302 | Silencing Distractions, Seeing Your Children, and Being Set Apart as a Father (Carlos Whittaker)
Episode Description
Five years ago, Carlos Whittaker joined us on the DadAwesome podcast. A lot has changed since then. With a new perspective of launching his children into the world, Carlos is here to ask the hard-hitting questions. He’ll inspire you to become a father who knows how to be, see, and free.
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Carlos Whittaker spreads hope and encouragement through his roles as an author, podcaster, and global speaker. He and his wife Heather live in Nashville, Tennessee, with their three young adult children.
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· No app can replace the love and connection you provide your child.
· What are you using to medicate some of the inadequacies you feel in your parenting?
· Lower the volume of life and be present.
· See past the problems and behaviors to parent your child.
· You are set apart as a father to breathe life into your kids.
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Podcast Intro: [00:00:01] Being a great father takes a massive amount of courage. Instead of being an amazing leader and a decent dad, I want to be an amazing dad and a decent leader. The oldest dad in the world gave you this assignment, which means you must be ready for. It. As a dad, I got on my knees and I fight for my kids. Let us be those dads who stop the generational pass down of trauma. I want encounters with God where He teaches me what to do with my kids. I know I'm going to be an awesome dad because I'm gonna give it my all.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:00:38] Hey, guys. Welcome back to DadAwesome. My name is Jeff Zaugg and today, episode 302, Carlos Whittaker coming at you guys. And we did a two part interview with Carlos back in the very first year of DadAwesome. So, about five years ago, had him on, talked about his book, Moment Maker, his book Kill the Spider and his dad, just perspective. And it was so helpful, but here we are, five years later. His kids are in a very different season and this is going to be fun. I'm really thankful you guys are listening today. I want a quick shout back to two weeks ago. We dropped episode 300 and we still, every day, people are continuing to reach out asking for the dad notes. So if you simply go to dadawesome.org/300, you can sign up for this 23 page, it's a mini, it's like a mini e-book. It's all of the action steps, the the encouragements from 31 guests. So, I want to encourage all of our DadAwesome community to sign up and get the dad notes because we want to send that to you so you can put into practice. Also, that it was a long episode, it was over 2 hours, episode 300. And as you have time available, the YouTube video is all timestamped with the 31 names of the guests. So, you can go back in and just dive right in to listen to a three minute video from this guest or that guest. So, want to encourage you guys to check out dadawesome.org/300 as time allows. But guys, let's jump in this week, episode 302. So thankful for this conversation with Carlos Whittaker. Carlos, it's been five years since we had you on DadAwesome, I think it was episode like 47 last time, so welcome back.
Carlos Whittaker: [00:02:29] Bro, you know, I probably, I definitely, five years, I definitely have had to go through an iteration of trying to dye my gray hairs in my beard, and then now I've just let them go. So you are seeing the Santa Claus version of who I was five years ago, and I appreciate you having me back.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:02:43] Hey salt and pepper is all, I'm just embracing that season right now. I just turned 40 a year ago, and aren't, didn't you, just a couple months ago, turn 50? Am I right?
Carlos Whittaker: [00:02:53] I just turned 50, bro. I'm a decade ahead of you, and I will let you know sooner or later that there will be way more salt and pepper. And so, you know, like, you just need to get, the whole salt and pepper everything, it's like, Nah, man, just salt. Let's just go all salt.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:03:06] That's great, salt. I love it. I love it now. And I think I'm catching you at a moment where you've got your oldest daughter getting married next year, your middle, your other daughter is moved out of the house into her own apartment. Am I right? Is that kind of the chapter?
Carlos Whittaker: [00:03:21] Bro, bro, you are getting me in, I mean, if you got me five years ago, I was freaking drowning in tweening and teening and, you know, and now I've got a 21 year old who's engaged. Literally, as we speak right now, as you're looking at me on my camera, my wife is upstairs with Brady, her fiancee, and her, they're they're both 21 and they're getting married in May. And then my 19 year old no, actually, she just turned 20, last week, has moved out and living with roommates in an apartment and I say moved out, she literally sleeps here half half the month like she's like and I'm like, babe, like you're paying rent, this nice, bougie apartment. She's like, Yeah, but I just miss you guys. So I'm like, Okay, so why are you paying rent? Anyway, and then I've got a 17 year old son who was a junior in high school who were trying to figure out how we can move him out faster than the rest of them. So that's kind of where we, where we sit right now.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:04:13] That's the chapter. And I mean, just even by form of like timestamp, in our last conversation, we talked mostly about Kill the Spider. That was kind of the main emphasis of it. I mean, that's two, that's three books a go, right? Does that sound right? That's three books ago.
