Episode 012 - Comparison: Raising the Child You Have, Not the Child You Imagined

Audio: Hey dads, today we are talking about comparison. and if we're not careful, comparison can kill a lot of meaningful relationships in our lives. So comparison is sneaky. Not only Reese does it steal our joy, but what it does is it changes the way that we see ourselves, our wives, our kids, other dads around us. If we're not careful, we compare our children to our own childhood or maybe other children around us, our wives to other women around us, our dad to ourselves. There's a whole lot of relationships we can compare in our fatherhood journey. and really what's at stake here is eventually we stop seeing the people that God has given us to love and to steward and to lead because we're too busy measuring them against some other person or some imaginary person that doesn't even exist. So another fun episode today, a lot of laughs, a lot of stories. Looking forward to jumping into it with you, dads.
The Boys And Audio: Hey, welcome to the Relatively Functional Dads podcast for fathers doing their best and learning every day. We're just three relatives walking through faith, fatherhood, and real life together. That was me. No experts here, just honest conversations about the wins, the struggles, and the moments that shape us as men and dads. Some days we've got it together, other days we're just trying to get to bedtime, but we keep showing up. And if you're dad... In the middle of it too, you're in the right place. Let's journey through this together.
Audio: Reese, tell us about the closed selection. I am very excited about this topic today. I'm excited specifically to hear what you two have to say about it because I don't really struggle with comparison in any way, shape, or form because I'm the best. He's the GOAT. but if you do struggle with comparison, you probably struggle with it on social media, of which we are available in many forms on YouTube, Instagram, Apple Podcasts, Spotify at Relatively Functional Dads. If you haven't already, give us a subscribe. Like, follow, and leave a comment. We don't have a question this week from from a listener. We need we need a new question for people. So Yeah, what the heck, dads and moms? Here's my question. Did you choose that we were doing a comparison topic and then show up just rocking your guns like no one's business and thinking this is fine and I'm just gonna breed envy, d jealousy in comparison with other people to look at those shoulders and be So so listeners on Spotify and Apple Pod or what other other ratchet platform you'd use besides YouTube, stop listening right now. Hop on the YouTube so you can see the video. Reese is wearing the wife pleaser, as he likes to call it. showing off the guns. Noah has a very warranted question and we deserve an answer. Are we recording this? I didn't I didn't even know that this was Yeah. That we put this out online. We got video. I thought that this was audio only. Audio only. I'm so sorry. If I had known that if I had yeah, if I had known that, no, I just you know, spilled a bunch of food on my shirt at work today. I have a spare, but I lifted in this, so and it felt good, so I decided to come over in this to answer question. The new uniform. But yeah, so Dads, don't compare yourself to Reese, he's in the middle of a cut, he's looking good. But to his point, yeah, make sure you follow along. We do not have any question this episode. We'd love to hear one. We've had some good ones last few ones. So drop a comment on YouTube, DM us, on Instagram, send us an email. 'Cause this community is for you guys. We wanna know segment ideas, we wanna know, man, I have a really good one from a bud that I don't have time to share, but he had a should have known better about his kid peeing in the pool. So Nice. We are here for all of those. We'll give you a shout out if you tag us or you reach out, send us a message, we wanna hear more. So Anyways, Reese, thanks for really bringing this topic today. when you came to know and I with this, I thought this was a great idea because comparison, maybe it's not on social media, maybe that's not your thing, but there are layers and layers and layers of this. We're gonna jump into it before we do. Let's have a little fun. What you got? Today we got hold on. Wait a second. I'm on page two. That's why. Big I thought something like Big Dad Energy. We have we've got fun segments. Big Dad Energy and Dad Decisions. Starting off with Big Dad Energy. do you wanna go first or do you want me to go first? I want you to go first because I think mine's gonna take a little longer to explain. But for the listeners, if you don't know Big Dad Energy, it's obviously just a time you wanna really kind of brag on yourself, push the shoulders back, chest up. we have a lot of laugh at our pains, should've known better. So this is the one time a month or so we We actually just unapologetically we brag on ourselves. Yeah. well that's great. Mine shouldn't shouldn't take too terribly long. It's just I watched Roman alone, which I do frequently, but I watched them at a party. And if you don't know me, I don't like large crowds of people in most circumstances. No. Especially when the ratio of kids to adults is at bare minimum one to one, if not more kids than adults. So Noise levels get me a little overstimulated. But Ellie had to work, so I was watching Roman at a birthday party. I fed him while he was in my lap with some watermelon that spilled all over him. But I managed to get through a several-hour party without my kid badly injuring himself, ruining all of his clothes. Had one moment where he almost swan dived down the stairs, but But didn't but crisis averted. And I gotta back you up on that. I was sitting across from him while he was trying to feed Roman and Roman was determined to be running to the stairs. Like that boy was bear crawling as fast as he could to the downstairs. Not the upstairs, the downstairs. Yep. And Reese again and again was like, Nope, come on back. And he did a great job in doing that. But he it was a loud night and so Kudos to dude. Yes, it was my thank you. For the listeners for my wife's birthday party. So a lot of our friends have kids that are six and under. So it was wild. Reese, I know you're introverted. I turned turned the corner and there's tables all set up like in the basement, on the porch, in the kitchen, and there's I don't even know if you set up that card table or if it was there. I did set it up. And he's sitting there eating by himself. I think it was in the dark, it may not have been. I don't remember. But bro, you s dimly lit. You sat here's here's the only J V move you made. You sat in the only room in the house with carpet. Yeah, I told that to them and they're like, no, don't worry about it 'cause they're so nice. Yeah. my our our in laws. But you made your job twice as hard. I I was very frustrated at myself. Luckily, it was one of those nights where my son loves almost any like meat and cheese food that you set in front of him. My man. The past two weeks though, for some reason, when we've set meat down in front of him, he has thrown it immediately. Not out of anger, just like it's an instant reaction. Almost like a knee-jerk reaction. You set the food down, he just throws it or swipes it off the table. so he's only interested in eating bread. I gave him one piece of watermelon, which he spilled everywhere, got him a bib, and then he didn't want watermelon anymore. So if he had eaten the full meal that was not red it would have been way worse. But either way, yes, I did choose the only carpeted room, with any table. So through through and through rookie move. You you did an incredible job. Introvert, socialized, son not injured, wifey was working, you held down the fort, dude. Yeah. Not gonna lie. They had us in the second half. Yeah. But the first half, we we were cooking. Well, because you had a a big enough you really cushioned the lead there. So that's that's right. So you're good. You're good. All right, I'm ready to hear this one. Yeah, what you got? So my life the last couple weeks has been a beautiful celebration of good things. Where sometimes you just drown in success in life. And that's where I'm at in this season, man. You're in the Ricky Bobby season. I'm just you wake up or every morning and you just piss excellent. Pissing excellence. Work. We're drowning in success at work. we're drowning with kids. Grayson, Madeline, Naomi. all had birthdays within a seven day, literally in a in a one week period that we just wrapped up. Naomi's birthday was two days ago. So I say drowning and success 'cause you sh you're drowning either way. But it's really, really good thing. So it's hard to complain. So I say all that saying hard to complain. But the big dad energy moment was I'm about a week and a half in to just kind of the grind this past weekend because we planned a big old