#70 Parent the kids you've got, not the kids you want, with Sean Donohue

Gentlemen, welcome to the Be the Man podcast.

I'm your host, Greg Denning, and today super excited to talk probably mostly about parenting.

My guest, Sean Donahue.

This is what he does and he's done for like 25 years or more.

All about parenting families.

What's up, Greg?

So glad to have you.

How's it going?

Hey, thanks for having me.

Why don't you?

It's good to be here.

Kind of introduce yourself a little bit, tell us about your family and what you do and, and I would love to hear why you do it.

What led you to to do?

It Yeah, yeah, sure, man.

All right.

So I'm a 46 year old man, married for 20 years.

I got three kids.

Oldest is 19, youngest is 8.

And in many ways, just like a regular regular show, you know, I love watching football on Sundays.

I'm going camping in Santa Cruz, CA on the beach with some, you know, family friends.

Camping trip this this weekend.

I love working out.

I I'm staring at the window right now just looking at the hills of love backpacking and that's love hot dogs from Costco fall salsa is my favorite food.

But on the on the other end of it is yeah, this I I had this idea for a business about 11-12 years ago.

And so even I know you're you're I asked you who your audience is.

You have an entrepreneur, you know, men as an audience and I don't normally talk about this because normally I'm on podcasts.

I don't like frame myself as an entrepreneur.

I kind of brand myself a different ways.

But yeah, I'm definitely had an idea for business and and rolled the dice, got it started and it was super scary.

So much failure, so much pain just over the last 12 years, just constant, just failures, just one after another.

And they just started having successes.

And now here I'm with you, man.

Was talking with you and just honored to be here.

So I, I kind of even forgot the question.

I got kind of like excited talking about being an entrepreneur because I I can never talk about it.

Let's let's go a little bit more with that because that story's relevant because you got three kids and you start 12 years ago.

So I mean, you're, you're right in parenting.

I guess when you started you had two kids at least, right?

Yeah, Yep.

And how did did you, did you leave like traditional work and?

I did, yeah.

So yeah, I did.

I had a yeah, I was working with, I've just been working with children and teenagers and parents and like nonprofit sectors and in like Christian Church environments for a long time.

And it was great.

I really enjoyed it.

But I just had this like idea, this is to start a business and it kind of branch off and to do my own thing and be creative and help people.

And it was so scary.

In fact, my father-in-law, he, he's had a, he's in construction and he had a white cargo van, like kind of like, you know, kidnapper van.

That's what we, we call him in California.

And so we had a, we had an idea.

So we would go pick up used furniture off Craigslist or marketplace and then we would flip it and we would just sell it out of our garage.

And that was the backup plan.

Like if this business didn't work, I'm just going to just keep flipping furniture.

I was like, whatever it takes to put food on the, you know, on the, on the dinner table because I really thought there's a strong chance this is going to fail.

No one's ever heard of this.

I'm a woman.

I'm a man in a woman's space.

I'm, I'm not really skilled in anything business.

I don't know anything about business and so this is probably not going to, this may not work, but yeah, it's really fun to talk about 'cause I don't really just talk about how much earlier on, but yeah, talk about business is just exciting.

It is and what?

When do you feel like?

When do you feel like it it changed?

When did you feel the the tide change for you in the business journey?

I think that you just have first client.

Yeah, first, first time you, you sell something.

I was like, I was sitting at a dinner.

I was sitting down and you know, selling.

At that time, my business called Sean Donahue Family Coaching and now it's called Parenting Modern Teens and we help families from all around the country, around the world.

You know, I have a / 1.5 million followers on social media, really popular podcast and it yeah, that's cool.

Thanks for asking me this question.

Just sitting down, that first sale you make sitting down in the living room and I slid my rates over and they're very high.

I was like, Oh my God, it's really too high.

What's going to happen?

And they're like, OK, we'll do it.

And then I started, you know, my first little contract working with this family and a really troubled teen boy.

And he actually had run away from, he was a teenager, 16 year old dude named Mitchell, and he had run away.

And he was just like from the house.

And they're like, go out there and find our boy and bring him home.

And that's just another cool story.

Yeah.

What happened?

That was like nitty gritty of the hardcore work that I've done and still can kind of continue to do.

But yeah.

How about you?

Let me ask you a question.

You know, here you are.

You've got an audience.

You're living in Portugal.

I just met you.

Tell me what was like, what was it like for you?

Like I'll ask you that first question the first week or two of starting or like how did you know?

OK, this is going to work.

Yeah, I, I think I, I loved hearing your introduction because I think we have a lot of similar aspects in our journey.

I was just very driven to help families, especially in like the parenting side of it because and I, I know you know this and, and the guys listening know this.

Like there are a few things that are as important in life is, is the work we do as parents, like what we do with our kids, loving our kids, serving our kids, trying to get that right.

It's it's everything and it motivates.

It's everything.

So I was terrified like you, man, when when we decided to go for I was I was so scared that we were just going to be broke and and saying when, when the first guy's like, please help me.

I'm like.

Yes, yeah.

And then it just spreads.

Just friends.

So do you predominantly work with teenagers now or parents with?

So, yeah, so I haven't got a small team.

So mostly what mostly what I do is parents I work with, I work with the parents, I do the parent coaching.

So if you think about it, kind of, it kind of makes sense that, you know, we, when we have issues with our teeth, we could of the dentist, we, we bring our, our cars to the mechanic and we all have these invisible parenting tool boxes.

I can't see yours and you can't see mine.

And in today's world, just, you know, so many issues can go wrong with our children and our teenagers.

There's so much temptation.

And we've got this generation of men now who are listening to this podcast and these are really amazing men.

These men are much different than their dads.

We are a generation of men who who want to like Bush ourselves in every area and we including parenting.

