Transcription
Welcome back to the Brave Co podcast, men. Hey, before we get started, I want to ask you one quick question. Do you have a really clear plan to build a strong, capable, powerful leader that God's called you to be? If you don't, we have the course for you. It's our Brave Co. Foundations of Masculinity and our sexuality relationship course. These are free courses that we've created that you can literally go and sign up today. The best part of these is you get access to our community, right? So, you can go and if you want to run with other men who are crushing it in life, there's tons of guys there that you can jump into a course with or we even have conferences and events that we do all year long that you can check out. But listen, I want you to to go back and think about this. If you don't have a clear plan, if you don't have other guys that you're running with, if you don't have a clear pathway to how do I grow myself as a man? How do I step into my calling? What is my code, my ethos? What does that mean? How do I set healthy boundaries? How do I show up for my wife? How do I do emotion-based communication that creates deep connection in in my family, in my marriage? Guys, we lay it out so simply for you. And honestly, I've seen so many men go through this and and get complete healing on the other side. All right. So, we want to give that to you for free. You can go to braveco.org and sign up today.
Welcome back, men, to the Brave Co podcast. This week, I have the one, the only, the awesome, the most masculine. Oo, my dad, Chris Val. Here we go. I see you got the memo on the shirt today. Oh, yeah, baby. Got white. There he is. The purity. It's great to see you. Pretty message. Yeah. Thank you. It's great being here. We just finished a Brave Co conference at the filming of this podcast. Yeah. And it was fantastic. Yeah. It was amazing. You preached one of the best messages I've I've You preached the best message that you've ever preached at our conference and one of the best messages I've ever heard you preach. Wow. It was incredible. That's good. You know why I'm so glad you gave me this subject. No, I was Well, you preach on this. I know what you're good at, Dad. Yeah. What I like about that is every man that didn't go to our conference right now is going, "Gosh, I want to hear that." Is it available? Not right now. They should have been there. This is me punishing them. Yeah. You snooze, you lose. Yeah, baby. Well, we're going to we're going to have it available um soon. It just takes a bit of time. Yeah. Okay. You are going to download it. It's good. Yeah. And you got you all can can get it. But our conference was incredible. We had over 600 guys show up and uh we um hadund and I don't know close to 130 young men run our ride of passage. That was just moving, wasn't it? It was. It was so cool. Last year was I cried through the last, you know, a third of it and then this year I was like the same. What an amazing, you know, the ability for the boy to become a man and actually watch the that transformation before your eyes as you see these these boys that are running through this mutter course and then and being helped by the young by the older stronger boys. Yeah. You know, and automatically finding a place of camaraderie without even requesting it. Yeah. So awesome. So powerful. It really is. So, but um today we're in the middle of our marriage series and of course the men have listened to Dr. Henry Cloud. He's amazing. That guy's a beast. Danny Silk. He's a bigger beast. Yeah. Um Ben and and Ben Armstrong talking about his affair. If you guys haven't if you're listening to this podcast and you haven't listened to those, just pause this one. even though I know it's tempting to play it and go back and listen to the start of the series. Yeah. And um we're building something. Yeah. We're building something. You'll love it. Um Dad, today I I really want to talk about how to prepare our sons for marriage. And a lot of men uh got married and they had never had a father that really prepared them for marriage. So there would be some guys that are listening to this that are like, "Man, I'm already married and I didn't get, you know, which is still unprepared." Yeah. And that's okay. Like I I think that it'll be a a good guide. And then there's a lot of fathers who have sons that are like, "Okay, how do I set my son up for success and prepare him for marriage and get him ready to lead and and do all that stuff?" I was um I have a a really awesome friend. His name is Chris as well, but he spells it with a ch. And uh he messaged me um five months ago and said, "Hey, my son's about to graduate high school in a year. I I'm preparing him for manhood. I'm having him um I want him to be able to have access to all my close friends. Would you would it be okay if he reached out and asked you a question some questions for an hour?" So, I just did that today on Zoom with him. Oh, man. I just thought like this is what we need to be doing with our young men. Yes. Like, he asked me some great questions. He, you know, we talked about my life and and we talked about my my divorce and my nervous breakdown and my failures and my successes and but there's something in us fathers that we really want to set our young men up for success. And and so anyways, Dad, I think maybe starting out with like I think every dad needs to be able to talk to his son about the value of marriage and what a covenant is. Like would you would you like unpack a bit of that and then of course maybe taking us into some of the some of the things that you think are most important. I'll add a couple and Yeah.