birthday party. If you see my shirt that says Daddy Sorus on it. We had a dinosaur princess theme birthday party for the kids. same theme for Madeline's thirty-first. It was the weirdest theme. I'm just kidding. She had like her golden birthday 'cause it was July thirty first is her birthday. She turned thirty one. So two big shindigs. I'm not a huge party planner. but yeah, together we we had a c a couple awesome parties with a lot of great people. I say I'd say I was I was I was limping into the weekend this weekend. A lot going on, people out for work, just really tired. But Madeline's birthday, Friday, her best friend said, Hey, can I take her for three hours? And just bless her. And I said, say less. Absolutely. So whenever Madeline's best friend says something like that, you say, I'll watch the kids, I'll do whatever's needed. So I get off work around 2 30 on Friday, and I still don't got a gift from Madeline. And it's like it's it's her birthday. And in my defense, she just told me two days earlier she wanted a bike. And she had a hard time picking a gift, she's just not a big gift person. But so I said, you know, there's a lady in Brownsburg, which is about thirty-three minutes from my house. About that was very specific. It's about 33 minutes. But yeah, yeah. So I was like, I can I can do this. So I loaded up all three kids. So for the listeners who don't know, I got a three month old, I got a now three year old, now five year old. And just got them up from nap, got snacked up, got Karis a bottle, and we drove to this lady who has like two hundred bikes in her house. And wow, I'm not a bike dude. I know enough I want a hybrid bike. Which is not a road bike and it's not a mountain bike and it's not a cruiser. That's what I'll know about bikes. It's in between. It's it's in between. It's a hybrid. And that's at least three more types of bikes than I knew existed. Dude, I'm telling you, I'm pretty proud that I even know four types of bikes. So I knew that's what I wanted. And I also know the size of the the wheel and the frame matters because you really gotta get the right size bike. So those are the only things I need. So I asked this lady, Do you have these two like this size bike, this type of bike? She's like, Yeah. So I get there with my kids. They're they're doing pretty well. Some old old lady who doesn't speak English answers the door. And I'm like, what's going on? She's like, You here to buy a bike? Like through like very broken English. And my three semesters of Spanish were not about to come out in this situation. And eventually she tried to say, My spouse isn't here, but I think she was trying to say her my daughter's not here. So she opens the garage and there's no joke, 200 bikes in there. Here's the problem, gentlemen. Half of them are kids' bikes. And I got Kara sleeping in the car seat. I got her out of the car. And my kids are like licking their chops trying to jump on these bikes. yeah. And I was thinking I'd talk to this lady, ask her two very basic questions. Show me the bike. Is this the frame size? Is this what's the cost? I'd be out there in five minutes. She's calling her daughter, who her daughter, who's supposed to be in meeting there. She's yeah, I forgot to tell you, I'm not gonna be there. So I'm trying to talk to this lady about this bike. So I have a really bad internet trying to pull it up and find the bike. So I'm like, if I can find the model bike, I can figure out if this is the type of bike I need. And then this this lady who doesn't speak English is selling a Spider Man bike to my son. So no. So I look I look over, bro, and he's on this bike. I I didn't even know he could get on bikes by himself. You're your host. There's no one who thinks this is hilarious. She wants to get on one. So finally I was like, dude, I don't even care how much this bike costs. Like We're my Venmo wasn't working. I finally got Zell pulled up. I sent it to this lady. She's on the phone. She's like, I got the money. I load the bike in my car. Naomi's having a total meltdown because she didn't get a chance to ride on the bike. So I let her sit on a princess one that had like a like a seat in the back for your doll, which she really liked. And she's like, $65. And I'm like, Lady, you need to go into your house. I can't handle this. And eventually, eventually through many, many, many tears, all three kids get back in the car. Wow. I get this bike. We drive thirty-three minutes. This is the adult bike. This is the adult bike. Not the Spider-Man bike or anything. We had we had no additional bikes. Okay. My go-to, you have to have a reason is there's no room in the car, sweetie. There's no room in the car. Once we put the other bike in, it's the minivan. You just keep getting smaller and smaller cars. There's no room. But my big dad energy was we got home, wifey's getting her nails done, hanging with her best friend. They did some pottery. She came back refreshed. She said, Hey, can you come pick me up from the place so can go out to dinner? And we did. And yeah, cleaned cleaned the bike up. It was lightly used. So we had time to clean it up. We put some ribbons on it, we decorated it, and she she had a birthday gift on her birthday. That's all golf clap for buddy. Dude, everyone, very, very proud of that. Kept it together, was very tired that night, but yeah, some big dad energy. That's awesome. That's my story. That's a great story. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I'm glad you I'm glad it ended with you getting the bike for one. Yep. I was worried you weren't making it home with the bike and that you didn't come home with any additional bikes and you were able to hold it together. And here's the thing like she's ridden it a couple times. I still don't know if it's her dream bike. If she don't like it, I told her I'll put it back on marketplace, get my money back, and we'll get you another one. But I got something. At that point, I was like, there's like two options here. I just gotta. Yeah, you you fulfilled the it's the thought that counts regardless. I literally told her that, dude. I was like, I just want you to know I try it. Yeah, you you put in the effort. And it was appreciated. It was. I appreciated that that she recognized it. So that's awesome. Anyways. Yep, that's my big dad energy. All right. We're on to dad decisions. Dad decisions. So, no, you can be involved in this one if you want to. No pressure. I'm gonna go, I'm gonna read off the first one. Would you rather win against your kid in any competition of your choosing? Forever. Yeah. But you tweak a muscle. That's my life. And by tweak a muscle, I'm talking a three to seven day recovery. Not you're down for the count and like can't do anything for months on end. Three to seven days. Gotta ice it a little bit. Less than a week. You're just like, every time you walk, you're kind of just like hamstrings flaring up a little bit, people make fun of you, that kind of stuff. You're getting old. Tweak a muscle every time and hear about it from your spouse. the classic like, I told you. I told you not to go out. I told you to be careful before you left the house. Please don't injure yourself. I told you not to go drill him in the face with a dodgeball and you just throw out your shoulder. Come on, man. Yep. That kind of stuff. We haven't hit the deductible. We can't be going to the doctor. I have I have heard this from multiple multiple people, multiple husbands who are older than me, that their wife, not every time, but many times when they leave the house to do anything sports related, please don't hurt yourself. And if you do, like you try not to say anything. Yes. No, no, it's fine. Like seriously, it's no big deal. Okay. Second half of this. Or or your kid beats you at every competition forever. All of them. Giving you buckets. And they, your spouse and friends and family make fun of you for it ruthlessly. Yeah. You can give this one some thought. I can run through it one more time if we need to. Yeah, so it's essentially you win, but you your pride gets hurt from being injured. And the first option, caveat is that you get to choose when you beat your kid in competition. Okay. So it's not that you just they never win anything. Now that's helpful. They never win anything. You're crushing their spirit, you've ruined them for life. They think they're just a big loser. You just have the option anytime you go into competition with them to choose to whoop up. But if you get the dub, you're going to tweak some. But if you get the dub, you're going to tweak something. Okay. Three, seven day recovery. So my dad, I I remember and he would tell me this story. So I mean I grew to be six inches taller than my dad. So when I was about fourteen, I was the same height as him. Maybe tall. I think I was taller at the age of fourteen. so that's about the time I beat him like legit one on one in basketball. I was probably thirteen, fourteen years old. And like I didn't know this at the time, but he came in the house like legit crushed and told my mom. It was like it happened. I knew this day was coming. It happened. And my mom was like, get over it, you know? Yeah. But he was like legit crushed. And then we had like six months or year where he'd win some, I'd win some. And then there there was no look back. There was no looking back. He would hit me with the will you let me score sometimes? Like I let you when you were seven, you know? No, I did. I'd cook you know. yeah. So this like I feel this. I'd I probably have it coming to me at some point with one of my kids just being way better. but I'm I'm gonna go I'm gonna go beat them when I want and tweak my neck or my calf because I'm talking right now with a tweaked neck, dude. This is just my my calf sore from running last night. Like this that's just something I'm used to. It's just luck of the draw. It could be a calf, hamstring, quad, dude. I'll take way too many in said anyway. It's not the same thing every time. Okay. But I'm gonna go that. 