We want to be close, we want to be connected, we want to be mentors.

And we're willing to read a book, watch a video, watch different social media videos.

We're like, we have a growth mindset towards parenting.

And I can't speak for every man you know of any dad growing up in the 80s or whatever your, if your dad was in the 70s or 80s or 90s, whatever.

I can't speak for them.

But there were some great dads back then.

But now we're, there is just this huge upswelling movement of men who are like, Hey, I, I want to be great in business.

I want to, I want to work out, but I really want to, you know, I really want to focus on my family and I want to be the best husband I can be.

And I'm open minded and I want to, I know I've got some luggage to work through maybe some childhood issues.

I got some temptations.

I got some issues with this issue and this and let's go.

And I need help.

I need support.

And this is this is happening all over.

It's really amazing.

That's awesome.

And, and yeah, you're right, you're right.

It's such a, it's a cool movement and such an important one.

Let's I I love and and really want to learn from your experience and your perspective with working with so many families.

What are some of those the biggest obstacles you're seeing that dads want or need to overcome?

What are some of those?

Well, I mean so many obstacles.

The 1st I mean the first two obstacles I think of is one of us, the screens.

I mean, this is the, this is the parenting battle of our generation.

And, and we're, there's been a lot of good movement in the last 12 months towards screens.

But I've been here, you know, doing this a long time.

And I've just, I mean, I've just seen these screens just destroyed kids, destroy parents, destroy families, you know, a bunch of just parents and not knowing what to do, a bunch of scared parents.

And now we're seeing a lot more educated parents, a lot more strong parents, a lot more mindful parents.

We've had a lot more, OK, I'm feeling better about this.

I feel like I've got a flow, but you know, there's just there's millions of kids out there struggling with screens and that means there's millions and millions of parents who are like, what happened to my kid or what's happening or I wish screens were never invented.

And so, yeah, man, I mean, this is a huge issue, right?

I mean, isn't it?

Hasn't it been an issue in in your home?

I mean, if, if my.

Yeah.

Absolutely.

And and everyone I work with as well.

It's just across the board.

Yeah, it's everywhere.

Yeah.

I just finished.

And we don't know what to do.

Yeah, we don't know what to do with it because the if it's really ridiculous, if you go to the the government website here in the states, like the CDC websites, they have the most stupid, ridiculous web pages on screen development.

It's so dumb.

It's so dumb.

It's like a 6th grader wrote it.

It's like, we'll talk to your kids about screens and monitor them.

It doesn't have anything direct, no guidelines.

And all the smartest guy, the smartest guys in the room, they're they're working at Snapchat, they're working at Google, they're working at Apple, they're working at PlayStation and they, they go on their websites.

They got nothing either.

So they know they've known for years on what we should do and what we shouldn't do.

And they're just silent because they're just collecting their dollars and they're leaving it up to us.

Regular old pair of like figure this out and it's just the information is getting out there more and more and more, which is good, but it's, it pisses me off.

It's really tough.

It's.

A huge problem and it's not being adequately addressed.

Share Share some of a couple of your like the most effective strategies you've seen, like what?

What have you.

Seen.

Oh, here's some good news.

Yeah.

Strategies.

All right, man, let's talk parenting strategies.

I got really good news for you.

You guys.

You guys are getting dig.

You're going to dig it.

You're going to like what I have to say right here, right.

The best thing you can do as a parent is just be close with your kids.

What's that?

No, it's not easy, especially when they become salty teenagers, but that's it.

Like that's what all the research points to.

That's my 25 years of research working in your with your sons and daughters, being close and connected with your kids now.

So that is not easy.

So we could talk about why it's so hard or how to be close because a lot of us listening to this, we weren't close with our parents.

So but actually you don't maybe even know how to be close with your children.

Or you look at your wife like, well, she's close, but they're not close with me or I'm close now, but how do I keep that closeness when they become seventeen or OK, I feel like I need to discipline, I need to step in.

But if I do that, it's going to hurt our closeness.

So it's like, it's like, yeah, we want to be the parent.

But the, that old saying is I'm your parent, not your friend is kind of becoming more outdated because what is a friend like a friend is somebody you like being with, someone you laugh with, someone you have things in common with, you enjoy being around this person.

So kind of being a great parent is kind of like being a good friend too, right?

Just say like, if I'm your parent, I'm your friend.

It's like, and and then what you have here is that kind of like a mind game, Greg, for some people, because some people were like, well, my, my parent was super strict, really hard on me like was we wasn't a friend at all, But I respect him and like I learned a lot, which is cool.

That's great.

So I don't need to be my kids friend because my dad wasn't my friend.

I was like, OK, that's fine.

So see the people get threatened by that, right?

Because they're like, it's like, it's like the it's like an attack like on them or their dad.

If I say something like that, but then I would just say, Hey, I'm not trying to attack you.

I'm not trying to take your dad, but your dad probably could have been as he was, but he also could have been more friendly and kinder and more of a mentor.

Because who do you want to who, who do you want your mentor to be?

Do you want to your mentor to be like some like douche that you don't like?

Or do you want your mentor to be someone you like and like, speaks to you kindly and encourages you?

And that's the type of person you want to be close with.

That's the person you want to learn from.

Like I could just go on and on like on this.

Like here's another great example.

I hope not talking too much like if someone knocks on your door right now and says, hey, how's it going?

I just met you.

I'd like to I'd like for you to convert to my religion and I would like to come in and tell you about my religion.

Like 99% of us are like no man, like my way, like I'm not coming to my house like I'm good because they're just a stranger.

There's no connection there.

But if you're if your best friend in life, your brother, your cousin, this guy you've just been through the trenches with for years, he calls you up to say, I got something.

That's a big part of my life and it means a lot to me.

