Kill Comparison, Keep Calm Under Pressure, and Becoming Your Own Father | ASK ME ANYTHING

In this "Ask Me Anything" episode, Ryan Michler and Kipp Sorensen answer real questions from men striving for personal growth. They share candid insights on breaking free from social media comparison, staying emotionally present without checking out, and stepping up as a father without a roadmap. The duo also dives deep into rebuilding trust after business betrayals, finding resilience through backcountry hunting, and overcoming self-doubt in leadership. Tune in for practical advice on building character, dynamic family life, and leading with radical authenticity. SHOW HIGHLIGHTS 00:00 - Intro & News Headlines 05:05 - Wholesome Anniversary Segment 11:56 - Beating Social Media Comparison 18:58 - Calm Under Pressure vs. Emotionally Checked Out 30:36 - Fatherhood Without a Father Figure 41:11 - Rebuilding Trust After Business Betrayal 47:07 - Character Lessons in the Backcountry Wilderness 52:40 - Leading Through Faith and Doubt 01:01:38 - The Line Between Providing and Spoiling Battle Planners: Pick yours up today! https://store.orderofman.com/products/order-of-man-annual-battle-planner Order Ryan's new book, The Masculinity Manifesto https://www.amazon.com/Masculinity-Manifesto-Establishes-Influence-Credibility/dp/1684513316/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1665048672&sr=8-1. For more information on the Iron Council brotherhood https://orderofman.link/iron-council. Want maximum health, wealth, relationships, and abundance in your life? Sign up for our free course, 30 Days to Battle Ready https://orderofman.link/battle-ready-0

• 0:00Speaker 00

  The complete sentence is never, it's the difference between what we have called an excuse and a reason. An excuse is a period at the end of the sentence. Well, we didn't hit the deadline because Kip didn't do his job. What do you do with that? Fire Kip, I guess. Instead, it should be, well, we didn't hit the deadline. We all know that. And it looks like Kip didn't have the resources that he needed. Now, look, the outcome's the same. We didn't hit the deadline. One halts progress, the other exacerbates it. Kip, what's up, man? So great to see you today. There is a bug on my screen, right in the middle of my forehead. And I didn't know if I had something on my head or, but I move around and that's a bug on my screen.

• 0:44Speaker 00

  So there we go.

• 0:46Speaker 01

  Ryan's just trying to get you all to go to the YouTube channel and watch from there. So that way you can see this bug. Yeah.

• 0:52Speaker 00

  I'm good, I'm good at this, right? Well, it's not on my face, it's on my screen. So you may or may not see anything. I don't know. You'll have to go to the YouTube channel, which just happens to be youtube.com/OrderOfMan. I'm just saying.

• 1:06Speaker 01

  Yeah. And let us know. Leave a comment. Let us know if the bug's there or not.

• 1:10Speaker 00

  Don't, don't leave any sort of comments about, you know, how our faces look because bug or not, we already know they don't look great. But if you want to see if the bug's there, you can go check it out.

• 1:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:21Speaker 00

  All right, man. Well, it was good to see you last weekend, or last week. We spent some time together at the lake and had a great time. And I, I took a video of you cutting down this big ass tree limb. And I swear, I swear, I thought either the ladder was, or the tree limb was going to take out the ladder you were standing on, or you had just fell it right on a, you know, six-year-old child. One of the two is definitely happening. And to be fair, neither of it happened, unfortunately, but I was ready to record just in case.

• 1:52Speaker 01

  Yeah. I appreciate you sitting back and just waiting to blast it on YouTube just in case. I got hurt seriously.

• 1:59Speaker 00

  I mean, you remember when we were kids, it was like, you gotta catch everything on video because you might win $10,000 with Bob Saget on America's Funniest Home Video.

• 2:09Speaker 01

  That's right. That's right. I totally forgot about that.

• 2:12Speaker 00

  Yeah, I love the weekends for that show right there. And now the whole internet is basically that. So.

• 2:17Speaker 01

  That's a big Bob Saget show is all that it is. Yeah, that's funny.

• 2:21Speaker 00

  It's it, man. Yeah, it's it. Quintessential dad right there. All right. Well, we got some good questions today. I want to get into it, but we've been doing this wholesome segment over the past four or five weeks now. And I enlisted some help from somebody who you love dearly. I didn't know this, but over the weekend, you celebrated your 18th wedding anniversary. Is that right?

• 2:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, 18.

• 2:48Speaker 00

  What day was that?

• 2:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, the 25th. So it was actually.

• 2:52Speaker 00

  I was just testing.

• 2:53Speaker 01

  Saturday. Yeah, you already knew.

• 2:58Speaker 01

  The unfortunate part, a lot of people don't know this, and the weekend of the 24th in the state of Utah is Pioneer Day. And although that worked out really well to inviting people to a wedding, it does not work out very well for, you know, celebrating your honeymoon because usually we find ourselves at the lake with a group of people or at a family reunion, you know.

• 3:20Speaker 00

  I remember doing fireworks a couple of years ago with you guys at the lake. Well, anyways, so your wife kissed me again this weekend and her and I have been texting back and forth since. So I just want to throw that out there.

• 3:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:38Speaker 00

  And I just, she told me that you guys had your 18th year wedding anniversary, which I didn't know. I would have honored if I was there and knew that, but

• 3:49Speaker 00

  I said, I really need some words from her about you.

• 3:56Speaker 00

  And I said, I want you to just share some things about Kip, about how you feel about Kip with me.

• 4:02Speaker 01

  And then you want me to reply whether I think those are wholesome or not? Is that what we're doing?

• 4:07Speaker 00

  No, they are, man. I went through these. No, they are. One's, one's a little questionable, but she gave me permission to read it on air. And you may not, but she did. And that's all that matters. So you ready for this?

• 4:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, sure.

• 4:22Speaker 00

  All right.

• 4:25Speaker 00

  That doesn't sound very convincing, Kip.

• 4:28Speaker 01

  I'm not convinced.

• 4:30Speaker 00

  All right, here we go, here we go. No, we'll ease into it. So number one, she, she wrote five separate things for me. And I said, oh, I'm sharing all of those. And she said, yeah, go share all those. She said this, she said, Kip's love language is working harder than anyone else. So we, it's capitalized, we can live a life he only dreamed about. It's number one. Number two, she said, the safest place I could ever be is with my husband. I take pride in knowing he could kill any man in the room with his bare hands.

• 5:04Speaker 01

  Let's not put that on the internet, though, like that, that sounds, I mean, I'm okay with her believing it. I don't know if it's true, but yeah, it is what it is.

• 5:14Speaker 00

  She said this, she said, Kip isn't trying to raise perfect children. He's trying to raise them to be better than himself.

• 5:23Speaker 00

  She said this, I like this one. If grit had a face, it would look a lot like Kip.

• 5:30Speaker 00

  I don't know if that's a compliment or an insult, but.

• 5:33Speaker 01

  I don't think so. I think it's a little both.

• 5:39Speaker 01

  Grit does not sound very handsome. Yeah.

• 5:41Speaker 00

  It's, you're not, she didn't say he's, he's great looking. She said, he's gritty looking.

• 5:46Speaker 01

  He just looks gritty.