'Cause I gotta let them know that I can run this house. Yes, absolutely. Okay. It's a great answer. Noah, you or me, or you just want to sit out on this one? for me it's no question. I will happily take a tweak muscle and just like my wife's minor disappointment for a little bit of time to have the ability to still dunk on my kid. Noah g Noah the type who'll back you down from the three point line just to get the dust. Right. Yeah. I don't remember my family's pretty active in athletic. So I I think that if if they really if like if my My dad or stepdad really wanted to. They could and sometimes they do like if we play twenty one. I don't just automatically win every time. But there was a point where I was young enough, energetic enough, had gained enough weight to where my stepdad was just worried about getting injured every time that he would play with me. Not because I was better than him necessarily, but because I was gonna go super hard. Yep. Elbows were gonna be flying. Yep. I was gonna try and run you over that. You're the type of guy I hit you with a pump fake and you'll jump so high you'll land on top of me. Yes. So I can't even score. You just maul But you go to the free throw line. Yeah. You're going you're going to the free throw line. And then pick up basketball. It's like this there's no you just check it up again. You don't get anything. Yeah. I I just I don't know, I just love sports. I do. I would I don't care what I don't care if it's backyard or whatever. I'm I really want to win. You do. Yeah, so I love it. definitely win. I'll take the tweak muscle. Easy easy decision. If you threw in the caveat that I beat my I by the way, I changed the verbiage. I put win against my kid instead of beat my kid just because the opening statement sounded bad. So win against my kid. If it was every time and I didn't have a choice, I think I would go the other option. I think so too. Cause I don't want to demoralize my kid into into thinking it's not even worth trying in any other capacity. Like a my dad just crushes me. I'm already finding the balance because Naomi's about to start soccer next week. So I'm like kicking the ball with her and she'll already get mad like when I take it from her. Which you gotta do. Like I'm teaching her how to play, but then at the same time, when do you like let her take it back from you? And yeah, I don't know. It's interesting. Side side question about this. How did you all ever feel if this ever happened, when someone older than you, specifically like a parent, maybe a dad, would let you piss me off. Would let you win at something. You ha you'd have to be real sneaky 'cause if I knew you're letting up, 'cause my dad I could tell, I'd get mad. I'd rather lose. I would rather lose, hands down. Yeah. it made me so mad. Found out that the first time I beat Ryan in ping pong, he was playing left handed. I was furious. man, it was like the greatest joy to the greatest deal. Do you wanna hear some bull crap? My dad would always be all time quarterback. We'd play like three on three football on the street. And if you were up three scores, this man would purposefully throw a pick to the team that was down. And he wasn't he wasn't good enough to like like throw an accurate pass barely to the wrong team. It would be like it would be it would be so obvious, dude. And you'd be so he'd be like, what? It would be like, I know what you're doing, bro. That's some that's some youth retreat. Some youth retreat type stuff. Like, all the all the athletes joined up together and they're killing the other. man That's funny. That's good memories, dude. Yeah, I like that one. So we always have a fun one and then we have a more serious one. Red Rock and Roll? Yeah, you got more serious one? Yes. And it doesn't take very long to explain this one. would you rather never compare yourself to another dad again or never compare your child to another child again? Yeah, it's a good comparison one. I didn't know if this one would kind of be i if it would be something that would be difficult to answer or if there's just one that automatically came to mind for y'all. But I th I think the thing that has the potential to be more damaging in my family is comparing my kids to other kids. Especially as they get older. And how a lot of time like their vices are seemingly vices, the thing that make them difficult or that you just don't enjoy about them. If you can be patient and and disciple and cultivate within them actually becomes one of their greatest strengths. But man, that can be choked out big time when you're looking at kids that are a little older or different personality type, different gender. Boys and girls are way different at this age of of my kids right now. yeah. I think that because for other dads that is a thing. And then and there's also the toxic side of it you gotta be aware of 'cause I mean there's times like I can be kind of self righteous. Say I'm man, my kids are a lot better behaved or I'm a lot better dad or I would never do that. So obviously that that has a potential to be damaging too. But I just feel like I could I could compare myself to another dad and it not damage my household as much as com comparing another kid to a kid. I I was thinking along similar lines. yeah, I th I think I'm I'm with you. It would be way more damaging if I was constantly comparing Roman to another kid, especially if he knew about it or found out about it or anything like that. But I think that's potential to hurt everybody involved. And not that the sometimes like self-deprecating nature of comparing yourself to someone else doesn't damage your family, but I don't know. I see that more as like it damages my family, but it's an internal struggle that I gotta figure out. Yeah, walk through. The other one. I mean it's an internal struggle that you have to work through and figure out, but until you get it figured out, it's massively impacting your spouse and your kids in a in a big way. And also, if like if the if the other kid ever figures out it's super weird. Yeah. Like, I think your dad likes me more than he likes you. Like the why what is going on? Why's your dad so nice to me and And I work for a company that would say that's predatory. That's right, that's stay away from that. I also just think of like every TV show I've ever seen where a dad does this and I just hate the character almost the whole time. I'm like, just love your kid. Yeah. Love your kid for who they are. doesn't mean you have to love all their behaviors and things like that, but I heard I heard some really good advice. Maybe I I shared this a couple episodes ago, but it was an older dad on I was helping lead a a discussion on fatherhood at our church. And he's got some kids in like middle school and he would say, Hey, just go into your kids' bedroom and look around at what posters are on their wall. And then that's the thing you have to learn a lot about. Ask a lot of good questions, be passionate about. I love it. So if it's a band, if it's horses, if you got a daughter, if it's, you know, cars or a sports team, God forbid it's my son's a Bama fan or something, you know, just show interest in the recruiting cycle for them. But I thought that was just a really good way of saying, Hey, may not be things you Ever thought your kids like you hoped they would love, but it's something you need to love because that's your kid. Yeah. And I mean you can learn about Bama and be like, I heard Bama's gonna suck this year. That's true. I did a lot of research. A lot of research. It seems like they're gonna, they're gonna go eight and four this year. Which sounds about right. If we were taking bets. I'm smashing the under on the on the nine and a half wins. That's right. anything, Noah? Tennessee go balls. Go balls. No big orange. If you didn't know. I'm just waiting for Grayson to Absolutely