The Sevan Podcast - #722 - Rod Richard | The Finest of Fathers

Episode Date: December 27, 2022

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Let's go seize the night. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash yamex. Benefits vary by car and other conditions apply. The, bam, we're live. The episode, I noticed yesterday, the episode from December 24th in the morning. Do you remember at the very end, I'm like,

okay, let's do one more thing. And we showed that footage of the, that you could barely tell, but it was two guys fighting someone was filming it outside their car it was an old man defending himself right dude last night after the show was i was telling hillar about it i was like hey do you think someone reported me he said for sure but you can go on youtube and type in like fights and see fights that are a thousand times more graphic than the fight we showed. We were talking about, um,

there's a square in the area. It's probably, I think it's like, it's not in the country that we're in, but in some place people get deployed to, and there's like, Oh, it's called, they had some name for it come to find out they do like public executions there oh my good oh my goodness you can pull that stuff up on youtube and like current day stuff and i was like how is that stuff not getting pulled down off youtube but you're gonna get flagged on a show that's significantly less, uh, dramatic,

I guess. And, and it's, it's crazy. It's crazy that basically it's like Gestapo shit. Basically people can just report you like, Hey, the Jews live there.

Yeah. It's bizarre, man, man, man, man, uh, chase Brianrian morning savages back to working in the snow what do you do in the snow oh god that's cold god that sounds cold for all the people working outside now man i think it's cold i wonder how cold it is in my house right now. I went to the beach yesterday. 48. Oh, it's going to rain today.

I wonder what time that's going to happen. I want to take the boys to the skate park today for sure. It's been raining all day here. It has? Is that normal for where you're at i think in the winter yeah yeah it says it's gonna rain here all the way to all week oh that's awesome we can always use the rain in california always always always let it rain baby i'm so excited about this show you too Let it rain, baby. I'm so excited about this show.

Me too. You don't even have any kids. Yet. Yet. Here we go. Rod. Rod, good morning, brother. Good morning.

How are you? I was just so excited about technology. I'm always like poo-pooing technology and talking about how dumb some of the technology we have is. And then this morning I was like, wow, this random dude that I've never met before meets another random dude. That's me. And we can just reach out to each other. I can reach out to you on a social media platform and just be like can i meet you and you're like yeah yeah yeah yeah it's amazing how it uh connects everybody right oh it's so cool it's like you and i what what's what state are you in i'm in california i'm in california where in california uh san bernardino so southern

california okay i'm in santa cru, so I'm 300 miles north of you. Yeah, I've been. I'm from the Bay Area, actually, so I've been to Santa Cruz quite a few times. Where were you born? Richmond. Oh, I was born in Oakland, raised in Richmond. At the Children's Hospital in Oakland? No, Kaiser.

Oh, okay. I was born at the Children's Hospital. Crazy. Yeah, yeah. In Oakland. Wow. And then did you grow up in Richmond? Yeah, I was in I grew up in Richmond till probably the 10th grade in high school. And then I moved to Antioch for a couple of years before I went to college. Wow. Did you go to Antioch High? No, I went to Deer Valley. It was brand new when I when I got there.

high no i went to deer valley it was brand new when i uh when i got there and uh and uh in uh richmond what school did you go to dianza high school wow holy shit i so i um my parents uh i was born in oakland and then i lived in el cerrito okay and then when my parents divorced i ended up moving to pacheco do Do you know where that is? Yes. Right next to Martinez. Yeah. Yeah. Crazy. Fascinating. Richmond, it was kind of interesting. And then when I was 16, my mom kicked me out of the house and my dad moved. My dad owned these two fourplexes on San Pablo. He got them like on foreclosure, you know, where the rent was like $25 a month to live in an apartment there on San Pablo. This is like in the eighties and they were crazy. I'm 50. How old are you? I'm 39. I don't, I don't know if you remember, but San Pablo, I mean, Richmond was

definitely pretty nuts. But, uh, when I moved into this neighborhood on san pablo it was it was like uh it was like a 70s movie like there were the dudes with the fedoras and the feather and the two rottweilers and he would have the line of the prostitutes up on san pablo it was wild that is that is san pablo yeah it was it was crazy san pablo and richmond and then mac arthur in oakland that is definitely what you would have saw around that time for sure. Yeah, I watched that whole neighborhood there change. When I moved into that neighborhood, it was completely, completely different than 15 or 20 years after. They put in 4th Street down there.

Have you seen that? No. 4th Street where the Apple Store is and in Berkeley. Oh, it's crazy. uh they put in fourth street down there that you know have you seen that no fourth street where the apple store is and in berkeley oh it's crazy all that shit back there what they did it's pretty cool it's pretty cool yeah it's it's pretty darn cool i guess some people would consider gentrification and i know that has a negative term, but the neighborhood definitely got significantly safer. It was freaky for a while. Yeah, yeah, yeah. When I was coming up in Richmond, it was bad for sure.

Yeah, it was like Richmond and Oakland. I mean, obviously, there were a lot of cities that can claim this, but it was like Richmond and Oakland were like these murder capitals of the country. Yeah. And then wedged right between them was Berkeley, home of the educated Jew Yeah. And then wedge right between them was, you know, Berkeley home of the educated Jew, you know, and it was like, wow, it's crazy. Interesting little sandwich, right? Yeah, for sure. And, and fascinating to me growing up. So then I would always commute over the hill to college park. That was the school across from dvc that was the high school over there yep yep i went to uh i went to dvc for uh for uh football and then i transferred from there so yeah

no as a friend i played at college park yeah wow what a small world yeah that's i i did uh i did a year and a half at dvc and then i went to, um, and then I did another seven years of undergrad at UC Santa Barbara, if that's what you want to call it. Uh, this is Caleb. Uh, Caleb runs the backend. Occasionally he talks, uh, Caleb is in the, uh, US military. He's deployed overseas and an undisclosed location. All right. All right. And hopefully after this conversation,aleb will want to have kids we won't we won't have scared them i hope not i hope not um thank you for your for your contribution i think that um the the i think the the number

one thing that's um bad for kids in the world is being born. But that's something that, you know, the leading cause of death of children is is the fact that they're born. It's the cause of death for all people, as a matter of fact. And then and then, of course. After that, I think that the single greatest thing you can do for a child, if you want to reduce their chance of heart disease, going to jail, being obese, you name it. After that, the number one thing you can do to them is give them two healthy parents. I think it's the common denominator that fixes almost all problems. You've taken a massive contribution. I think you've taken on probably one of the most noble endeavors in society today by, you know, doing your part to give parents the tools to stay together. with versus like a single parent home versus a two parent home. Right. Especially when that,

that second parent is the father, right. When, when the fathers are involved in a child's life, um, they just, I try to do this without like singling out single mothers, because when I, when I say something, when I post something immediately, it hits a vein. And I understand it. I grew up with a single mother for a large portion of my life. Um, and I understand the pride that she took in being able to raise me and, and, you know, through all the odds and all the different things that she had to go up against in her own life. Um, but being able to give me the tools and provide for me, and I understand the pride in that, but the reality is, is if a child doesn't have their father, um, they just don't do as well as a child with a father, even if that father isn't great, right? Just the presence of, of a male figure, um, that is related to them, that they can see themselves in that they hold value, uh, with,

uh, just, it just changes their, their life dramatically. Uh, I mean, we're hold value with, it just changes their life dramatically. I mean, we're talking education, like you said, obesity, we're talking prison time, self-esteem. There's so many different things that just having a present and available father changes for a child. Yeah, that is the interesting thing, right? Like, it really isn't something. I got it here in my notes. How do we talk about this without making it seem like there's some

duality? Like the point is, isn't a dig at mothers at all? Zero, zero, zero, zero, zero dig at mothers. A matter of fact, it's kind of interesting interesting i want to play this clip like for me personally in my mind i think if you could only like i think every boy needs a mom like like you really need your mommy like you gotta have someone who nurtures you and gives you that unconditional uh love that mom gives you but i but i want to play this clip it's at the very top i played it a couple shows ago. It's from your Instagram account, and it really blew me away because the end of this clip, I had never heard this part before. Here we go. anyone just follow it even if you don't have kids you should follow it because it will give you perspective on society so when there's other things that you think might be the problem like gun laws diet all of these other things that people are trying to fix these are just symptoms and they're you're not addressing the issue. And when you address symptoms,

what you do is you often exacerbate the problem. Okay, action. The home have lower self-esteem. Okay, fine, that sucks. But also women with low self-esteem are more promiscuous. No father family is more likely to be victims of abuse, especially with single mothers. The more opportunities a child has to interact

with biological father, the less likely they are to commit a crime or have contact with the juvenile justice system. Okay. Another way to say that is men and women who are incarcerated, the population of the prisons mostly encompass fatherless homes. Now here's something that no one else has mentioned, which I think is cool. And I don't really say this eloquently. If a man and wife raise a child, cool. And I don't really say this eloquently. If a man and wife raise a child, they're less likely to end up in jail, but they have the same statistical chance as children raised by just their father. So if we want to keep children, I had actually never, I had never heard that. Have you ever heard that anywhere else? Or have you dug into that? I haven't, I haven never heard that. Have you ever heard that anywhere else or have you dug into that? I haven't I haven't heard that anywhere else. And I'm definitely going to dive into it because, you know, a lot of times you see stuff on social media and it's like, all right, that sounds that sounds accurate.

And it fits the mold that I'm trying to go in. But but let's make sure that that's accurate. I'm trying to go in, but, but let's make sure that that's accurate. Um, I can say though, and from my own experience, there is a level of, I would say discipline that comes from the father, um, that, that is just kind of natural, um, that I think children who are raised by single mothers don't get, I know when my mom, when my mom, when my dad was out of our lives for that period of time where he was gone, um, there was definitely a wild West feel, you know, it was like, I knew that I didn't want to disappoint my mom at the same time. It was like, well, she don't know. You know what I mean? It wasn't even like, then when my dad came back around, it was just even that little bit of a thought, like, Ooh, what if my dad finds out? It's just

that little bit just made me stop in my tracks before I did something. Um, and so that's why I think you get that, especially where she's talking about the jail situation is, is a lot of, a lot of children see their father as an authority figure already, so they don't test the authority figure levels. If you don't see your mom as an authority figure and you see her just as loving, then you go and test another authority figure. I think as fathers, we experience that. Our kids will test us a little bit, see how far they can push. But if there's no one in the house that is testable, well, then you test somebody outside the house. And then if nobody kind of curtails that early, then you end up with more problems and you start testing bigger authority figures. You bring up a good point. Yeah, that was my relationship with my mom.

There was only one thing that I didn't want to do. I didn't want to disappoint her. mom. There was only one thing that I didn't want to do. I didn't want to disappoint her. Yeah. But my dad, my dad, who I saw on the, on the weekends. And I think maybe how my, my kids feel about me is, is like, there's a little bit of fear, little, little bit of healthy fear. Like, like I'll just pick you up and move you. You have, please get in the car. You didn't get in the car and I'm taking action on you. Like you're going to end up doing burpees right away or you're, or I'm moving you. Yeah. And I think you, I think that what you said there is that healthy,

healthy bit of fear, right? Because I don't think you feel like as a kid, you don't feel like your dad's going to hurt you. And I mean, there are obviously those situations as well, but you don't feel like he's going to hurt you, but you do understand that he has a more powerful position than you. And I think that's automatically understood that there's a hierarchy and you don't start challenging that until you get, you know, quite a bit older. So you start to feel like you're a man. And so as a child, if you don't, if you're, if you you're in a in a household and there's no hierarchy where your mom is just loving on you, no matter what, she's giving you unconditional love while you appreciate it. It kind of puts you on level with her at times. Right. Because she's giving you the same amount of respect and adoration that you're giving her. So it puts you on the same level. And then you're like, OK, well, I'm the man of the house. I'm going to do what I do, you know, and it kind of causes,

causes issue, uh, maybe more than it should, especially, um, you know, when it's just mom. I like how you use that word respect because my mom and my, and my wife are always reminding me that, Hey, make sure that no matter how you treat your kids, don't ever disrespect them. Like don't, don't disrespect your kids. And so I can see that that's like an important thing to them. You're right. And the kids do see, they do get kind of get on that level with their mom. I'm more of the bulldozer that moves them around and their, and their mom is more, I don't want to say they're equal, but they had, they have that connection with them. And I think I'll eventually have that connection with them too,

but now's not the time now I'm dad. Right. Right. And you can't, you can't have that, but, but it's, it's not a constant feel of that. Right. Like I definitely, and my wife does the same thing. I definitely try to make sure that I'm respectful of my children and they're they're humans. Right. They're people just like I am. And they they live in my household. So I definitely want to give them the respect that they deserve. But but I feel like sometimes she's giving them respect they haven't earned necessarily. And then there's there's a lesson that they have to learn to get that level of respect. Right. And they're going to continue to gain respect and grow. But I don't want to give them credit for something they haven't done yet.