• 5:48Speaker 00

  Take that for what that's worth. Uh, this is the one that's funny to me. I love this one. She said, Kip's, Kip drives me crazy more than anyone I know. He's stubborn, opinionated, and yes, for reasons I'll never understand, he still thinks sticking his finger in my butt crack is hilarious. But if I ever had to choose my partner all over again, I'd choose him every single time. And that's the secret. Strong marriages aren't built by two people who never argue. They're built by two people who never stop choosing each other.

• 6:24Speaker 01

  And it is hilarious.

• 6:26Speaker 00

  It is hilarious. Of course it is. Why doesn't she understand that? Why don't girls understand that? We want to touch your private parts inappropriately. Like, what's the problem here? That's wholesome, man. Like, if that isn't wholesome, I don't know what is. I love that. That's pretty cool. I love your guys' relationship. I love you, I love her, and you guys inspire me. And I just wanted to share that with you because I think that kind of love is pretty special.

• 6:56Speaker 01

  I appreciate it. Thank you, man.

• 6:58Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 6:59Speaker 01

  I had to keep cracking jokes so I don't cry over on the air. No, it's really insightful and touching.

• 7:10Speaker 00

  Basically, what I heard is that your face is ugly and you like to touch your butt crack. That's basically what I heard.

• 7:15Speaker 01

  And I love my kids.

• 7:17Speaker 00

  I did hear that.

• 7:18Speaker 01

  But not enough to be easy on them.

• 7:21Speaker 00

  Yes, fair enough. Fair enough. Alright, man. I love you, brother. I thought that was cool. She sent that to me and I'm like, mm, yeah, we need to talk about that. People need to know the man behind the mic. So I appreciate you.

• 7:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, thank you. Thank you. And I'm still alive after cutting down that tree, so we're all, we're solid.

• 7:40Speaker 00

  I thought for sure. I thought for sure you were going down. I'm like, I'm like tapping into my past CPR training and my military medical training and the medical stuff. We've done it at our previous events. I'm like, hey, what am I gonna have to use, right? He's probably gonna break the leg.

• 8:00Speaker 01

  Stop the bleeding.

• 8:01Speaker 00

  So I'm gonna take, I'm gonna elevate, and I don't think they do mouth to mouth anymore, which is unfortunate. I was hoping to get to use that.

• 8:11Speaker 00

  So I'm like, okay, what do I do? And I didn't have to use any of it, damn it.

• 8:14Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, what's funny is like, people might assume that I was confident and then you were like questionable. No, I was up on the ladder going, is that gonna swing back and hit my ladder? And then I hear the boat coming in. I'm like, I sure hope a kid doesn't walk under here.

• 8:30Speaker 00

  I told the kids, I'm like, guys, just keep it wide. As they came in, I'm like, go get lunch, just keep it wide. And they're like, okay.

• 8:36Speaker 01

  Half a tree is planning on falling right here.

• 8:41Speaker 00

  Just don't stand by Kip. Other than that, you'll be fine.

• 8:46Speaker 00

  All right, man. Let's get into some questions today.

• 8:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely. All right, we'll hop right into it. Cody Ashworth. Ryan, I run a small landscaping crew and I'm doing fine. House, wife, two kids.

• 8:59Speaker 00

  You should have hired Cody.

• 9:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, absolutely. In fact, Cody, we just gave you some tips on marketing, like, don't die, hire us, right? Just like, that's the selling proposition. All right, Ryan, I run a small landscaping crew and I'm doing fine. House, wife, two kids. But I scroll past guys my age who seem to have it all figured out. And I feel like I'm failing by comparison. How do you kill the comparison game when it's baked into every platform that you're on?

• 9:31Speaker 00

  I mean, that's, that's the truth. I love the way you said it. It's, it's literally baked into the equation. Because the same people, so I live two hours from Vegas. The same people who program and design and build and engineer the slot machines are the same people who are building Instagram and Facebook and social media and YouTube and all these others. So you can't for a second believe if you do, you're an idiot, that they aren't designing these apps for you to stay on them as long as possible. I mean, every time I share a outside link on Facebook, the engagement plummets because Facebook doesn't want me to send their users to YouTube or Instagram. They want to keep them on their platform. So it's good that you know that.

• 10:16Speaker 00

  I'll tell you this, and I, and I know this 100% to be true because I have conversations daily with men who I would otherwise think have it figured out. And they don't. They don't. They don't have it figured out, man. I promise you. Like, if you see that guy and he's got the beautiful wife, they probably haven't had sex in four weeks because she's mad at him because he's a jerk. He's got the brand new truck and he's really excited about it. It looks awesome and he looks awesome in it. But every time he sends off $1,100 as a truck payment, his gut drops a little bit. Um, when his, when his alarm goes off, he's going to show you the 20% of the time that he gets up out of bed on time. And you, you know, you might see his six pack abs, but

• 11:01Speaker 00

  he's spending $500 on testosterone and GLP ones, or whatever they're called. Uh, and he's not going to show you the other 80% of the time where he hits the snooze, or he woke, wakes up hungover. So it's really easy to deceive people through this device. In fact, it's built to be deceitful. The apps are built to deceive you from reality, even when you see what I put out there. Look, if, again, go to YouTube, check it out, shameless YouTube plug, and you can see what the new studio looks like. Bro, if I pan this camera back 10 feet, you'd be like, what the fuck?

• 11:37Speaker 01

  [laughing]

• 11:39Speaker 00

  That's his studio? That's, and I, but I actually showed pictures on Instagram the other day. Yeah, that's my studio. And you know where it was before this? In my bedroom. It was in a corner in my bedroom. I can make it look good. I can play the game. The game has to be played. I make it work. I do what I can. But the reality is, is that nobody has it figured out. It's like going to the set of a TV show and looking at the, the, the scene that they've set up. And you're like, oh, this looks awesome. Then you go on set and you're like, oh, it's just this little box and everything around it is trash? Yep. That's life. That's everybody's situation. Kip, you have fights with your wife, you get impatient with your kids, the same way I get impatient with my kids. I have quirks

• 12:24Speaker 00

  and problems and struggles and self doubt and temptations, just like any other man. And the more that you realize that not, no, no one has it figured out, then you can just give yourself a little bit of grace. And the only thing that I think you need to compare yourself to is, did you do better than the guy that showed up yesterday, or last week, or last month, or last year? Is your weight down? You know, maybe you were 50 pounds overweight, now you're 45 pounds overweight. Good, compare yourself to that guy.

• 12:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:57Speaker 00

  Did you hit the snooze button 17 times last month? Cool. Can you do it 10 times this month? Did you put the booze down? Did you tell your wife you loved her? Did you make more money than you did last month? Did you pay off some debt? That's the guy you should be comparing yourself to. Cause that's the only man that you really have 100% access to. And you can, you can fool yourself too. Don't get me wrong. But that's the only guy who you get to see all the scars and flaws and unflattering aspects of his life. Nobody else is going to show that to you. They're just going to show you the best.

• 13:33Speaker 01

  Yeah. A powerful way that this has been shared with me is don't compare your chapter two to someone else's chapter 10. Cause some of you guys might be listening and you're like, well, Ryan, it, no, no, I know them well enough. Their life is great. Yeah, but that came at a price. And maybe that's even further down the road. And that's 15, that's chapter 15. And you're sitting at chapter three, right? And so be careful, we're not even, even, even if like you believe that their life is buttoned up. That came after time and nuance and, and different variables. And the other element too, which I find is fascinating is like, who's in control, right? Of our happiness when it's dependent on even our circumstances.