love video games. Yeah. Yeah. That might be the one where I'd undo all this conversation. I can't wait to encourage it. That can be y'all's thing. It really like that's maybe we'll get into that. There can be things it's like, hey, I'm not super passionate, but I got up an uncle or another sibling or something like that, a cousin. That's cool. I remember I remember as a kid loving loving the idea of going hunting. My dad never took us hunting. Yeah. And I'm fine with that. But like if my if Mason has the same thought be like, You know, who is great and loves hunting. Yeah. Your uncle, buddy. I dream of it 'cause I got into hunting 'cause of my uncle. He took me every year and taught me everything that and like really into fishing. My dad took me fishing, but my uncle was like a fisherman. Is this the one out in Cali? Is there Louisiana? Yeah. real close. Real close. I I do have family from out there, but yeah, so like I I dream of that as as yeah, nephews, nieces get older, stuff like that. So Yeah. that's good stuff. I was hunting when I was playing God of War Ragnarok yesterday. Different type of hunting. You played video games yesterday? Yeah. After I made the outline. You got your responsibility. I got my I d do what you have to do before you do what you want to do. My man. Doesn't work all the time. Okay, so most of us imagined what fatherhood would be like before we had kids. And yeah, we thought we had an idea of what fatherhood would be like. We we thought we had an idea of what our kids would be like. do they love sports? Are they easygoing? Are they artists? Do our kids sleep really well? Do they listen? Do they love really good food? All these things that we know they may not love or be good at all this stuff, but we have some hopes. We have some dreams. The problem is when the hopes and dreams become expectations, and now your kids aren't meeting your expectations. You gotta do something with that. I don't I don't think it's a bad thing to name, but it can't rule the way that you you love them, you lead them, spend time with them, stuff like that. So question. What expectations did you have before becoming a dad? Yeah, let's just start there. What expectations, fair or unfair, did you have? Yeah. I I feel like we've maybe covered this once or twice, but I'm gonna take it from a different angle. I don't think I have many expectations. I feel like I was kind of given that gift by my parents. Not that they never had any expectations for me, but just like unfair. I didn't have I don't feel like I had a lot of unfair expectations put on me. I feel like I had a lot I have a lot of hopes. I really hope that Roman loves playing sports. And would you say it's a healthy expression? Like Yeah, I I think in a way that if he chose not to, it would be I I'll be sad. Sure. But I wouldn't make him feel bad for it. Right. at this point, I guess I wouldn't know until I'm in it. I don't think I would try and make him feel bad for it, but I'd like to I'd like to think I would not. so yeah, I would say it's healthy. Sports, I hope he's funny. I hope he has a sense of humor, which if he grows up around my family in any capacity, he will he will have some dry humor to throw around. shout out Papa Jeff. Yes, shout out Papa Jeff. Yeah, affectionate nicknames like Jackass have been thrown around in my family for for quite quite quite a few years. So, taken from the infamous Happy Gilmore, one of the greatest movies of all time. Absolutely. But no free shout outs. No free shout outs. yeah. I hope he's funny and I honestly I hope he loves Jesus. Yeah. That that would be the hardest thing for me. if he didn't. I know there I know plenty of parents have kind of watched their kids walk away from faith. Jesus altogether. I think that would be the hardest one for me. All the other stuff is kind of just I hope he likes doing I hope he likes hanging out with me. That's one big one. I hope he likes spending time with me. I don't care if he has several phases where it's like he doesn't he doesn't like hanging out with me for a time, or he whether that's just from a coolness perspective, or even that he's mad at me and doesn't agree with my decision making for a little while, but I hope it always comes back. but yeah, I don't think that for him specifically, I have a ton of expectations besides maybe how to treat others. Yeah. I will be pretty upset and there will probably be consequences if I feel like he's regularly a jerk to other people, things like that. I don't know what that's gonna look like up to this point because right now he's either like a joy or a jerk to everybody. There's only there's only those two options. And he doesn't really he doesn't really know what he's doing. So yeah. Right now we're just enjoying him for for everything that he is and I hope to continue to do so. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, there's a lot of unknowns, but you can yeah you can establish that mindset right now as your kids growing. I was thinking about this honestly, like I expected my kids to listen to me more. Like if I'm gonna be honest and I I think You'll probably relate here in a couple more years. Cause right now Roman can't listen. Yeah, there's no expectation for that. There's not a lot of expectation. And here's why is my mom, I was not a perfect kid by any means, but she would always say, You were such an easy kid. You were such an easy kid. She just would always talk about that. I don't know if I had a vitamin D deficiency. I don't know if I was low on iron, but I think I just slept a lot and ate real well. And like four year old buddy was just a little pudgy and just kinda down to chill. Yeah, bro. So I I just kind of Probably because I heard that so often about me as a kid, thought my kids would be like that. Well, you know there's only one other factor. What's that? Me. No. yeah, there's another side. And honestly, Naomi is very similar to Madeline in some ways. We joke about that a lot. Madeline's got a firm sense of justice that as I say, as you cultivate that within Naomi, it's gonna be really great. She's gonna stick up for what's right. she has really a A compass for righteousness and and really wants to point towards what's righteous. sometimes in order to follow through with that righteousness, she does it in a way that's not righteous, right? As we see her like bullying and pushing her. Strong arm of the law. Dude, I'm telling you. That's exactly what it is. So I think I think honestly that was kind of my expectation is it would come easier. Sure. but yeah, my daughter is a lot more of a feeler. She's big emotional. Very compassionate, but then gets her feelings hurt real easy. She felt embarrassment today in a way I didn't understand because she was acting up. We had to bring her inside. We said, Hey, we won't have to bring you upstairs where we have like our timeout time. And she afterwards she really freaked out more than normal. And it's because our neighbor was over with her kid and she said, I was embarrassed that you said that in front of them. So we're like, Whoa, you just turned five and you're like, We now have to recalibrate how we're parenting. And so yeah, I I just and then I think some of it overall is just I was naive. I mean, I've never She was embarrassed that she was reprimanded in front of people. Yeah. Okay, I got you. Yeah. That's that is So there's like that's an older kid a process. Her awareness of that. So in my EQ still ain't like at that place where like I'll just say stuff and not realize it hurts people's feelings because I I didn't mean to say anything mean. But yeah soft. I don't remember everybody's soft. No, I'm just gonna fault it's all their fault. But I don't remember being three and being a three major and you know, but that's that's where Grayson's at and he'd just be yelling and hitting and so it's yeah, my expectations were that they would listen and respect my authority and I'm realizing it's you gotta you gotta cultivate that. It takes long, longer amount of time. But the thing is more than their obedience, I want them to learn to trust me. Sure. And that's the correlation with God right now. Is I don't want kids that just obey God's commandments. Eventually they gotta get there because they choose to obey God. Because they know God and they trust God. And we'll get Meredith Miller on the podcast. I think that's the goal here in the next couple months. But reading Woven really just reaffirmed, put some language in my own life. she wrote a book of just that's the importance of we can't have just obedience based discipleship for our kids. Because eventually if they don't know the person they're supposed to be obeying, yeah, dude, it falls apart. I got a question for for y'all. What do you think I guess up to a certain age makes a huge difference? 