Well, first of all, I I really do want to just say that that marriage is a covenant. So the difference between, you know, living together or cohabiting and marriage that it's actually a world apart. You're like, I live in the same house. I'm having sex with this woman. Maybe I have kids with her. But the difference between cohabiting and marriage is that cohabiting says, I'm in this for what I can get. Yeah. And so it's it's a it's really, you know, you might call it a you know, a an a shake hand agreement. Yeah. That as long a contract. Yeah. As long as you're benefiting me and I'm benefiting you, then we're in this. And and you ask people that have been together 10 years or 12 with the same person, maybe have children, why don't you why don't you guys marry? And they say, well, it's just a piece of paper. I'm like, really? If it's just a piece of paper, why don't you sign it? And the reason why you don't sign it, it may not may not be consciously, but the reason why you don't sign it is because that that marriage certificate, you know, metaphorically says, I'm in this come thick or thin, come hell and high water. Yeah. I'm in this forever. But I actually use the fear that I'll leave you if you don't perform. Yeah. as a way to get what I want because I'm actually here for me. Yeah. And I may help you, but I'm actually here for me. I'm like, what is best for me? Yeah. Marriage is a is a death march to a life camp. And so marriage is a covenant, interestingly, that a woman has a himman inside, which is basically a sack of blood. And most of the time it when when she has intercourse for the first time or the second or third time depending on how it how it works, but most of the first time her that sack breaks and it spreads blood into her obviously into her vagina y and over your penis and it it it prophetically says we just made a blood covenant. Now you'll notice if you break your arm, you break your toe, you break your leg, whatever, your body will heal. Yeah. Yeah. But what's interesting is once our himman breaks it without a supernatural act of God, it never like it doesn't fill with blood again. Yeah. So it was made to be broken one time. It was made to be broken the first time that you have sex. Now people will point out every time I I've been sharing this for 40 years. It' be like, "Oh, sometimes it breaks when she's riding a horse or, you know, it doesn't always happen like that." I I understand. But here's the other side of it. The science of it is that there is no reason for that. Hyman. Yeah. And there's there's no there's and I'm and you go do the research like there's no like there's no there's there's no purpose no reason. Yeah. For the assignment, right? And it doesn't it doesn't refill with blood without a miracle. So my question to those people are like, "Oh, that is not the way it happens. Doesn't always happen that way." I'm like, "All right, what is the purpose of high?" You know the purpose of your nose, purpose of your eyes, purpose of your ears. What is the purpose of he? And the purpose is that God wanted God wanted marriage to come out of covenant. So he provided the blood. So that before the children are conceived, the covenant is already ratified. Yeah. And so now we have to talk about a covenant. Why is it blood? Well, it represents death. It says, "I've come here to lay down my life for you. I've come here for what I can give." Yeah. And the way marriage works, as we both know, is that I laid down my life for you and you lay down my life your lay your life for me. And so I've come here to die for you. Yeah. And and and as the husband, I began the ecosystem of reciprocity. I'm the first one to lay down my life. Yeah. I'm like, well, if you lay down your life, I'll lay down my life. It's no you are the you are you are the leader in this covenant, so you first lay down your life. I hope and you and the reciprocity is I lay down my life and you lay down your life for me now. So, and and then I said, I'll do this forever for better or worse, rich or poor. And so, a covenant is forever. It's into eternity. Yeah. And so, I I'm not like when we have bad times or it doesn't go well, I don't get my way or, you know, we have a miscarriage or we have some crisis in our life, we're not like, well, you know what? This just isn't working. It's what it Well, you made a covenant for life. So, your choice you have is to make it work. Yeah. Yeah. You You have to make it work or you have to break your covenant. And the And also, I'll finish the covenant part with this. It's a three-part covenant. So, it's me and her and God. So, I'm not just breaking my covenant with her. I'm breaking my covenant with God. Yeah. It's massive. Massive. It really is. really understanding the covenant. It is so important in the world that we live in today, but it's it's also this massive benefit. Um the covenant takes away this really tormenting thought of, man, I could be somewhere else. I could get something easier. I could get something better or she'll she could leave any minute. Yeah, she could leave at any minute. and marriages in which they um they flirt with divorce are the most th those are the most miserable marriages because it creates and breeds a bunch of insecurity in it. It does. Yeah. And so creating and I would add this while we're on that part of the subject. It creates that in the children. Yeah. Yeah. So so children born into cohabiting have an inherent sense that their destiny is in in no way forged. Yeah. It's in jeopardy. It's in jeopardy all the time, every day. Yeah.