And I think that's the difference is that she's she's willing to do it. She's going to give them everything no matter what. Yes. I want to make them earn it. And that's to give them everything no matter what. Yes. I want to make them earn it. And that's where we kind of sometimes butt heads is like, I, yeah, they don't, they didn't do anything to get that right. Like they, they're great kids. They do good in school. They don't cause any troubles. And so in that regard, you definitely want to give them everything you want to pour into them. But at the same time, it's kind of what they're supposed to do. That's their role in the house right now is to be good students. You know what I mean? Clean your room. That's like your normal, that's what you're supposed to do. I don't want

to give you brownie points for doing the job you're supposed to do. I will congratulate you and pat you on the back a little bit, but Hey, I need you to go do something else. My wife and I were together for 15 years. We were never going to, we never planned on getting married. We told each other we didn't believe in marriage. We didn't believe in having kids. There wasn't something we were going to do. And then when she was 39 and I was 43, she saw another woman breastfeeding and she's like, hey, I want to try that.

I was like, all right. And so, you know, stop using contraception and boom, she's pregnant. And then two years later, she's pregnant again with twins. And I think, you know, for ease of the story, I don't think we had fought in five years. And we just figured it out. Right. We're having the same fights over and over. So you figure it out. You have some heart to hearts. Then you have kids. And it's like what you said, all of a sudden she's the nurturer.

And I'm the lion that sits around at the top. It's just like, you know, constantly looking for danger. And we started fighting again and every single one of our, not, not in a bad way, but it's important for your kids to see you fight and important for them to see you make up. But all of our, all of our, any tension in my relationship with my wife now is around raising the kids. Right. And it's around nuanced stuff about am I being too aggressive? Am I not respecting them? Am I? And it's interesting, you know, and it's a give and take. Right. Sometimes she realizes she overstepped her bounds on nurturing them.

You know, like what you were saying, they got to earn that. And then other times it's like okay i let that um i i let it go that way like okay yeah yeah yeah yeah it it's interesting um i and i like what you said about your kids have to see you fight and have to see you you know make up that's important but um, um, it's so important, right? Especially if they see you fight, you have, even if I have to fake it, I'll go in there and kiss her and apologize and like, say, Hey, it was, I handled the situation completely wrong. The refrigerator door was left open and that's never a reason to raise your voice. And I'm a complete jackass and there's no

excuse for it. And I'll do my best to make it better, even though I'm still angry about it. You know what I mean? Right. Right. Yeah. Cause I, cause I want that. I want closure. I want safety for them.

And I want them to do that to, to the women they meet. I want them to have closure. Plus no one wants to fight. Right. Yeah. No, you don't want it. You don't want it to linger. That's for sure.

It doesn't get any better. That's something I've had to learn just because, you know, emotionally, like improving my emotional intelligence because I have two daughters. It's something that I've really been kind of big on in the last year or so. But it's definitely helped me with with my wife, too, is like before kids, I had two emotions. I was happy or I was pissed off and that was it. Right. Because I just didn't have any need for the other emotions. You know, I had a bunch of bad stuff happen when I was a kid and being sad didn't help make it any better. So I just kind of let that go. And when you're married and you have kids, you can't just be happy or angry. Right. That's how the world works. I can't walk around the house

upset. So I had to learn how to be self-aware, be socially aware, and then understand what emotion I was feeling and be able to express that better. And it also helped me understand what my wife or what my kids, what emotions they're feeling. And I joke about this all the time. I had those two emotions. I realized there were other emotions, but when you look at, there's like a, this emotional intelligence wheel and there's like all these, there's like 47 emotions. I'm like, but there's no way I felt all these things. There's no way people feel all of these things. Um, but it is, it is definitely a real thing. And to have your kids, especially sons understand, you know, that we can have emotion and then we can work through it without being angry, without being frustrated, without using, uh, our body to handle the situation. And we can,

we can converse about it and then we can move forward. It's super important. And it's definitely something that I want my daughters to see from me because I want them to be in relationships where if they do have an argument, the man in their life talks through it, conversates, respects their emotions, and then they can move forward. I pride myself on knowing everything. on, on knowing everything. And if I, and if I don't know something, being able to stay still and look into myself and get the answer, I've just pride myself on it.

I think I'm just so fucking smart and wise and funny. And the other day, my six year old son in the car driving next to me goes, Heidi, that's father in Armenian. What are feelings? And I'm like, oh, shit. And I'm like, okay, just stay still and let the answer arise out of you, Savan. Everything always comes to you. You live a charmed life. And I gave him some examples.

And the whole time, I'm like, I'm not telling him what feelings are. I'm fucking like waffling around. I'm just giving him examples. I'm like,'m like hey dude i don't really fucking know i can give you examples but i don't even really know what feelings are i'm like so when you figure it out you tell me it was it was a crazy it was a crazy moment right yeah because i usually that's what i do i just stay still and i just wait for some like answer to come if i don't like it i stay still a little longer and another answer comes and I try to and I want to be honest with them at all times. Dude, I don't even know what they are. You know what I mean? we have to continue to do. And I, when I say emotional and getting, getting in touch with our emotions and understanding what emotions are, uh, you get a little bit of pushback from, from guys mostly. And it's like, you know, that you're going to, that's soft and emotions or

whatever. Right. And I definitely am not advocating for you to be soft, whatever that means to, to whoever. Um, but I think when you have a connection to how you really feel, you can move in the world a little bit differently. You can be a little bit more decisive. You can show up as a better family. If you only operate through fear, anger, and happiness, it's really hard to decide what to do. And a lot of times, a lot of times you're acting out of that fear or you're acting out of that anger. And those are probably, uh, movements or, or situations you're going to regret later on. Like, oh man, I really don't, I wish I hadn't done that. Um, but yeah, it's really, it would be really hard

for me to even explain to my kids what emotions are, what are feelings. I don't know. Right. It's a trip, right? When he said that, I was like, well, we got a word for him. If you ask me what a dog is, I can be that four-legged furry creature that we've chosen dog. Right. Right.

Yeah. Go ahead. I do talk to him about using their emotions. I always tell them, hey, man, that's free energy. So like if my if my kid says, hey, can I can I play with it's 830 at night? He said, hey, can I take this toy to my bedroom? And I'm like, you know, off the shelf in the living room, can I take it to my bedroom? And I'm like, no, we're going to bed. And he'll throw a temper tantrum and I'll kind of just walk away from him and let him like process that. And later on, I'll be like, Hey dude, what if you took that energy and you were to come over and hold my hands and say, Heidi, how about tonight, baby? Just one night we make an accession and you look in my eyes and like a, like an alchemist. And then he's like,

what's an alchemist. I'm like, you gotta, you gotta take that energy and see how to use it better to get what you want as opposed to let it take you over. And I kind of, and you know, that's a lot for a kid, but, but they're starting to get it like, like, like that, man, it's, it's a powerful, it's a lot of energy that just goes, can go to waste if you don't use it right. Yeah. That's a really important seed to plant through no matter how old they are is, is understanding how to use that energy and that emotion to their benefit, because you're going to have emotions, you're going to have feelings, and you're going to not know why you feel them. But if you can channel them into something more

purposeful, like you said, like taking that energy and understanding how to not manipulate the situation, but use it to your advantage. That would have been huge, right? He'd have grabbed your hands and looked you in the eye. He probably would have broke you down, right? Oh, they can work me. They can work me. It might have turned into every night if he'd have played it, right? Yeah.

But I think that's an important role for us as fathers is to teach them those things, right? And I think you can without actively doing it. Like in that situation, you would actively be teaching them how to use that energy. But I think in the, in even the not responding to him when he has a tantrum, right. Or like my wife. Yeah, that's what I do. I try not to respond. I just try to stay still and just stay still. Yeah. Like I was saying, my wife in the situation, because my youngest has big, big swings of emotion and she won't give in and she's getting better at it now. But she used to like hold her and pull her in and, you know, and do all these these really nurturing things. And I just like, you know, I'm not taking that from you.

So she's learned that it doesn't work with me and that she has to use a different angle to get me to do something for her. Right. Um, and that's awesome. Cause that's a new skillset for, right? Exactly. Manipulate mom, how to manipulate dad. You're doing your job. You're giving them another skillset. Right. And it's an, it's an, it's not active in the way that you, you had told him about his emotion, I just, I stonewall that idea of, I'm going to cry my way to get what I want. Because I know when she leaves my house, crying might get her out of a speeding ticket,

but it ain't going to get her much more. And so she's going to have to use her vocabulary. She's going to have to use her thoughts to figure out how to get what she wants without going into this on the floor kicking, screaming set of emotions that isn't going to get her anywhere in public. The Great Cobra Rhodes writes, I believe the most important thing in dealing with someone else's feelings is to know that those feelings, though they may not make sense to us, are

very valid to them. Cobra has, I think, seven kids, maybe nine kids. Oh, wow. Wow. Kudos. Kudos. I don't know if I could do it. I got two and I'm done. How did you end up going down this path? What was your, um, uh, inspiration? Did I see, um, hear correctly about you? Did you used to manage five gyms? did i see um hear correctly about you did you used to manage five gyms i did i did yeah yeah um how i got it and you were a sports guy we established that right you played college at uh dbc and then you went on to play uh at a four-year yeah i played i played football at dbc uh i went on to play at michigan tech uh which is in a much colder place than I am right now. After school, I actually worked in business coming out of school.

I went in to get I was actually going to be a veterinarian. So I was in biological science until my second, third year. And then I switched because I start playing better and they gave me more responsibility and, uh, being, being in the lab until 10 AM and getting up for practice at 6 AM didn't really make sense to me. Um, so I switched to business and I was in marketing for a couple of years and hated it. And so I got into personal training. So that led me to... What position did you play? I was a linebacker, outside linebacker.

Okay. Yeah. So I got into personal training and kind of worked at normal commercial gyms, like 24-hour fitness and some of those places. Ended up at a high school. So I got into strength and conditioning, got out of personal training. I didn't really enjoy training. You know, this time of year is great, right? Everybody's about to start going to the gym. In about two months, nobody's showing up. So I got tired of riding that wave and got into strength and conditioning so I could work with athletes again, um, and got lucky enough that I was doing well enough to, to take a job with the New York Mets. Um, so I worked there for two seasons, uh, and then my wife got

strength and conditioning. Wow. Wow. Yeah. My, my came home for an R star break. Uh, we had missed each other and, uh, I think we know how that goes. uh, we had missed each other and, uh, I think we know how that goes. Um, and then, you know, I, it's, it's interesting. We, uh, we were going to visit my family for Thanksgiving. She wasn't feeling well, you know, took the test, found out I was going to be a father and it was, it's immediately in that moment. Um, when she told me, I, I was like, y'all, I'm not, I'm not going back. I'm not going I'm not, I'm not going back. I'm not going back to Florida. I'm not going back to New York.

I am, I, it was nothing in my mind that I could reason for me not to be there, not to be there for the, the, the appointments, not to be there during the pregnancy, not to be there. You know, once, once the baby's born six months out of the year, I'm in Florida or, or New York or flying all over the country. Uh, and in six months I get to see my kid. I just couldn't put that together in my head. So, uh, you know, I called my coordinator and let them know that this was it. Uh, you know, I'd finish out the season or whatever they needed me to do. And luckily it wasn't much. And I was I was out. And so that's where I say, like, I kind of realized my purpose in that moment.

You know, I had been trying to I thought strength and conditioning was it and trying to get to the upper levels of strength and conditioning. And, you know, being in a major league baseball is huge, but it wasn't as fulfilling as in that moment when I heard my I was I was dad, you know, immediately that trumped everything else that I had done to that point. And so I had to figure out how I could be home and available for for my child. So I came back to California. I was I was, I had been kind of working part-time with a company, um, a strength conditioning company down here in Southern California. Um, I let them know that I was coming back and they, they welcomed me with somewhat open arms, um, and, and just kind of work my way through the company to the point where I was, uh, what I say would be regional manager. I was basically second in command in terms of the company itself.

