Full Transcript for The Difference Between Being Nice and Being Kind

little moments are gonna turn into resentment because the problem doesn't disappear because you refuse to talk about it. Being kind sometimes means having the conversation before resentment has a chance to grow, even when it's uncomfortable. Especially when it's uncomfortable. I want to talk to you guys about marriage for a minute. I think a lot of men confuse being a good husband with never ever upsetting their wives. You know, that old saying, and I hate it, happy wife, happy life. Ho ho ho. And that's not realistic. You're two different people, two different cultures, possibly two different upbringings. You're gonna have different opinions on how things work. Different needs, different expectations, different ways of seeing things. Sometimes you're just gonna fucking disagree. That's okay. The question is how you handle those disagreements. You can disagree with your wife all day long and still respect her. You can have a boundary and still love her. You can tell her something is bothering you without attacking her. You know, we learn this in therapy all the time: that when you talk to somebody and somebody's bothering you, you don't say, You do this. When you do this, you say things like I feel. I feel like when this happens, this is how I feel, this is how I act, this is why I behave the way I do. You don't ever attack your wife. If you want a peaceful, loving, amazing marriage, and I'm not talking about like if she's cheated on you or like bad stuff, right? But disagreements like maybe she didn't get to clean the house that day. Or she says she wasn't cooked dinner or didn't, or whatever. She forgot to pick up the kids because she thought you were supposed to. You can let her know that it bothers her without attacking her, saying, I can't believe you did this, or why did you do this? There's no need for that. And you can hear something that you don't want to hear without turning into a fucking courtroom or becoming a fucking asshole or becoming a fucking monster. I've talked about this before. Winning an argument isn't the same thing as taking care of your marriage. But neither is avoiding every argument. Because sometimes men will say, I just want to keep her happy. Okay. But are you actually helping your relationship? Or are you saying yes to things you resent? Are you pretending to agree with decisions you don't support? Are you refusing to communicate what it is you actually need? Because eventually your wife might think everything is fine, or you're quietly becoming more and more frustrated. And that's not fair to either one of you. Now, here's the other side of this. Being kind also means recognizing when your wife needs something from you that definitely might inconvenience you. I give you an example. My wife suffers from migraines, right? It's very random. A lot of times, if the weather here in Florida is bad, thunderstorms, whatever, whatever reason, she'll get a migraine. Here's the thing: I work from home. You know, I'm a podcast

host. This is what I do. I run businesses, everything I do out of my home. I'm here in the house. So I walk the dogs. We have two dogs. I walk the dogs twice a day, right? She comes home. She walks the dogs at night before we go to bed. I fucking hate walking my dogs. I hate it. I'm sorry. I hate it. If I had a house with a backyard, I'd just let them run out in the backyard. Let them go be outside. But I have to do what I have to do because I'm in the townhouse. I don't have a backyard. Is that inconvenience, right? Anytime she's been sick, anytime she's had a headache. Or anytime she really just didn't fucking want to, I'll go take the dogs out at night. Regardless if I want to or not, because it's an inconvenience, yes. But I'm gonna help my wife. I'm gonna recognize that she needs this from me. That may inconvenience me. Or when she asks me, hey, the car needs an oil change, the car needs, you know, a tire rotation, whatever. And while I could do it myself, okay. Babe, I'll schedule the appointment for you and we'll go take the car to the mechanic. It's just easing that burden a little bit. You know, maybe she needs you home more often. Now, of all the high performers I talk to all the time, and when I was doing coaching, a lot of times, if your wife says, Hey, I need you home more often, it's not because she's nagging you. She needs you more home more often. If you got in a relationship and you got married and you're constantly hanging out with the boys and always like, Okay, I understand you have to have friends and you can go hang out with the boys, but I need you home. I want to spend time with you. I want to be with you. Maybe that's what you need to do. Maybe she needs help carrying more responsibilities around the house. Maybe you need to stop needs you to stop treating every conversation like a problem that you're supposed to solve. Maybe sometimes she just fucking needs you to be an active listener. And being kind means taking those needs seriously. Not because you're afraid she's gonna get mad. Not because you're trying to earn bonus points, but because you love her and her well-being also matters to you. A kind husband isn't a man who always says yes. He's a man whose words and actions show that his wife matters. And that includes being honest when something isn't working. Now let's talk about another subject, fatherhood. This is one of the biggest places where being nice and being kind gets confused, especially when you're a divorced dad. And I can speak to this from my own experience. When you don't get to see your kid every day, there's a temptation to make every moment enjoyable. Give in to them, give everything they fucking want. You don't want to waste the time you have. You don't want to be the parent who's always enforcing rules. You don't want your child upset with you when you already have limited time together. I understand that. Believe me, I've had issues with this. But here's the problem. If I'm so worried about my son being happy with me that I stopped being his father. I'm not doing him