One thing that um I talked about uh is the the the most important thing that you can bring to a marriage and create in a marriage is a a ecosystem of emotional safety. Yes. And like um um they would describe it as like an above a bubble of emotional protection and safety. And it's so important because if you think about it, like if you don't know how your dad's going to come home, if you don't know how your mom's going to show up every morning, if you don't know what to expect in in inside of that, if dad doesn't know how mom's going to greet him, if mom doesn't know how dad's right, like if I have this disruption, even just the question of it, yeah, all of a sudden it creates all this protection, these unnecessary protections in inside of the relationships and it really breaks them down from anxiety. Yeah. From anxiety, from fear. Yeah. And so the covenant, right, getting this right and teaching our young men that your word is your bond. I remember growing up and you constantly telling me, "Son, your word is your bond." And a man doesn't break his bond. He doesn't break his word. And constantly that that worked for little league. I remember playing little league. I wanted to quit. And you say, remember that you started, you have to finish what you start. And and these lessons where you go the greatest things in your life aren't going to start out fun. The greatest accomplishment in your life aren't aren't going to be ones that you really enjoy at the beginning, in the middle, and through the end. They're going to be the things that you said you would. You stuck with it and you continued all the way. And so I do I think your word is your bond is a a a covenant lifestyle. Teaching our young men that covenant is what we do. It's how we were supposed to be born into this world. And it's the it's the greatest thing that you'll protect and and while you're alive. And even when you're in heaven, you're still protecting your covenant with God. Yes. A third of the angels fell out of covenant. Yeah. It's the thing that that keeps us all bound together. Yeah.
Think about this, Jay. What's the difference between u you know, you go to a hotel and you rent it for a day or you or you rent a house yet you have no contract. It's day-to-day. Y and you lease a house that you have, let's say, a five-year lease on or you buy a house that you own. Yeah. Well, think about how much work am I going to put into a house I have a day-to-day rent on? Zero. Yeah. Am I do do I ever like remodel a hotel room? No. As a matter of fact, the least cared spaces are the spaces that have the least amount of commitment ownership. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, my hotel room, I like I'm a clean freak. My hotel room, no. I have a I have a day-to-day rent on that. There's somebody to come clean that. Exactly. Same thing. You know, you rent a car. Those are the worst cars in the world to buy because I have no ownership of that car. So, you know, it sounds crazy, but you know, when I when I'm in a cohabiting relationship, it's like I have I I I rented a house for the day. Yeah. Or maybe I rented it for the year. It's like, yeah, this could last a year. Yeah. I got a lease on it. I got a lease on it. This might go three years, but you know, I'm not going to put a bunch of money and sacrifice into something that I don't think I own. No. And so, you know, that's the difference in between, you know, the attitude and consciousness and actually subconsciousness of of a cohabiting relationship. Yeah. It's great. Yeah. Okay. And marriage part two. So, yeah, cuz I I really do I think I think that the covenant piece is massive. Yeah. It's something that men learn before they get married. Yeah. We can't wait to teach our young men this hopefully when they get married. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you're at least starting to plant those seeds and cultivate them. That's for sure. I mean, there's a ton of Christians that get married without knowing that and then their first big dispute, they go see a counselor like, "Oh, when I said better for worse, that was like a covenant." Like, I said I'd do this forever. Yeah. It's real. It's real. Yeah. It's real.
