Father yourself first, p.8
Father Yourself First, page 8
Keep in mind, we’re not talking about an absentee father here. Pat is a guy who loves his family and has always been around them, so hearing his passion to be even closer to them had a deep impact on me. He had come face-to-face with death, and all that mattered was family.
Watching Pat’s desire to be close to his family is one of the reasons we decided to move to a farm with more land as well as buy an RV. I feel a sense of urgency around connecting with my kids and building a relationship with them now, while they are young. I want my family close; I want to be there for them, and I want them to be with me.
When we catch a glimpse of how valuable and powerful our fatherhood role is, we feel a sense of urgency about it. If this is our biggest stage, it needs to be a top priority in our lives. If we’re going to be the fathers our kids need, we’ve got to make sure the craziness and chaos of life that pulls us in a thousand different directions doesn’t distract us from our families.
That’s an ongoing challenge, and you need self-compassion in the middle of it because you’ll often feel like you’re not enough for all the demands placed on you. The struggle is real, but the struggle is also important. It forces you to choose what really matters. There will be times when something has to give, when you’ll have to cheat something—but make sure it’s not always your family that gives in or gets cheated. If you’re going to err, err on the side of spending too much time with your family. Err on the side of laughing too much, of enjoying them too deeply, of closing the laptop too soon, and of going on bike rides too often. Not because you have to but because you want to and because you know how valuable your presence is to them.
* * *
If you’re going to err, err on the side of spending too much time with your family.
* * *
The Bible says, “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up” (Galatians 6:9). I don’t know what the “proper” time is—that’s in God’s hands. But I do know his grace is enough for us. He gives us the strength to keep doing good works, to keep building masterpieces, to keep playing to the audience that is our children, until his perfect time comes. Yes, family and fatherhood are work sometimes, but they are the best work we could possibly do.
06
The Voice They Need to Hear
I’ve started hiking for exercise, and recently Uriah, my second oldest, asked to go with me on my usual hike because he said he wanted to get in better shape. “Are you sure?” I asked. “It’s a five-mile trail with some steep hills, and it’s hot out there.”
He insisted, “I can do it! I know I can.”
Now, I know my son, and I’m aware he has a very high view of what he is capable of, which is something I love. But he also tends to give up quickly. Sure enough, partway through the hike, the excitement wore off and the heat and fatigue kicked in—as did all the feels. He’s dramatic, which seems to run in my family, so I had to spend the next hour encouraging him. Since we were in the desert, we had no cell service; it wasn’t like I could call an Uber to come pick us up. And I sure wasn’t going to carry him out.
“I can’t do this,” he kept saying.
“Yes, you can,” I’d reply. “You’re strong.”
“No, I’m weak. I’m hot. I’m tired.”
“You can do it.”
“What if I pass out?”
“Well, you’ll wake up.”
He literally fell over at one point. He just collapsed and started crying. I had to talk him through that too. “I promise you, you’ve got this. This is the hardest part, then it gets way easier.”
It was a huge learning experience. Not just for him but for me. Together, we went through all the cycles of fear and frustration that each of us experiences when we attempt to do hard things.
I finally got on his case a little bit over the way he was talking about himself. He kept saying, “I can’t do this. I’m too weak. I’m going to die.”
“Yes, you can do it,” I said. “You gotta stop talking like that. Your inner voice needs to be positive.”
Then he told me, “I just need a hug right now.”
That was both beautiful and disgusting, because we were sweating like nobody’s business. I was like, “Really? Why do you need a hug right now?”
He didn’t know. He just knew he needed one in order to keep going. So we stood there in the middle of the desert heat, my man-boobs pressed against his man-boobs, and hugged until he felt better and was able to keep going.
Obviously, he didn’t die. He didn’t pass out either. When he finished the hike, he was very proud of himself, and I was proud of him too. I asked him, “If you could go back and talk to yourself during that hike, what would you say to encourage yourself?”
He thought for a second. “I can do it. Push harder.”
I loved that answer so much. I could literally hear him silencing the bully in his head. He was replacing “I can’t do this” with “I can do this.” When things get tough, instead of saying, “Give up now,” he was reminding himself to say, “Push harder.”
I made a video out of the experience and posted it on our channel. Naturally I got a few angry comments because everybody hates to see a little boy suffer. Even my wife said, “Babe, why didn’t you call me?” Inside I was thinking, Because you would have let him quit. But all I said was “No cell service.”
As a father, I hated to see him suffer too. But even if I could have called a helicopter to airlift us out of there, quitting wasn’t what my son needed—or what he really wanted. The experience was so much bigger than surviving a five-mile hike. It was about seeing himself differently and learning that he really can achieve what he wants to do, even if things feel overwhelming in the moment. He can dream big things and do big things.
