Dad In A Daughter's World

Have you ever found yourself adding things to your "honey do" list, or working longer hours then necessary? Have you ever asked yourself why? I did this and realized I was using my work as a distraction so I didn't have to deal with something that made me uncomfortable.

Some dads are good at playing with Barbies, I am not one of them. I have frustrated my kids more than once because I'm not good at imagination games. I think we, as dads, need to be honest with ourselves about our strengths and weaknesses as well as candid with our kids regarding them.

Sometimes we miss things. No one's going to bat 1.000. A childish disagreement on the playground is a great opportunity to help separate the dignity of the person from their ideas, thoughts, or beliefs. If we can teach this one thing, our future will be brighter.

We all know that phase when you hear, "hey, dad! Watch this!" or, "Hey, dad. Look at me!" It is a fun stage where they really think you are the coolest dude ever, but it comes with it's challenges, like the constant demand for your attention. We have to consider a few things during this stage to help maintain the status of coolest dude ever to our little girls.

It is critically important that we read to our kids every day. It is also important for dads to be involved in that. The kids benefit from seeing us read to them as well as from the books we will favor over what they will typically choose.  If you need some help getting a good bedtime story, please consider my first children's story The Great Wolf. The Amazon link is here

I have put quite a bit of time into reading parenting books this year. I wanted to sum up some lessons from those books and the first one is "The Strong Willed Child." There are some good tidbits in this book, but overall, you could probably save quite a bit of time just by listening to this podcast.

I got to sit down with a local Christian apologist and father 4 and we discussed bringing up kids in the faith and how important it is to live out our faith. I highly recommend connecting with Robby. He is insightful and doing great work with Stand To Reason.  https://www.str.org/robby-lashua

Are you a dad and an entrepreneur? If so, then you probably have a really good idea about how hard it is to do meet all of the obligations. Miguel Chavez is a coach that helps with exactly that. We talk about discipline. I think there is some info that will serve you here. Also, if you need some extra help, reach out to Miguel for coaching. Reach out on Instagram @hardworkdiscipline or to Miguel d...

My daughter came home upset one day after school and explained that she was on a girl's "hate list." It was sad, but also a good teaching moment for her and for me. 

Have you seen the #protectwren stuff going on? It was in the headlines, so I read a bit about it. I thought, "this is crazy!" Then I thought about it a little more and realized most of us do the same thing, just maybe to a lesser degree. We need to protect our children from the internet.

We can't control everything that happens and we can't live in fear of everything we can't control. So, what are we to do? Focus on the only thing we can control, which is our response.

After 50 episodes, what is the number one lesson, most important lesson I have learned? Listen and find out!

If it hadn't been for the gentle nudge of my loving daughter's, I would have never realized how much life passed me by as I stared watching nonsense on social media. I have been on a social media fast (removed it completely from my phone). This is the story that has motivated it.

No, I am not going to tell you how to become the ideal dad. You have to figure that out for yourself. This is about how I have received a bunch of different approaches and advice on having an ideal self envisioned. This is the approach that I use and it helps me get over my pride and work towards being the dad I want to be remembered as.

Have you ever felt physically drained? Exhausted? But, yet, satisfied at the same time? Working hard is important. The sense of pride we get providing for our families is a tangible currency. It has real value. I also think we judge ourselves incorrectly as it pertains to the work we do for our families. We need to give ourselves more credit for the intention. We need to care about the hard work....

In celebration of Father's Day, I share a story about my girls throwing me a "best dad ever" party. That expression of love was enough to keep me going. I hope you had a wonderful Father's Day. If no one else told you, you are appreciated, even if they don't know it yet.

Despite the warnings we received, we made the decision to get my daughter a dog. It's been hard, but what my daughter is learning is worth it.

We got back from our epic trip to New York City. These are the 3 biggest lessons I learned traveling across the country with my kids.

What is the key to traveling with kids? Planning, planning, and over planning. It is too much work to try and figure stuff out while managing a family. Plan everything out and make room for unexpected things to happen, then be present with your family.

I don't think I censor my kids, but I do manage what they experience. There are certain things that require a certain level of maturity to handle. I can't control everything, and for those instances I make it ok for them to ask questions. That is how we foster a healthy pursuit of understanding.

You would think that it was deeply satisfying, but it was not. It was actually extremely disappointing. These girls need to do things that suck so they know how to grind and not quit. Those are key elements to success in life.

I have discussed discipline before, but I lay out our method for discipline here. 

If we force our dreams onto our kids, it becomes their burden. Our children are not our mission. Our children cannot bear the weight of our dependency on their shoulders. We are bringing up co-pilgrims to walk this road with us (and make it a little further down than we did).

Comparison is the thief of joy. Please stop robbing yourself and you kids of the joy of knowing them uniquely and individually. We have to work hard to remove comparison.

One of the most difficult topics to discuss with our kids is our bodies. This conversation is so important to ensuring our girls have a healthy image of themselves and of others. We can't shy away from this conversation. It might be awkward. It might be uncomfortable. It will also be the most random inappropriate times, but we have to capitalize on every opportunity to have meaningful conversation...