Dad, we were talking a bit earlier and and you were you were describing a bit about the dynamic of a man and a woman and a a bit about how a man isn't isn't actually complete without a woman. Like can you take it take us into that a bit? I think it's an important foundation. Two perspectives really. you know, I'll talk about the woman's first and we'll and we'll uh we'll end that part with the men's because a woman often looks at a man uh and she's like, "Well, you know, he he's he's this or he's that. He's not ready for marriage." And I'm like, "Okay, there's some real reality there." Here's the other side of it. God said, "It's not good for man to be alone. I'll make a helper for him." That word helper, Ezar, is the same word used two times for woman, 17 times for God. So the deal is is God looks out, he sees the man, he goes, "Oh, this guy needs help." Yeah, this guy needs help. I got to find him a helper. And I got to find someone who completes him. And by the way, it's it says that corresponds to him, which means opposite of him. So the challenge is on the woman's side is she's looking for a complete man. Yeah. She's looking for a complete man. She to marry. She's like, "Well, I like him, but he's not complete. He he needs to grow up." And I'm like, well, maybe he needs to grow up. But he can grow old and never grow into the man he's supposed to be without you because he was born to have a helper, a catalyst. Yeah. And and on the man's side, what I find is men have this deep sense often of uh a sense of uh inadequacy. It's like, I just don't know if I'm ready. You know, it's the cold feet before I get, you know. Yeah. It's like, "Yeah, I love this girl." And, you know, my sex drive and my and my passion is kind of leading me. And then I get three weeks from the wedding. I'm like, "Oh my god, I am not ready." Yeah. And it's like, well, maybe you're not ready, but here's the other problem. For what you need to be, the man you need to be to actually have a great marriage, you cannot be without a woman. Yeah. So, it's a little bit like if you've ever worked with resin, you know, you got resin and then you have a catalyst and you know the catalyst, you know, you get a gallon of resin, you just need a few drops of catalyst. Without that catalyst, which by the way, 70% of the average car is made out of resin. Without that catalyst, the resin doesn't get hard. So, you're over here with goo and you're like, I have potential, but I've never made anything of myself. It's like, yes, you can't without the catalyst. like she's catalytic. Yeah. Can I say to the hardening of your divine purpose? Yeah. And so, you know, I think it's so common for men to have especially as they move towards marriage and they find someone and you know, I can't even tell you how many times I've had these conversations like, I don't know, it's a month away and all of a sudden I'm scared. It's like, yeah, you're thinking of all the responsibilities that you're not prepared for. But here's the challenge. You can't be prepared for them without the catalyst in your life because that's how God designed you. Yeah. The I think the the lie that I am going to somehow complete the work that God has in me outside of being in a agitating relationship which every relationship should be agitating almost. My relationship with my kids is agitating. Stirring. It is. It's it is agitating or stirring unto my my present condition. Uh because relationships reveal what's inside of us and and then God helps to perfect that. Yeah. And they they really bring out that. And so you're right. I mean it took me it it took me 10 years to be to be ready for marriage. It took me 10 years of being, you know, in my analogy, if I could say this, like you put the catalyst in there and you have to stir it, right? And so Proverbs says, you know, faith for are the wounds of a friend. Yeah. Deceive other kisses an enemy. Iron sharpens iron. So one man sharpens another. What are we talking about? We're talking about the stirring of the catalyst into the resin so that it it actually uh you know, infiltrates every part of who I am. Yeah. And that and that catalyzes my purpose. Yeah. Like a good woman, a wife catalyzes purpose. And Yeah. And so, you know, viewing yourself uncatalyzed and then feeling bad about it is like uh yeah, it's a little bit like um I'm hungry. That's why I don't go to the grocery store. I'm like, you're not you're not going to actually not be hungry till you go to the grocery store.