• 14:17Speaker 01

  I mean, you know this, a lot of our circumstances are, are outside of our control. You know, sometimes there's death of loved ones. You know, we, we get laid off despite, you know, maybe being a hard worker. A lot of things might happen that dictate our lives. And if we focus too much about our happiness and our self-worth being dependent on outs, outside things, then we're giving that power over to other people. And, and we're not taking that power for ourselves.

• 14:47Speaker 00

  That's actually one of the things that we're talking about in the iron council this month. So for the next several days is this concept of controlling what you can control. The topic of the month is think like a warrior. And there's an accompanying book that we read together. And one of the principles in that book is control what you can control, which is really two things. Your effort and your attitude. And by the way, I actually don't, I'm one of those people, and I think you are too, Kip, because we've talked about this, I actually don't think comparison is automatically bad. I think it matters on what you do with it. So if I, you know, I just pulled up all that stuff about you and your beautiful bride, and that inspires me, that motivates me,

• 15:32Speaker 00

  like, that makes me excited. And so, you know, I'm not married. I was married for 18 years, but I'm not married now, and so, but I'm not threatened by that. I look at it, and I'm inspired. I'm like, oh, I want to actually create that kind of love with somebody. If conversely, I didn't feel that way, and it demoralized me, for whatever reason, right or wrong, if it just made me feel that way, then I'm not gonna allow that into my life. So you get to decide, is this a person who motivates, inspires, and lifts me up, directly or indirectly, or is this a person who pushes me down, demotivates me, and makes me feel bad about myself, directly or indirectly? And then you just make your decisions from there.

• 16:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. Okay, Preston Vell, what's the difference between a man who's calm under pressure, and a man who's just checked out emotionally? From the outside, they look the same.

• 16:28Speaker 00

  Is that, oh, is that it? Okay. So from the outside, they look the same?

• 16:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:32Speaker 00

  Yeah, not really.

• 16:36Speaker 00

  Not really. I don't think they looked, do you think they look the same? I don't think they look the same.

• 16:41Speaker 01

  Well, I mean, I think, at first glance, you might assume that, right? It's like, oh, man, he's not flustered by this circumstance. But I think the difference is, are they doing something about it? Right? A man that's checked out is just hiding over in the corner, and not addressing the thing. Calm under pressure is, there's a situation, and they're being intentional with action.

• 17:07Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 17:08Speaker 01

  And so maybe the fact that they're not reacting in the moment, they might look the same?

• 17:14Speaker 00

  Yeah. Okay. Well, let's, let's take you as an example. It's, we're gonna spot, I'm gonna say all the good things and all the bad things about Kip today. So stay tuned. No, let's, let's, let's take you for a second. Okay. So we're at the lake and, and this is, this is a recurring thing for you and it's not, it's not bad. I'm, I'm not gonna blast you right here. It's a recurring thing. I've seen it for, you know, four, three or four years now at the lake. And I've known you for longer.

• 17:42Speaker 00

  And you like to go outside and you like to work on things. I was sitting in the kitchen, talking with the group and I saw you, you know, marching this way and marching that way. And you had the saw out and then you're like cutting limbs and then you're pulling weeds and mowing the grass. Like, I remember, I actually remember watching you sit on the lawn chair and I'm like, I wondered how long he can sit there and not get up. And it took about seven minutes or so and you were up doing something.

• 18:10Speaker 01

  Well, it's because I was laying down. I looked at the tree and I'm like,

• 18:13Speaker 00

  I know.

• 18:13Speaker 01

  That's a big dead branch.

• 18:15Speaker 00

  I know. I know.

• 18:17Speaker 01

  And, and, and full disclosure, every man knows this. Once you get out of chainsaw, like you can't cut one thing.

• 18:23Speaker 00

  You gotta cut all the things.

• 18:25Speaker 01

  All things start getting cut. Yeah.

• 18:28Speaker 00

  So you were outside working in the property and I didn't once for a second think you were disengaged from the family.

• 18:36Speaker 00

  Somebody might look at that on the surface and say, well, he doesn't want to hang out with his family. That's why he's doing all this work. And I don't think so. I think you were doing it because you love the family and because you want it to be a good experience and you want them to have fun and you want them to be safe. And all the things that a man is a protector and a provider does. So it's not really the attitude. It's to your point. It's what's behind it? What's the meaning and significance behind it?

• 19:01Speaker 00

  You know, I, I, I think if you look at a man for any amount of time, you can tell if he's dead inside or if he's got life to him. You know, I'll sit there and I'll, I remember, I remember when I got hurt training jujitsu and I'd never, I actually never missed going to jujitsu, even when I was hurt. Now, I didn't train and roll, but I would sit and I would watch or I would do box jumps and lunges and sit ups. The things that I could do with my injury.

• 19:28Speaker 00

  And as I sat there on the mat, you might say, oh, he looks disengaged. What are you talking about? He's watching intently. And I remember coming back and started training again. And I, one of the guys that I trained with, he's like, dude, you're better than you were when you got hurt. How's that even, how's that even, how's that even possible? I'm like, what do you think I've been doing for three months? I know everything you're gonna do. I know all of your moves. Now, look, there's something between knowing it and feeling it, but you can still catch me in those things, but I know.

• 19:55Speaker 01

  Stay engaged.

• 19:56Speaker 00

  Yeah. I know what you're gonna do. He's like, how do you know? Cause I watched you. I watched you do that for three months. And that's the difference. It's not really just how you see a man from the outside. It's, is, is his heart and soul in it. And I think if you look a little deeper into a man's eyes, you can figure out pretty quickly if he's still engaged or if he's done, if he's tapped out.

• 20:20Speaker 01

  Totally. How much of this, Ryan, is like, just where we are too? I mean, I had a dad that was pretty quiet. You know, people would generate drama around him and he would just be like, whatever. And I falsely judged him. Like, I was like, oh, man, he's, he's checked out. He's emotional, he doesn't care. But, but that was based from the immaturity of, of a young man thinking that, well, you, you should, you should argue with everybody and you should have an opinion about everything. And, and later on in life, I realized, man, he didn't need to.

• 21:01Speaker 01

  He didn't, like, him being engaged was, I'm not engaging in that behavior. And I'm okay with that. And I'm confident enough with it. I can be calm in this thing and it doesn't cause a reaction from me. Right? He was choosing to respond a certain way.

• 21:20Speaker 00

  So, you know, I appreciate, I don't know your father. And so what I'm gonna say isn't a slight or a praise, like I, I never met him.

• 21:30Speaker 00

  But I also think as men, we have an obligation to communicate effectively as well. I don't, I, I, I think it's very important, and again, I'm not trying to chastise him at all. I don't know him.

• 21:44Speaker 00

  I, I think it's important to communicate with our people what we're doing. Otherwise, you run the risk of what happened with you, misinterpretation.

• 21:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, totally.

• 21:54Speaker 00

  So, so I think a more

• 21:59Speaker 00

  elevated response, let's say, is maybe people are creating drama around him and it's very simply him saying, hey, look, this is not a conversation I want to be involved with. Or I don't want to speak ill of that family down the street, or this is not a conversation I'm comfortable with, and so I'm going to excuse myself. So, because then, then there's no connecting the dots. There's, there's no you as a young, impressionable boy trying to figure out, well, what's dad doing? You know, I, I remember my grandfather, he was the most gentleman ever. He was a great man. And he loved to play the piano and I would sit and play the piano. He taught me to play chess.