'Cause like you said, at first It's gotta be just part of the habit formation. But how do you feel about forced apologies? I I'm eight and ten years older than my brothers. So they would do stuff that they needed to apologize for all the time. whether it was to each other or to me or whatever. And sometimes they would be made to apologize. Yeah. And anybody with half a gnat's brain would know that Max was not sorry for throwing something at Wade's head. Yeah. And vice versa. What age are you thinking? I don't well for the two of them or just in general. just like when you think of this example. I guess I'm thinking I w I I wish I knew. Probably like five to eight. Okay. some I don't remember exactly, but I know they were they were little. I mean they were and it's not just them. I've just I've I've seen it happen before. Yeah. Forced apologies irritate me. I'd rather I'd rather that person either not say sorry, but again, it's a kid, and you want to build good habits of like, hey, this is what you do when you mess up and you make mistakes, or at least you should. But if you don't give the heart behind it and figure out or help them figure out, Hey, why are we even doing this? Yeah. I guess that just can Fall on deaf ears. it's a good question. Where where we've landed is they they do have to apologize. Sure. And they how they do it matters. So you have to look them in the eye. The other person has to say, I forgive you. And if they're not ready, they have to say it later later. Often we have them hug. Now they're three and five. It works out. I asked how old, because when they're five and eight, they might punch each other in the back of the head whenever they're not ready to forgive yet. So but where we're at now, it is about building the habit. Grayson is he's just like me. He's too quick to say sorry. Bro, I I'll apologize just to kind of just like let's just move forward. That boy Let's keep the peace. He's like still actively hitting someone saying sorry. And that's my bad. And Naomi's she feels a lot of shame or embarrassment. So she struggles more. But getting the reps in right now, I think will help when they're a little bit older. So maybe that goes against what I said of like like obedience base, but you do have to have practices for No, the practices, especially when they're young. I think that's that's the hard part is figuring it out because The only reason stuff like that irritates me is I really don't want an apology from an adult unless they actually mean it. Don't be saying sorry to me if you're not if you're not sorry. Cause I'll forgive you and then find out later that you didn't really care and then that'll Ten times worse. That'll make me really angry. It's a great question. Yeah. That's where we are currently. It might change, but yeah, that's where we're at currently. Okay. And it is helping. I think it is. So any any of those expectations surprise you or meh. Just kinda you thought you kind of thought those would be your expectations for a while. Yeah, I think an an another one, a new one, a different one than what I've mentioned is I I am surprised I was better at the newborn stage of being a dad than I thought. So that was good. Like I expected like the first year to be really the hardest year. I'd never change the diaper. I don't have younger siblings or cousins or stuff like that. So One thing I was surprised. You had never changed the diaper. Never had. You did change diapers in your child's first year. Yes. Just wanted to clarify that for you. So the listeners know I have changed the diaper of my three month old multiple times today. So today, yes. So yeah, leading up to it. Sorry, I mean to it's helpful. Interrupt. That's helpful so they know I'm not a complete fraud. Yes. but yeah, I I didn't it surprised me how how kind of naturally it came. Sure. And I think that is a lot to do with my wife helping me. Other people around me give me examples and then just the grace of God to hey, like if you don't carry the boats, no one will. Like it's time for you to be a dad and so that was a a really great surprise. And then the flip side is the the toddler the toddler phase, like when both my kids turned about two, I like, Holy crap, this just got a ton harder. Sure. so I was kinda surprised by that. I thought that would be the easier of the of the two that I've experienced so far. Sure. Makes sense. But you? Not really. I don't I don't think so. Every time that you give an expectation, I'm like, I guess I kinda thought that. Or like kinda thought something similar. So I would have assumed that the first couple years would be the hardest. I like you think that I will thrive when the kids are older, with just deep conversation. Yeah, dude. Things like that. I'm super excited about it. I hope that I don't get my bubble burst and find out that that's the part that I actually really really see. I really hope that's not the case. no, I can't wait to I mean I I alre I already have the opportunity to do it now, but it'll look different. But I can't wait to just like help shape inform my my kids, especially if they desire to have guidance, things like that. Just prepping prepping to be great at that now. So yeah, I'd say that's where I'm at. Cool. But good. Thanks for Sharon. Yeah, absolutely. I think that one of the biggest traps in parenting is assuming the way I grew up is the right way. Mm-hmm. Yeah. sometimes it's not the way, it's just a way. The goal isn't really to create our childhood. The goal is to faithfully parent the child God gave us. That's right. So my question for you is what's something your parents did that you thought was the right way until you became a dad? Yeah. I would say so much of of my life after like late elementary age revolved around sports. more like me playing sports. So I joined an AAU basketball team in sixth grade. very competitive. I was the worst kid on a on the team, but it was a really good team. I mean, we we would hardly ever lose games. So it was it was it took a lot of time and it was it was really hard for for me to jump into that. but I just assumed you know, I think just assumed that that was what was best at the time. It did help me improve as a as an athlete. played competitive high school basketball, peaked peaked there, you know, as a six foot two power forward, not many D one offers coming your way. Especially when you're thirty pounds underweight. But yeah, I think it just it took up so much of my life and maybe that's not my my it's not my parents' fault by any means, but not having some of the guidance maybe needed to recalibrate some of that. And now that like our daughter's starting soccer and upward, super competitive, they'll probably keep score. Upward. If they don't keep score, I will. Yes. And my goodness. Someone needs to. Don't get me started. I will sound like an arrogant jerk if I start talking about three. But seriously, we're thinking about like, my gosh, like already having to think through and maybe it's not sports, it's just other activities. I'm so pumped. Dude, it's gonna be fun, but I could see me getting so invested in it. And when you have my sister ran across country, I did high school basketball. If we had a third kid, dude, that just would really Just take everything. And that was my mom and dad's community. So we graduated and then I was no longer playing those sports. So those parents weren't there. And you began to see how they they poured everything into us, encouraging, always there, supportive, dropping us off at practice, even when we could drive, being everywhere. But yeah, I th I think that's something I thought was the right way at the time and my parents probably would, but I'm I'm probably gonna recalibrate a little bit as my kids get get older and get more involved in sports. It's really good one. Most of your answers are, but it's really awesome. Thank you. Yeah, my pleasure. I got a lot of time to think on it 'cause yeah, like I said, she's just starting and we're glad to get her in some organized something so she can learn how to be a good teammate, how to listen to coaches, stuff like that, and just start there. There's no I and team. No I and team. But there is an E. Let's go. Kobe Bryant. N and win. R. I. P. R. I. P. The GOAT. I'm gonna lead off with I think that this was well intentioned and it might be individualistic, but I think my parents overemphasized grades. granted, I was not a great student. so and a lot of it was I did not care. so I'm sure that some of the overemphasis on grades was more of an overemphasis on wanting to adjust my attitude about Yeah. About schooling. but and addressing the grades is the quickest way, easiest way to address it, right? Yes. but I do remember most of the anxiety or stress that I would feel growing up wasn't about what would happen at school or how I would do on tests. It would be about how coming home with those sorts of results were were going to affect my relationship with my parents. Because apart from that, I mean I was a I don't know, I feel like I had a broad