Nurture, Not Control
Fatherhood is not pretty. It’s messy business sometimes. It’s dramatic business. It’s sweaty-hugs-in-the-hot-desert business. That is part of our role though. We will often know what our kids are capable of even better than they do, and if we are willing to stay by their side and encourage them, we can help them grow into the people they were created by God to be. As fathers, we are mentors, teachers, coaches, and cheerleaders. We come alongside our kids to protect and serve them as they blossom and develop.
Don’t get me wrong here. This is not about running a boot camp or demanding perfection. Nor is it about ignoring your kids’ feelings or trying to force them into some preconceived idea you might have of what they should be. There have been plenty of times when I’ve let Uriah back out of something, and that’s okay. But this time, he needed to finish.
Fatherhood is less about control and more about nurture. Your goal is to help them step into the fullness of their potential. You don’t even know what that potential is yet, but you catch glimpses, and then you nudge them in the right direction as they keep growing.
Farm life is relatively new to us, but there are two things that are clear about any living thing. First, it will take its own sweet time growing; and second, it will grow up to be what it was designed to be. I can’t force a tree, plant, or flower to develop faster or differently than its inner design dictates. Sure, I can decide where to plant it and guide its growth a little bit, but my role is mostly to nourish and protect it during its built-in, God-designed growth process.
In a similar way, as a father, your role is not to control, force, or impose your idea of who your kids should be on them. God has put a lot in them, but it’s in seed form. Your job is to come alongside them and do whatever they need done in order to bring those things to life. God is doing the hard work of creating growth, and if you pay attention, your kids will show you what they need and who they are becoming. You are there to protect, provide, encourage, and teach as that future becomes reality.
We have more influence on how our kids turn out than we do on the trees or bushes in our yard. But ultimately, as I said before, we need to diminish so they can increase. They’re going to want to cut off their locs or wear certain styles of clothing, and it’s important for us to discern when it’s time to start letting them make the decisions that are so important for their identity and confidence.
By “nurturing,” I don’t mean just hugs, bedtime stories, and compliments. Those are part of the package, but nurturing includes whatever they need to grow. Sometimes nurturing looks like telling your child that if he passes out during a hike, he’ll wake up. Other times it looks like driving them back and forth to hockey practice even when it means working late into the night to meet a deadline. Other times it looks like a heart-to-heart conversation or making them do chores or chasing them around the room pretending to be a superhero or sitting with them when they’re sick even though you’d rather be chasing their mother around your own bedroom. No matter what form nurture takes, the desired outcome is the healthy development of your children.
As dads, I think we sometimes confuse these two concepts of nurture and control. If we’re not careful, we can focus too much on getting them to do what we want and too little on getting them to do what they need. The difference between the two lies in the motive behind them. When we’re encouraging or even requiring our kids to do something, we’ve got to make sure it’s for them, not for us. Both nurture and control mean being highly involved in their lives, but only nurture is capable of releasing and empowering over the long haul—and that’s what they truly need.
When I say “highly involved,” I mean it. Fatherhood is a contact sport. These kids sleep in your home, eat your food, wipe boogers on your wall, and put holes in your trampoline. You must be involved in their development and growth. That’s why they call you dad, and it’s why they usually carry your last name.
So if this involvement doesn’t look like ironfisted control, what does it look like? It looks like showing them how to live and telling them what they need to know.
Show and Tell
When creating videos, there are two main elements that work together: showing and telling. “Showing” involves imagery, such as the shots, the location, the lighting, and the action. “Telling” primarily involves dialogue. It’s what people say to each other or to the camera. The best videos have both showing and telling, and the two elements together tell a powerful story.
In the same way, when you’re raising your kids, you want to have a mixture of showing and telling. Remember, their eyes are the biggest cameras, and they’re always watching (sometimes from dark hallways after they’re supposed to be in bed). The goal is for both your example in the home (actions) and your teaching and encouragement (words) to work together to give them guidance and support. Let’s look at a couple of ways to do each of these.
What Should You Show Them?
The list of things you might show them is infinite because kids are sponges who soak up everything you say and do—especially things like the cuss words you didn’t mean for them to learn. Human behavior is mostly caught, not taught, and they catch it first and foremost from you.
That could either freak you out or inspire you to be intentional about what you show them, or maybe a bit of both. They’ll pick up some things you’ll wish they hadn’t, but more than that, they’ll pick up the things you take the time and energy to show them. That’s encouraging, especially when they’re not listening to your words because they’re running around screaming like they’re possessed. They’re still watching your actions and learning from your example. That gives you a lot of freedom and power as a dad.
The specific things you show them are up to you, and they’ll likely include your unique areas of expertise. My kids know a lot about filming and social media, for example, but I haven’t taught them anything about how to rebuild an engine. (I don’t even know what that means.) Generally speaking, here are three things to focus on:
1. Show them what is normal, right, and good.
Long before our kids are unleashed on the world, they will have been learning from us what it means to be human. That’s the “biggest stage” idea we talked about in the last chapter. In the home and with their family, children learn what is normal, what is expected, and what is right. As fathers, our actions and reactions will teach them how to carry themselves, whether we realize it or not.