• 22:39Speaker 00

  We, he had this beautiful rose garden in the backyard and he loved his roses and I would go walk. I remember that backyard like it was yesterday. I'd walk on the gravel. It was like this white and gray gravel and we would prune roses and smell it. Like it was amazing. And then we'd come in for lunch because he always wanted to watch a soap opera. I think it was like All My Children or As The World Turns or something. And I'm serious. And we would stop everything we were doing and grandma would bring out the TV trays. And we'd both sit in the recliner and she'd give us a tuna sandwich or whatever. We'd watch All My Children. And then as soon as over, we'd go back out in the rose garden and we'd go for a walk. He would take me to McDonald's in the morning.

• 23:24Speaker 00

  Um, after we went on our walk, he'd let me wear his hats, you know, like just this, just the most gentleman. And you know how I knew when he was mad? Is he would say this, oh geez.

• 23:39Speaker 00

  That's all. If he said that, I was like, ooh, grandpa's mad.

• 23:45Speaker 00

  He's just this gentle soul. But looking back on it, I'm like, man,

• 23:51Speaker 00

  what would it, what would it be like if you were as gentle as you were, but also had boundaries? What would it be like as if you were as gentle as you were, but also communicated effectively? He's a great man, but that communication piece was missing, and that's something that could have been very, very impressionable on his wife, on his children, on me as his grandson. Something he didn't do, and I don't think ill of him by any means, but I think it would have been elevated if he would have learned to communicate that more effectively.

• 24:24Speaker 01

  No, I, I feel that, man. I mean, I, I actually think that's a really good point, you know, because how often do we make, take action, but we don't go out of our way, maybe even to communicate in the circumstance, but even grab your kid and just say, hey, now, this is how, you mentioned this, right? It's like you'll have a circumstance or a situation that occurs. I, I think, you know, a story that you share is going to the, the archery shop, right? And it's like afterwards, grab your son, it's like, all right, how did we handle that? This is why we handle it this way. This, that's over communicate. You didn't have to. You could have hopped into the truck and just drove home. But the value add was explaining it to your son so he could connect the dots and say, okay, got it. Right? I, I now understand that circumstance better.

• 25:10Speaker 00

  Well, and, and another example, yeah, that's, that's one, but another example comes to mind just recently. My youngest son, he's 10 years old and he and I do store orders together. So when we sell hats or shirts or whatever, he boxes them up and he packages them and he

• 25:25Speaker 00

  signs a note that we had printed up and, you know, he does a pretty good job. And a couple of weeks ago, we were, he was boxing up a hat and the tape got stuck or something. He's like trying to tape up this box and it just looked like crap.

• 25:40Speaker 00

  And he started to put the hat in, I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on.

• 25:44Speaker 00

  And he's like, what? I said, what, what are you doing? He's like, well, the tape got stuck. I'm like, yeah, I can see that. Is that your best work? He's like, well, I didn't know what to do. Said, I think you do know what to do, just don't think you want to do it.

• 26:01Speaker 00

  And he's like, well, what do you mean? I'm like, well, what do you think you should do? He's like, probably throw this away. And then what? And then fix the tape and do it right? Yeah, exactly. He's like, well, I didn't want to waste tape or the box. I thought you'd be mad. I'm like, that's fair. That's a fair thought. But why do we do this? He's like, I don't know, because people ordered it. I'm like, no, that's not why. We do this because people believe in us.

• 26:28Speaker 00

  And he's like, what? And I said, yeah, people believe in us. When they order something, they expect to get it in a timely manner. When they order something, they expect it to look nice. When they order something, they expect it to be flawless because they pulled out their wallet and decided to take money out of their wallet and give it to us because they believe in us. And it's our obligation, responsibility to exceed their expectation. He's like, yeah? I said, so do it right. And if that means we wasted a box or wasted some tape, I'm okay with that. I will never be mad about that. Now, if you do it all the time, I'll be mad you can't figure it out. Because we're just wasting resources needlessly. But I'm not going to be mad if you mess something up and you fix it by doing it right.

• 27:13Speaker 00

  He's like, okay. And he's been pretty solid the last couple of weeks because he knows. And what was funny? This was really funny. One of his little buddies came over last week. And he's like, hey, Dad, um, can we do some, some orders? I'm like, well, your friend's over. Like, hang out with your friend. We can do orders later. He's like, no, no, we want to do them together because we want to earn some money and go to the dollar store and spend a little money. I'm like, cool. I'll, I'll, I'll help you with that. So I took him and his, his buddy out to the garage and we started working on store orders. And it was actually really funny to watch my son tell his friend why we do it right and what right looks like. And I'm like, yep.

• 27:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:52Speaker 00

  It's working.

• 27:52Speaker 01

  I love that. Yeah. I love that. All right, Isaac Broderick. My dad left when I was six and I haven't seen him since. I've got a two-year-old son now and I catch myself panicking that I don't actually know how to do this. Not because I'm lazy, but because nobody ever showed me. Where does a man start when he's building up the plane while flying it?

• 28:17Speaker 00

  Well, first of all, even if you did have a dad who was engaged, you'd still feel the same, just so you know.

• 28:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:24Speaker 00

  Like, you're not, your, your thought process is not uncommon, whether dad was around or wasn't around. So wrap your head around that one for a minute.

• 28:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, we're all, yeah, we're all figuring it out, even if we had a dad around.

• 28:37Speaker 00

  Yeah, your dad was around and did you feel the way that Isaac felt when you started having kids?

• 28:42Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 28:42Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 28:43Speaker 01

  And by the way, I felt that way with different kids. Because all of a sudden, you're like, God, kid number two doesn't show up like kid number one did. All the things that we did last time didn't work this time. It's like, different human, learn again.

• 28:55Speaker 00

  Yes, so don't, don't feel like you're behind the curve, first of all, is what I want to say to you. Like, you're not behind on anything.

• 29:04Speaker 00

  There's a couple of places I would start, but the first is the mentality that this is a game. Now, it's a game with very real stakes.

• 29:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:15Speaker 00

  It's, it's not like chutes and ladders. It's, it's a real game and depending on how you show up and perform really spells the difference between how your kid eventually will show up and perform, or how your other kids will, or how your wife views and perceives you. Like, this is a very real game with a lot of real stakes, so I get that. But I think if you look at, at it as a game, then you can understand that you don't quite know the rules yet. And so it's your job to figure out what those rules are. So how do you do that? You find people in your life who are doing a good job. I'm sure you've got friends who have kids and you feel like they're good fathers.

• 30:00Speaker 00

  I'm sure there's people that you work with, or maybe even people in your, in your family, who, maybe it's a brother or a brother-in-law, and you're like, man, he's good at this. Talk, talk with him. Say, hey, how do you, how did you handle that situation? Or what do you do when one of your kids gets out of line? Watch, observe, be a student of the game. And you'll start to pick up that stuff partly through osmosis and also partly through your own inquisitiveness. You're just asking questions and then trying it and experimenting it with it. The other thing I would say, so that's mindset number one, is learn the game. Mindset number two.

• 30:36Speaker 00

  Is be the kind of father that you wish you would have had. So when you think about when you were a young kid, let's say you were seven or eight years old, and maybe you're just getting started with with T-ball or coach pitch baseball. And you think to yourself, man, I really wish my dad was around. I really wish he would have been my coach. Cool. Be your kid's coach then.