And we grew that to five gyms and it was great. And then the pandemic hit and I realized that I had gotten away from my purpose. You know, in the gym life, especially if you're running a gym, I was the first person in and the last person out. And in between, throughout the day, I was going to different gyms. So I was driving all over the place. I was spending 12, 14-hour days at the gym, and my kids were growing up without me. The reason I left to be home with them, I had lost sight of that. You know, I got into, you know, we're building this great business and we got all these kids. We got 50,000 athletes that have trained at our facilities and it's just all these different things. And it was great, but it wasn't my core

purpose, right? Serving, serving people. Yes. Helping young athletes reach their potential. Yes. You know, reaching back into the community and doing some of the community stuff we were doing. Yes. But my core purpose has always been my children and being a father and I wasn't there. Um, and I say that during the pandemic, I realized that because, um, you know, all the gyms are shut down in California. So I'm home and I think it was like a Tuesday and we're having dinner. And my youngest daughter asked me, why am I there? Um, even now, even now that it chokes me up because like, I hadn't in her whole life, I hadn't eaten dinner at home throughout the week,

like Monday through Friday, like I was gone, you know what I mean? Um, and so, you know, for her to see me at dinner and I, in my own house, like I was like, you know what I mean? Um, and so, you know, for her to see me at dinner and I, in my own house, like I was like, what are you doing here? Um, and she didn't, obviously didn't mean it maliciously, but it was like, you should use one of those kid questions. Like, why are you at dinner? Like, what are you doing here? You don't eat dinner with us. Um, and again, in that moment I was, I was rocked to my foundation. Like this is, And again, in that moment, I was I was rocked to my foundation like this is I'm not doing what I'm supposed to do. So I set it up and, you know, hired some people and trained them and, you know, and replace myself, basically.

And so. Wow. Wow. Yeah. back into being committed to my family, to showing them and providing for them and doing the things for them that they need me to do. Obviously, I still got to be a provider and I still got to do different things to make sure that I'm bringing, keeping the roof over my head and, you know, food in their mouth and all that stuff. But I get to go to games. I coach their softball teams this last season. I'm at practices. I'm at, you know, midday awards events like, you know, anything that they have going on, everything that they have going on. I want to be fully present and available because I was I was the kid that didn't have that for a period of time. And I know how it felt. And I don't want them to ever feel that way. And I know how it felt, and I don't want them to ever feel that way.

Three things I want to go back to. I'm going to write that down. You know how it felt. When you found out your wife was pregnant, did you feel like a software program started up in you that you had never seen before inside of you? this thing where you're like all of a sudden because that's what happened to me i felt like something like this thing start up and i'm like who the fuck is that and then that person just took over they just kicked the old me out and i was like this is this is incredible yeah it's it's funny and i talk about that all the time is how how, you know, that title father, even if you've never had one, even if you never experienced one, even if you don't download a system or have another version of yourself step up, that crown is going to weigh you down. So almost immediately, yes,

I definitely felt like I was becoming someone else and nothing had even happened yet. I just heard some words. I stepped right into it. A door opened in front of me and it was my opportunity to, to rectify whatever I thought that I could, or to create a world for this person that, that I didn't see in front of me. You know what I mean? Like it was, it was, fluent i'm like what the fuck right still blown away i don't know if that's a biological thing or what but all of a sudden my everything shifted all sorts of the example i give is when i used to packages used to come in the mail and they would be like camera equipment i would be so excited and i would sit down and open it like nothing else mattered the whole world would go away and now all of a sudden packages are sitting on the counter for weeks i don't give a shit you know what i mean i'm like who have i's a, there's a new lens in there. You know what I mean? I was, it was a trip. Yeah. Yeah. It definitely shifts your perspective.

You know, some of the, some of the things that you place value in just don't seem so valuable anymore, you know? And, and if, and it's freeing too right it's freeing it's so freeing if you allow it to because i know a lot of guys and this is especially younger guys yeah and i was old i was old i was 43 they they struggle with uh letting go of their ideas and i understand it because as a young man looking back if I had if I would have had my kids maybe 10 years earlier when I was 10 years old, I would be 17. God, please. No. But had I had them had I had them younger, let's say five when I was in my early 20s. Yeah, I was just learning how to be me at that time. I was just I was I was just figuring out who I was and

then to have a kid come in. And now I've just embraced myself. Now I've got to be a father or I've got to be a husband. I can't even imagine. I can't even imagine the struggle of trying to grapple with all of these identities all at one time. Right. Cause we have our biggest struggles in life when we go through these, these identity crisis. these identity crisis. And, you know, going from a boy to a man is one of those, you know, going from just being a boyfriend to a husband is another one of those that we struggle with. And definitely manhood to fatherhood might be the easiest transition if you've had some time to establish your manhood. Right. Because fatherhood is like that next step and if you haven't really built out the foundation of manhood well then you're fathering on sand and it makes it more difficult you aren't able to just download the fatherhood software yeah it was

so easy for me yeah your system i was kind of done with myself i was ready for it i was like fuck 43 years with that guy done with him right yeah yeah it was it was time with myself. I was ready for it. I was like, fuck, 43 years with that guy. Done with him. Right? Yeah. It was time for an update. It was time to update your software. You're compatible. You had all the things. A lot of it too is as men, we are building to a point, right? Like we're trying to get financially stable and we're trying to get some of the things that we've always wanted as young men. And we're trying to create this life for ourself. And then kids throw that out the window. They don't care about that. They immediately just come in and, you know, they demand your resources.

They demand your attention. They demand your time. So if you haven't had an opportunity to enjoy some of your success, to enjoy some of your manhood, then you're at an internal struggle with yourself where the man, you and the dad, you were like, yo, I need this. I need this. And it makes it a bit harder. It's interesting. A lot of people, the conventional wisdom is, is that you're going to have kids and you want to have them kind of young so that you can go out and throw the pigskin around with them and play Frisbee with them and, and, you know, uh, lift weights with them and all that stuff. Um, and coach their softball team. But the truth is, is although I, I may not, um, be able to go to the beach and play Frisbee with

them for six hours straight at 50, because I T I take care of myself. I can still go out there and play for 30 minutes, full sprints. Then I just need 10 minutes or 15-minute break, hang out, lay down, and then I can go again. But I never harden myself for it because I enjoy watching them move actually as much as I enjoy participating. It's really not a – I don't feel like I'm missing out in the slightest. I can just go to the skate park and post up and just watch them move and just be in awe. Right. Yeah. I think, I think that's, that's on us. I think we think that we have to have that six hours of energy. Right. But if I tell guys like money wise, right. If I paid you a hundred dollars over six hours, or if I told you I'll give you a hundred dollars an hour, which one would you have?

$100 an hour, right? I'd take that all day. Your kids want that $100 an hour too. You don't have to play Frisbee for six hours. Give them $100 worth of Frisbee in that hour. You know what I mean? If that's what you got, if that's all you have, be intentional about it. Set your schedule to fit it. Go all in, go all out during that time. And then you don't have to worry about those. Maybe those are the five hours you can do some other stuff. There's some other things you can fit in. And I think we struggle with that because the world demands so much of our time. And we're trying to figure out, well, if I'm going to give eight hours to my job, I got to sleep. Nobody really sleeps eight hours anymore, unfortunately. But let's say we got eight hours to my job. I got to sleep for eight hours. I'm

probably commuting. There's not any time for my kid, right? So I got to wait until I got to, you know, there's all these different things that we think and we put on ourselves, but whether it be kids or any other thing that you want to commit yourself to, if you're intentional about the time and you set it up correctly, you can give your undivided attention to, to your child, to your goal, to whatever, to your wife, if it is, if that's the situation. But it's a matter of taking hold of your life and understanding things that are going on around you.

The paradox here, there's a two part question for you. The paradox here, this two-part question for you. The paradox here, right, is that you're, how is it that you're, we're saying that dads are so important and yet you were raised by a single mom and you're becoming such a wonderful dad. So there's that paradox here I'd like to explore.

And then also I want to talk, where did you learn your work ethic? Is that from watching a mom? How many siblings did you have? I'm only child but i have four sisters so i'm a mom's only child so i'm living with my mom it's just me okay so when i was yeah so somehow she set an example for you about work right what did that look like and i thank god i had that too my mom was a fucking workaholic yeah so so here's my my situation's interesting um so my mom and dad are together something about five um my dad struggled with some drug issues.

80s, California, like, you know, drugs are huge. So they end up getting divorced and he was gone. Gone completely, I'd probably say for two to three years. Right. Very important years, though. Right. From, you know, like four and a half to, to seven and a half, uh, almost eight. Um, you know, he's, he's not in the picture at all. He starts to come back, you know, he's gotten himself together. He's starting to come back, but then it's the custody situation. So I get to see him, uh, every other weekend,

every month in the summer, you know, they split the holidays. So I get to see him like Christmas Eve, that kind of thing. Right. So I don't get to see him a whole lot, but I do get to see him. My mom remarries. She marries my stepdad, which which is, you know, good because there's a male in the house. But he worked overtime all the time. Right. You did like having a stepdad you weren't resentful of him you weren't like hey dude get the fuck out of here uh well that's all let me let me okay okay so i i did i don't want to say i didn't like him because i didn't have a reason not to like him right like i just i'm a pretty agreeable person he wasn't doing anything wrong he loved my mom

for all intents and purposes. But here's the thing about it is, like I said, he worked overtime, so I barely saw him. When I saw him, he was eating dinner or he was asleep. You know what I mean? Like he he wasn't around. He was a male figure in the house. And so there was that, you know, that that feeling of discipline and structure. But he wasn't ever there. He was always working. My mom, my mom actually got injured on the job and she's been on disability like since I was six or seven. So she hasn't been able to work like a real job like that. So from him, I saw you get out, you go work, you take care of your family. Right.

And I always had, and I, I actually looked him up the other day. They had been divorced for 20 years and I looked him up the other day and I was going to call him, but I didn't have the courage to just yet. Um, but, uh, what I saw from him, what I learned from him is that a man goes out and provides for his family, no matter what, no matter how tired he is, no matter what the situation is, you get up and you go work. Right. Uh, when my dad comes back into my, into the picture, he's working for three jobs. Right. And so, uh, I see the same thing from him when I'm at his house, he's going to and from work. He's, he's making sure to spend time with me cause he doesn't get a whole lot of it. But you know, I know that he works two jobs

and sometimes three jobs. Um, so I'm seeing that from him. My mom can't technically work. Cause if the state find out she has a job, they're going to take away whatever resources we get. So I'm seeing that from him. My mom can't technically work because if the state find out she has a job, they're going to take away whatever resources we get. So she's doing side jobs and doing little hustle things. Right. That's an interesting conversation on its own, huh? Yeah. What you just said about how the state works. Yeah, man, it's it's it's I don't understand how they expect people to live. Granted, I know there's it's it's I don't understand how to expect people to live. Granted, I know there's that's a very nuanced conversation. There's a whole lot of parts to it. But but even today, in 2022, the amount of money that they give a person to live on in a state like this is is and then say you can't make anything extra. You can't go out and do it. It's tough. It's tough.

extra you can't go out and do it it's tough it's tough so we were we were uh i think at that time i think it was like 14 000 a year um and we're you know a mother and a child supposed to learn that and if she goes out and get a job which she she could have but she's like literally injured like it wasn't like she wasn't she didn't want to work like Like she had surgery. She was going through physical therapy for years. She still to this day at the age of 65 has the same and similar back injury that she had, you know, when I was six. So 33 years ago. So it wasn't like she didn't want to work, you know, working. I wouldn't hire somebody that has to take every other day off. Cause they're right now. I mean, just to be real, right. Like, you know, you're,

you're a great person. Your work ethic on Monday was great, but I can't have you out Tuesday and Thursday, you know, it was just not going to make sense. Um, so she, you know, she did different, different things under the table. So in terms of working to, to make money, I saw everybody around me working to make money. You know, everybody is doing something or multiple somethings or working overtime, um, which I inherited from them. And which is why I was working those 12 or 14 hour days. Cause it's just what I thought people did is what you're supposed to do. You go out and you breadwin. Um, but I don't, you know, looking back at it now, I think it was both a gift and a curse because I didn't get to spend the time

with the fathers of the male figures in my life to teach me some of those other lessons, um, that I would have liked to. And I, yeah, I didn't know that I needed to know them then. Um, you know, I was just happy that, you know, somebody was there and taking care of business. So learn that that part of work ethic. But then I play sports and I had some really good coaches along the way. And I think in that era, that 80s, 90s era of sports, it was it was there were still some coaches that would get in your face, grab your face mask. sports, it was, it was, there were still some coaches that would get in your face, grab your face mask. Uh, they weren't taking you, uh, being lazy. Water was for the week. And then some of these things that aren't necessarily good things that we know now, but they just weren't going for you not working hard, working hard. It was like, that was inherited. It was innate. That's what

you had to do. Um, and so I wanted to play, play sports. I enjoy to do. And so I wanted to play sports. I enjoy playing sports. And so I adopted it. Hard work pays off. Right. And that's what we're going to do. So that's where my work ethic came from. I would say is, you know, seeing it from the people that are that are right around me. And then it just nothing less being accepted. Right. What was your second question? i lost it in all of that well i i think i think i think you nailed it i think you nailed it basically you're saying is that the two components were is that you did have people around you who are working very hard in sports the fact that you were in sports and you had someone basically saying to you

hey don't be a pussy and there's a place for that. Right. Right. And I'm not the, I'm not the, like my, my, my, it's funny. My, my, uh, my grandfather, if you go back to, to, uh, Richmond and you look at some of the track and field records, my grandfather's name is at the top of almost every list. One of the fastest guys in the city, one of the fastest guys in the state during his time. He didn't finish high school. So you're talking about a freshman, sophomore, was the fastest guy in the state for many years. And then actually my uncle ended up breaking this record. Wow.