And I want to share with you because I think you might not be interested in it too.

And I, I think it'd be good for you.

I'd love for you to check it out, whether whether it be religion or anything.

Then most of us are going to respond with Ohio.

Yeah, come on over.

Like, let me throw steaks on right now and I'd love to hear you out because there's that trust, there's that connection.

So if you want to make a good impact on your kids, a huge impact on your kids, here's some girly good news.

Just nurture that closeness and that connection.

And, and earn well, what you just articulated right there, described so well is just earning, earning the, the ability, earning the privilege to have that greater influence, which is so profound.

I, so I, I in my mind, I can hear people saying, well, they feel like they want the relationship, they want the closeness, but they're literally competing with the screaming.

Yeah.

And right and so in unless they preemptively beat that and and you know, that's tough to do, But if if the kids are on the screens and and they're constantly there, it's like it feels like this competition.

What?

What have you seen men do to?

Yeah, cool to win.

To win in that competition.

Well, yeah, yeah, Thanks man.

Thanks.

And if it's OK, I'd love to you live like in a, you know, pretty cool place, Portugal.

If I could, can I ask you a question?

What are some things that you enjoy doing with your kids that kind of nurture closeness like, you know, with your kids?

And I'll answer that question about screens right now.

But so I have successfully helped countless parents around screens.

So you can have victory over the screens and so have hope for that.

Also realize that if your kid has an unhealthy relationship with screens or if they're a screen addicted, that's on you.

You can't have an addiction without an enabler.

Like you did that, like you screwed up.

You're, you've made some bad, bad choices.

Your, your, your kid needs you.

And you got to step in to change that because screens are like the most powerful device in the history of mankind.

They're more powerful than any bomb, any gun, any tank, because they have the ability to change our minds and change a child's mind.

And so like, if you have a grandpa and he he takes a kid out to the woods and says, OK, so now I teach how he uses his rifle.

First of all, that's the cool grandpa right there.

Then the grandpa is going to teach the kid how to use this dangerous device.

And if the kid or the teenager starts acting out, acting stupid with this thing, then Grandpa Joe's going to be like, OK, we're done.

We're done.

Give me that thing.

No, you're not ready.

You're not ready because you have to be able to trust the child with this extremely powerful device called a rifle or gun.

So screens on the surface are about screens on the surface there about Fortnite, which I was playing last night with my 15 year old daughter and her 15 year old boyfriend and his 11 year old sister.

We were doing a squads last night, Fortnite and so on the surface they're about Snapchat.

It's about all these things.

But really, they're not Just train your brain to see that screens are about trust.

You either have it or you don't.

And it's your job to teach it.

It's your job to teach trust to your children.

Because we're never going to take class in the psychology of trusts and how powerful these screens are and how they must, we must keep a trusting relationship with these devices if we're going to bring them into the house.

So.

Good.

So, so good.

Thanks.

I want to answer the question you asked me because I think it just got me running.

It's relevant to about one building the trust, building the relationship.

And I guess my, my approach has been like for, for us.

I don't, I don't know if every family can do this, but for us, I want to make our life more exciting, more engaging, more appealing than some screen right?

Instead of watching it vicariously like we're going to live it.

And so, so with our family, we travel.

We do just bucket list stuff all the time.

We travel all over the world.

We just wow adventures and we.

Just yeah, I saw a really cool picture.

It looks like maybe your kids on in your Instagram.

We're in these like, is that you?

I don't know if it was.

Yeah.

I mean, you probably have a few of those, right?

A bunch.

It's so cool.

Yeah, we stack those up.

We're just stacking memories and adventures.

But we just got back from Kazakhstan and Mongolia and China and Qatar and do these these just life changing stuff.

But, and that's kind of the macro level, right where I'm like, we're going to go do big adventures together, but on a micro level like we exercise every day together.

Oh wow, you do.

Yeah, every day we work out together.

That's so I'm so I'm with you.

Like I love exercising, but I, I, I wanted that family culture and that's been one of one of our unique and super powerful family bonds is exercising together.

And then I read to my kids.

So we read read great books together, which that's that's another thing.

Those are just two two simple examples where I think.

Oh, wonderful.

That's built the bond and and maintained the bond so that we have the closest of the relationship.

So when do you read to them?

Or do you read the same book the same time and then chat about it?

So when they're little, I read to them and I saw all this, this 20, like 22.

So I've been reading for 20 years.

So I read the little ones at night and then now with the older ones we read the same books or listen to the same books and then talk about can.

You give me an example of one or two books that maybe you read recently with some of your older kids or younger.

Man, right now we're going through Love Does by Bob Goff.

Oh, I've read the children's version of Bob Goff to my 8 year old.

An incredible book.

Oh good.

Oh my gosh, Bob Goff is a genius.

Yeah, he's awesome.

So you're reading the big version?

I don't know.

I think I have that too.

No, I think I have everybody.

Everybody does, or everybody loves.

Everybody wins.

Yeah, the.

Children's version of Love does.

It's like a children's book with like these little like 3 page stories.

I think that's the name of it.

It's so good.

It's so good, yeah.

Yeah.

And it's just those little things like that you, you know, man, it just makes it, it makes a, it makes a huge difference to engage with the kids and be involved in fun ways that are, that are meaningful to them.

It's like making deposits in the in the relationship account.

Yeah, that's really nice, Really nice.

Rather thanks for sharing these stories.

Inspirational to hear hear you say that stuff.

What are what are some of those like another I got lots of questions, but let me shift to another question.

What are some of the maybe the most common?

Is it mistakes or misunderstandings with for for dads and their kids and and maybe.

Oh yeah, this size, I think that's an important question, especially like I'm just trying to guess your audience since how both man, let's listen to this, you know, I'm guessing your audience and some of your clients are a lot like mine.