• 31:03Speaker 00

  Or let's say you're you're sitting there and you're thinking to yourself, man, I really wish my dad would have read me books when I fell asleep. Cool. Read books to your kid. Or maybe your dad was around. This is for people other than Isaac. And let's say he was drunk a lot, or maybe verbally abusive. And let's say you did something stupid as a kid, and he just came down on you way too hard. He yelled at you, made you sound foolish. Maybe he embarrassed you in front of other people. Remember that. Remember that. When you need to administer discipline with your child, and instead of doing it publicly in front of everybody and shaming him and making him feel embarrassed, or or striking him,

• 31:46Speaker 00

  maybe even potentially, you pull him aside, and you're like, hey, bud, let's let's go. And you pull him aside, and you have a good. You did that this weekend. One of your kids was getting a little little out of line, and we all giggled and laughed after he left. I'm sure you knew that. And we're trying not to in the moment. But you did that. You didn't embarrass him. He needed to be disciplined. I agreed with with the way you were feeling. But you didn't do that in front of us. You didn't make him feel stupid, or silly, or embarrassed. You did it the way that I would expect I would want to do it. And so you have this really, Isaac has this really interesting opportunity where the slate is clean.

• 32:29Speaker 00

  You have no bad habits from your father because he wasn't around.

• 32:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:35Speaker 00

  Which means that you get to decide whether what a father looks like and it's all a blank slate. What an amazing blessing if you choose to look at it that way.

• 32:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's such a great attitude. Yeah, because you assume what you're missing, but it's like, yeah, you also didn't inherit all the garbage.

• 32:51Speaker 00

  Totally.

• 32:52Speaker 01

  That your dad created for you either. I love it. You know, Isaac, I'll project on you something that that I fail to that where I struggle and it's, I struggle to show up powerfully as a father when I think my circumstances justify something different that I know what I should do.

• 33:13Speaker 01

  If that makes sense.

• 33:14Speaker 00

  Give me, give me an example of that, Kip. Like, what would that look like in practice?

• 33:19Speaker 01

  I love your exercise. I actually, in fact, I'm walking, I'm walking away from the call with that as the exercise of what are the things that I wish my dad would have done and write them down?

• 33:32Speaker 01

  And make sure and do an inventory, make sure I'm doing them. But I'll tell you right now, I'm not doing those things because I think my circumstance justifies the inaction. Oh, yeah, but and there's no buts to this, right? Like, there's no, there's no explanation. It really isn't. And, and that's where we go wrong, right? Is we'll learn lessons from our fathers. We'll, we'll look at other circumstances and then we think our circumstances unique enough that it justifies the inaction or it justifies us not doing what we ought to do. And I think that's, that's the Achilles heel for me that I have to go, nope, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter that it's a stressful time. I still have to play baseball.

• 34:16Speaker 01

  I still have to throw the pitch. I still have to watch my attitude or my temper. And it's not justified just because today or this season's a hard season.

• 34:29Speaker 00

  So there's, I've never done this before, but I know this principle. It's a principle in improv. And I'm a professional communicator, so I study communication. It's important to me. And there's a show, you've probably seen it. Whose Line Is It Anyway? Have you seen that show? Uh-uh. Oh, it's hilarious. You gotta watch it. I don't even know if it's still on, but go watch it. It's hilarious. I think that's what it's called. I'll look it up here in a second. But anyways, the principle in improv is that whenever you're engaged with somebody in this exercise, you're not allowed to say but and counter whatever they say to you, regardless of how outrageous it might be, your sound.

• 35:14Speaker 00

  You're not allowed to say but. The principle is yes and. So it's if somebody says something outrageous and you're doing improv with them, it's, oh yeah, I remember that. And also, and that's a little bit about how you pivot it, but it's always yes and, never but or no, because that shuts down the dialogue. Well, it's the same thing in your life, even if you're having a conversation with yourself. Yeah, I want to be a good dad, but my dad wasn't around. Period. Okay, well, what do you do with that? You know, there's nothing, it shuts down the conversation. It's like you just put a period at the end of the sentence and the chapter's closed. Instead, it's yes and.

• 35:57Speaker 00

  So I really want to be a good father and my father wasn't around, so I need to figure this out for myself. That's the attitude. And we've talked about it in this context before too, Kip, is that's the complete sentence. The complete sentence is never, it's the difference between what we have called an excuse and a reason. An excuse is a period at the end of the sentence. Well, we didn't hit the deadline because Kip didn't do his job.

• 36:25Speaker 00

  What do you do with that? Fire Kip, I guess. Instead, it should be, well, we didn't hit the deadline. We all know that. And it looks like Kip didn't have the resources that he needed. Now, look, the outcome's the same. We didn't hit the deadline. One halts progress, the other exacerbates it. So it's like, Kip, you didn't hit the deadline. Maybe we failed to get you the resources and tools you needed. Yes or no? Yeah, I actually needed X, Y, and Z. Cool. Let's get those to you right now. Yeah. So there's reasons and there's excuses. Yeah, right. And not do it again. Yeah. But there's reasons and there's excuses. And right now, when you start saying things like, well, but my dad wasn't around, that's an excuse. So what?

• 37:11Speaker 00

  I know plenty of great, amazing, inspirational fathers whose dads weren't around. So what's the difference? I think we know.

• 37:21Speaker 01

  Yeah. And props to you, Isaac, for like prioritizing this. I always thought parenting is so funny, right? Because we make this assumption that we should be able to do it well, just because we had a kid.

• 37:35Speaker 01

  And it's like, actually, we should have probably been studying.

• 37:39Speaker 01

  And learning as part of preparation. And so the fact that you're questioning and you're not operating in this default mode of like, well, that's just the way it is. And that you're like, well, is this the best way? And what should I do? And, you know, and taking action to improve? That's, that's huge. Cause not a lot of people do that.

• 37:57Speaker 00

  Yeah, I agree. I think the last thing I would say is just have fun with it, you know? Yeah, there's real stakes, of course, but lighten up, have some fun. Try not to lose your patience, you know, try not to lose your cool. Like even when we were sitting at the dinner table and your son was getting, you know,

• 38:14Speaker 01

  Mouth and off.

• 38:15Speaker 00

  Mouthy. Yeah. Yeah.

• 38:18Speaker 00

  You know, I'm sitting there trying not to laugh and you pulled him aside and all of us laughed. And I'm sure you were kind of chuckling inside too, even though you had to administer discipline. Like, it's fun.

• 38:27Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 38:27Speaker 00

  It's fun.

• 38:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:30Speaker 01

  All right, Marcus Delfino. My business partner of nine years lied to me about company finances and I found out by accident. We've since split the company and legally I'm fine, but I trusted this man like a brother. How do you keep leading with an open hand after something like that without turning bitter and paranoid with the next guy who earns your trust?

• 38:59Speaker 00

  Let's, let's take, let's take a jujitsu example. So let's say I'm training with you and you do this like really weird Kumura inverted thing where you take my back to me, you do that to me.

• 39:14Speaker 00

  I still haven't quite figured it out.

• 39:16Speaker 01

  You said weird and I went, yeah, that's probably, he's probably speaking through truth here. That's some awkward, weird position.

• 39:24Speaker 00

  Totally weird, very unorthodox and I still haven't figured it out. But I don't stop rolling with you.