broad range of how I would act as a kid. I was respectful, but also I was gonna question the rules because I didn't if they didn't make any sense to me, things like that. bro, you got some funny stories. Probably for another day, but you guys For another day. We gotta keep this under an hour. Keep it under an hour, but pushing on that line. Yeah, I just I don't know. It that it wasn't until after high school that I realized I could question rules, but still respectfully follow them. Yeah. Even if I didn't like the answer. Sure. And not have made a point. And not have made a point or not have like given up the what's the what's the right term, I guess? Just like not feel like I had given up on fighting for the cause or something like that. I could just be like, you know, I chose to go to this school, or I guess my parents put me in this school. I can either fight them and ask to leave, or I can respect the rules that are put here because they're the people in authority. So like things like that. but yes, I would definitely push some people's buttons. but regardless. Most of my stress came from coming home. We would check my grades online. This was after I had many, many missing assignments. I did not turn in homework very often. Loved tests. scored well on tests. Just there was a zero chance that I was gonna go to school for seven hours and then do work out more than thirty minutes. It is ridiculous, man. More than thirty minutes of homework after a seven-hour day at school for me. Now that I'm accustomed to working. Anywhere between eight and twelve hour days. My work capacity has improved. Yeah, but I understand it. But when I'm fourteen and I have no concept of what a long day's work is. Not that I wasn't a hard worker, but it was isolated. Like my hard work was being a kid. I mean, I would there are some people who are like, I don't want to go for a walk 'cause that's exhausting. I would play sports for ten hours, because it was fun and stimulating and got my brain engaged. School was hard. It did not engage my brain a whole lot depending on Depending on the week, depending on the subject, things like that. Uh-huh. And I think the difficult thing with with what I was dealing with is there's really it was really hard to get me to care about something from somebody else's like approval and things like that. I had to just want it. Yeah. There I mean, I guess you could have made a severe enough negative reinforcement to get me to do something. It would have needed to have been pretty severe. But it's behavior modification. Yes. Yep. And then if you did the positive reinforcement, you better have new ones lined up because after I after I receive the reward a few times, I get get sick of it and I'm ready for for something different. So so yeah, I think that I will I will change the way that grades are viewed in my house. and again, I really want to give my parents as much credit as possible. I don't even know if they're listening, but They just they just wanted me to set myself up for success. Yeah. It was well intentioned. it gave me a lot of stress and I really do think that what they were going after was more just my attitude and posture behind it. But sometimes it came across as if you don't get good grades, our relationship's gonna be tainted. Sure. And each kid's motivation is so different. for sure. Like what motivates a kid and having to figure that out because Yeah, I mean some people are just more self driven, some people like more positive reinforce enforcement, some people need negative consequences, some people need natural consequences that the only way you're gonna learn is if you gonna get the F and the coach is gonna bench you or something, you know? Like Yes, absolutely. So it's kind of figuring out it's trial and error within parenting of sometimes figuring out what works for your kids. Well, and you gotta agree as a couple. No, that's true too. Like I like I mean, I I bet you that Ellie and I will have lots of conversations on how to approach grades for For Roman and the hope is collectively you're a lot better because your collective experiences help help you guys avoid some of the blind spots. Absolutely. 'Cause he's gonna he's gonna be more similar to one of you two, more than likely. So that can help the other person understand him a little bit more. Yeah. I think I'll ask I think that if if my kids struggling with school, I'm gonna ask a lot of questions. That's good. What interests you? Why do you suck? Why why do you suck it? Why do you suck at this so bad? Can we do this better? Yeah. Like, is there a way that we can make this easier for you? That's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's do he's gonna have that. I mean that's within his meta classes for sure. And I I I not at P? okay. I thought yeah, that's right. About to make a joke. Let's keep going. No, no, no, I'm sorry, I'm a bad No, no, no, you got IEP, yep. Is there anything you've intentionally done differently? than your parents at this point. You may have already covered it in the first question. probably the way that we prioritize extended time with extended family. So it wasn't meant to be a jail. I know, but that's just Probab I would assume it's more. I see you fools about yeah. I would assume there's no way it's less. I see you fools three times a week. Minimum. Minimum We we moved up to central Indiana for that. My mom's moving up here in a few weeks. It's gonna be it's gonna be great. So my kids we have prioritized to surround them with grandparents, aunts, cousins. which was different. And my my parents did not and for many for many relationships was for good reason. some of it was geographic, family all spread out. Louisiana, Maryland, we lived in Mississippi growing up. But for some of it it was just we had people on the West Coast and it was like now that I'm older, I understand, yeah, I wasn't gonna spend time with uncle such and such or aunt such and such. And it was because they were protecting me, you know. So but yeah, that is something different where we've we've just said this is gonna be a pillar of our family is one, we're gonna be great aunts and uncles and sons and daughters to our extended family. And then two, our kids are gonna be blessed, by their experiences and time and all of them love Jesus. All of them are not only safe, but They are formed more into better human beings after spending time. And it's really cool, man. Grayson and Mason, I was telling someone. So if y'all know Grayson and Mason, knowing I's sons, they're about three weeks apart. And they're best I mean, they're like brothers. And I made a joke at Madeline's birthday party. They're like a shadow. if you see one, just wait a second, the other one will be 'cause a few times I like, Grayson, we're yet. I'm like keeping tabs on the kids because it's Madeline's birthday. She's talking to her friends. So I'm like I'm watching other people's kids. I'm watching their kids. There's like this basement's crazy. And sometimes I'd lose Grayson and all I'd have to do is find Mason. And he was just hiding somewhere right next to him. So it's it's beautiful, man. It's pretty cool. That really is. So I love watching them. Yeah, I c I it's just I mean, just three years in, I can't imagine. It's probably hopefully just gonna keep keep getting better. But yeah. How how have you prioritized anything differently? Probably too early to really tell intentionally. I mean unintentionally n Ellie and I both work and both split the the hands on parenting pretty or as evenly as we can or try to really try to really share it. unless you're a single dad. Single dad, great term. Single dad knit for the night. Yes. For those who don't know. So solo parenting is a better term as You're not a single dad, you're a solo dad if your wife is out with the girls from the solo, not single. Not single. do we need to give any other context on that? Or really no, we're good. Okay. Nailed it in community. Yeah. anyways. No, I I think that I mean, I grew up in my stepdad and mom. My stepdad worked, my mom stayed home with the kids, so not intentionally. I would just say that the dynamics are a little bit different. Yeah. And I don't remember I don't remember how I don't remember how I was raised up to Roman's age of thirteen months at this point. So I don't know if we've done a lot differently. I guess when I was that young, my poor mom was was just surviving. Yeah. so Yeah, it's a different circumstance. Yeah. Thanks, mom. Yeah, shout out. Yeah. And and I mean the reason why we're bringing this up is because we do have we compare Who we are as dads to the dad figures in our life. We compare again our kids to who we were as kids. But the situations are totally different, man. And it's a callback to episode two. You need to really evaluate your fatherhood scripts, what was given to you, and it's not to trash and it's not to overglorify it to or be like, I wish