A long time later. So I come from a fast family, but I'm not, you know, I'm not slow, but I wasn't as fast as them. I wasn't as strong. You're a big dude though too, right? You know, I'm all right. I'm not slow, but I wasn't as fast as them. I wasn't as strong. You're a big dude though too, right? You know, I'm all right. I'm all right. Considering like I had to work hard at it. And this, that's the point I'm getting to is like, I wasn't the fastest. I wasn't the strongest. I've got some, some athletic talent, right.

But everything I had to work for and in order to get better, I had to work at it. And because my dad was gone or, you know, splitting visitation time and my stepdad wasn't there, anything that I wanted to get back, I had to do. I had to go out to the park, recruit some friends or I had a buddy in high school and his dad was a bodybuilder. And we used to just like beg his dad to give us workouts. Right. We saw Walter Payton videos. So we reached, we found a hill and we used to run up and down the hill. Like, it was just things that like, I would go out and actively try to find ways to make myself better because I really enjoyed sports. Um, and I felt like I didn't have all the tools that somebody like my friends, I had friends that were like phenomenal athletes.

Right. Like, oh, man, this guy is a freak athlete. And I wasn't a freak athlete. I was just a good athlete. So I had to work and I had to do things to help myself be better at it. You know, we talked about a little earlier, Richmond being a wild place. There was a period of time in my life where I couldn't go outside cause it was dangerous in our neighborhood. Um, and there's only so much TV you can watch. So I, my, I begged my mom for a dumbbell set and I used to just do curls and pushups and, you know, it's like being, I think about it now, it's like being in prison and trying

to get yard time, uh, go out and do some workouts and workouts and, you know, that kind of stuff. And so that definitely helped me, you know, as as things went on, I did kind of become a bigger, stronger, faster guy. But I wasn't that initially. And I had to work at it. Do you know how your granddad ended up in Richmond, where he came from? From Texas. He's from Texas. His side of the family is from Texas. uh from texas uh he's from texas his side of the family is from texas um uh by way of louisiana i want to say baton rouge my great-grandmother's baton rouge and then they moved to dallas i believe their dallas area um and then they end up moving to richmond because she is a really cool story she ended up working the docks in richmondcks in Richmond. The port there at one point was the

largest port on the West Coast. She, as a woman at that time, was not allowed to work there. So she wore a big jacket and a hat really low and covered her face and worked as a woman on the ships for, I want to say, and this is her telling the story. She would say for, for a time and a half, which was like, you know, seven years, 10 years, whatever time and a half old, old black people talk, um, as, as a man, she worked on the docks, but obviously she's a woman and they found out and she got fired, but she worked on the docks and she would, you know, during lunchtime, she would just go somewhere else where everybody else, you know, spent time having and she would, you know, during lunchtime, she would just go somewhere else where everybody else, you know, spent time having lunch, you know,

in an effort to provide, to try to provide for our family. And that's where she met your granddad? No, that's my great grandmother. That's how he got to Richmond. She brought him out here. Oh, wow. Wow. Interesting story. I was I was walking around in the Berkeley Hills one time and I heard this this this this is probably like 20 years ago.

And I was walking with my wife and we used to go on these long walks up from San Paolo up into the hills. And I heard this like screaming, not even like screaming, like wailing, like an injured animal. And I'm looking around and I can't figure out what's going on. And, uh, I finally see that there's a garage and it's in the middle of the day, right? There's no traffic. Everyone's off to work. And I see that there's a garage door. You know how the garages are off to the side of the houses there. They're kind of like not connected to the houses. There's nice houses up there. And I see a lady's head sticking out from underneath the bottom of the fucking garage door and the garage doors closed on her. I fucking jump over the fence into her front yard and I pull up her garage door.

And it's like this 90 year old woman in the garage door had collapsed on her and pinned her to the ground and um she and and i and i take her into the house and she's so crazy thankful she makes us tea we sit around and we we eat with her basically i'm just trying to find like some relatives i can call her we hang out there for like two hours until some of her relatives show up but she was a black woman and she told us her whole story about how her dad had was basically a train he worked on a train he's like one of the guys who walked inside the in the in the train cars and uh and and he did the train back and forth from new york to california and then and then that's how they got established there and it was just a fascinating story so i find it fascinating also And it was just a fascinating story. So I find it fascinating also that it was your great grandmother who worked on the docks, right? She

came out West for, for work, right? And I'm going to bet she came out on the train. I would bet so too. My, my, my grandfather on my mother's side worked, worked on the train as well. That was, I mean, obviously trains were the way people got around, but that's how a lot of people got to that area of California, right? To that Oakland, San Francisco Bay Area, just coming out West on the train. Let's find work. Let's find something to do. I know that was, I guess, the case for my family in some ways.

I remember the question I asked that we were getting to. So then how did you get into thinking that this was a good idea for you to start sharing this with the world? How did this become your mission? You knew it was your mission for yourself, for your two daughters and your wife? When did you decide, Hey, you know what, I'm going to take this up, um, as, uh, I'm going to get on a ladder and start screaming, uh, this to the world. Um, it's kind of two answers there. The, the, the selfish answer is, is that if I don't help other fathers, the world that my daughters grew up in are going to have bad men and bad women. And so in order to make them, in order to help create a world for them that I would like for them to live in, then I'm going to have to help others. Um, so that's, that's brilliant. If I don't help who, who the fuck is, who's my daughter going to marry? That's how I feel too. If I don't make good boy, if I don't help, then who are my daughter, who are my sons going to marry?

is, how transformational it is, how it is a perfect example. So you have a weight loss client, right? They lose a hundred pounds was one of the first things they go do go start telling people, right? And then they become a coach somehow. Now they're, they're helping people lose weight. It's, it's one of those things where you have those transformations in your life. Fatherhood is a transformational event. You want to go share how important that is or how wonderful it was for you or some of the things that it changed. And as, as I began to do that in my immediate circle, um, you know, other people start kind of catching on and I start talking like just random people. Like I run into a guy it's being a dad is, is one of those, he's like, you talk about like a networking event where you have to find a commonality to make that conversation.

It's super easy. Like we, we all have these little connecting things and I start talking to the other guys and I just start spreading out. And I was like, man, being a dad is super important. And there's a lot of dads who are leaving that on the table or just for whatever reason. And I'm not blaming anybody. What does that mean? You mean, you mean not embracing the job and running with it? Yes. 100%. 100%. Because, you know, and there's, there's a number of reasons. I won't say excuses because they're real, right? People really feel these feelings and they have reasons why they aren't able to be there. And there's custody things and there's relationship things and all those things. But I think that being a father has such an important role in our society. It's such an impactful thing to do

in our world. If we can be better fathers, then we can create a better world. Like, I don't think that I'm going to be able to change the world, right? I don't know that my daughters are going to be able to change the world, but if we can individually infect one other person and that other person can affect another person, it's a spread that eventually, kids, great, great grandkids, somewhere they're going to feel that impact. They're going to be in a world,

hopefully, um, you know, where, where the children of that generation have been fathered well, um, and they can move and enjoy and live, uh, in a world or with a, with a partner or group of people, a community, whatever it is, uh, that has been fathered and they can enjoy that that fathering what do you what do you what do you think is there is there a single reason you um you know in in the circles i run in there's people blame the government a lot for the reason why uh women are breaking away let me not let me rephrase that the reason why men and women are separating they're saying that the way society is set up that people are being rewarded for leaving their husbands you know maybe you've heard that narrative i don't know what narrative i believe i don't even i don't what's what's the solution how do

we keep couples together is it like hey don't have kids unless you're going to stay together you kind of can't say that because people are going to just fuck like that's what we do right yeah right is there any practical advice or like hey like like hey do six sit-ups a day and you'll stay with your wife i mean is there any is there any like you know just learn how to make an omelet and you're cool. Like what's the practical solution? I know it's important that we just talk about it. I definitely know that because then maybe you're less likely to snap on your wife or snap on your husband and you'll realize the importance of staying together.

All my – I will say this. Every single one of my friends who's gone through a divorce is like, dude, no matter what, don't get a divorce. And then there will always be someone in the comments who will be like, hey, my fucking husband beat me. Fuck you. And I'm like, okay, you win. Yeah. Is there any just like practical advice? Is it go to counseling with your wife or, hey, make sure you work out with your wife?

Because that's the root right we got to try to keep couples together who are having kids right yes 100 um i think well even in that statement we have to keep couples together that are having kids a lot of people that are having kids aren't couples um So that that's one of the things I would say, too, I think we have to think of. The bigger picture, right, I think a lot of times we go into these situations, people have kids based on six seconds of pleasure. Right. The average orgasm lasts for six seconds, guys have an orgasm. And then we're like, oh, and then we had, you know, we had a kid. I need a sandwich. Yeah. Right. 10, 10 months later, we got this kid that we never intended on having, and we're having to make a transition sooner than we, so now, you know, we're going to do the right thing. We're going to do right by her.

And we, you know, we married this woman that we really had no intention of marrying prior to that. Um, and then it gets rocky and we've never worked on our relationship because at the start of it, we didn't intend on having this long-term relationship. So we never worked on ourselves. We never worked on our relationship. And now it's easier for me to just bail out. relationship. And now it's easier for me to just bail out. This isn't working. I can't stand you. I look, I love, I love little John Jr. is my favorite. I love him. Um, but I don't like you at all. And so I'd rather just leave you and love them than to stay here and hate you and hate my life. Um, so I think there, there definitely, I think we put more time in, unfortunately, I think we put more time into picking out our shoes than we do picking our partners.

Wow. Wow. Wow. Like, like if you think about it, like if you're going to go buy, if you're going to go buy a pair of shoes, right. You, you, if you go to the store, let's say even, even if you go to the store, you take them out, you try them on, you put, you tie them up, you walk around the store a few times with them. Uh, nah, I don't really like those. You put those back. You know, these are a little too tight. Let me take the, like, I don't think we, we vet our relationships enough for something as serious as fatherhood or parenting, I should say, uh, or marriage even. Right. I think a lot of times we, we, uh, cause marriage is work. It's not, and I don't say that in a negative sense. It was anything worth having is worth

working for. Um, but it requires you to work on you, which a lot of us don't want to do. Right. As men, we definitely don't want to admit that we have faults. We don't want to say that there's something wrong with us. So we don't want to, we don't faults we don't want to say that there's something wrong with us so we don't want to we don't that's always hard saying that because then you get like like you mentioned the comments as always no i get it i get it there's always somebody on both sides if you get a flat tire in your car you have to cars are work right you get a car you have to wash it you get a flat tire you got to change it the engine make down you have no problem doing that work but for some reason you keep getting in the same fight with your wife every three days and right if by the 15th time if you're still blaming her you're a fucking idiot right exactly because like hey man now it's like you you need to do some work

you need you have to change something that's coming out of your mouth you need to stand differently it doesn't matter but you better start fucking like working. Right. You better slow everything down and start working. You're right. It is work. A brand new car is work. A brand new relationship is work. You're getting into work.

And it starts with you, right? Like you have to, you have to, if I get a brand new sports car, I got to learn how to drive it. Like if I get a, if I put a Lamborghini in my, in my driveway today, I don't know how to drive that. Right. You know what I mean? Like, I think I do, but I don't really, I don't really know how to drive that thing, you know? Uh, so I'm gonna get in there and I'm gonna mess it up the first fuck a couple of times.