Carlos Whittaker: [00:04:26] Yeah. Killer the Spider, Enter Wild, and now How to Human. Absolutely.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:04:30] How to Human. Yeah. So I knew that, I mean, just how you have continued to invest though, in different like what's God doing in you and then you just bring that wholeheartedly to, to the world. I'm grateful, grateful for you and and we we love catching dads in hinge point moments. It's one of my favorite things. So you are at that moment. I mean, you're about to have a daughter get married. You just moved out your 20 year old. I mean it's, hinge point moments are fun moments to talk the dad life because it's maybe a little more introspective than other moments. You also just did a whole series on parenting on your podcast, which will link that series so we can just send our our crew over for all the goodness. But you, you mentioned something that I think you collected thousands from your insta familia, your your Instagram family. You get thousands of questions and there was a thread in those questions of survival, a thread of how am I going to make it? Will I make it? Will I ever make it? A thread of desperation, survival versus, versus the thread that you, the charge that you're just so passionate about, which is a hopeful. Like no, let's stay hopeful in the dad life. Let's not stay, we're not defeated, there's this is a great opportunity. Would you just talk about like that thread of what you gathered and how you encourage dads in that?
Carlos Whittaker: [00:05:44] Yeah, you know, I do feel like, I mean, let's not, let's not sugarcoat it. You know, like the amount of the navigation that dads, and moms, have to go through with their kids and all of the all of the ways that that could possibly trip up your kids. There are, you know, I just moved my parents across the street and we and we were having a conversation with my mom like I was having lunch with her last night going, and she looked at me. She's like, I don't know how, I don't think I could have done it. Like, if you had a phone when you were 18, if you had the ability to do all these things, you know, when you were 15, I don't know if I could have done. And I was like, No, mom, you could have done it. Like I'm doing it. And so you definitely could have done it. And of course, there's, you know, there's positives, right? Like, mom, you could actually tracked me and found me when I was doing what I wasn't supposed to be doing because Like360 would have told you, right. And so, like, there's pluses and minuses. But but, you know, I do, I did find a common thread of parents being like, I don't know, I don't know what to do. I don't, I don't think I have the capacity to know everything I need to know in order to make my kids safe, in order to protect my kids, in order to do, you know, especially dads, right. Like like I mean, let's let's just be honest, like, for a second, like dads already, there's data, I'm not being sexist when I say this there's just data that shows that men have a lot harder time connecting emotionally with their kids, with their spouse, with their old, even their dude friends, right. And so I think there's a lot of dads that are like, I just, I mean, gosh, my my, my daughters are just, you know, they're connected to their devices, they're all these things. And so there was a big, there was a large amount of people that were like, maybe, maybe I just can't do it. Maybe I just give up. Maybe I try to keep them alive. And I, you're right, I am the hopeful guy. I am the the parent that's like, you know what, honestly, as a, I have a 21 year old daughter, a 20 year old daughter and a 17 year old son. And the last four years of their lives have been my favorite season I've ever dad-ed. Is dad-ed a word, you know?
Jeff Zaugg: [00:07:53] I think so. I think so. Yeah.
