah I remember every time I came home and visited and if I stayed the night, it'd be like, okay We're gonna be gone really early Maybe see you tomorrow. Maybe not. It's like, it sounds good. Cause y'all are heading to the gym. You should probably do a full episode on that whole October when it has worn off.
DadThat was wild. Well, you know, the nice thing is I did document it and I think it does warrant a conversation about mental health. Right. Especially when you're going through a lot.
AshtonSo it'll be fun. It'll be fun when we hear that. I think you, you kind of already covered what you, did you cover what you want to work
Dadon throughout the season yet? No, I talked about, I talked about what I was working on in 2023 and, and the thing I need to do and I think it probably echoes a little bit of what everybody's talking about Continue to get clarity. You know, we've got some big things that we're trying to address mom and I, as we're launching a new business, which is I'm grateful for, I have a new client for pushing it, which is going well. We're getting some traction with our nest to empty nest. And then Gideon's put in some fantastic work on adulting decrypted on the website. Now with Jean back and with everybody refocused, I'm excited to where we can take adulting decrypted. So, I think my, probably my biggest thing for 2024 is consistency, I think would be my word. So, I think we can spend a couple episodes talking about consistency, consistency of effort. That would be the thing I'd like to focus on. Yeah,
Gidthat's awesome. I totally
Geneagree. And I don't think it's just consistency inputs. Yeah. I guess that also covers like, not just like the physical inputs that we put in, like, the hard work. It's also like, the consistency of our personality. The consistency of who we are and who we want to be. Consistently
Dadworking. I like that gene showing up and being present there's been a lot of research I've been doing on a lot of things I'm excited to explore in season 7 as a group as it pertains to emotional Resilience pushing it some stuff gene came back from his mission with that. He wrote down that he thought man, that'd be great Enjoyed conversation. I've had with each one of you guys individually now. I'm looking forward to sometimes to do some Zoom recording as Jean will be down at SUU going to school and Ashton will be probably up in Salt Lake, you know, so we're starting to spread out and that's okay. That's part of life and excited about that next step for adulting to crypt and where we can take it into 2024.