Like it's, it's not going to look as sexy as it does in the James Bond movie. Like, you know what I mean? Um, but eventually I'm going to get the hang of it, but I have to learn how to be the driver of a Lamborghini. Just like we have to learn how to be the driver of a Lamborghini. Just like we have to learn how to be a husband in a relationship or how we have to learn how to be the man in a relationship. Here's the sad part about it. I think put up a stat and I think it's like 50% or 51% of marriages ended in divorce or something like that. People break up, right? marriage has ended, divorce, or something like that, people break up, right? That means that happened.

And the numbers are a little different, but that happened in most of our parents' situations, right? And so that's normalized. Me and you, both of us, both of us, divorced parents, yeah. It's normalized. We've seen that before. Totally normal for me. Totally normal.

It's an option. We don't have to work through it. Like if I don't like you and you don't like me, I don't want to change. You don't want to change. Cool. Let's let's let's break up. we invite in that. And this is the only argument that I'll make for the government or in the government sense, because I, that's, that's a lot. Um, once we decide we're going to split, we're inviting a third party in that neither one of us really have control over and they are going to do what they want to do in our relationship. And if, if we wouldn't allow any other third party into our relationship, why allow that one in right um and i don't think we ever see that we don't see that coming right and guys and honestly guys get the short end of the stick it's not our fault but it is someone's fault somewhere along the line some dudes were screwing this thing up um and so we're we're we're on the short end of the stick

at this point what do you mean because the legal system will push the kids towards the mom uh regardless yeah yeah yeah yeah they definitely do and in a lot of situations like to be honest like a lot of dudes aren't no gosh dang it a lot of dudes aren't fighting to have uh full-blown custody like that they definitely want to be involved. Definitely want to be a part of, there are definitely a lot of moms that are, that are, you know, using weaponizing kids because that shit is crazy. How about the irony of that? You divorce this woman you don't get along with, but the truth is, is you're going to have to try to get along with her more than ever. If you get a divorce, 100% or else the kids are going to have to try to get along with her more than ever if you get a divorce. 100%. Or else the kids are going to suffer like a mofo. Yeah.

But again, that's the big picture, right? You've got to look at the big picture of it. You're going, no matter what, you are tied to that woman forever. For at least 18 years, you're going to be very closely tied. After that, yeah, you guys might not. You might see her at the wedding. You might see her at the grandkids' birthday party. That might be it. But for these formative years, these next 18 years,

while they're in school or they're growing or they're getting older, you are going to have to deal with her. You're going to have to co-parent or parallel parent or something. So you're not getting away. You may not have to sleep in the bed with her. You may be able to go put other women in your bed, but your, your household still involves her. The decisions that you make with about that kid still involve her. The things that you want to do when you go to that football game, who are you going to be sitting next to like her? Like you're still, you're still there. And maybe her new husband. Right. And that's uncomfortable right so

it would be better or it could behoove you to try to work through it if it's possible caleb go ahead let's play this clip by the way the i want to tell you once again it's for fit fatherhood it's the number four fit fatherhood it's it an endless resource. I dug through it for like two hours last night on my computer. There's so many good clips, all varieties. And he tackles some tough subjects because... Well, because. Okay, let's hit play on this.

You'll know why here in a second. For instance, a woman, you know more single dads than single... Excuse me, can I get a second? You're forgetting about the part about the fathers who should find you new parents. Hold up. I'll let you talk. You're forgetting about the parents. All right, you're about second? You're forgetting about the part about the fathers who should find you new parents. Hold up, I'll let you talk. You're forgetting about the parents. All right, you're about to.

You're forgetting about the fathers who's not given a chance to be a parent. My father tried to be there. Because he wasn't with my mother no more, she made that shit so toxic for him, he had to let me go. So you say, yes. No, no, no, hold up, hold up. I'll let you talk. My mother didn't even want me, but still didn't want my father to take care of me. Okay.

But you're still not seeing the perspective of women not allowing men to be fathers. No, that's who you. That's who you. I've seen the kids weaponized more than once, man. That is a fucking tough thing to witness. Yeah. Yeah. And it's because, because there

aren't many ways to get at a guy, right? Like, because we're stoic and we put these walls up, even in our relationships, right? Like we don't give more than we have to. Women know like that kid is your soft spot, no matter how tough a dude you are, right? No matter how much of a badass you are, kids are your, they immediately have a straight shot to your heart, right? And if I can't get back at you, I'm saying all these things about you to you. I'm telling people around you, these things about you are keyed up your car, all these little petty things. And you're, you just, you're shrugging them off. Well, I know how to get you. I know how to get it. I know how to dig in. You can't see your kids this weekend. No, they're not going to make it. Sorry. They got something

going on this weekend. You can't see him. That hurts. That is definitely a way to get at somebody who maybe doesn't respond in any other way. By the way, and in the end, it's only the kids who suffer. By the way, and in the end, it's only the kids who suffer. 100%. 100%. 100%. I was doing some work with First Five Alameda with co-parenting through the holidays. And some of the stories the guys have, it's a struggle. And we're like, oh, we go to court and they figure it out in this, you know, maybe a few months, few weeks. These dudes are struggling for years. Yeah. Five, six, seven years of custody battles where it's inconsistent visitation, no visitation at all. A buddy of mine that I played football with that I grew up with, and you may have seen it on my podcast, his wife just took his kids and moved to Africa.

Like just took off. Holy shit. And didn't, she forced his signature, just took off. And he had to go through the FBI. Like, he had the whole, I mean, it's the whole thing. And I tell him all the time, bro, it sounds like a movie. It does sound like a movie. It does sound like a movie.

There is a movie. I'm sure there is that movie. I'm like, bro, you're liam neeson like you literally had to go and and like he had to get help from the government to get his kids back did he get him back he did he got him back just recently a few months ago he got him back and uh they they went out there kicked in the door and and you know got the kids back um so now he has no shit shit, the FBI did that? They do good shit like that? It was a struggle. It was a struggle for sure.

Because he actually went out there and tried to take care of some stuff on his own. But the government out there was like, if you're not paying, we're not doing anything. Which country were they taken to? Ghana. She went to Ghana. Wow. That's where?

West Africa. Okay. Yeah. Up in the top, right? Near Nigeria, if I'm not mistaken. Okay. Wow. That's some scary shit to go to a foreign country and try to get your kids. Yeah. That's what I was talking about, man.

It's like a movie. He, he, uh, he went out there on his own, uh, like right after it happened. And, uh, the, I guess the chief of police or whatever the title is, they're literally told him, if you can't pay me out of your pocket, if you don't have any pocket changed and your kids are going to stay here. Like it's nothing we're going to do. And I think even the country itself has some some rule. They don't interfere in those things. So we had to get the American government to help because they would not at all. And technically, because she wasn't a full citizen yet, she's still, you know, still responsibility of America. And so they were able to come in, but had she had a little bit more time, that was it for him. How long did they date before he married her?

That is a good question that I don't know the answer to. How long did you date? How long did you date your wife before you had kids? How long did you date your wife before you had kids? We were high school sweethearts. So we were together for 10 or 11 years before we had kids. We were together for 10 years before we got married, 12 years before we had kids. Yeah. You think that that's a – so you kind of understand what I say when you're like, by the time you had kids, you kind of been through all the fights.

Yeah, been through all of it. Had some time apart. Yeah, me too. we were broken up for about a year yeah got to experience life without each other uh like the high school sweetheart thing is really cute to say but it comes with its with its downfalls and pitfalls because you don't really get to experience life as a person as yourself uh because you've always been, you know, and you've always been an and you never get to be a you. So I think we talk about it all the time. That year apart was huge for us because we got to explore ourselves and get to know who we were. And then we came back into relationship. We were 100 percent ourselves again. But then growing together is important because you get to figure out, do you really want to be with this person? So yeah, I agree. Dating for a longer period of

time, even though people are pushing you to get married sooner, get engaged, what are you waiting for? Dude, if you don't feel it, you don't feel it. It's no to rush it um because as much as she wants to have a ring on her finger she also don't want to have to take it off at some point so if that means you guys dating longer and getting to know each other then definitely do that hey i i'm gonna be frank with you too i'm armenian and my wife's a jew and uh i'm there's no fucking way i'm spending ten thousand dollars on a fucking ring i'll'll put $10,000 in a mutual fund. And when my kids are 77, they'll have $11 million. Yeah.

Thank you. Yeah. And they'll be like, okay, I bought a little gold ring for 400 bucks. And I told her, hey, let that shit get scratched up and pass it on to your grandkids. This guy right here, Matt Schindeldecker. Morning, Sevan.

We work through and talk about skills to navigate these topics at the new CrossFit Athlete Center Trauma Sensitive Coach Seminar. Love this topic and conversation. Dude, you would love to have this dude on your podcast. This dude has started a program that's expanding out of his state, and it's expanded all over his state. And basically what he does is he has this crossfit gym and the courts instead of sending people to juvenile hall the kids have a choice like hey or you can do this program every single day for nine weeks and the kids that come in there are fucked up the stories are crazy right you could just imagine the crazy shit these kids have at home but because they're in this group

every single day with other kids who went through the same thing and, and adults who've gone through it already. And all the probation officers have to take the class too. So like you're, you have to, you got to do a hundred burpees with your probation officer. It's cool. Shit. I can't recommend this guy enough.

This guy's like, like when we were talking, what's the solution. This guy's getting the damaged goods and like, and, and like rebuilding them. It's cool. Shit.

Yeah. He's doing the work. I like that. Yeah. cool shit. Yeah, he's doing the work. I like that. Yeah, it's really cool. There's this video. There's this thing that I'm making a sweeping generalization. By the way, I saw a friend of mine on your Instagram account. You had James Townsend on your Instagram many months ago, maybe a year ago, working out with his daughter. This guy is a fucking incredible man.

Does that name ring a bell? Do you know who I'm talking about? I know the video. I don't know him personally, but I know the video. I know exactly who you're talking about. Yeah, this dude's amazing. Now he's got another daughter. He's got two daughters.

Lucky man. Yeah, he is a stud. But another guy i highly recommend uh you get on the podcast he's he's cool as shit and he's putting in the work that's cool right yeah yeah see like that's that's so that is super cool and what i really like about it is it's breaking that like your daughters have to be princesses. Like she can be a princess and lift weights, right? Like they're, they're connecting in such a way.

And it looks like it's just weightlifting and it's cute, but they're connecting in such a way that she's seeing struggle and strength at the same time. And she's standing at the man she's going to marry. 100%. Right. He's marrying her. like he's setting her up for success 100 like and it is it's it's beautiful to see it right because we don't see this right like we don't get to see how many times a dad has taken his daughter to the gym and we don't get this and you can tell this is not the first time like her i like her form is solid video the kids are freaks the kids i mean she's locked and he's a tough dad too man it's not all fun and games with james townsend like this this guy's this these girls

work and that that's the way it should be you know yeah you you that the little kiss before all of that all these little parts of the video are just like, so he looks there right in the eye. You know, all of these things are so important. She feels safe right now. It's like, you know, dad can protect, look at all the weight dad's lifting. Look at what I'm lifting. Like, oh man, he's amazing. He's my superhero. Like all these things are happening right now. Oh, we're dancing? Oh, let's dance. You know, all these different things. It's so important. And here's the thing. He could go work out by himself.

Yeah. Yeah, that's sacrifice on his part. Because you know that guy, he needs his alone time to get. He needs his alone time. Yeah, he gets at it. He definitely could just be like, hey, I'm going to the gym. See you guys in an hour, two hours, whatever time it takes for me to get through today's programming. But to be like, hey, you're coming with me. And not only are you going to come with me and sit in the corner on the iPad,

let's get the kids bar. Let's put some weights on there. Let me show you what we're doing today, right? What we are doing today. And that's super important. That connection will last forever, right? No matter what happens. And this is what I always say, no matter what happens between the two of them and their lives, those moments are going to last forever. And they're going to echo through eternity. Right? Whenever she talks about her father, whether she's a grandmother, great-grandmother, she's going to say my father. And by that time, great grandfather, like he'd be great grandfather at that time. He may not be around anymore, but the image and the impact that he has in her life will echo forever.