Carlos Whittaker: [00:07:53] Let's go. We just make it up, you know. And it literally has been my favorite because at the end of the day, all of those other, all the things that we may be scared of that provide, provide us with, I think, moving targets of trying to figure out how to, how to nail this thing as a parent. All of those things are there, but what doesn't what's not a moving target is like loving and spending time with your kids. Like there is nothing that can trump that. There is no app you put on your phone, there is no family meeting that you can plan twice a week, there is no structural system of family navigation that you can put together that is just going to be looking your kid in the eye every single day, telling them that you love them, showing them that you love them, and then treating them like you love them. And I just feel like that's the ticket, especially when when everything is so chaotic. I'm like, okay, how can I just get parents to take a deep breath and go like, No, you, you not only can you do this, but you can crush this. And your kids are waiting and wanting and desiring for you to crush this. So, they're rooting for you. They may not look like they are, but trust me, they are dying to make sure that they feel seen by you. And so, so do it, you know, do it. So there's a little bit of hope in the midst of the chaos.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:09:05] I love that. And you mentioning your eyes and looking at them and them wanting to be seen. What are, even some examples of how we can, the non-emotional dad who might be listening right now, that's like, I don't know how to get through, am I getting through at all? I don't know. How would you encourage, like just to take that little step closer and to use our eyes to get to get within like, man, Like our kids know that we're pursuing them?
Carlos Whittaker: [00:09:33] Yeah. You know, it's I don't think it has to be emotional on on what you think is emotional. I don't think it has to be these deep, you know, you don't have to like write a a love letter to your daughter every, you know, four days and like, put it in an envelope that she's going to save the rest of her life. Like, sure, that's great. That's fine. But like, like you can do that. But how about you just look and see what they're into and get into it to. That, that's not super complicated. If your daughter is reciting the 12 minute version of Taylor Swift's longest freaking song that all the whatever teenage girls know like, and guess what you get to do, learn the lyrics and next time it comes on, next time you hear them singing, can I tell you what's going to blow their mind and touch their emotions in ways if they're non-emotional dads. Just just to themselves, it's like, I'm just a girl with my new boyfriend, and she's like, Oh, my God, I'm just... And also they look over and they're like, Is Dad literally singing every single word of. the Taylor song? Like, what are they into? And get into it. Like, when I, when I, when I do parenting seminars, I show this video of my daughter who was when she was a 12, maybe, she was into flipping water bottles. And I thought that was the stupidest thing I've ever seen. I'm like, why is she, why is she spending all of her time flipping water bottles? And you know what I needed to do to to get back in touch with her because she drove me crazy in this season of life, 12 years old, she was the meanest. I'm telling you, my daughter was so mean. She would, she would like try to make me cry on a daily basis, try to hurt my feelings. And I'm like, she's the last person I want to spend time with. She's the last person I wanted to, because she drove me crazy. And you know what I just needed to do? I needed to see her, right. And so, just like you said, how do we see them? What are they doing? So guess what I learned to do, flip the water bottle. Guess what we started to do, flip water bottles together. Like, what are those things that aren't hyper emotional, super deep, that you can just do that they're into and you get into it with them?
Jeff Zaugg: [00:11:28] Yeah. Yeah. Well, let's take it one step further and parallel some of the dad advice out of your recent book. So, to be, to see, to free. Just thinking about those categories and how those could be leveraged as just a framework for us dads. Could you kind of just expound a little bit on what you mean by those three categories?