I had the life I had when I was a kid. No, dude, you probably don't. You don't know a lot that was going on behind the scenes. No. Or you were probably a lot crazier than you give yourself credit for and it was harder on your parents. So but it's it's to identify that, champion some stuff, tweak some stuff. I think that's a that's a healthy expression that goes against comparison, but instead just like stewards your life really well. For sure. I remember like the enlightening moment of finding out that extended family vacations were not always the most fun for for certain people. For everyone as they were for the kids running around doing whatever they talked about. All your favorite people were there. my goodness. All the all the similar age kids that you don't get to see very often just having a blast for anywhere between three and seven days. These poor parents, I just grew up thinking this was just as fun and rejuvenating for them as it was for me. Everyone. Yeah. but but yeah. Well, I wanted to go over the differences between comparison versus curiosity and kind of the idea of s substituting curiosity for comparison. Okay. I think that one of the questions that comparison asks is, why isn't my child more like blank? Mm-hmm. But curiosity asks, who has God made this child to become? our kids aren't really meant to be projects. They're not meant to be perfect, they're people to know. And I think one of the things I wanted to know is where are you most tempted to compare your kids? Yeah. I I love this because I mean, we've already talked about you gotta be students of your kids, whether it's walking into their bedroom and looking at their walls and what they love to read about or learn about or get excited about. And then you you really talked about the importance of like you would ask good questions, in school. So we're already kind of all over this curiosity. idea without putting language to it. So that's helpful, Reese. I think I compare it to friends with kids that are just a little bit older. Mm-hmm. So again, Grayson and Naomi just turned three and five. And we have friends with kids that are five and a half or seven or eight. So it's real easy for me to think, man, why is my three year old son not acting like my friend's six year old son when it's because there's three more years of early childhood development that he needs to go through and I need to help lead him through to get him there. and then even like life stage of like, man, it would sure be nice to be able to hop in the car, my minivan with my kids, and it not take me 20 minutes to get in and out of anywhere, bro. Yep. so I'm comparing which means I'm not grateful. I'm not present in the season that I'm in. The most helpful thing is I've had multiple older dads tell me, cause Karis is probably our last, more than likely. She's three months old and it's gone by fast, man. He's like, do not pray away or wish away the long nights, the snuggles, the cuddles. And it's harder. I get less of that because she's my third. My attention's divided. But yeah, I don't I don't wanna do that by comparing to other other kids that are a little older in a stage that's surely gonna be awesome. I can't wait to yeah. Man, it's gonna be awesome. It's gonna be so much fun. I'm taking Naomi out into the deer blind that I bought her for her for her birthday and we're gonna put it out in the woods in about a month and then about a month after that we're gonna sit there and we're gonna look at some deer and it's gonna be amazing. But that doesn't mean that, you know, time with Karis as she's three months old now or Grayson as he's three and they're not old enough to do that that there's not special things too. So For sure. So anyways, yeah, I would say comparing either my my younger kids to my older, or even vice versa. Sometimes Grayson acts more mature than Naomi. So like don't compare your kids to one another And then also just older kids is pretty common for me. Yeah. And I mean we've talked about this a little bit, but I mean everybody has different difficulties, different levels of difficulties with different things. So one one kid compared to another kid just doesn't make any sense. Same way one adult compared to another adult. And there might be stages like this kid sucked at the age of four but crushed in life at fourteen, and then vice versa. Yeah. I mean we all know that that athlete who was killing everybody in eighth grade, but Turns out that's as tall as they were gonna get and then they were getting smothered in they always have a drinking problem when they get older. I literally was thinking about this kid named Chase who was way faster than me. And then by the time we graduated high school, like he had a legit drinking problem. But he's still faster than you. He probably is. What a piece of crap. Dude, I don't know why I was thinking about that legit yesterday. I haven't thought about this kid in six or eight years. Chase, we're praying for you. Chase praying for you. And for me apparently. Yeah, yeah, and for and for Buddy. Buddy's top of the line. And it's a therapy. That's right. man. Again, my kids won. It's kinda I mean, I guess I could compare him to like benchmarks. I don't really feel the need to do that. Yeah. I mean Is he different than what you thought a one year old would be like? No. Okay. He's exactly what I thought a one year old would be like. That's amazing. He is taking a few steps here and there. He gets into everything that he shouldn't get into. He only wants the five or six things that he's not allowed to have. Sorry. Not in like a I'm doing this on purpose in a I'm only curious about the things that I'm not allowed to have. Which irritates me. Yeah. Not at him. That that's the way that it is. That's his brain work child development. I'm looking around at the quadrillion toys and things that we have in the house. Why are you getting into the into the cabinets with with the pasta strainer? Bro, we ha we don't need to be doing that. We have to have an episode on what it looks like to be minimalist as dads. Yes. We need to start the movement. Quarterly purge. Yeah, dude. I've already kind of started doing that and I've thrown away enough things that I wasn't supposed to. I'm starting to get in trouble. To purge. But it's hard, man, because you do, your kids have the most fun with things. That after they've played with something else two or three times they move on and it's the things outside, it's the stuff in the cabinet, it's kitchen crap. It doesn't even make any sense to me. It really doesn't. I mean, it'll be something new, but that looks exactly like one of his toys, like the same function. And you spent twelve dollars for something you didn't need, and now he's playing with the same thing over there. But no. He's exactly what I thought a one year old would be. He's delightful. He fills my day with joy. I want to bang my head against the wall sometimes. It is it's kind of what I thought it would be. He's probably he's probably a little bit easier than I thought, I guess if I had to say something. And he's he's been a blessing in that way. He's got his seasons. He got sick a few more times than I thought he would with his within his first year. Also, why does sickness stick around for a month? Yeah. That makes me so angry. Yeah. But either way. Yeah, that boy Wild, it's gonna be fun. I mean Wild's fun. It really is, but it's it's wild. All right. How can we become more curious instead of c compar instead of relying on comparison, how do you feel like we can be more curious? Yeah, so if we're gonna stop a bad habit, we gotta pick up a good one, right? It's being curious. I prefer to just grip my teeth and clench my knuckles and fight against the bad habit. Yeah. Just to inevitably Become exhausted and and then cycle it over and over and over again. Yeah. I will say a very practical thing I've done is praying over my kids when I run in the morning. That's awesome. Like I pick a word for them. So father, will you help Grayson today be dope. Be dope. Super dope. The best. Yep. be someone who wants to learn. So then I become more curious on how God is trying to form him into someone who wants To be curious. That's awesome. Can you teach my daughter today contentment? And then I become more curious, as I'm praying over that word for her today. What does it look like to partner with God? to find things throughout the day that would help her be more content and and grateful. So I do think a lot of it is you have to be intentional before the moment happens so that you do you can identify it. And that's a lot of fatherhood is Whether you're exercising or you have a quiet time in the morning or you're talking with friends over coffee, if you can do that, then you can notice the moment. And then that's when you can lead with curiosity, obviously question asking, things like that, but I think it's some sort of self reflection on the front ends needed. Yeah. Follow up question. How many times has Naomi's word been contentment on the prayer? It's been quite a few. It's been a few times, okay. Actually it's been regulate. Can you help her regulate regulate, that's right. Emotionally regulate. but it is cool. If you'll if you'll listen for a couple of minutes, there'll be specific words that I think God will give over you to to pray for them that day. it's hilarious when they're real young. 