He's always going to be her father. And that moment of strength and struggle is always going to be there. And my dad was strong, but he cared about me. This is this one thing that he really, really loved. And he included me in it. I was a part of it. Um, you know, she may grow up and love weightlifting herself. And that may be something, you know, that may be a legacy that they leave to get like, it's, it's being present and available at the best gift that you can give your kids because they're gifts that last forever you said something yesterday that um i was listening to your podcast yesterday and you said something that made me so freaking happy it's it's like i need to hear stuff like this what i heard on your podcast that this whole fucking mess we're in if you want to call it a mess my words not yours can be changed in one generation and when i heard that i was like oh my god we can we can flip the script in

one generation if everyone just does their little part yeah the whole the whole thing can just change course in one generation i was like god i needed to hear that because sometimes i'm like man what a mess we've gotten ourselves into yeah i think I think, you know what? I think, I think a lot of it is, is people feel hopeless. A lot of people don't live by the adage of, you know, you're planting, planting a seed today so that it's shade for somebody tomorrow. We don't, we don't see that, right? A lot of times we want, we want the shade right now. Right. And if we can't get the shade right now, then why plant the seed? Um, but I think if we all, right, if, if right now we had a conference and all the fathers got together and we said, Hey, this is what we're going to do. Right. Look, Hey, you've great dad, Debbie, dad, everything in between. This is what we're going to do.

And we're going to change the world. And we get together and we put our hands in the middle and we go one two three break and we all broke out into our lives and did that thing by the time our children are adults and obviously our children will be at different ages and some of them will be older and they'll start making changes right now some will be younger be making changes throughout their life the world and the next generation will be completely different. Wow. Completely different. Right. If you,

and if you take it even smaller, like I have a group of guys that are like, I will say my inner circle, like my group of friends, my kids grew up with their kids, our, our wives all know each other. If we all make a conscious effort to be better than we were, or better, not even better than our fathers,

but better than we were yesterday. We all get together and say, Hey, this is what we're going to do. And we do it. Our kids are going to be better than us. Right. Just, just, just kind of how it works. Right. Usually, I mean, there's ups and downs, but usually like you you do a little bit better than the person before you because they've laid out some type of blueprint. Right. Like you hope so. You know, unfortunately, you could be a better criminal or you could be a better wife, Peter, or you know what I mean? Like you could repeat it and get even. But but I see what you mean. Hopefully there's some growth. repeat it and get even, but, but I see what you mean. Hopefully there's some growth. Yeah. But as I was saying, if we all got together in a conference, no matter where you rank on that good dad, bad dad scale, if we all say, Hey, you're a bad dad, but this is what we're going to do. Right. Right. You're a great dad. Awesome. But this is what we're going to do. Right. No matter where you are on scale, if we all just did that thing. And I don't know what that thing is. Right. And it's because it's so, so many different things that fatherhood encompasses. But if we all, even if we just say we just really all embrace the fact that we teach, to honor that person's life or those people's lives, we could instantly create a world of better people. And the hope is that world of

better people will make better decisions for the other people. Right. And that would just continue to expand until we get some kind some kind of utopia, which, which is, you know, obviously not, we have to push in the right direction. Yeah. But we have to work towards it.

Yeah. I, I, we live, we live in a really interesting time. And, um, my,

uh, my politics have changed significantly since I've, uh, had kids. I was raised, uh, in as a liberal. I did all the things that I was supposed to do, affirmative action, feed the homeless, vote for Hillary and Obama. for you know hillary and and obama and then i had kids and and and i and i also spent many years being homeless and something happened to me after i had kids and i'm wondering if you've gone through any uh similar change than that too and then and then also i to push it even further i don't know what your thoughts are if we even have the same definition of what woke is, but do you ever feel that something unhealthy is happening and that the community of black-skinned people are being leveraged in some sort of ideological war that's going on? And how do you manage all that?

And if none of that even – if you're like, hey, fuck you. I don't play that game. And then there's this other group that's all that they want to do. Instead of pushing forward with solutions, they're just complaining. Right. Yeah. I'm very solutions-based because, like I said, I grew up in a tumultuous childhood. And this is why I only had two emotions is because of, you know, sadness and victim, I, and being the victim never really amounted to anything to me. It didn't help me in any way. Um, but in regards to like politics, politics is such a, like a, it's like an umbrella. Like it's so large. It's so above the day to day stuff that we have to deal with. Not that it doesn't matter. But I think there's so much more focus.

And you mentioned it earlier. Wasted energy. Is there so much energy that we could use right now, right where we are, right? Like we'll get on social media and we'll complain about the presidency and we'll talk about big corporation this and big corporation that. Right. But we have no idea who's on the council in our city

or who the mayor is. You know, we don't do anything in, in the smaller, in the smaller elections. We don't even care about them. We don't even know where they are. Right. I don't know who my mayor is. You fucking nailed it. But I'm bitching about all that other shit all the time. You fucking nailed it. Yep. And that, that is the umbrella, right? That is the umbrella that covers the country, but in your immediate area, right. If you can't fix your backyard, right. Or not even the backyard, let's stay in the house. If you can't fix what's inside your house, well, damn, the backyard don't matter, right? The backyard only matters to people who are outside looking, right? The people who

live inside need the house to be clean, right? And if you aren't taking care of the house, then who cares what the backyard looks like yet right now. Right. Eventually, we're going to get to the window. We're going to be looking outside like, oh, we need to cut that grass. That grass sucks out there. Let's go do something about it. But I think we spend so much time throwing that energy out that we don't ever focus it in. And that that is that is a big, big issue. That is not to say though, that there aren't problems outside, that there aren't things that are going on that definitely need to be fixed, that there aren't wrongs that need to be righted, right? All those things are

true, right? And they can be true at the same time. I think there are those of us though, who are missing our opportunities to do something important in our circle because we're looking outside of the circle. Um, because politics and politicians are going to always be politics and politicians, no matter who you get voted in, right? No matter who you elect to be into office, you're going to have some complaints because the government isn't for you specifically. It just isn't, right? It's for the whole country. And some people more than others, right? Like if you got a little bit more of a fatter wallet it's probably

in a little bit more in your favor um so to put that energy and and and and and you're also a little bit more of a slave that's that that's that's the weird part about making money you end up being the more money you have the more likely it is you're starting to go down the road of being a sellout and you'll lie and you'll lie to yourself about it too. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you're getting, you're getting closer, getting closer to a level where you have a little bit more to say, or, you know, people care a little bit more about what you say. And so they want you to say the right things. Like look at all these people on social media with these massive accounts. I mean, I had my account taken from me because, because i had questions about the injection and i had a blue

check mark account with 100 000 followers on instagram and they took that shit from me because i had questions it's like fuck right yeah but but my peer group stayed quiet even though i know they're they have questions too because they don't want to lose their account. Right. Right. You know, they don't want to lose their job. Right. There's always going to be there's always going to be somebody that has to go out and be the sacrificial lamb in order to the vanguard of the movement. Right. Someone is always going to push for something and then they don't get to see it. But somebody else does, Again, planting a seed for shade later on, right? You having questions, we're asking the questions that probably a lot of people had, right? But don't have the leverage or the following or the courage to say it out loud.

Or they don't want to lose their monster energy drink sponsorship, or maybe their dad's a doctor and that's how he makes his living. You don't want to fuck that up. Right. Yeah, it's very – these things are very complicated, right? Or is it more important for you to stay out of that even because you have to stay focused on your message, which is contributing to the world too. You know what I mean?

Like, hey, I really have strong feelings about this, but I'm going to push it down. I'm not a sellout, but this message, I can't let this message get derailed. Yeah. I can, I can speak, I can speak directly to that in regards to this message. Um, so initially with, with the podcast for fifth fatherhood, the name is whatever, but it was a fatherhood podcast for fathers by fathers. And I say that specifically because for us, by us is FUBU. FUBU was a clothing brand. If you're not familiar, FUBU was a clothing brand started by Damon John is a urban is a black clothing. Let me stop. Stop beating around the bush. It's a black clothing, black clothing brand. Right. For us, by us. Right. Forfeit Fatherhood was a podcast for us, by us. Right. It's for for black fathers, by black fathers.

I saw some white dudes on it. I was going to ask you if you let white dudes on your show, but then I saw some white dudes on there. Yeah. So initially it was because I was experiencing fatherhood for black people in a black community with black children and black fathers. So I needed to address that community, right? Started there. But then as I get more into it, I'm like, man, there's a lot of lessons that can be learned. If you go further back into the Instagram page, it's not a whole lot of diversity and color. But as I get further into a fatherhood is so much bigger than just black fathers in our situations. And we can learn from everyone. Right. And so I started first in the house. Right.

Started working with the ones around me, those that look like me and those that experiencing similar situations. And I'm definitely going to always be tied to that. Right. I can't get away from it. It's not I'm not it's inescapable. Right. Right. But there are so many other lessons to be learned. And if we truly want to be better as fathers, then we have to get the lessons from anyone, from everyone. And so even though my mission, you know, my mission initially is it was, you know, black fatherhood and I can stay in that lane. I can continue to push down that lane. But the reality is, is if I'm only getting the experiences of the people who look like me, then that's a very short sighted way to see everything. I have to be able to rope everything in. So we have a comprehensive understanding of what fatherhood means, because there are lessons to be learned from very wealthy fathers. Right. There are lessons to be learned from very poor fathers. There are lessons to be learned from guys who have great dads, guys who have no dads. Chinese dads, Armenian dads, Black dads, Jew dads, get them all.

Right. The way that different cultures or different religions parent is important to understand because there's a lesson in all of it. Right. I may not agree with it. And this is something that people on social media struggle with. I may not agree with it, but let me hear it. Right. Like, I don't mind having an argument. Right. And I don't really even call them arguments. I don't mind having a discussion. I like to have people around me who I don't necessarily agree with because their opinion, while it may be different than mine, is a valid opinion. And it may help me understand. So it's important to have all of it. So so you'll see now that I'll post this kind of everywhere, right? There's, there's, there's dad lessons from all over the place because those lessons are important for everyone, no matter who you are. Um, and, and so, you know, I'm, I'm all, again, like I said, at the core of it, I'm still, you know, look at me, you can't, I can't deny the fact,

not even look at me. If you hear me, right. I sound like a black guy. Like, there's no way around it. But I definitely think that there is some embracing of everything that has to happen in order to be better, do better for our kids and the next generation. There's this video. Let me see if I. Oh, your wife wrote a book. I don't want to forget about that before I go to this other thing. Your wife wrote a book. She did.

You must be so proud of her. Extremely, extremely proud of her. That's no easy endeavor. Isn't that great being around someone who's creating shit? Like she said like she said that she said she's pushing the bar right i know i know healthy competition it's so cool when i saw that i was like oh my god he's stoked yeah she she did she did amazing and it was it was cool to be there through the process to the ups and downs right because if you haven't written a book

and i've like messed around and wrote a book but but it wasn't like not a book. Let me just stop that. A pamphlet? A postcard? that someone goes through to take all of these thoughts and feelings that are in their head and put them in the paper and commit to letting the world see those, because we're thinking things all the time, right? And we're guarded with our thoughts and we keep them in our head and we don't share them. But to put them out there, to be vulnerable and tell your story and try to help other people through your story, it takes the courage that not a lot of us have. Um, and she's, she's a super humble person. So this was like, I had to fight with her to get this book out. Um, because she was like, no, she wrote it, but then she was like, uh,

now that it's out of my head, I don't want to do anything with it. Um, but yeah, it's, it's really, head, I don't want to do anything with it. But yeah, it's, it's really, it's good. It's for ladies, but I, you know, obviously I had an advanced copy and it's really amazing. Some of the things that she's saying, I read, I read it and I looked at her and I'm like, dude, you're good. That's why I married you. Yeah. Like, wow. Like, this is really good. Like this for it's like, and I say it's, it's a strong enough for a man, but pH balance for a woman. Yeah. Yo, it is. There's stuff in there that I was like, oh man, I need to do that.