Carlos Whittaker: [00:11:47] Yeah. So the book is called How to Human: Three Ways to Share Life Beyond What Distracts Divides and Disconnects Us. And I wrote it in the current cultural context of where we are, right. So we got people that that we used to, that we loved for 27 years, you found out who they voted for, and you don't love them anymore. And it's like and it's real, right. We're all hyper aware of our opinions these days. And so I, the book really helps people be humans, see humans that don't look like them, think like them, vote like them, talk like them, love like them, all the things and then free them. And so it's only step one to see somebody, but then how can you give them freedom in some way, shape or form? And the whole dad part of this and this is here's here's here's the thing, you know, I give this talk, How to Human, in front of corporate settings all the time, right. They're use to these leadership principle people coming in. They're used to people telling them all of these ways on how they can make more money and be a better salesperson, all these things. And I come in and I might listen, listen, I know that we, I would, you would love for me to come in and help you with relationships in the workplace. But the way to practice these things be human, see humans, and free humans isn't at work or in touchy, hyper political conversations. It's to do it at home with your kids. It's to do it with with with those people that you see every day. So, it's really cool because all the, all the the examples I give when I do my live talk on How to Human, I think everyone's expecting me to talk about race and how to like like heal the racial divide in the workplace in America. And I just talk about my kids and I just talk about, listen, how can you be fully human with them? And what I mean by that is like, present, right. Like, like we are not present anymore. You look at what being human means now compared to what being human meant even 30 years ago, the average American meal 30 years ago was 75 minutes long. The average American meal in 2023 is 12 minutes long. So don't tell me that that we are being human anymore. We're literally not. And so, like I lean in to what does it mean to be present, to be human with your family? But obviously, yes, you know, we can blame our phones and and and things, but I mean, there's always been something that have kept our eyes off of, off of our families even before phones were around, right. Men were just addicted to, dads were just addicted to their work, before that, they were addicted to whatever it may have been. So what is the medicator, and we talked about this five years ago, the medicator that you're using to maybe medicate some inadequacies that you feel in your parenting, break those things and be more present. You know, what does it look like to lower the volume of life, slow the pace of life down? That's what my exact, my next book that's coming out in 2024 is all about presence. And it's all about, I did an experiment where I didn't look at a screen, this is crazy, I didn't look at a single screen for 11 weeks. So, I didn't look at a phone, an Apple Watch, a laptop, an iPad, nothing, for 11 weeks. I didn't know what's happening on planet Earth and I was just present. And I it felt like I was like a dad in 1972. It was, it was the craziest thing ever. And I got my brain scanned at the beginning and I got it scanned at the end. So, you know, so the next memoir is going to be kind of what that journey looks like. But it was a an experiment on presence, on and I'm telling you, my kids, my wife, my friends, they're like, you are a completely different human being when you're present, when you be human, that's step one. Step two, free. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. See humans. See. So, step two is see. And you know, and that's, that's the water bottle flip, right. That's the, that's the thing where how can you see them? And even I would say like like in in difficult parenting situations, a lot of times what parents see and what what dad see is the problem. And so so we try to parent the problem. And that's that's never that's never what it is, because we're only, we're not even seeing past, we're not seeing them, we're seeing the behavior. And so seeing your kids, it's hard, right. So, like I know it sounds catchy, be, see and free. Okay, sweet. I got this thing down. No, man, you read the book and you're like, Oh, this is actually complicated. This is hard. This is going to take a little bit more work than maybe I thought I had in me. So see them. See them for who they are and not who you want them to be, and then free them. What are ways as a dad that you can free your kids? You know, how can you free them from mistakes that you made growing up? How can you do that in a way that's not full of shame? What are ways that you can, you know, come together with other dads to or maybe even free other dads, you know. That you may see some dads and some chains and whatever they may be. So the whole be, see, free thing is, you know, I like things that rhyme. I'm a child of the ninetie. So, like, I'm like I'm like, I'm like, all in. But it it's memorable enough that I think every single day we can lower the volume of life and be present. We can see those around us that that maybe we vehemently disagree with or can't stand and sometimes there's people that we can't stand our own kids. Let's just and let's not sugarcoat things. And then how can we free them? Like what, what are ways that you as a father are set apart and separated from the rest of all of humanity, all of the other individuals that are speaking into their lives, you as a father, you as a dad, you are set apart in a way that nobody else is. So how can you use that for for a lot of kids, just a look from their father, looking them in the eyes and saying, I love you and I'm proud of you. Just that is going to free your kids in ways that, you know, you probably can't even imagine. So those are the three steps, be, see and free.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:17:30] So good. So good. Let's, let's jump back to your daughter, at the age of 13, when you didn't want to hang out with her.
Carlos Whittaker: [00:17:36] Let's not. I'm triggered.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:17:39] So how would, how did that move towards freeing her and freeing you to maybe be closer together again after that, that that chapter?