Well, here's what I love is what we're not saying is that you should have a whole bunch of baggage in your life when you get into marriage. No. And so I think when I just one area is when I think about what I want my sons to have when they go into marriage, like I want my sons to be able to own their own heart. I I want them to come into marriage going, I am the steward of my heart. There's going to be a whole bunch of areas that come up in my life that are great and that need work. And you know you I just we did that so much, Dad, growing up. So much. We had so many conversations in the car mostly about my heart. Yeah. How are you doing? What's going on with you? How's your relationship with girls? Are you struggling with masturbation? Do you know what sex is? I mean, like, we had so many conversations back and forth about my life. And we even had so many conversations about what my struggles were and challenges and growths and opportunities. And then I watched you also do the same with other men in your life and go to prayer meetings and business meetings. And I learned over that time that I am the caretaker of my soul. And there's going to be lots of times in my life when I need to root out a weed. Yeah. And you taught me that the biggest obstacles that you face that you overcome, you get to give those away. You don't have to hide them. They become these victories. Yeah. And these places of growth and strength, right? And so I had this value for uh tough challenges. I had this value for facing the hard things, but I didn't I So, when I say it took me 10 years to be ready for marriage, the beautiful thing was it wasn't my wife's fault that I was the way that I was. Yes. And it wasn't her responsibility to fix me. Yes. She just got to mirror. Yeah. The relationship was in and of itself was an agitator. The relationship in and of itself and the responsibility that God placed, it's not even her. It was God's design for me in the relationship was I would have something that I needed him to give me in order to fulfill this.
Well, I would say too, maybe you mean it differently, but it she becomes the an agitator that reveals my inadequacies. And sometimes I accuse the agitator instead of realizing that my inadequacies are something I have to take responsibility for. Yeah. I'm saying the same thing is that God's design Yeah. God's design was never that I would be fully equipped. Yeah. That that I would be fully finished. I should say that is that what I need in order to accomplish this mission is in seed form. Yes. He's It's going to be revealed. Yeah. While I'm doing the mission, whatever that mission is, it's going to be revealed and I'm going to need him in order to help me accomplish it. It's the thing where you would you say like any mission, any dream that you feel like you can do on your own. Yeah. Is too small or it's not God at all. Or it's not God. Because when I look at fatherhood, I was telling this young boy again, this young man, he's 17. I was telling him, he said, "Tell me about your life." And then he said, "Tell me what you would change, you know, if you could go back to 17." I started telling him my life, the addiction to masturbation and pornography and the uh um the affair that my wife had and the divorce and the nervous breakdown and getting remarried and the miscarriages. And he's like, "Holy crap." And my response is all that stuff was preparing me. All that stuff like God, I needed God to go through it. I wasn't equipped before it happened to handle it. And yet it's made me who I am today. Yeah. that is. And my message to him was, you're about to get into a season of life that's challenging and hard and it's supposed to be because anything in life that you really really thankful for and satisfied, you worked hard for. Doesn't have to be emotionally devastating. Yeah. No, exactly. And it doesn't have to be a divorce. I mean, and part of what we're doing like here is taking our struggles and saying, "Listen, you don't have to go through a divorce. You don't have to have a nervous breakdown. You don't have to have the these negative things that happened to you because we're here to show you the way, a better way." Yeah. And uh interesting, it says, the Proverbs says, "House and wealth are the inheritance of fathers." Yeah. But the word health in the Hebrew is the word to make it easy. To make it easy. He So the proverb isn't saying give all your money to your kids. It's like no the house and wealth to make it easy. Like my job is to make your life easier. Your job is to make the generation easier. Yeah. And so it doesn't, you know, obviously we could do our very best to make it as easy as possible and you can still have a nervous breakdown. I could have a car accident. My wife could leave you. She has, you know, her her own free will. But you're right. And I think that the other thing that you said that's really profoundly powerful is when I take ownership of my own life, I stop blaming other people. Yeah. For, you know, for my own my my own stuff. And I think it's just I think it's kind of the nature of our old man to go, it's not my fault. I mean, it's not my fault. It's not my fault. She gets so upset over underwear being on the floor. I mean, she throws a fit about it. I She yells and screams about it. All you have to do is pick up your underwear. Yeah. I mean, your disrespect has created that over a period of years. Yeah. You know, so it's it's like and and maybe her uh escalation is feels irrational, but has a lot to do with your your inability just to take ownership for the simple things that she's asking for. Yeah.