Some of them are really high achievers, type A entrepreneurs, executives, you know, very like I want to push myself to the Max high achievers.

This sound like that menu or listen to this right now.

So yeah, I think then I'm going to laser focus my response to them.

What are some of the mistakes that these type of men make?

All right, here's a few things that come to my mind.

First thing is I have this teaching that I think is really, really important.

It's very, very good.

It's very true.

I hope you do it, but it's really hard.

It goes like this.

You got to parent the child you have, not the child you want.

That's tough.

That can be tough, especially if you're like like yourself and you think you're a good person and you're really successful and you have a lot of good things going on in your life.

That could be especially hard for you because then you're like, I'm cool, I'm great.

I figured life out, I'm successful.

So now I want my kids to be like me and to do what I did and to do what I do.

And so in rare circumstances, you'll have a dad that says, I like to work out and my kids work out with me.

I like to read and my kids read with me.

Like that's a wonderful story you shared there, Greg.

I mean, it's incredible story.

Like I've been working with parents for a very long time in that little story you shared.

I mean, I don't know if you realize that it's just incredible.

Your kids work out with you and they read with you.

That's hard to that's hard to that's hard to establish, like having your kids following your footsteps and do what you want to do.

In most of the situations, you have to pivot and parent the child you have, not the child you want.

What do you think about that saying, man?

Yes, it's it's profound.

Give us give me give me some more examples and I can think of in my own experience and others, but I'd love to hear some of your examples and thoughts and and and maybe some specific application.

So I'm guessing one of the things you're saying is if if the child has interests over here, you go with the child into those interests instead of trying to pull the child into.

Your that would be one way of looking at it.

Yeah.

So like, let's, you know, Yeah, that would be one way interest hobbies.

Yeah, give us some more.

One way of looking, yeah, one one way would be looking at it.

We'd be like, you know, I remember a really sad conversation I had with a friend like 12 years ago.

We were, we were on a jog together and he's a successful banker and he was just talking about his like 13 year old son in a negative light about used, how he doesn't have anything in common with him.

And he, you know, the son doesn't want to go on runs with him And he just, you know, wants to talk about baseball and play video games.

And I'm not really into that.

And like I, I really want him to do this one course on financial, you know, maturity.

He won't do that.

He just wants to screw around all this time.

And, and he was just like venting to me.

But for me it was like, like, what the hell, man?

What the hell?

I know this boy is an amazing 13 year old boy.

You have a son.

I have three daughters.

I'm never going to have a son.

I won't want your son to be my son.

Your son likes baseball.

Shut the hell up and go play baseball with your son.

Enjoy go to the baseball games.

You have a amazing son yeah your son wants to screw around.

We'll screw around with your son.

He's 13 he's 13 year old screw up screwing around.

That's what 13 year olds do They play their kids go play and have, you know mess around with your son.

It's not about you like your son's like going to be thirteen for like a day and so enjoy.

Your son weighs 13.

And then what happens is that if you, if you spend time with your your kid doing things that you know, you may not enjoy doing, when they get older, they're going to start doing things that you enjoy doing because they get it.

Like here.

Just to build on that example, like ask me right now some trivia on My Little Pony.

Go for it, dude.

Greg, test me on My Little Pony.

Do you think I like My Little Pony?

No, but I know a lot about Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Twilight Sparkle versus Alexia.

You think I you think I like playing with dolls, man, I'm playing with dolls for 19 years.

I'm still playing with dolls because I've got three daughters that the good Lord gave me.

So man, I've been raising and playing with dolls in for 19 years, man, because right.

You think I enjoyed doing this?

Like not really, but I do it because this is what it means to enter their world and parent the kid you have.

I love sports, man.

I played the year round basketball.

I played pick up basketball 2-3 times a week and I got only one daughter that tried to play basketball so far.

Maybe the youngest is going to go for it.

And it was awesome.

She scored zero points in two years of playing basketball.

She didn't make one basket, man.

She didn't make one basket.

She's so amazing and she was a great rebounder.

If she passed and she wasn't her favorite thing, but she did it.

I think she might have did it a little bit for me, maybe for herself.

But that's the thing.

Like just you got to adapt and just, you know, go with the flow with your kids and just accept them and know them for where they are.

And that is a big mistake that many, many, yeah, many high achiever type dads make.

I mean, that's just one busy mistake.

But I go online mistake because it is a popular one.

Now, yeah, you're right, that one's very prevalent if if we're out chasing dreams and goals and and high achieving, very driven, very ambitious that we want to get that target.

And yeah, you want.

To here's a second mistake.

This one's kind of controversial.

You might even disagree with this one.

OK, there's something I've been thinking a lot about.

So we have these sayings in sports and like, imagine like you're a dad or you're a coach and you're coaching your kids in sports.

And here's what most dads say, especially high, cheap first.

So here's what I want you to do.

All you got to do is go out there and have fun and do your best.

You got to work hard and give it your all.

That's all I expect.

That sounds like a pretty basic speech, right?

Yeah.

Very common one.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Very common is there.

Do you see anything wrong with that speech?

No.

Right.

Because most people don't, right.

But, but I do.

I do.

And I'm just being a little picky because, you know, this is my space, this is my world.

So I think about stuff in ways that other people don't think.

But I play pick up ball 2 three times a week.

I'm like 6 two.

I'm like a shooting card.

I can play, I can play point guard, I can play center.

And I, I, I'm, I'm a OK player.

I'm pretty good, but there's bumping it better than me.

But sometimes when I play basketball at 5:45 in the morning, I don't give it my all, Greg.

I don't give it my all because it's pick up basketball in.

The morning.

I'll go with 50% sometimes.

I've got I'm nursing, I'm 46 and my body is breaking down.