Carlos Whittaker: [00:17:48] Yeah. You know, you know, we, I did this thing where she got home from from school and I'd ask her how school was and she's like, fine. I was like, how was gymnastics? Fine. You know, and then I'll never forget the day that she came home and was like, How's school? Fine. How was gymnastics? Fine. Hey, you want to go in the backyard and flip a water bottle with you? Yeah, I did like that. I was like, wait. And we go back there and we have this moment, right, we're flipping water bottles, we're laughing. We're having a great 20 minutes of fun, right. After I felt like a year of not having fun with her. Walked back inside. She went to a room, I went to the sofa, started watching the news. And I'll never forget, man, like, 5 minutes later, she comes walking out of her room, plops down right next to me on the sofa, doesn't say anything, and just like sticks her head into my armpit like she did six months ago before she turned 12, right. And I just remember holding my breath, going like, oh, my gosh, Like we both just were freed from animosity towards each other that we felt but didn't know how to talk about. But guess what, we didn't even have to talk about it to find the freedom. We found the freedom through experiencing something together. And that's just, that's it, man. That's what I want dads to know, is that, you know, for me and staying out of the freedom wasn't necessarily found in, like, some deep healing conversation. It was more of a moment that we had together.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:19:11] Play, I mean, really an experience or you guys played together and that unlocked and melted some of that...
Carlos Whittaker: [00:19:18] Oh, yeah.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:19:19] The wall. That's amazing.
Carlos Whittaker: [00:19:21] Absolutely, man.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:19:22] Let's jump from there into a post that you shared, it starts with in 100 years. You talk about, like, who's really going to know who I am in a hundred years, no matter how famous you are, like, it's like those come and go, whatever recognition. But there's a chance we could be famous for for our great, great, great grandkids or whatever the, you know, the breakdown is. Do you remember, do you recall that post?
Carlos Whittaker: [00:19:48] I do. I'm actually going to pull it up while you, while you ask me that question, because, you know, when I wrote it, I can't remember what I was like specifically thinking about. Here it is right here, in 100 years. Oh, yeah. Just a reminder, don't waste the time you have because people will remember you, because people will remember you just may be not the people you think. And yeah, that's it, right. It's like, you know, you know who's going to remember, especially because we have digital footprints now. Like, everything you say, I just think to myself, everything I post online, everything, even if I like, can't stand somebody on Twitter and I have an off moment and I go off on them, I just think to myself, my great, great, great grandkids who are going to be trying to figure out who they are, are going to get to me some at some point and they're going to get to and this is what they're going to read. Like like what is it, what is it that we're leaving them? What is the, what, what is the truth of who you want them to remember? And so, yeah, we're going to be remembered by just our family and the the generations that we, that have to come behind us because we're the great, great, greats or whatever it ends up being. And so I guess, you know, I just wrote that post because I wanted people to well, everyone's trying their hardest to, you know, to leave some lasting impact on planet Earth. And they're trying to, you know, do it by, you know, making videos and all. And I just I just sit here thinking like and like, hopefully my kids will tell their kids my dad was awesome and and my dad loved me and my dad saw me. My dad freed me in these ways. And then my grandkids will tell their kids, Yeah, my great grandpa, you know, And it's just because we all have an expiration date, you know, like every single one of us, we work as hard as we can. And like, my dad used to say all the time, you've never seen a U-Haul behind a hearse. And so, like, we can work, we can work for all this stuff, but at the end of the day, what are we taking with us? Nothing. What are we leaving? I mean, material stuff, sure. But what we're really leaving is that legacy of love and seeing and freeing as many people as we can. And so, yeah, that's what that was about.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:22:01] Really helpful. Your, your vantage point, Carlos, is about a decade of more life than me, not quite eight years or something like that, of life. But then about 12 years of parenting more than me. My oldest is ten. That's the chapter. And this this could be from your own lived experience, like, Hey, this is what you want to pass on to this dad on the other end of the zoom line right now, that that has a ten year old. But it also could be some of the things you gathered or talked about over that five week parenting series you just did. So, you were gathering from experts and friends that are experts. What which is like dad wisdom, dad ideas, dad priorities, would you want to pass on to me in this moment?