any favors. Sometimes being a father means saying no. Sometimes it means enforcing a consequence or a rule that was broken. Sometimes it means having that conversation with your kid that you don't want to have and your kid doesn't want you to have with him. Sometimes it means telling them that something they're doing is obviously wrong, and sometimes you're going to be pissed off at you. That's parenting. Because my responsibility isn't to make sure my son likes every fucking decision I make. My responsibility is to help him become a capable, responsible, decent human being. That requires love, patience, understanding, but it requires standards. Now there's a difference between discipline and humiliation. You don't have to scream at your kid. Guess what? I did that for freaking 15 years of the 18 years I was married. I screamed at two of my three kids. Now my youngest son. He's lucky that as I've worked through my shit, I don't scream at him. I don't yell at him. I talk to him. I don't belittle him. I don't make him afraid of me. I can hold my son accountable without making him feel worthless. That's what kindness looks like in fatherhood. You can be firm without being cruel. I think that's a lesson a lot of us had to learn and learn the hard way, especially if we grew up in a household where disability maybe meant yelling, intimidation, or anger. But we can do better. But doing better doesn't mean removing every boundary. It means learning how to enforce boundaries with love. Now, this is one I've personally, personally, personally and continue to deal with, and that's divorce and co parenting, especially as a divorced dad over 10 years. And if you listen to a recent episode about what 10 years of divorce taught me, you know co parenting hasn't always been easy. One of the hardest lessons I've learned is that you cannot control the other adult. You cannot force somebody to communicate, you cannot force somebody to agree with you. You cannot force somebody to let go of anger, but you can control how you conduct yourself. And this is where the difference between being nice and kind becomes especially important. Because sometimes, in an effort to avoid conflict, parents agree to things they generally believe aren't their child's best interest. They don't want to argument, they don't want another nasty text, they don't want another confrontation. So we just go along with it. But here's my question. Are you keeping the peace for your child or are you avoiding the conflict for yourself? They're not the same thing. Sometimes the kindest thing you can do for your child is respectfully stand your ground and say, no, I don't agree with that. Here's why I'm concerned. I think we need to talk about what's best for our child and then have the conversation like an adult. Now let's be very clear. That doesn't give you permission to become combative. It doesn't give you permission to

attack the other parent. And it doesn't give you permission to use your kid as a messenger. And it sure as hell doesn't mean dragging your child into the argument or disagreement. You can be kind to your child while maintaining firm boundaries with the other parent. Sometimes that means accepting the other person isn't going to be happy with your decision. That's okay. You don't have to win their approval. You do have to remain responsible for your behavior. And if communication can consistently becomes hostile or unproductive, Kindness may mean keeping communication brief, factual, and focused on your child. Not every disagreement needs a 10-page text message. Sometimes the best response is a respectful boundary and then getting back to being a good father. Here's something else I'm gonna address. Somewhere along the way, a lot of men we started treating kindness like it's weakness. Like if you're compassionate, you're a pussy. If you're patient, you're weak. If you're respectful, you're somebody's bitch and you're gonna be taken advantage of. It's bullshit. I've worked in the military, law enforcement environments, I've been around men who could handle themselves in extremely difficult situations. Some of the strongest men I know were also some of the kindness. We didn't need to intimidate everybody. We didn't need to win every argument. We didn't need to prove how tough we were. We could remain calm. We can treat people with dignity. When something needed to be addressed, we addressed it. That's strength. Because anybody can lose their shit. Anybody can be disrespectful. Anybody can tell somebody to just fuck off. But you can remain respectful when you're frustrated. Can you enforce a boundary without being an asshole? Can you tell somebody the truth without trying to humiliate them? Can you apologize when you're wrong? Can you help somebody who's struggling without making them feel weak or needing help? That's the kind of man I want to be. Not somebody who's nice because I'm afraid of confrontation, and not somebody who's cruel because he thinks it makes him strong. A man who knows how to be gentle and when to stand firm and understand that those things aren't opposites. This is an important distinction because I've heard people say, Well, I'm just brutally honest. And usually what comes next is something completely unnecessary. They insult somebody. Maybe they embarrass somebody. They make a hurtful comment and then they hide behind, I'm just telling the truth. Okay, but was your goal to help that person? Or did you just want to say something hurtful? Because those things are two different things. Honestly, without compassion, it's gonna become cruelty. And compassion without honesty is. Can become avoidance. Kindness requires you to do both. Think about your friend who's struggling with his health. You could say, bro, you're getting fat as fuck. What happened to you? And in the military or law enforcement, that may work. But you could say,