I got a little broken thumb.

Never been to the doctor but I think I broke it, got a little sliver break.

I've got freaking like tennis elbow in my right in my right so it won't go away.

And my tongue is numb from an injury from like two years ago.

And I wake up, man.

I'm just like, I'm just trying to go half speed dawg.

I'm not trying to work it.

I'm just trying to have fun and freaking exercise.

I'm just trying not to get injured, you know?

I love it, yeah.

And so if if you were to show up, all right, Sean, be the man, I want you to work hard.

I'll be like, shut the hell up, Greg.

I'm just trying to have fun, man.

So the problem with that speech is that you have to decide what is sports.

Yeah, Like is sports really can your, can your 12 year old just have fun and do they have to work it as hard as you want them to work it?

Are they just work it at their own pace?

And so instead of saying, hey, I expect you to go and you've got to push yourself.

If you're going to play, you have to go.

You have to be, you have to, you have to instead say, look, man, it's a game.

So and I think what you'll find is that if your kid is really, really into that sport, they're going to push themselves, right?

And they'll find whatever.

Find the thing that they're willing to really push into.

It'll come.

At least that's that's been my experience where when they find it's either an age or maturity thing or by choice, they're like, oh, this thing and they're really willing to work.

But I think as parents sometimes.

We're afraid.

My kid will never learn how to work if I don't.

They're very afraid of that.

Give them the speech on everything they participate in.

I also share a little controversial thing where I say I'll say hey it it's OK, it's OK to quit some things.

So many parents are like, no, I don't want my kid to be a quitter.

If they start something, they finish.

It I'm like well.

Not everything's worth finishing.

Yeah, right, right, right.

We don't be lying.

You quit stuff, you know, sometimes all the time.

You just.

Yeah, there's a lot of fear in parenting like that.

If you want to be a really great parent, you've got to do the inner work in on your own fears.

What are you afraid of?

Because right there you brought up a good example.

I'm afraid that if I let my quit kid quit lacrosse, then he's going to be a quitter forever.

I'm afraid that if my kids not pushing themselves very hard on the soccer field at age 8, then I'm raising a lazy bones that just wants to play video games all day.

I'm afraid that if I let my son, you know, have attitude around me that I'm a bad dad and he's going to become so disrespectful.

He's going to be disrespectful to cops.

He's going to end up in jail by the time he's 18.

Like, see, there's just a I'm so many things we're afraid of so many.

And, and if you're not afraid of things in parenting, it means you're, you're maybe not as in tune with yourself or your emotions as you should be, because that's a normal, healthy part of being a leader, being a lion, being a a strong man is looking and seeing all the scary stuff around you being like, OK, I see it.

I'm not going to parent in fear.

I'm not going to parent in fear, but I'm going to be aware.

I'm going to be parent in wisdom because parenting, and you know, if you're parenting in fear, then you're not parenting in wisdom.

And that's how that's a talk about mistakes.

That's all a huge mistake that many parents in 2024 are making, their parenting in fear.

They're afraid of having their kid ride their bike down to the park to play with their friends because they're afraid of getting kidnapped.

They're afraid of all these things happening.

I'm afraid if my kid doesn't get 3.8, then he's not going to go to a college and he's going to become a loser.

It's like, what is going on?

Yeah, man, have you, have you read, have you read the It's called The Anxious Generation.

You read that book.

Yet I have I just bought it it's on my shelf by like a month ago that tell me your thoughts.

Have you read it yet?

Yeah, man.

And you're you're like, you're speaking from it already.

Like there's two or three things you already said.

I'm like, oh, you're going to love that book where he talks about that.

We're eliminating that fear and letting our kids move away from a screen based childhood to a play based childhood.

And really it's it's fundamentally from the fear we have as parents and teachers and community leaders.

I'd like to think that Jonathan Haidt is the leader.

We've been waiting for an essential with his He's got this teaching is called the four norms, and I can tell you what they are.

But it's like we've been waiting for a strong, rational voice to speak up and just tell us what to do.

And that's what his four norms are.

Can I?

You want, you want me to share the norms?

Yeah.

Do you?

So the norms would be no cell phone until 14, no social media.

Correct me if I'm wrong because I haven't read the book.

You've read the book.

I've just been watching him on a lot of social media podcasts.

So no.

So no phone, no smartphone until 14.

So high school two, no social media on that phone until 16.

So good.

And and solid hardline, especially for our daughters.

Hardlines.

Yeah, for daughters, it's it is just a Wrecking Ball to their psyche.

A Wrecking Ball can't handle it.

Wish we did that with my oldest because now she's 19 and she's saying I wish that you guys were stronger and I said no, but we were very strong and very we waylated than all of her friends but it's still like we wish we had done it more.

We just.

And that's cool of her to acknowledge that.

That's awesome.

It is, yeah, it is cool.

And, you know, we had a, we thought we, she made good choices on the phone.

You know, she wasn't obsessed or addicted to it, but she was just a, you know, she's 19 now and she was bright, a 16 year old young woman just trying to figure it out.

And even then 16 is, it's just, I mean, they're just 16, right?

Can you remember what you were doing?

You're 16.

And then the next norm is phone free schools.

I love that one.

And I don't have this data memorized yet, but I do believe it's a fact that the two largest school districts in the United States, New York and LA, have passed legislation to move to phone free schools soon.

And that is going to be a game changer.

I think it's very correct.

Yeah, Yeah.

Important distinction there that that I heard from him in in the book specifically, he says it can't be that they have the phone with them just turned off or in their bag.

He says it.

Like it has, it cannot come in the school.

It's too tempting not coming in the school.

It's too tempting, right?

And you have a generation of scared parents.

That's us who have been on Facebook and we heard about a kid getting kidnapped like 2000 miles away.