I need to start kind of taking some of this advice. And then the other side to it is, is for guys who have wives who are, are experienced in some of these, my wife is, uh, she builds mental health programs for school districts. So she goes in, she creates the whole program from scratch, um, hires all of the employees, builds out all the programming, brings in all the interns. She has a private practice where she works with families and individuals. She is a professor at two colleges. She is a mother of two kids. She's a wonderful wife. She's an overachiever. She does all of these things. And a lot of women do a lot of things, right? There's a lot of stuff that they do. And reading this book helped me really understand her as a husband and how I need to allow her the space to be her and not just be my wife or just my kid's mom, just whatever box I put her in that day. Um, and I think a lot

of us take that for granted with our significant others that they're just going to be whoever they are. Um, and we don't allow them to move from that. Right. Right. I mean, I'm definitely guilty of that, but you put them in a box. Yeah. Yeah. And it's, and then when they, when they do something outside the box, we're like, what we're like what the yeah but they're allowed what makes you vulnerable too it makes you vulnerable too right like i'm sure that book makes you vulnerable also yeah yeah yeah no it's it's it's really good man it's really good um it was good to see her uh color outside the lines and and you know kind of get outside of uh all the things that she's doing. And it helped me understand, too, her journey on self-care, of why she needs to say no sometimes,

or why she is the way that she is without assuming. You've been my wife and you've done these things for me. Why all of a sudden you don't want to do that no more? What's wrong with you? I'm still doing stuff that I was doing. Why are you changing? And it's a part of, it's growth, right? We all should be growing together. We're growing apart. And if as a husband, as a boyfriend, as a whatever your title is, if you aren't growing with your partner and trying to understand their growth, then you will be growing apart. Uh, the name of the book, for those of you who are listening, the most of the

people listen to the show and don't watch it, it's called the power in choosing. And the author is Ariel McCone, Richard, the power in choosing. You can find it on Amazon. Yeah. The power, power in choosing you, sorry, the power in choosing you no it's in the description as well thank you um you know she's in it she's in a very interesting spot working in the school system uh man i i i've lost so much faith in the school system i homeschool my kids um i i i dare say that i think the system is now exacerbating issues instead of making them uh better that they are uh they're they've become codependents of mental health as opposed to helping people navigate um navigate towards health i think they've lost their their

their north star unfortunately i don't know if i don't know if i saw it on your instagram account I think they've lost their North Star, unfortunately. I don't know if I saw it on your Instagram account, but they stopped doing lobotomies. You know what that is? They pull off the front of the brain and they fucking chop it up with a butter knife. They stopped doing lobotomies. It was a surgery for psychological issues people had. And they were fucking people up, right? They were making them retarded.

Yeah. And that was the last operation that they've ever done in the United States for psychological issues, and now we're back at it again. People have psychological issues. Instead of helping them, we're putting them under the knife. And it's very disturbing to me. Very, very, very, very, very disturbing to me. Yeah.

We've made it business instead of love. Right. And it's tough it's tough yeah i think i think uh business as you described it business instead of love is definitely what's happening because there's money there's money involved once you put money into it and you need money to do things right you obviously need money to to have these programs and these things well pharma's voting i guess pharma and medicine are voting with their money i guess is what i'm saying yeah you're right because you still need money to take them to the gym but like i'll just say this for practical reasons before you go under a knife for some psychological issue have you worked out five days a week for a whole year and i know that's and have you cut sugar out of your diet for just 30 days?

As crazy as that may sound to people, I'm 99% sure that's always the solution. At least to create enough space to start working on the problem. If that doesn't fix your problem, it will at least give you enough self-esteem. And what did you say in the beginning of the show?

Cultivate self-awareness. Just tinker with your diet and start moving. But fuck it. Yeah, no, I think I think we are always looking for not we, but we are. Society is always looking for that, that that quick fix. Right. The magic pill, whatever is going to get us from 30 days. No sugar. Oh, my God. I'd rather just have surgery. Right, right, right, right, right.

Yeah. Working out for a year. Oh, my God. I've been asking you to do a lot. Just go for a walk for 40 minutes, five days a week. I'm not asking you to do a lot. Maybe start carrying around a five-pound weight with you when you walk halfway through the year. Yeah, yeah.

First, for your health. Yeah. health yeah oh no it's all right don't worry i'm gonna get this surgery and pop these pills yeah um i've had you on uh an hour and 44 minutes i want to ask you a a question i want to make sure i get out my my what do you think about telling black kids and jewish kids um I use both examples because I know it's pretty common in those households – telling those kids that the world is going to be a tough place for you and people are going to treat you differently? My wife was brought up like that, and I know a lot of my black friends were brought up like that, and I fucking can't stand that shit. No one ever told me when I was 16 that I was going to go to school one day and people were going to start making fun of my nose. I had to find out my own way. All of a sudden my sophomore year dudes thought were making fun of my nose. I went home. I'm like, what are they talking about? And I had to look in the mirror and be like, oh shit. Do you have thoughts on that? What are your thoughts? Do you tell your daughters, hey, you're going to have to work 10 times as hard as the white people to get just half? You know the lecture. Yeah, the talk, right?

Yeah, the talk. And the Jew kids and the black kids get that talk, and I'm like, why are you putting that fear in them? So I'm going to push back on that a little bit. Yeah, push back all you want. I'm totally open to push back. I think it's honesty. The reality is that there is a stigma to pigment. It's just we can say it isn't real. We can say it doesn't exist, but it's real. And it's a global issue. So to prepare them just like we would if if we if it was raining outside

right right right and our kids have on a short shorts and a tank top we don't we may not let them just run outside in shorts and tank top we may we may go hey look it's raining outside you might want to go change damn you're fucking me up metaph Metaphors are my game. Damn. because this isn't the 60s, isn't the 50s. It isn't as in your face as it was in that time. But there is some difference between you and everyone else. I'm not being facetious when I say that. You can look at you and look at everybody else. You look different. So there are going to be some different experiences that you have. Here's what I want to instill in my kids. So there are going to be some different experiences that you have. Here's what I want to instill in my kids. Hard work and a great attitude. OK, if you work hard and you have a great attitude, most things are going to work out in your favor.

They may take longer, but they're going to work out in your favor. I'm not saying that you're not going to experience these things because you are. I have. My wife has. My family has. These are real things. And so I want to prepare them for reality. But I'm not at the same time saying that this is an excuse for you not to get it done. Right. It is going to be a little bit harder for you. Right. Maybe depending on where you end up. But it doesn't mean that you can't get it done because people have gotten it done before you. get it done because people have gotten it done before you. Right. So, so like it's, it's, it's a reality. And I think we do need to prepare our children for it to say it's a handicap is something different, right. To say that you can't get ahead is something different. I don't know that we live in those times, but those times existed and those people existed and they are still around and

there's no denying that fact right it's not that long ago uh that you know there were separate water fountains it's really it's really not it seems like it was a long time ago but it's really not that long ago those people might be separate and it sounds like there might be separate ones again already yeah so like it's not those ideas aren't far-fetched i agree i agree it crazy. It's responsible to let them know that that's there or, or you can let them go out and find out on their own and then hope that you're able to be there to solve it for them. Right? Like you went out and you, you know, somebody started talking about, you know, you came back and you, you worked through that on your own and you had the, the,

the strength and the awareness and the mental dexterity to work through that without it crushing you. Right. Um, or, or, or deterring you. Um, but if it's in that, and that's, you know, that's not a, a, a, I don't want to devalue that situation, but like, let's say my daughter's an engineer, scientist. My daughter loves science, right? She goes to try to get a job as a scientist and she just keeps getting rejected, right? She makes it to the interview because she's got a pretty normal name, right? Makes it to the interview, but she gets in the interview, she gets rejected. Everything lines up. Papers are good. She went to college. She's done all the things. She's interned. She's done all the things, right? Maybe she sucks at interviewing, right? That's a

realistic possibility. So let's get her some interviewing skills, right? We can do all these things. We continue to work uphill to try to figure out all these things until eventually something is left on the table there's got to be one thing right um and if that is the color of her skin i need her to know that that was a possibility going into it right but but but let me ask you this um um rod let me ask you this why so if i'm if i'm walking down the street right if i'm walking down the street and there's a black dude walking to me and for some reason walking down the street right if i'm walking down the street and there's a black dude walking to me and for some reason i cross the street like i see my friend across the street right or i see oh shit the coffee shop's on that side or my i have my headphones in my iphone said make a left here and i cross the street and the black dude's been told hey white people cross the

street because they're afraid of you then he spins that narrative up and there was no truth to it and that and that in that instance that's the shit that kind of like like freaks me out you know what i mean like like we're spinning up nerves now let me tell you something if it's three dudes coming down the street and their pants are sagging and they're talking loud it doesn't matter what color they are if i'm if i'm in berkeley i'm crossing the street oakland richmond i'm crossing the street like i got you know what'm crossing the street. You know what I mean? Yeah. No, I get you.

I get you 100%. I just don't want – I feel like – crazy as I am, I feel like more than 51% of the stories that I'm hearing are fake. Meaning the person who was offended, and it doesn't matter what the issue is, was in their head. Obviously, it's gone way beyond black now now it's like sex and just it's just fucking everyone's got like a story spinning in their head why they're offended right right right yeah everybody's offended i'm offended you're offended someone needs to write a song yeah i'm offended um but so in that in that situation right like you cross the street and he thinks, oh, man, he crossed the street because I'm black and he's white. Yeah.

What does that turn into, though? Like, where does that go from there? Maybe it solidifies. But someone had to tell him that, right? Someone had to tell him that. Like, you don't come up with that shit on your own. But someone told him out of out of so dang it's hard so when we have the talk right and this is this is a i don't

know if you've heard that term before but this is yeah yeah did you my wife's jewish i'm telling you the jew parents do it too everyone's out don't trust anyone here don't trust anyone here's here's why they have it and this is what this is like legacy and tradition right is because at one time it was 100 true 100 true at one time in this country not that long ago there were sundown towns and there are still some actually to this day what is that black people shouldn't be out past sundown you could not be out after sundown if you were caught out after sundown you were subject to whatever happened to you. Still exist, right? We still have countries who have not, I'm sorry, countries, states who have not voted slavery out of, out of legislature. No shit. Like this still exists. So it is, it is, and maybe not in that exact term, right? It'll say slave, right? Right.

So, so it still exists. People are telling their children these things out of love and out of care for them, right? They want to protect them because in my grandma's lifetime, this was a real thing. In my mom's lifetime, she tells me stories now, she's 65. She tells me stories now about when he went to go visit her family and they couldn't, my grandfather, my mom's dad is creole if you saw him today well he's gone but he looks very much like french and black he looks very much like you okay like very like you wouldn't be able to tell that he's he's black his mother is black his father is french and i don't know where exactly from, but he, but very, very, you would say he's passing. Right.

But, but my, my grandmother, when they would go visit family, they, he would go in the front and get the food and then they would eat in the back because they could not be together. That's not that long ago. No. You know what I mean? And so these, these, these stories and these conversations are happening because it's not that long ago. No, you know what I mean? And so these, these, these stories and these conversations are happening because it's not that far. Again, it's not that far fetched for that to be a possibility. Those same people who were eating in the front with my grandfather, right. Are a lot of them are still alive. Right. Right. Right. And cause it's not just old people

that were there. There were people that have all ages. not just old people that were there there were people that of all ages there were kids there that were living through that and that was their reality and so those people are the same age as my mom now right right right those people are if you look at you know if you look at i'm not saying what you're saying isn't true i'm just saying why teach it do you know do you know what i mean by that like i'm not saying it wasn't true that i was going to get a big nose but like but but but like like no one told me hey dude it's going to be crazy hard for you to get pussy you're never going to be over five five i'm gonna fuck like no one told me that i had to learn that on my own okay now here's here's my question for you

had they i apologize for saying that because you have daughters but it was just for the impact of the state no you're fine you know you're fine had they told you that, would you have moved a little differently? Had you had that knowledge ahead of time, you may have been equipped to do something different. I don't think anybody's telling their kids these things to, to damage them or to skew their view of the world. It's more to make them aware of how the world views them. Right. Right. And to give them a, a, uh, foundation to, to jump out off of. Right. Because if I know, and again, I would have never tried to hit on the tall girls if someone would have told me that that's the thing maybe or maybe i would have overcompensated but i didn't learn

that till i was in college till i had a girlfriend i was hitting on this girl and one of my i was fucking 20 one of my friends is like dude you have no chance with her i'm like why he's all dude she's like five inches taller than you i was like what you what I mean? That that like struck me right in the heart. Right. But so, again, the conversation has to be had. And I don't think that it's not. I think the conversation is had with an understanding of why we're having this conversation. Right. Like a very I don't remember having. OK. Yeah. I don't remember having it where people were just like, you know, white people are going to hate you. Right. It was like, you know, it was it was always in it was it was it was situational. And they're like, this is and this is how you have to overcome that. You can't. All right. So I'm a strength conditioning coach, right?