I think um part of part of what it leads me to when we're talking about being prepared for for marriage and and for life is the is teaching children how to build healthy habits and how to contribute to the environment, right? And so I think that's why it's so important that as kids are growing up like Lauren and I, we have a a 5-year-old and a three-year-old in the home and we're starting to although they are not perfect, we're starting to create expectations, healthy expectations that create a sense of purpose in them, ownership, and responsibility. And so when they get up from the table every night that I can remember, uh, once they're able to walk and carry stuff successfully, they pick their table, their plate up when they're done, and they bring it up to the counter. And that is one of the ways that they know, okay, I've got to start contributing. As they get older, you know, they start to unload the dishwasher with us now and put it away. Edy can even make her own breakfast if you uh don't mind it. It's a little bit mess. Yeah. Yeah. And now we're start starting to go, okay, your room is something that you're managing, you're responsible for. I'll come in and help you, but this is your responsibility. So, cleaning it up. And then we have these routines that that they do every single day, you know. But part of the benefit in that is again, we're going back to I'm not trying I'm not actually trying to create responsible kids. I'm trying to create a responsible adult. I'm trying to create an adult that understands how to build a healthy habit and and learns how to ma create an internal structure so that when they get married and they find those rhythms and routines that you know Lauren what Lauren was good with when I got married and what I felt like was acceptable were two different things. My family's culture was different in certain areas than what her families were. And so what clean meant to mom was different than what clean meant to Lauren's mom. What and and vice versa. We'd have what what conflict looked like in our home was different than what conflict looked like in her home. Mhm. But because I grew up in a home that taught me the value for ownership, but also how to create habits and how to take responsibility. It set me up to be able to flex and go, "Oh, even though this isn't what we did, this is what this is what your nor this is actually what brings peace to your life." Yeah. so I can get on this other track and jump in with you. As opposed to I see a lot of young men, I see a lot of grown men who were never uh never taught how to create healthy habits. We're never taught personal responsibility and therefore it's so hard to flex into and even build another culture outside of the one that you've always lived in. Yeah.
And I and I would I would add to that that part of covenants. So when we talk about covenant, it sounds like a little ethereal, kind of mystical. Yeah. And and to your point, you know, if my wife came out of a culture where her house was significantly cleaner or or neater or more organized than the home I grew up in. And she's like, I need you to put away your dishes after, you know, wash your dish and put it away or put it in the dishwasher or I need you to wash your clothes. And I'm like, well, and I grew up and my my my mom always washed my dad's clothes. Y it's like, okay, the the question isn't the question really isn't about roles. No. As much as it is about laid down life. So I am I'm not So it's not that I'm so responsible for putting away my dishes. I'm responsible to create a connection with my wife. Yeah. And uh and I and I think that this is part of covenant. It's like, okay, well, I didn't grow up like that, but what I did grow up with is a mom who loved my dad. Yeah. And my dad who loved my mom. And my mom didn't require she didn't she wasn't a neat freak, maybe. Yeah. So, he did he wasn't tasked with, you know, vacuum the house once a week, whatever, but he was tasked with with protecting her heart. Yeah. And so I come into a home where the core values are the same, but maybe the actions are different because the person that I'm in relationship with has a higher value for certain things. Yeah. And so, you know, like like I would be the clean freak in our family. Yeah. You would. And so and Kathy is not she's not a pig. No. But she can live with she can live with a much higher level of clutter. Yeah. Than I can. And I'm and I'm like, but she she she doesn't live like that. Like she picks up her stuff, you know? We work together to keep and and it's like she doesn't have to do that. She just does it because she loves me. So this is this is covenant actually. You know, what does what's the action of covenant look like? Yeah. It really is to serve. It's really I've come here to serve. It's that simple.