hey man, I've noticed you haven't seen like yourself lately. You doing okay? Do you want to start training together? Both conversations might come from recognizing that something has changed, but one attacks the person while the other offers support. I know which kind of friend I'd rather have. The same applies to marriage, fatherhood, leadership, coaching, whatever. Tell the truth because you care about the person, not because you want to prove you're right. And sometimes the kindest thing you can say is, I don't know what you're going through, but I have your back. You don't always have to have the perfect device. Sometimes people just need somebody willing to listen. Now you guys know the deal, you know the routine, and you know the drill. If you're new here, I don't want you listening to this episode and thinking, that was some good shit. And then changing absolutely nothing about your life. So we have to put something practical behind it. I always ask five questions. Five questions I want you to ask yourself. And I want you to think about your answers within your marriage, your kids, your friendships, your workplace, and those people you deal with every day. Question one. Am I doing this because it's right? Or am I doing this because I want to be liked? That's the first one. Before you say yes, before you agree, before you avoid the conversation, ask yourself Am I making the decision because it's generally the right thing to do? Or because I just don't want somebody upset with me. There's nothing wrong with wanting people to like you, but it shouldn't determine your integrity and your reality. Question two Am I avoiding a conversation that could actually help somebody? Is there something you need to tell your wife, maybe your child, a friend, a coworker? Something you've been putting off because it's uncomfortable? Maybe that conversation is exactly what the relationship needs. Have it respectfully, but have it. Question three. Can I say no without feeling like a bad person? Guys, this is huge. Because if every time you say no, you feel guilty, you're eventually going to start saying yes again to things you don't have the time, energy, or willingness to do. That builds resentment. A respectful no is sometimes kinder than a dishonest yes. Question four Am I using honesty as an excuse just to be an asshole? Think about the way you communicate. Are you correcting somebody to help them or embarrassing them to make yourself look better? Are you telling the truth or are you using the truth as a weapon? Your intent matters, but so does impact. You can be direct without being disrespectful. And question five Do the people closest to me experience my kindness? This might be the hardest question you have to answer. Because it's easy to be nice to strangers. It's easy to smile at somebody at the grocery store. It's easy to compliment somebody on social media. But what about the people within your circle that live with you? What about your wife, your kids, your closest friends? Do they get your patience? Your understanding, your compassion? Or does everybody else get the best version of you while the people closest to you get Whatever's left over. Because if you want to know what kind of man you're becoming, don't just look at how you treat people when everything is going well. Look at how you treat the people closest to you when the shits hit the fan, you're tired, stressed, frustrated, disappointed, or broken. That's where your kindness really gets tested. Look, getting really close to fifty. I'm forty nine April sixth, I will be fifty. And I've been thinking a lot more about the kind of man I want to be as I'm on this back half of my life. Not just the things I want to accomplish, not just the money I want to make, not just the business I want to build, but the kind of husband, father, friend, and man I want people to remember the impact, the legacy. And I don't particularly care if everybody thinks I'm a nice guy. Don't get me wrong. I obviously don't want people thinking that Rob is an asshole. But being liked by everybody just isn't the goal. Being liked by everybody isn't the goal. Being somebody the people I love and that I can count on is the goal. I want my wife to know that she can tell me anything, especially if it's difficult, without me immediately becoming defensive. I want my kids to know I love them enough to tell him no or tell them no when it's the right answer. I want my friends to know that if you're fucking up, I'm gonna hold your feet to the fire. And I'm not gonna sit there and cheer for you to destroy your life even more. It's easier, you know, for someone to destroy themselves than trying to have the uncomfortable conversation. And I want people to know even when I disagree with them, I'm going to try to treat them with respect and dignity. Am I gonna get that right every time? Of course not. I'm still working on it, but that's the standard I'm trying to live by. And here's what I want you to take away from this episode. Being nice isn't the problem. Being nice at the expense of your honesty, your boundaries, and your responsibilities is the problem. You don't have to choose between being a good man and being a strong man. You can be both. You can be compassionate and direct. You can be respectful and firm. You can love somebody and still tell them no. You can hold somebody accountable without tearing them down. You can stand up for yourself without becoming the kind of person you don't want to be. This week's Battle ready challenge, I want you to identify one conversation you've been avoiding because you just don't want somebody to be upset with you. Maybe it's your wife, your kid, friend, coworker. Ask yourself whether that conversation actually needs to happen. And if it does, figure out how to approach it with both honesty and compassion. Don't go into it looking for a fight. Don't go into it trying to prove you're right. Go into it trying to make something better. Because here's the difference I want you to remember. A nice man wants people to feel good about him. A kind man wants to do right by people, even when they don't feel good about what he has to say. And the best men I know, they learned how to be both. Take care of yourselves, take care of the people you love, and turn your pain into progress, and always battle harder.