That’s a scary but important truth. In my home, my kids learn that it’s normal to treat their siblings with respect. It’s normal for Dad and Mom to love each other. It’s normal to walk through the kitchen rather than running. It’s normal to laugh a lot. It’s normal to work hard and play hard. It’s normal (and nonnegotiable) to wipe your butt after using the toilet. It’s normal for me to expect that I shouldn’t have to smell you to figure out whether you put on deodorant, because you love yourself and the rest of us enough to not let us smell you like that.
Healthy mindsets and habits are also modeled more than they are taught. Every day, you are showing your kids how to be well-balanced, decent human beings who act with common sense, good manners, and intelligence. You are imparting the wisdom and life lessons you’ve picked up over the years, which are invaluable gifts that help set them up for success.
2. Show them what is possible.
Not only are they learning how to be humans; they are also learning how to become like you. While they won’t want to be exactly like you (especially once the teen years roll around), you are their hero, and they look up to you. Long before they’ve thought about college or a career choice, you represent what they can expect to achieve and become.
On a family level, show them what a marriage and family can look like. Be the best family you can be because they’re going to reproduce what they see. When they are grown and gone, they’ll have that solid example to look back on, and the bar will be set high.
On a personal level, show them how to continually grow and mature. Let them see an example of genuine love, someone who knows how to treat people with generosity and empathy. Be an adult who is both confident and humble, able to stand up for yourself but also able to work with others with grace and patience.
On a relational level, let them see the value of a wider community. They’ll learn social skills from you, and they’ll discover how to have a wide world. They’ll also learn safety and boundaries. They’ll watch how you choose friends who share your values and add to your life.
On a work and financial level, model a good work ethic and financial responsibility. Many of us are not where we want to be in this area, but we’re on a journey, and it’s good for our kids to be part of the journey. They can learn how to work hard, save, budget, spend wisely—and how to enjoy their blessings and be generous to others.
Finally, on a spiritual level, show them how to know God. Help them see what it means to trust God and live in wisdom and love. By your example, teach them to pray, to read the Bible, and to value the church community.
Never underestimate the power of simply doing life in front of your kids. When you grow in an area, when you set and accomplish a goal, when you make healthy changes, when you take steps forward—each victory is a source of vision and inspiration for your kids.
3. Show them how to recover from mistakes.
I hate that this is true, but you will mess up in front of your kids at times. You’ll lose your temper, you’ll say things you didn’t mean, you’ll make decisions that don’t work out, you’ll hurt their feelings, and you’ll embarrass yourself or them.
That sucks—but it also offers an invaluable opportunity. They are watching your every move, and if you only model perfection, how are they supposed to measure up to that? That facade sets the bar too high. It isn’t realistic or honest, because we all know that behind the scenes, we’re painfully fallible.
* * *
Never underestimate the power of simply doing life in front of your kids.
* * *
You can keep up the hero-who-never-messes-up persona for the first few years of their lives, but the image starts to crack as they grow older and become more aware of the realities of life. Let it crack. Let them see your humanity. But don’t stop there. Show them how you deal with your mistakes.
What should you model? Here are a few things that spring to mind, and I’m sure you could add a few more from your own experience of being a flawed (aka normal) human being.
Model grace: Have compassion and patience with yourself.
Model humility: Admit your flaws and be willing to ask for help.
Model a growth mindset: Seek ways to improve and grow rather than repeating mistakes.
Model emotional intelligence: Let them see how you process frustration, embarrassment, and anxiety, and how you move from there to a place of stability.
Model resilience: Show them how to bounce back, stand up under pressure, and move forward even when things didn’t work out like you planned.
Often we don’t even realize we’re teaching them these things. We’re simply putting our life skills into practice and doing our best to survive and move forward. But they’re learning lessons, including It’s okay to cry when I’m sad. It’s okay to feel hurt; I will get through it, and life will be good again. It’s okay to be frustrated, as long as I don’t punch the person I’m mad at.
Over the years, they’ll pick up hundreds—perhaps thousands—of invaluable life lessons that we impart through example.
We won’t be perfect at this, which means we also get to model how to apologize, make amends, and grow. This is vital to the process. Don’t expect your kids to be perfect, and don’t expect yourself to be perfect either. The unfortunate truth is that they will often learn more from your mistakes than from your successes. On the flip side, the beautiful truth is that they won’t have to make those same mistakes. By being open and honest, you’re teaching them how to both avoid those specific errors and—even more importantly—how to recover from errors they’ll make down the road. As I’ve said, fatherhood is messy, so let them see the messiness, but also model the process you use to work through the mess and get better at what you do.