So we're so afraid.

So here we give this kid this device because we feel like we need to track them.

Well, we weren't being tracked at all.

I think about this.

This is the first human generation of human beings to grow up with these screens in their pockets, in their badge room, who are being tracked, and they're just all around.

That would be his fourth.

No, his fourth norm.

It says something like like more unsupervised free outdoor play, something like that.

I should probably, you know, memorize that too.

Does that sound familiar?

Drake Yeah, you nailed it.

Where he's just and and and more adventurous.

He, he, he, I love the way he says it.

He says.

We we don't want scars, but we definitely want more bumps and bruises.

He's like, oh wow, I love that, you know, and.

And experience that.

Yeah, like, as much as I love organized sports, love organized sports, they're, you know, our kids need more than organized sports.

There's there's you just put your faith in organized sports or travel sports like they're you.

You got to be aware there's dangers of that.

Like some of the best things that kids need are just, you know, getting in the back of a boat in a tube or jumping off a Cliff into a lake or just going to the beach, going to the lakes, just going there with their friends, going to the parks, you know, being together, swimming pools, trampolines, just living life like that travel adventure, you know, going on service trips.

Oh yes, all that good stuff.

Exactly.

And letting them go.

Yeah, I think, man, I.

Think what's what's the tip?

Let me, let me ask you, you're very special person you've been, I just met you, but clearly you've got some skills and you've got some amazing parenting skills and unique things that you're doing raising your kids.

If I were to ask you give, give, give, give us one or two parenting tips from your years of raising your kids.

What is one or two things that you would be like you're, you know, foundational tips that you believe in?

Yeah, I, I related to one what you're just saying.

And I was, I was thinking, as you said it to, you know, let them go jump off the cliffs and go try all the things and, and do the dangerous stuff.

I I just decided early on, well, OK, maybe I'll back up because I loved, I love doing the adventure stuff and I grew up in a broken family.

And so I actually left home at 16.

So I was out on my own, like I could do whatever I wanted.

I got no parental supervision and and I just loved adventure.

I was just trying adventurous stuff all the time.

So as my kids wanted to try stuff, I thought, you know what, I'm, I'm just going to go all in.

Like if they want to jump, we're jumping.

If they want to try something, we're going to try it.

And I'm going to teach them how to be safe.

And then full scent.

We even found a place in Mexico.

They let you go skydiving as long as you're over 8 years old.

So we took our entire family and went skydiving, right?

It was it.

Was eight years old in Mexico.

Yeah, it was awesome.

We get in.

This little yeah, that's your wife is your wife is very brave and she's very trusting of you and Mexican skydivers.

Yeah, that's awesome.

Yeah, she.

Was there and she did it with us.

It was like, yeah, it's scary, but it was it was an awesome experience.

So Oh my.

Gosh, 8 year old skydiving.

I'm sorry I just hung up on that image.

Right now I have an 8 year old.

Oh my gosh, that's incredible.

Please continue.

Yeah.

It was awesome.

So, so pursuing the adventures, allowing, allowing our kids and this, this one is also scary and also difficult like you were talking about, but allowing our kids to dream and shake their dreams.

And I think another thing I see is that parents get afraid, like if the kids come back and like, I want to go scuba diving off the Great Barrier Reef, His parents were like, it's so far away or it's so expensive or you're not even scuba certified or I hear they have sharks there.

Like, and so we pull back and pull back, pull back.

And I think sometimes we inadvertently hold our kids back where, you know, as a parent, I I want to be, I'm aspiring to be the guy that is the yes dad like encouraging.

Us to to chase.

Chase their dreams.

Yes, takes their dreams, not your dreams.

Yes.

And it sounds like you've kind of set the example for that, which is which is you talk about a mistake.

And another really wonderful thing to think about.

I think here's let me just kind of say the same thing you said in a different way.

Something that's really helped me as a dad get through the hard times that I've had with my kids and help other parents through their hard times is a little saying that I have it's, you know, parents are teachers and every home's a school.

And that's the name that's actually similar to the book that I've been writing for four years.

It's hopefully going to be coming out soon.

It's called schools won't teach this a parent's how to guide to raise wise, emotionally intelligent adults.

Very deep book.

Can't wait for people to read.

Hope it hits bookshelves everywhere.

But on one hand, when you break that down, parents or teachers, you should hopefully feel some weight to that like, Oh my gosh, you're right.

You're my kid is never going to take class on the psychology of trust, how to manage to screen, how to have self-control, how to have self esteem, how to build self esteem from within, how to not be in a codependent relationship, how to stand up for yourself in a healthy way.

How to have a healthy relationship with food.

Your kid is not going to ever take a class in the world's most important topics.

So they need a teacher and these idiots behind these screens or like vying for your kids attention to be their mentors, to be their teachers.

But good news, parents are the most powerful people in a child's life.

So the weight should be really willing.

You've got to step up and parent and teach and guide and mold and love and be present so you can earn the right to be heard to do this.

So that is weighty.

And that really makes sense.

It's like, if you're not ready to do that, you know, they shouldn't have kids in the 1st place.

Long gone are those days of a dad being like, yeah, I just went to work.

I pay the bills.

What else do you want me to do, honey?

I'm paying the bills a lot more than just paying the free and the electricity bill, man.

And then you go and drink, you know, Coors Light while we watch a game.

So much more than a father than that.

But here's here's the stuff where you take a breath and relax is that I'm just a teacher.

So I cannot control the learner.

And my kids are their own like wildflowers.

They're not bonsai trees.

They're going to grow at their own pace.

And if I have a child who doesn't want to listen to my teaching, it doesn't make me a bad teacher.

It doesn't make that kid bad.

It just means like, hey, that kids on their own journey.