• 39:33Speaker 00

  I'm, I can maybe guard it a little better than I did in the past. Not fully, but a little better than I could when you first did it to me. Because we learn, right? Humans are amazing. We learn, we, we adapt, we evolve. But I don't stop playing the game because I like the game. I want to get better at the game and business is a game. I like the game. I want to make money. I want to serve more clients. I want to offer new products and services. I want people to, to have solutions to whatever problems they might be dealing with. I'm not not playing the game. I just need to learn how to play it better. And so I would ask you a question back to answer your question. What lessons did you learn?

• 40:15Speaker 00

  Sit on that for a minute. Maybe you didn't vet this guy as well as you should have. Maybe the reason you brought him in is because you liked him as a person, but he lacked the skill set that he needed to be a good business partner. I don't know. Could that have been? Maybe you did see warning signs, but you overlooked them because you didn't want to create conflict. Again, I don't know, possibly. And so would you bring up those issues sooner next time? I would hope so.

• 40:42Speaker 00

  You know, maybe, maybe you were so close to him because he's a friend of yours, that you knew the baggage that was going on. Maybe he was struggling to make his mortgage payment, and so you were willing to sacrifice on his behalf because you knew what was going on with his wife and him. Is that his fault, or is that your fault? It's like Aesop's fable of the, the young boy who carries the, the snake across the river, and the snake bites him. And the snake says, "You knew what I was when I picked you up. I was convincing, and you decided to pick me up. You knew what I was." Whose fault is that? A snake is a snake, and you're the sucker. Maybe you were. I don't

• 41:24Speaker 00

  know. But I would really spend some time thinking about what lessons I learned, and I would write them down, because the business partner thing is not the problem. The problem is, potentially, that it was the actual business partner, and/or your own behavior towards that business partner. And what do you need to learn about that situation, so you can keep yourself in the game, but a little bit more aware, a little bit smarter, a little bit more wiser than last time?

• 41:54Speaker 01

  Yeah. I love it, man. He said, "How do you keep leading with an open hand after something like that without turning bitter and paranoid?" And I can't help but read that sentence, and it's like, by not realizing that this is like, this personal attack, that, well, like this blanket judgment, "Ah, see, you can't trust people. Everyone will screw you over," and there's over-dramatization of a situation, which might become a narrative for you if you're not careful. Right? Don't let this become the narrative, that you can't trust people. The truth is, Marcus, your business partner became untrustworthy. Period.

• 42:36Speaker 01

  Why? Learn some lessons. Grow. Move on. The next person, guess who the next person is? Not the same guy. But did you learn? And do you pivot? And do you adjust? And by the way, we could take this principle and...

• 42:50Speaker 01

  Apply it to cheating spouses or other people that have done you wrong throughout your life. If you over dramatize it and you add this, you know, this, this statement of this always happens to me, or you can't trust X group. Man, you're going to be hurting yourself moving forward into the future. So be very careful. See this for what it is. Watch the story that you're creating about the circumstance and then to Ryan's point, learn from it.

• 43:22Speaker 00

  Yeah. I mean, that's, I was going to share something personal. I might just save that for another day, but there's a phrase that you often hear, which is if you want it done right, you have to do it yourself. That's what, that's, that's a defense mechanism.

• 43:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:38Speaker 00

  That's exactly what you're saying.

• 43:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:41Speaker 00

  But that's not true. If you want it done right, you have to find the right person to do it.

• 43:45Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 43:46Speaker 00

  And it could be you. Yeah, it could be you. Or it could be somebody else. But just because somebody else failed didn't mean that you're the only one in the, on the planet out of eight billion people that can do that to the degree that you can. We're all replaceable, including yourself. So yeah, that person wasn't the right person to do it. Correct. But there is a right person to do it. And there actually is somebody who can do it better than you. There's always somebody who's bigger, better, smarter, more successful, more intelligent, higher IQ, fill in the blank, always.

• 44:22Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah. Halas Rena, I took my 13 year old daughter on her first backcountry elk hunt this fall and something shifted in both of us out there. Do you think the wilderness teaches lessons a classroom or living room never could? Or am I just romanticizing it?

• 44:42Speaker 00

  Both. You can do both.

• 44:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's.

• 44:45Speaker 00

  It is romantic.

• 44:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. And there's value in romanticizing things. I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing. Yeah.

• 44:52Speaker 00

  I don't either. It's funny because you often hear people make the claim that women are more romantic than men. I don't believe that. Now, maybe from like an intimate perspective, sure. But how many guys do you know, Kip, who dream about?

• 45:08Speaker 00

  Their first child and watching like even me, I'm, I'm, I'm dreaming as we speak of my son, my oldest son, playing his first look like stepping onto the college field and playing his first lacrosse game. Like I can see it. I can see me getting emotional. I can see him stepping out. Guys just don't share it as much. Being so proud. Yeah. That's romantic, you know, or how many times do you, do you romanticize even this, the idea of you sleeping in the middle of the night and you hear somebody break the glass or break through the door and you grab your gun and he's in there and you shoot him right in the chest and he dies and he's bleeding on your floor and you're

• 45:50Speaker 00

  like, yep, I protected my family. That's romance. That's a romanticized version of reality. We all do that. And I think it's awesome. We should be doing that. But yes, to, to, to your point, uh, yeah, there's things that you can learn in the wilderness that you just won't learn in a classroom. And part of one, one virtue that I've really latched on to recently is this idea of adaptability. I, I think if there's one virtue that men could really stand to improve in society, modern times specifically, it's the ability to just figure shit out. You know, like I was on Facebook last night and there was this

• 46:33Speaker 00

  guy and he said, somebody raised, raised the, I can't remember the, the tongue of his trailer and then broke the, the, the handle off. So he couldn't lift it or raise it. And he's like, I had to have somebody come, I had to wait here and have somebody come lift the trailer off and put a new jack on it. I'm like, what? Like, couldn't you have just taken the jack out of your truck and put it under the tongue of the trailer and lifted it off your hitch and left it there and, and gone and got whatever tools you needed yourself?

• 47:10Speaker 00

  You couldn't have done that?

• 47:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 47:14Speaker 00

  Or couldn't you have lifted it up just a little bit to relieve some tension with the jack already in your truck? And then put a screwdriver in where the handle was and cranked it? So it like, you just sat there and you waited? For somebody to come rescue you? It was so hard for me to wrap my head around. But that's how helpless people are. We are so helpless in modern times. And I think being out in nature really creates a lot of unknown, unforeseen, unpredictable realities that you have to confront. You know, what happens if you shoot an elk?

• 47:54Speaker 00

  Let's say you shoot a nice mature bull and it's you and your daughter and you're 10 miles from camp. And you forgot your game bags. What do you do?

• 48:05Speaker 00

  You gotta figure it out.

• 48:07Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 48:07Speaker 00

  Right? Or what if you're walking back and she rolls her ankle? Now you lose a third of the hauling power that you had. And you gotta carry her back. What do you, what do you do? Well, nobody's coming to get you. This is not a classroom. Like maybe you have to put a splint on her leg and maybe you have to, maybe you have to sacrifice the meat that you got and throw her over your shoulder. Or maybe you hang the meat in a tree and you throw her over your shoulder, fireman, carry her home, get her back to camp, get her all settled in, taken care of, and go back out and go get your meat. Like you have to figure it out. There's no other option.