Or I am was still do it right. Can be all right. So this is how I looked and I've looked like this for the last 10 years. I'm a pretty nice guy. I'm pretty fun. Like I'm not like super extrovert, like all in your face like that. Right. But there are kids in our gym who are just naturally afraid of me. I look scary. I don't know what that means. Right. But I had a kid that trained at our gym for a long time. And then she eventually became one of my personal clients. And she got to college and she, you know, she wanted to train with me personally. And I asked her how come she never talked to me when she was younger. She said she was afraid of me because I

was a big black guy. Nobody told me and her mother have always had like you know good conversation me and her dad always a good conversation so i don't think that they were at home saying that you know black people are bad and that you know you should be afraid of them right she just saw me and big black guy i'm afraid of him that's a social melu too right even if your parents don't teach you that the big black guy is scary, right? Like he's the guy. Yeah. Right. And so, and so when, when I'm telling my daughters that it's not because there's a real black boogeyman outside the door that she needs a specific person she needs to be afraid of, but there is some connotation with walking out of this door or out of this house with melanated skin. It just is what it is. And

if I don't, just like anything else I would prepare them for, I would be doing them a disservice to not prepare them for that. And then to go out into the world and be, you know, cause my daughters, I'm doing pretty good. My wife is doing pretty good that we live in a suburban community. My kids are one or two of the only black kids in their whole school, you know, really nice neighborhood. And so they don't have to have their head on the swivel a suburban community. My kids are one or two of the only black kids in their whole school, you know, really nice neighborhood. And so they don't have to have their head on a swivel like I did in my neighborhood. And so they are kind of walking through life just with their head in the clouds a little bit. And I don't want them to be blindsided by the reality that you are different than everybody else. If I can help you navigate that here versus the world,

because the world, again, the world is not going to be so nice about it. They're not going to explain why someone treated you that way. They're just going to treat you that way, right? And if I can give you a heads up, hey, it might rain today. You might want to take your umbrella. Sure. Wear the shorts and the t-shirt. Do whatever you want. I know that's what you like, that those are great take that out but hey just throw your umbrella in your backpack you never know what's gonna happen you're a fucking good dude rod man you're a good dude a great smile too there's this uh i saw this video and it's this guy walking out of walking out of a building little white guy and and these people walk by

him and they go and they they this is like two a year ago during the height of the pandemic and someone's and he's little and someone said to him i can't remember someone said hey dude you need to be fucking wearing a mask and he goes if i was six four and black you wouldn't talk to me like that it was a fucking it was a fucking great line. I was like, oh, shit. I just kind of like the reverse play on that. But it's real. And the reason they wouldn't is because there's this innate fear that goes back for centuries. Like you wouldn't talk to him.

That might be a healthy fear, too. You shouldn't be taught. You should be careful how you lip off to anyone who's six four i don't know about the six four you don't be stupid right life's not fair don't lip off to someone who's six four but the black is just the extra seasoning on it right like yes yes i agree like there's some like there's some insinuation that a black person is more violent than a white person and which is completely a fucking absurd there you go yeah hey um i i really appreciate you coming on i'm so happy i got to meet you um uh who am i to tell you who to have on your show but uh james townsend and that guy uh schindeldecker dude if you need

their contacts let me know. Oh, both amazing guys doing great things with kids. And I think they're both in your wheelhouse. You have these four pillars, faith, family, finance, and fitness. And I think those are just right down the pipeline with these guys. Yeah, yeah. Definitely. definitely uh want their information like i said it's it's comprehensive right a father is is is everything right and so um i i like jane jason wilson has this this thing um where he talks about manhood being comprehensive um and it's a man is everything that he needs to be whenever he needs to be it. Um, and that, that surmises what a man is, because when you ask what's manhood, what's a father, you get all these different answers.

Um, and after I read his book, that's what kind of helped push me to including the other, other fathers, right. Other types of, so it's, it's, I definitely would love to have those guys on anybody that's doing anything father related that, you know, we can talk to and bring on is. And I actually had somebody who wasn't I wasn't a father on just recently, just in the process of trying to get to fatherhood. So just trying to broaden the horizons and give dads the best opportunity to be great is where we're at right now. One of the you said this line in a podcast, and I want to share this with everyone. You said it's hard to be a bad father if you're a good man. And then you went on to describe a good man as being emotionally sound, financially sound and physically sound. And I was like, wow, that's really good. I want to read that again.

It's hard to be a bad father if you're a good man. And boy, that takes a lot of stress off of you. If you're worried about being a father, just worry about being a good dude, a good man. And you're, that was, that was really well said. Yeah. It Yeah, it's hard, man. Like if you're a good guy, just in general, if you're a good man and not a father, not a husband, it's hard for you to do bad things. You know, right. You hold the door open for people. Someone short a dollar at the register in front of you. You pay it for him. Just normal shit. Right. You call your mom once a day. Just like. call your mom once a day, just like, yeah. Yeah. And then, so you take that, right. You take that as your foundation and you put everything else on top of it. Right. Like, I think, I think that, that part of it is, is important and there's, there's a gotta be some work done to be better men. Um, as men, we have this flaw of we're wanting to like win Rome in a day. Right. But it's not, not that way. Right. It's just a little bit

every day where we just get a little bit better every day percentages. Right. Some days are going to be 10%. Some days are going to be, my kids just set off the alarm in my house. They're smoking in the bathroom. I don't know. So I heard, I heard the dog barking in the distance. And I'm like, oh, man, this is going to go well. He's going to come to the office and get me. But he must have went to got them and they opened the door. But, yeah. So the foundation of being a good man makes everything else better. Right. Like a rising tide, raise all ships. If you're a good man at your core.

Yes. You're a good man at your core. You can be a good father. A good man at your core, you can be a good husband. That doesn't mean that it's not still going to require you to continue to work, right? Because if you're not working, you're dying. But if you can get there, right, if you can get there to being a good man, you can be a great father. We are no longer in an era, people, where the experts are the scientists or the people who have the degrees. You have to know that. Anyone who leans on you, anyone in their argument, if they say, well, the scientist said, well, the psychologist said, that's a – there's a fallacy there in your argument. You are using authority as some pillar.

I'm telling you this guy, Rod Richard, just the fact that he's immersed himself in this podcast, in this work is a greater resource than fucking 300 PhDs you'd have in a room at a conference. I really appreciate you coming on. Thanks for continuing to curate that amazing Instagram account. And I'll be watching and maybe we can circle back around in a year and do it again. That'd be great, man. Thank you. I really appreciate you opening up your platform and having me. Oh, dude, my pleasure. To share the message of fatherhood, to talk to another father is always good, man. Awesome, dude. All right. Tell your wife congratulations on the book.

I will. I will. Thank you. I'll see you around. All right, brother. Have a great one. Yep. Cheers, dude. Cheers, brother. Dude, if I had that smile, would be the killer yeah that would be the i would be at the uh it put on another 100 subscribers he's a handsome man

yeah good show man there were so many things i wanted to open up. He's good. I enjoyed that. Jay Hartle, good shit. Randy Martin, this is some good stuff. Loving it. Jessica Valenzuela, awesome guest. Thank you. Yeah, I enjoyed that. AZZZ, I'm catching a live show again,

so I listened to this dad and then listened to Candace Owens and the difference of opinions. His thoughts are very different. His thoughts and the difference of opinions. His thoughts are very different. His, his thoughts and, and the difference of opinion is thoughts. And Candace's thoughts. And the difference of,

yeah, I don't, I don't, I don't understand. How are his kids different from everybody else? Well, let's, let's fucking be realistic. The only two melanated skin girls at a school

that's in high school though it was a daphne and andrea they were the two melanated girls that i fucking want freshman sophomore junior senior school with everyone everyone knew them they were cool but they were fucking different and they happened to be friends and everyone else was fucking either whitey or a Mexican or a Jewy or whatever. People didn't even know what Armenian was. So that's how they're different. I mean, in the most superficial sense,

that's how they're different. Thank you, Matt. It means a lot to me. Guys, what a great podcast. So glad I listened in. Thank you. Alright. Guys, what a great podcast. So glad I listened in. Thank you. All right. These are some of my favorite Sevan cast. Which ones? The ones where I talk to the other people?

Not CrossFitters. Yeah. Nice, Caleb. Nice save. You saved me. Yes, the one where I talk to non-CrossFitters. People still don't get what Armenian isian is yeah we're the original people there were black people and then there were armenians the first you're the only armenian i know probably if you if you that we're in we're in like two places we're like in detroit and are

in los angeles and armen. Three places. And Israel. We got a little compound in Israel. A little corner of the city of Jerusalem. Tomorrow morning we have Facundo on. Is Facundo coaching Roman Krennikoff? Is he coaching Guy?

Is he coaching one of the Panchik brothers? How many people is this guy coaching? Is he coaching anybody at this point? Yeah, maybe he's not coaching anybody. How's his relationship with Rich Froning? Will him and Brian friends start flirting on the show? These are the hard-hitting questions.

I'm so shaken, by the way. Whoever reported me, you did a really good job. You really fucked me up. Point. You got a point. You win must i'm so shaken by the way whoever reported me you did a really good job you really fucked me up point you got a point you win i'm really shaken i don't want to have to worry about um i don't want to have to worry about what i'm saying okay here we go azz round two sorry no need to be sorry wait Wait, okay, I'll accept your apology. Never mind. Their parenting and the ways they see themselves, both black but different perspectives. I didn't catch this till the end, though.

Candace Owens is more of denying any treatment differences. Here's the thing. It depends on how absolute you want to get into reality, right? Is Candace denying it? i i do like this i'm pivoting a little bit i do i do like the self-responsibility uh component that this guy is pushing hey it's on you um clean your own house uh staying away from the bigger picture it was a trip that his wife was involved in the educational system we know what a fucking complete disaster she's in the two biggest disaster zones on the planet right now, mental health and education. I mean, those are just, those have been laid to ruin.

Anyone who's working in those fields is navigating a minefield. Wouldn't you say, Caleb? Yeah, it's pretty weird. Good answer. I haven't worked in a college. you know good answer i haven't worked in a college um i know some people who work in colleges and it just gets like very particular about like what they're doing there's no freedom in any of them there's no freedom of thought in education or in medicine it's just especially in like liberal arts colleges they're just like you have to take a certain amount of um like electives and those

electives are like a list of like 10 different things that nobody really cares to listen to but because of some somebody who gave a bunch of money they said hey this is the class that i want you to host and it is not something anybody gives a shit about. There's this college. I cannot believe I can't remember its name. It's a super conservative college. I want to say it's in Michigan. Something healed, something shields. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.

I can't remember, but I was reading the Wiki article on it the other day. And the irony is they refuse to do is they refused to participate in affirmative action. Colleges that participated in affirmative action, even private colleges, were given money, and this college refused to participate in affirmative action because they knew ideologically it was wrong, that it was based in racism. And yet this was the first college in the United States to have melanated students. The irony, right? And it had like the largest number of – yeah, is it Hillsdale? Is that what it is? Yeah, definitely not California.

Is it Hillsdale? Wow, good job, Clock Cutter. Let me see. Let me check their wiki page. Hillsdale College. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Fascinating, right? It's a liberal arts college, but it's crazy conservative.

God, man, if you want to send your kids to get an amazing education, send them there. The people who work, the cast of characters they have they're fucking brilliant hmm hillsdale college is a private christian liberal arts college in uh hillsdale michigan it was founded in 1844 by the abolitionists known as free will baptist wow abolitionists those are people who are against slavery that what that um oh yeah i guess abolitionists yeah anti-slavery oh the fucking irony do you guys fucking see this it's endless it's fucking endless it's endless it's so obvious the Civil Rights Act, the Democrats. It's so obvious.

This is a fucking Christian conservative fucking college. It doesn't participate in any of the woke shit, and it's an abolitionist college. It's like endless, endless like – In August 1844, members of the local community of Free Will Baptist resolved to organize their denomination's first college institution. After gathering donations, they established Michigan Central College in Spring Arbor, Michigan. Wow, Hillsdale College. This is a – I don't know if you want to read something cool and learn something college is still around conservative liberal arts college almost sounds like a fucking oxymoron right

they almost have a billion dollar endowment yeah that's million dollars yeah they didn't have to participate in the racist experiment that all the fucking liberal schools in California did. That's crazy. OK, so tomorrow we have Facundo on. And then at 9 a.m. after Brian and I dance with Facundo for an hour, we will. I'm going to go over to coffee pods and wads and chat with my friend Pedro. Yeah, only 70 people on. Hey, dude, that's fucking great for me.

I'm ecstatic. I'm ecstatic I'm not canceled. Everyone tell five friends they need to listen to this show. See you guys tomorrow. Bye. Bye-bye.