Carlos Whittaker: [00:22:38] Yeah. You know, I just think that, okay, I mean, we'll just go with, like, raising girls, you know, like one thing that my wife really helped me with because I didn't know, man. I just had brothers and I didn't want my daughters were my freaking world, and I was their prince. And it was, you know, the I it was it was amazing. And then boys entered and I was like, What the heck? Like, they've got googoo eyes for these knuckleheads and these, you know, And something that I did early on in their dating was that I actually brought these boys in by close, as opposed to what you immediately a dad want to do is distance yourself from from the boys who are now stealing your daughters from you and their hearts. And so it was it's counterintuitive to do it, but I invited them in. And I mean, I took them on vacation three months into them dating. I'm like, I'm like, sweet, they're coming in. And I just remember all my dad friends like, what are you doing? Like, this is this is horrible. No, you don't want to bring them in close. Oh, you know what it, what it did it did two things. A, it allowed me to see every facet of who they were. And I could tell from a lot, I could tell a lot better close up than I could from far apart, you know, what it is that you're looking for. And then secondly, it allowed them to trust me. And I built some relationships with these young men that were courting my daughters that I know a lot of mine, now, a lot of my dad friends wish they had with their future son in laws or whatever it may be. And so, you know, that is one thing that I try to tell dads more than anything right now is like, dating's going to happen, you know, again, my son hasn't started dating yet, so I'll have a whole other talk, I'm sure, at that point. But when it comes to daughters, as a dad, don't do the whole shine my shotgun thing in front of them. Like if you've raised your daughters, if you've raised your daughters well enough, you won't have to shine the shotgun. Your daughters will believe in who they are. They will believe in their worth. And you can now at that point invite those those young men in closer. Now, that's not to say that when they come in closer and you see something that you don't get to, there's been some uncomfortable conversations, but I wouldn't have been able to have those uncomfortable conversations had I not brought them in close. And so as you parents, right, we may think that parenting is a lot better done when you have binoculars. Because because a lot of times, right, you think of binoculars and you think, I mean, I can see something really close, like I'm looking out my window right now and I see a squirrel on on the chimney in the house in front of me, next door to me. So I can take out some binoculars right now, and I could look, and I could locate that squirrel. And guess what? I could see it really well from far away. I could. That's that's the great thing about binoculars. But if that squirrel moves two inches to the left, if you've ever had binoculars on, you lose it like like you lose it for like 10 seconds and you're looking, you're searching, you're searching until finally you narrow to it. That is not the way that you want to be parenting your kids, you know, especially into their teenage years. You don't want to be doing it with binoculars. Instead of doing it with binoculars so that you can see them closely, just get close. Just just get close to them, keep, you know, keep it close. And so I think, I think that's been I mean, recently I'm sure there's a thousand things I could have said. I'm not quite sure why I picked that one. But I feel like lately, for me, that's the one that I probably because a lot of my guy friends, their daughters, are just starting a date. And so I think that that's been what's been on repeat a lot lately is just like, bring him in, bring him in close. Don't watch with binoculars, but bring him in close.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:26:10] It's really, really helpful, Carlos. And then one just other category to kind of tee up, if you had any advice in is the screen conversation, which of course we could do a whole series on. But any just top of mind, I know your wife mentioned in your series, she's like, I would have tried to wait longer, but yet it's good to have that time under your roof for your coaching training. But any just high level advice, wisdom on screens and technology?