• 48:48Speaker 00

  And I like that about nature. I love that about nature. It's, it is, it does not discriminate.

• 48:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think it's humbling. Like you just realize that like.

• 49:02Speaker 01

  It could decide to thunderstorm and there's nothing you can do about it. Just like you have to deal with it. You can't control the environment. You can't dictate outcome. And, and you just have to adjust and you realize how small you are in it, in all. That's what it does for me. Yeah. And it really sense, and I think that humility gives me gratitude. You know, it's like just silly things. I mean, we were just camping this past weekend. It's just like a silly. I thought about it last night, laid on my bed. I thought, ah, this is really nice to lay on my side. Cause that rock and that tent did not feel good on my side. For two days straight. You know what I mean? Like, you know, and it's just simple things that you all of a sudden appreciate.

• 49:47Speaker 01

  Even AC, you know, it's like, it was wicked hot, you know? It was a hundred degrees and it's like, what's the best thing you could do? Shade. And that's it. That's the best you could do. Maybe find a cool somewhere. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's a beautiful thing.

• 50:03Speaker 00

  I love it. I love it. Cool.

• 50:05Speaker 01

  All right. Deacon Whitfield, I lead a man's Bible study every week and I haven't told a single one of them that I've been wrestling with real doubt about my faith for the past year. Is it hypocritical to keep leading while I'm not sure what I believe? Or is that exactly what leadership sometimes looks like? That's a good question.

• 50:29Speaker 00

  It's a good question. It's actually hypocritical to do what you're doing right now.

• 50:34Speaker 01

  Without saying something.

• 50:36Speaker 00

  That's hypocritical. You're engaged in being hypocritical right now. It is not hypocritical to say, hey, guys, like, I'm actually struggling with my faith. And I'm turning to these scriptures and this book and these answers and these people. And I would like some insight from you. That's not, that's not hypocritical. But yeah, it's, it's definitely hypocritical to just keep teaching without being honest about how you feel.

• 51:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:03Speaker 00

  And, and look, I, and I say that because when I was in the throes of my alcohol abuse and struggling with my marriage, I was being hypocritical, not because I didn't believe what I was saying was true. I believed it was true, but I wasn't acting it out. But I, I, I connected the dots when I just started being honest about it and said, "Hey, look, I struggle with this and here's what's helped me. And I'm going through a divorce and here's what's been working in navigating that divorce. And yeah, it's, it's hard, you know, it's humbling.

• 51:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:39Speaker 00

  It's, it's potentially threatening to you and your livelihood or, or in your case, Deacon's case, the, the position that he's in of authority with, with the guys. Yeah, it threatens that for sure, but I'd rather that be threatened and be honest. And by the way, when you say it, the 10 or 20 or 100 guys that you're working with, they're all gonna be like, "Yeah, me too. I do too. Thank you."

• 52:03Speaker 01

  And we'll be, yes, and we'll be grateful that you said something. Yeah.

• 52:08Speaker 00

  Yeah, they're like, "Finally, like I have a teacher or a, or a guy who I appreciate and respect and he's being honest with me." Because this goes back to the first question that I think it was Cody was asked about, like, everybody seems to have it figured out. Nobody has it figured out. Everybody's lying to each other. And so, don't be a liar, Deacon. It's okay that you're struggling with your faith. Tell your guys. But isn't that the point of studying? So you can shore up your faith? Like, this is not out of the realm of possibility. This is the exact reason you're actually studying the Bible. So that you can build your testimony. So, start being honest with your guys and let them be honest with you. They're all struggling too.

• 52:53Speaker 01

  And it helps. This is how you serve, right? Is by letting this kind of stuff go. I mean, I, I don't, I can't share a name or I don't want to share a name because I, I didn't ask him if I would share and I, you know what I mean? I want to be respectful.

• 53:06Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 53:07Speaker 01

  Um, but, you know, on Friday, you and I, we run all hands, uh, all hands calls on Fridays for all the men in the Iron Council. And, uh, my Friday afternoon call was while driving up to Idaho. And so, I asked, uh, a few men if they would be able to facilitate that call. And one guy that I asked, he said, "No, I, you know, I'm busy. I'll have some work going on." You know, kind of gave some reasons. And then he reached out to me on Sunday and said, "Hey, I need to talk with you." And we spoke this morning. And he said, hey, you know what? I could have done it.

• 53:46Speaker 00

  Hmm.

• 53:48Speaker 01

  And, and I gave you some excuses.

• 53:52Speaker 01

  Instead of stepping up because of, you know, me being fearful, facilitating the call. I don't, I think so highly of the guys in the Iron Council. I don't feel like I'm ready to do that. You know what I mean? And so I made an excuse.

• 54:07Speaker 01

  And I just wanted to clear that up. He didn't need, society would have been completely okay with him never having that call with me. In fact, even some guys told him like, dude, no, no, no, don't worry about that.

• 54:22Speaker 01

  But this guy decided to live at a higher standard and went, no, no, no, I need to clean that up. And here's the greatest thing. Do I think more highly of him this morning than I did before? Absolutely. I'm like, dude, you are a stud. Like, I love that, that he was authentic. He was real. And he had admitted like, man, and he, and he felt it critical that he cleaned it up. Not for my benefit, because I would have never known. For his benefit, for his conscious, for his alignment, for his integrity. And it was just so powerful. And, and just like that. You know, this, this example from Deacon's like, man, trust me, you, you communicate that to your men.

• 55:06Speaker 01

  Um, in your Bible group, they will respect you. And what's great is you don't need to be the know it all. There's power in you going to Bible. Why do you have Bible study? Probably you should be at Bible study. Why? If you're wrestling with your faith, that's a good place to be.

• 55:22Speaker 00

  That's the best place you should be.

• 55:25Speaker 01

  Yeah. So like embrace that, that embrace that and go, hey, guys, this is what we do. When we're struggling, we show up. We don't just stop showing up because we don't look good enough or we're not complete. We come here because we're incomplete. Because we're figuring it out, because we're growing. And that's what growth looks like.

• 55:46Speaker 00

  Well, and, and also I would say, just because you're struggling with your faith, doesn't mean you don't know the Bible.

• 55:54Speaker 00

  Right, like you can know every story, every character, every scenario, every vibe, every feeling, and still be struggling with your faith. Does it make you less qualified? No. Because if you still know the stories, what it actually does is if I'm with you, Kip, let's say we're doing this Bible study and I'm reading you the story of David and Goliath, and we're all going through it together. And I'm like, no, I don't, I don't know if I believe this. Like, I mean, here's, here's the words, here's the story, here's what's written, and here's what I think it means, or what I don't think it means. I'm open to being wrong. What do you guys think?

• 56:28Speaker 00

  That's a way, like, where you guys can actually begin to debate, not as this factual thing, but like, no, let's actually debate. Is it, is it, did it really happen? Is it a parable? Is it, like, what is the lesson we're supposed to learn? What is this, like, having those discussions, I think, are way better. And I'm not telling you that you should play devil's advocate. I'm telling you that you should be humble enough to say, hey, I don't know if this is true. Like, I'm curious what you guys think about it. I would also say there was something interesting about your scenario that you shared with me on the, on the Friday call. So this gentleman, and I don't know who it is, but this gentleman, I think for

• 57:08Speaker 00

  him to have the balls to make it right was, was pretty awesome. But the thing that you left out of the story, and the thing that I wish more men would understand, is you, Kip, have created and cultivated an environment where somebody is comfortable enough to come tell you that. Because if, if he wasn't comfortable in telling you that, because you would have been a dick, or lost your temper, or made him feel shame, he would have never done that.