And there may be a slow learner and they're not ready to receive these lessons.

Like if you go to church or a synagogue, you know, and you you don't listen to the pastor or the rabbi, does that mean that they're a bad preacher?

No, it just means you aren't ready to listen to that lesson.

And that's OK.

And so part of being feeling free as a parent and being successful is just kind of this letting go and being like, I really feel like in my heart, I'm doing the best I can.

Not perfect, could do better, but that's OK because I'm imperfect and I'm just my job is just to teach by example and with my words and some lessons are going to stick and some aren't.

And and how I handle that really matters.

And so I think that's freed me up, that type of mentality, that mindset, just be the best, you know, that I can be and then to help me through the hard times.

Yeah, I love it.

How have you seen?

Because there's a I, I love what you said.

And but there's a little side that there's a temptation to be more passive and kind of wash your hands of it, maybe throw in the town, be like, well, I did the best I could, you know?

Yeah, they weren't ready for it.

I tried.

Right.

Which I, I, I guess only, only each person will really know is like, did you really try?

Did you really do your best?

Were you?

Trying temptation, yeah.

Or or were you?

Are you just?

Using that as a cop out like.

You sound like a wise man who's parented a teenager before.

Yeah, because that is such a legit thing.

We we get frustrated for our lack of impact and we get tempted.

Just wash your hands.

Be like kids will be kids.

I'm done.

So one of the big responses that I have to that to be helpful if if you were feeling that way, is to, is to realize that parenting like a teenager and even someone in their 20s is like shifting yourself into this role of a mentor, like a coach.

Like, especially when that child it's like 12th grade, senior year, like you're not a controller, you're not the protector anymore.

You're other coach and you will feel rejected at times and powerless and disrespected and unheard.

And that is normal.

And that's OK because you are this child's not, you know, controlled by a joystick and you are not God.

And these are normal feelings.

But it's how you manage those emotions really matter.

Because if you just give up and you wash your hands, what that means is you're you're not coping with the emotions of parenting.

Well, fight, flight or freeze.

And you're, you're flighting, even though your child still might be in the house.

And this is, I hope you see, I I think it sounds like you agree.

This is like a pretty big temptation for many, many parents.

Huge problem.

Huge problem.

They just give up.

Yeah.

Man, I gosh, I had, I had never thought of it.

About the flight aspect, you're right.

It's it's like, hey, this isn't working.

I'm I'm hurt, I'm frustrated, I'm scared.

And so the washing hands of it is, is a flight, It's a flight response.

And so it's like this fearful, your brain shuts down and, and you, you flee.

But to articulate, if they're so profound and we have to stay in it.

And my my perspective is this like if it's not working try different aspects.

Try a different.

Like a trust and see what lands.

And you're right.

Like you, we want our kids to become independent.

Like I want my kids like move out and be adults.

Well, that means they have to start being independent from me and say, Hey, I'm going to do my thing on this, the choice I'm going to make.

And, and, and now I'm, I'm trying to be independent.

We want that.

We have to move through that phase of them desiring independence tactfully and becoming the mentor.

I love.

I love the way you're articulating.

And here's a, here's a great word since that I love instead of choosing fight, flight, freeze or fawn, which is like people pleasing because yelling and yelling at our kids is a form of fight, right?

If you're in that space and you have a challenging kid or a challenging teenager or challenging 20s, instead of doing those things, a great alternative is to choose patience.

Patience does not mean avoidance.

Patience means you're here, you're being patient, you're not giving up, you're not acting out and not sabotaging yourself by saying something stupid, right?

You're patient.

You're a patient mentor, patient with your mentee.

And that is that's the key.

That is so key to good parenting is patience with your kids.

And that again goes back to parents and child you have, not child you want.

Just realizing I'll be patient with this kid right now, maybe in a year or two, they're not ready for this.

Maybe they'll never be, but I just want to be patient.

And and stay in it, stay engaged, stay present and be patient in it.

I love that instead of I'm going to step out and be patient over here, disengaged.

Disengaged.

Avoid it all and try and saying I'm being patient.

You're right.

Just staying right in it.

It's less.

It's more.

Yes, we step out because it's it's pain.

It's less painful.

Yeah.

And being patient and being connected with your kids is painful.

That's why like, if you're a good parent and parenting is not easy, like it's just if parenting is hard for you, it means you're you're probably a good parent because you're trying, because you're.

Trying, Yeah, what are you trying?

I want to, I want to shift gears a couple and, and see, I'm curious here, if you know, the guys are listening to this and, and we've talked about powerful principles, importance of parenting and, and strategies here are there.

If, if there's a, there's a guy he's like got a few kids, wants to be a great dad.

He say, what are, what are some specific actionable things I can start doing on a daily or weekly basis?

And, and is this something you even get into?

And maybe it's not, but I'm I'm curious.

Yeah.

Oh, definitely.

Are there like, OK, what, what do I do this week, Sean?

How do I start to, to make adjustments and improvements to being a better dad?

Like what does what does tomorrow look like?

What does this week look like?

I don't, there's a lot of things running through my mind right now, but there's one parenting tool that I nerd out on.

It's the it's the number one tool that I teach all of my clients, whether they're in my one-on-one sessions or in my, you know, inside my membership.

It's AI, call it the heart talk.

Heart talk.

Before I tell you about it, I think you probably already know what it is.

If I were to ask you, like when you're having a heart talk with with your kid, Greg, what do you, what's it about?

I'm just kind of curious.

Can you entertain me for a second and answer my question?

Like what do you think a heart talk is?

Or when you're having a heart talk with your kids?

Yeah.

Yeah, like a heart.

Like my heart in my chest.

The heart to talk.

Yeah, Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

For me, I'm going to be we're going to talk about the things that are most important to me, my greatest desires for them.