'Cause I'm like, grow, help caris grow, breathe. That's right. Feel loved, sit feel safe seeing, you know, things like that as a regular one when they're real young too. Because dude, the things like that for a one year old literally rewires their brain for a lifetime. Of of so many different benefits. from smarter people than me that I've read about and I I forget immediately. So but I just know it's it's really important in those early ages and it helps you be more intentional and you don't miss those moments. Yeah. So anything else that you would say? Honestly, the question just makes me think of Ted Lasso's speech when he's throwing darts. be curious, not judgmental. Then he throws two triple twenties in a bullseye for the win, and it's one of the best scenes I've ever watched. But but the sentiment rings true. if you're curious, you can you can get to the heart of things. If you're judgmental, you just scratch at the surface and then yeah honestly make it a worse time for you and everybody else. So I think a way to be become more curious really is to ask questions without necessarily like an agenda or an ulterior motive. So just ask a lot of questions, whether that's internally to yourself, why am I feeling this way? Why am I not content about this thing? with if it's with your kids, just asking them questions that are gonna get to the root of Yeah. What's bothering you rather than And that breeds so much intimacy. Yeah. I mean a lot of connection with your kids. And that's the goal. Yeah. you want to save them from making catastrophic mistakes. But yeah, if you can if you can breed trust and know that they're loved intimacy, that's the goal. Yeah. So and we gotta keep it under an hour. I had one more thought. yeah, if you if you read through the life of Jesus after his death, burial and resur resurrection, he confronts Peter, who's betrayed him, and has this like really beautiful moment on the beach. Essentially says, Hey, I need you to to get back up and I need you to feed my sheep. Tells him three different w times. He says, Hey, do you love me? He asks him three times the same amount of time that he he betrayed Jesus as as Peter three different times said he didn't know who Jesus was. So Jesus goes straight for the jugular and says, If you love me, feed my sheep, feed my lambs, feed my sheep. And it's this restorative conversation, it's kind of a second conversion of of Peter as he has this experience of God's of Jesus' grace that goes on to propel him to be the the apostle that really helps establish the church. But even as Peter's working out his salvation, man, he's just got a lot of edges to be polished off. As I like to say, we all got a little Peter inside from the pulpit. We all got a little more Peter than we'd like to admit, but all of us are like him, we're we're learning. The very next thing Peter says is apparently John walks by and it says the apostle or the disciple that Jesus loved, which we all know is John who's writing John twenty one's way of giving himself a shout out. So John walks by and Peter goes, Well, what about this guy? Because the thing I forgot to mention is at the end of the speech, Jesus tells Peter, Peter, you're at some point, when you were young, you dressed yourself, you did what you wanted to do. And this is kind of fatherhood, honestly. But at the end of your life, Peter, you are gonna go somewhere that you don't wanna go. You're gonna be led by someone that you don't want be led, and you're gonna be made to do to suffer in a way that you don't want to suffer. Essentially prophesying. his eventual Peter was crucified, church history says upside down. So Peter's like having this restorative conversation from his best friend Jesus, he now knows he's loved. He's being commissioned back out and then he's given this like, hey, it's gonna be like harder than you could ever imagine. And then right at the end of this, John's walking by and Peter goes, Well what about that guy? What's like what about for him? What's like what terrible thing's gonna happen to him if I'm going through all this You really seem to be close with the disciple that you love. Surely if you love him so much, you got something hard for him to go through. And Jesus' response, dude, is essentially, What is it to you? What is it to you, Peter? Yeah. Follow me. Which is the same thing that he told him three years earlier on probably the if not the same, a very similar beach when he met him for the first time, said Follow me. Yeah. I mean, just movie scene. The way the way that the whole thing wraps up. Ties it together. And he's commissioned out. And Peter believes that. And I think that's fatherhood because right when we sometimes have to swallow the pill of what fatherhood is, is man, this is not going the way I thought it would. Jesus is with me, but he's sending me out to do something hard. We see someone else walk by and we go, Well, what about that dad whose son does not have an illness that is debilitating and changes their family? Or what about That dad who has a wife to help support him and I don't. Or what about that dad who has three kids and I only have one and I want to have another one? Or the opposite. I got six and I don't think I can handle but two. I wish I only had two sometimes. and Jesus says, What's it to you? I've just asked you to follow me. Yeah. So that that's that's my encouragement is yeah, I I think whenever we begin to compare to other people around us, Jesus is saying Hey, all I'm asking is for you to identify and be aware and hear my voice of what I'm calling you to do. And because I I can only bless you where you are. I can't bless you where someone else is. Yeah. So that's my encouragement. If if you're a follower of Jesus or you're interested in Jesus, you might spend some time in John twenty one and do a practice called imaginative prayer, which is you just read it and you pray and you picture yourself in the situation and see how God might talk to you through it. That's awesome. So, anyways, yep. Do you want to close this out with a a challenge this week, Reese? Yes. this week let's try and replace one comparison with one moment of curiosity. So instead of asking something like, Why aren't they more like blank? let's ask something more along the lines of what is God uniquely developing in this child? and if you have friends who don't have kids, don't ask what they've been up to. Just say, Hey, it's good to see you and then move on with the evening. So That's funny, man. yeah, just encourage one thing, That's unique about your child. I and I love that 'cause you might be curious by asking your kids question, but it's also just being curious with God. Yes. Like God, what are you up to here? Like what are you doing? What are you doing and how can I be a part of it? And yeah, I I think that makes life the hard parts of life a little bit more exciting and hopeful. Yeah. So it's a good challenge. Hey, last thought, again, c comparison keeps us chasing something that's not real. It's an imaginary family, it's an imaginary life. But gratitude, curiosity, asking God what he's up to. It helps us love the people that God's asked us to love. So yeah, you've you've been given actual people. Go love those people. Yeah. Not the ones that you want to compare, the people around you. So absolutely. Reese, pray for us and I gotta get to bed. Let's do it. Jesus, you are so so good to us. Your name is worthy, worthy of praise, worthy of worship. I pray that you would be the only thing that our hearts delight in, that you would sit on the throne of our lives, and that if anything else is sitting on the throne of our lives, you would help us get rid of it and put you back on the throne. Lord, I pray as we go out this week as fathers, as men who have influence in our communities, in our workplaces, in our homes, that you would just Bring about a spirit of curiosity, a spirit of gratitude and contentment with what we have, what you've given us, all the things you've blessed us with, Lord. I pray that we would be content. Yeah. And I just pray against any any attack from the enemy, any attack from the flesh or the world that just begs us to compare what we have, who we are, who we have with others, with the way things used to be, with the way things could be. and I just pray that you would step in and that you would just bring about a season of joy, contentment, and gratitude. We love you. Amen. Amen. Have a great week. Love y'all. Peace. Peace.