• 57:43Speaker 00

  And I want, I want people to hear that because as fathers and business owners and leaders in our community, I think, and I'm not great at this, but I think it's really important that we attempt to create a culture where people can be honest with us, even especially when it's uncomfortable, because that's the environment people need. They need to feel that safety, like, yeah, I can come to Ryan with this issue and he's not going to be a complete dick about it. I mean, I had, I had somebody reach out. I was a dick to this person, um, the end of last week, and he reached out and he sent me a video and he kind of let me have it. He laid into me. I'm like, yeah, actually he's kind of right. And I told him that. I messaged him back and like, you know what? A lot of that is

• 58:27Speaker 00

  warranted. Some of it is not, and I'll defend myself on that, but a lot of what you said is warranted. And here's what I think we should do. That's good. That's a healthy thing. Cause the alternative is I keep being a dick and he keeps saying nothing.

• 58:44Speaker 01

  Yeah. Built in animosity, passive aggressive. It's all yucky. Right?

• 58:49Speaker 00

  Right. Yeah.

• 58:51Speaker 01

  Um, last question for me, if that's okay.

• 58:54Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 58:54Speaker 01

  Ronnie Castellan, is it possible to over provide for your family in a way that actually weakens them?

• 59:03Speaker 00

  Yeah, of course. Of course. I mean, you see it all the time. You see spoiled kids all the time. They get everything handed to them. They get, you know, all, all, all the food, all the cars, all the toys, all the technology, no restraints, no borders, no boundaries, no discipline, no sacrifice, and they turn out to be sniveling, whining little bitches. So, yeah, the answer is yes. Who can't figure out anything on their own. And so, so the key here, I think, is to what extent do we provide? I think that's a good question to ask.

• 59:36Speaker 01

  Or the definition of, or more accurate definition of providing. What does that really mean?

• 59:42Speaker 00

  Yeah. The way I look at it is it's, it's kind of a medical term when you're prescribing medication. We just call it minimum effective dose.

• 59:53Speaker 00

  Minimum effective dose. I don't withhold the medicine. It's the medicine that keeps the person alive if they're dealing with something, some, some life-threatening illness. So I don't withhold the medicine. I give them the proper amount of medicine so that their body can learn to create its own antibodies and learn how to fight whatever is the bacteria or the virus that they're dealing with themselves. So minimum effective dose to provide the treatment and then let the body struggle with the rest so it can become capable. And so the same thing is true with our children, for example. I'm gonna put a roof over their head, of course, because if I don't, they'll die. Like, where are they gonna go? They'll die.

• 1:00:36Speaker 00

  I'm gonna provide food so that they're not starving. But my oldest son, as he, as he's graduated now and going out on his own, I said, "Hey bud, if you wanna live here while you're going to college, that's a deal I made and I've been talking about this for years. If my kids are going to school, and when I say going to school, I'm not talking about underwater basket-weaving majors. I'm talking about like, no, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go into the medical field or STEM or whatever. Okay, you're doing something productive. And if you're doing that, then you can stay here." And I told my oldest, I said, "You can live here full-time if you want with me." I said, "But I want you to know that there's gonna be rules. Like, you don't just get to come in whenever you want and leave whenever you want, not communicate effectively, effectively with me.

• 1:01:20Speaker 00

  And I also want you to know, you're gonna start paying rent." He's like, "What? I never had to pay rent before." I'm like, "You haven't been 18 before."

• 1:01:29Speaker 00

  And I said, "You're gonna pay rent and you're gonna help with groceries." He's like, "I am? I never had to help with pay groceries." "I know, but you're a man now." Now, it's not gonna be exorbitant and I realize I'm trying to help you and giving you that minimum effective dose so you can get your schooling and education and career lined out. But no, you're gonna help. And you need to struggle, struggle and suffer a little bit so you can figure it out." I don't want my kids to deal with that. I would love to have him here indefinitely. Selfishly, I would love that. But that's not gonna serve him. Minimum effective dose is my answer.

• 1:02:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, I love it, man. I mean, we did the same thing with our older kids. I think Ian, like, if we let him, he'd still be living in our house, right? Nation and I are like, "Dude..." You got six months.

• 1:02:13Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:02:14Speaker 01

  Once they moved back from, because they, him and Chiavi moved to Spain for a while to live and they came back and crashed. And we started sensing like, is he planning on staying here?

• 1:02:24Speaker 00

  Too comfortable.

• 1:02:25Speaker 01

  So I did, just so you know, this is temporary. You, you got a few months and, and you're out on your own. Why? Not for our benefit. I'd love to have him here, right? But it's, it's good for him, right? It's good for him. I, you know, in this, and maybe just to broaden the horizon. It's like, provide. It's like, man, as parents, this is where the book like Coddling of the American Mind. I just, I can't help but like, look at life and go, okay, how are we setting up our kids? And man, there's a lot of parents not setting their kids up for success. Um, because they're just,

• 1:03:04Speaker 01

  I don't know what's the term, just coddling them too much. Not letting them deal with life and let them struggle and learn and grow and progress. We're anti-fragile by design and we're robbing our children from these opportunities of growth when we swoop in and save them too quickly.

• 1:03:20Speaker 00

  I think, and I'll, and I'll, I'll leave with this because I know you got to get going, but I think when we engage in this type of behavior as parents or, you know, spouse or whatever. I think,

• 1:03:34Speaker 00

  I don't think it's selfless. I don't think we're doing it on behalf of other people when we over-provide. I think what we're doing is we're sparing ourselves. It's very selfish, actually. Because I'm not okay with seeing my son be uncomfortable. He can handle it. He's fine. He's an 18-year-old kid. He's resilient. He's tough. He wants to go out. He's fine. I don't like the way I feel about it. I don't like to see him struggle. I don't want to feel like I'm a bad parent. It has less to do with him and more to do with my own discomfort that I'm trying to hedge against.

• 1:04:11Speaker 01

  Totally, totally. And we get validated. See, I'm needed, I'm wanted, you know, I'm doing all this great stuff. Yeah. Yeah. I love it, man. Well, call to action for you gentlemen, listening. Connect with Mr. Mickler on X and Instagram, at Ryan Mickler. And as always, if you're on that fence, right, you want to surround yourself with like-minded guys to be pushed, to be able to have kind of a lot of the conversations that Ryan and I get to have. Join us in the Iron Council to learn more. Go to theironcouncil.com. And we'll have another preview call scheduled, I believe, August 12th.

• 1:04:48Speaker 00

  August 12th, Wednesday, August 12th at 8:00 PM Eastern. You can go to theironcouncil.com/preview. I'm actually recording a new preview introduction video today, so that will be up, and you guys can check it out.

• 1:05:03Speaker 01

  Cool.

• 1:05:04Speaker 00

  All right, Kip. Appreciate you, man. Thanks for the call, guys. Great, great questions today. Keep them rolling. I love the questions that we have these days, so just keep them coming. We'll keep answering them, and let's keep getting after it. We'll be back on Friday. Until then, go out there, take action, and become the man you are meant to be.

• 1:05:22Speaker 02

  Thank you for listening to the Order of Man Podcast. You ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you are meant to be? We invite you to join the Order at orderofman.com.