It's going to be around my love for them.

It's going to be it's going to be emotional and and and closer things that are important to me, I think and how.

Much you have.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Yeah.

So in any type of communication, there's speaking and listening.

In any type of bad conversation, it means there's bad speaking and there's bad listening.

And any type of really good conversation like the one we're having, you know, you kind of take turns with the person where you listen and you speak active listening, empathetic validation.

And you could use good listening skills.

And then when you speak, you use good speaking skills, right?

You don't label them.

You don't.

You have an agreeable tone, you have positive words, you have a positive ending, and you speak from your heart.

So one thing I've learned is that when it comes to parenting, so much of parenting is, is about really connecting your heart to your kids heart.

And many men really struggle with this because they were never modeled this by the men in their lives.

So they speak from their head or from their butts, right?

Speaking out of your butt.

They give these lectures, these pep talk scoldings, these threats when in a in reality, what's happening here is that like your kid doesn't want to eat their vegetables and that that is a a that's a that's a heart issue.

Your kid being late to get ready for school on time and affecting all the other siblings.

You won't address that with the heart.

Your kid like having a bad attitude, getting off a screen or not wanting your teenager not wanting to spend time with grandma and grandpa or be respectful or speak to you in a disrespectful.

These are all issues of the heart.

These cannot, these will not be successfully solved through a lecture, a pep talk, or a punishment because if you punish a child, you might get them to show that outward respect or that outward obedience.

But that's pretty cheap.

And what you really want is the inner inner obedience, inner respect, inner care.

And that if we're problem solving, so we're teachers and we're mentors, we've got to train our minds to speak to their heart.

And many, many men really struggle with that.

And I don't blame them because we were not, we were not raised like that to talk like that.

And then we look at our wives, we're like, you're being so soft on them and they look at us like you're being too hard.

And so, yeah, you can.

But the true masculinity means that being, yeah, you can.

You can be be harsh, you can be strong, but you can also be gentle and sweet.

And we've all been there.

We've all, it's just we all have these talks before with our kids.

But that is like you want to create that hard talk a part of your home culture.

Yeah, I love that because that's like you were saying, that's where the transformation actually happens.

Where?

That's where the action that's genuine.

When has a dad lecture ever worked?

When has it ever landed in the like?

Never again because I gave the best dad lecture.

I've changed.

I've changed.

Dad, You're, you're so good, right?

Your lecture was amazing.

You're spot on, Sean.

That was awesome and and the heart talk.

Even with the little daily misbehaviors, when they're addressed the right way, the behavior changes.

It really does.

Yeah, it really does.

Because they, the child then starts really processing emotionally processing, connecting, understanding what's going on.

You know?

No, most children don't change when they get yelled at.

Even most punishments, believe it or not, are are pretty wildly unsuccessful.

Like I've personally never met a teenager in my life who said to me, yeah, my I got grounded for it and it really hurt, man.

It really, I'm not going to do that anymore because I hate being grounded.

It's the worst.

I've learned my lesson.

Like it's just doesn't.

It's just, it's, it's just normally not very effective for kids, grounding them even like, yeah, I take my screen away for a day.

It just doesn't.

There's it's like it doesn't reach the heart.

If you're going to do discipline, which is really rooted in the verb training, you've got to really, you got to take the time, you got to really train them to understand all the social, emotional aspects of what's going on, why you're doing this, what's the purpose, and help them see that.

Yes, even because fundamentally we inadvertently teach the wrong lesson.

Like, hey, don't do this because you can get caught, and if you get caught you'll get punished versus hey, let's do the right thing for the right reason, whether anyone's watching or not.

Yeah, like I want.

Well said.

To make good decisions on their own, not just because somebody might catch them and they would get in trouble.

Gosh, that's so great.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I like that.

Yeah.

We want them to do all these things not because we told them to do them because, but because we're helping them understand this is what we do in this family.

This is part of our family culture.

We love your siblings.

We, we put the family over sports.

Exactly.

We put our family and our mental health over our academics, even though that's very important too.

We slow down and we care for each other.

We have these hard talks.

We don't just rush through life, you know, just going from one to another.

This family in our being close and being connected is more important than these things.

I love that.

Yeah, so, so good, so good.

All right, well, we we can wrap right there.

That's fantastic.

Let people know where they can reach out to you, where they can learn more from you.

I know you have the one-on-one coaching.

You have group coaching you.

You got tons of stuff on on.

Yeah, thanks, man.

Thank you.

Yeah, you can find me online as as the family coach on my podcasts, which is called the Sean Donahue show.

We produced two through podcasts per week.

Or you can visit me on my website, which is parenting Modern teens.

I work with mentor private sessions or through this really powerful, really affordable membership that I provide.

I do a lot of role-playing with clients.

So that's how I help solve problems are like, what do I say when my kid says this to me?

And then I'll like act it out.

It's very, very effective coaching.

And so, yeah, that's a little bit about me.

I'm based out of Sacramento, CA area.

So Greg, man, you're really, I can just tell you're a really great leader and a great dad.

And so thanks for letting me get to know you and hear about your family.

You're an amazing family and what you're doing for for men everywhere.

And thank you for what you're doing.

Like, like I, like I said early on, well, I think I think particularly because my dad split out when I was really young, step dads came and went.

So when I started a family was like this.

This is going to be one of the most important things I ever do in life.

Yeah.

Man, and I think if if all of us as men will move fatherhood up the the priority list a little bit and and make it more important, even even perhaps just that one mental emotional movement will make us more effective because it's more important to us and I think one of the most important things we do.

So you're you're you're involved in a great work brother.

So appreciate what you.

Are too.

Thank you.

Thanks for being on here man.

Thanks.

For having me OK.