Carlos Whittaker: [00:26:34] Yeah, yeah. Don't give up on them. You're going to want to give up. You're going to want to just be like, shrug their shoulders, I can't, I can't control it, so I'm just going give up, don't. You have only a certain amount of time to coach your kids with screens while they live with you. And so, you know, my son is 17 years old, still doesn't have social media, still is on screen time. At 17, still has like, you know, where it's like, well, he's about to be a young man. Sweet. Yeah, but guess what? He's going to, I'm going to give him that freedom slowly under my roof so that, you know, it's actually, so I guess it was two weeks ago was when he I gave him Instagram like 20 minutes a day, you know, And and he's you know, he's I mean, he literally two weeks later, like I'm looking at a screen time, he's not even opening it up. He's like, that's just stupid people just talking about themselves, you know. But just don't, don't give up, don't give in it. It is it's hard. It's it is scary. I'm going to say it's not. But man, what a, what a gift you have to have your kids under your roof and you be the ones that are coaching them, you know, into this. You can, I tell parents all the time, you can try to stand in front of a tidal wave with a surfboard and block the tidal wave. It's just going to take you out. Or you can flip that surfboard around, jump on it when the wave hits just right and you can start surfing. And that that's what we need to do. We don't need to try to block it because it's coming. So, you know, when it comes to screens and again, to, wait as long as you can. Just wait as long as you can to give it to them, knowing that you know you're going to wait less time than even ten years ago. Because kids, that's how they communicate now. That's where I started to realize that my son was missing out on on relationships because he wasn't on group threads. And next thing you know, he's not going out because he didn't even know it was happening. So it's like, okay, what, what you're just going to have to, you know, navigate it. And then last, last I say on this is don't make the rule at 13 or when you give him the phone, whatever, 16, don't make that rule, like this is just the rule we're going to live by. And until they move out, that's it. Because technology continues to develop and things continue to shift, you have to continue to shift in your parenting and how you're parenting them with technology.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:28:44] Really, really helpful. Carlos, thank you. And one thing we didn't talk about, but I just want to thank you for is the amount that you've encouraged me to look at counselor opportunities to find a Christian counselor or a counselor for my kids. I, we always recommend on DadAwesome that us dads go see a counselor. But the way that you and your wife have kind of like welcomed a broader audience into that, hey, your kids are seeing a counselor. They're finding freedom because you don't have everything that they need. You actually need a professional. So, I'm going to link out to your other podcast on that instead of having you talk about it now. But thank you for your just transparency in that area. It's a huge encouragement.
Carlos Whittaker: [00:29:20] Absolutely. Again, and we we are very blessed in Nashville, Tennessee to have Daystar Christian Counseling for kids. I stuck every one of my kids in there when they were six, seven because I know I've jacked my kids up. So I needed somebody to come in there behind me to help us out. And yeah, and so again, I recommend it for every single parent to find someone else that your kid can talk to and let them talk to them.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:29:45] It's amazing. Would you say a short prayer for all of us dads listening?
Carlos Whittaker: [00:29:48] Yeah, absolutely. I pray right now for any dad that's listening that may be feeling overwhelmed. And so what I ask for Jesus very specifically and Holy Spirit, is for You to come in and maybe blow some breath in their lungs that they didn't even know they needed those dads that maybe didn't know they were holding their breath. Maybe right now is the moment where they get new breath in their lungs and they're like, oh, this is this is this is what I needed. This is the boost that I needed. And so I just encourage any overwhelmed dad right now by the blood of the cross in the power of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, may You, Jesus, be be the exact thing that takes that overwhelming nature off of them. And may they just begin right now to feel a new sense of freedom that they haven't felt in a long time. I pray all these things in Your name. Amen.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:30:45] Thank you so much for joining us for episode 302 with Carlos Whittaker. All the conversation notes, the links to his books, the links to that parenting series that I mentioned, just simply go to dadawesome.org/podcast and you can find, it'll be right at the top here, this episode, 302 with Carlos Whittaker. So make sure to hop into there. It's also in the show notes of whatever podcast app you're listening on. Guys, thanks for joining us this week. Thank you for choosing to be intentional in this area of your life, the dad life. It matters so much. We we now have added some clarity to kind of our mission at DadAwesome, man. We are all about activating dads to lead with wonder. And man by learning first, now you can go lead. And let's not be dads who are just learning, but let's be dads who put something into practice this week. Let's pursue the hearts of our kids. Let's get intentional with screen time and how we're creating boundaries with screen time. Let's get intentional on moving closer, moving closer to our kids, as Carlos mentioned. So, guys, thanks for listening. Thank you for being a DadAwesome.
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· 14:03 - "Men were just addicted to, dads were just addicted to their work, before that, they were addicted to whatever it may have been. So, what is the medicator? The medicator that you're using to medicate some inadequacies that you feel in your parenting, break those things and be more present. What does it look like to lower the volume of life, slow the pace of life down?"
· 16:54 - "What are ways that you as a father are set apart and separated from the rest of all of humanity? All of the other individuals that are speaking into [your] lives, you as a father, you as a dad, you are set apart in a way that nobody else is. Just a look from their father, looking them in the eyes and saying, I love you and I'm proud of you. Just that is going to free your kids in ways that you probably can't even imagine."
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