The interesting thing about serve and I want to cover one more thing before we finish, but the interesting thing to serve um in a lot of ways really is to lead. And we often think of serving as this person who's doing what somebody else wants. But when we talk about the man in a marriage and serving, it very much is leading. You're serving from the top down. You're serving as the leader. Yes. And the same way that a man opens the door for a woman practically, you never stop being the one that's the initiator, that is the one that's opening the door. Exactly. So, emotionally, mentally, physically, spiritually, um the the Bible says that a man leaves his mother and father and clings to his wife. And I heard you preaching this um I think two Sundays ago or something, and you made a great point. The the point is isn't that they go and live with her parents. Yeah. The point is is that God intended that a man would always pursue a woman. Yes. That a woman would always be pursued. Most men make that until the wedding day. Sure. Right. I'm pursuing uh sex. I'm pursuing uh But the beautiful thing is the design for a man was that we would always un continue to pursue her. And that is an act of service. I have this mindset that I'm going to serve in in emotionally connecting. I'm going to serve in finding out what's important to her. I'm going to be the first guy to open the door constantly and make sure that she has a way to come in and to be vulnerable, to come in to add her she's the incubator. Yeah. Right. So, if you give her the ingredient, if you serve her and give her the ingredients, she's going to give you something more beautiful than what you brought into it. Exactly. And and and that's that's a beautiful place to to grow from. Um one of the things that I want to to add before we finish here because I I think that it's not talked about enough in marriage is the best marriages in life. You It's like um you can eat whatever diet you want. You can eat a Mediterranean diet. You can eat uh the carnivore diet. You can eat uh like the Spanish do. you can eat as long as you don't put processed food in it, right? And so the people are like, well, how come Italians aren't like dying and they don't they drink wine and well, how come? So the the healthiest thing in in a marriage, we talked about the emotional safety and connection, but is to have flexibility, emotional flexibility inside of a marriage. And when I look at you and and mom, if we were to, which would be fun someday to to map out your guys' history, your timeline, and to frame it and to look at it for for all of us, is the marriages. And you can really the artificial agreement agre ingredient in this. What's that? How's the artificial ingredient? Yeah. Fifth, I'll give it in a second. You're getting there. Yeah. So to me, what creates flexibility inside of a marriage is that emotional connection. Yes. And but it's not even just the emotional connection. It it is that deep emotional connection, but it's that I'm responsible for myself. I'm taking ownership. Uh I'm able to communicate and set healthy boundaries, right? that creates a ton of flexibility inside of a relationship. You can have emotional connection uh and you can have a deep emotional connection, but if people don't know how to set healthy boundaries, if they don't know how to communicate uh and do conflict really well, then all of a sudden I have a relationship that's really rigid. And relationships that are really people that are really rigid, they have to have the same thing the same way every time. Laws and rules. Yeah. And when I think about like my daughter Edie, a year ago she was um a year and a half ago she went through a whole stage of her life where all of a sudden she was really triggered. Um she after Lauren's mom died, she had a very hard time. And it wasn't just that, but that was a trigger in her life of I can't put socks on, I can't put pants on. Things feel right. She's a very rigid person, but it's not just physical. If you changed the plan on her, if you said, "Hey, we're gonna watch TV." And then, "Oh, actually, we have to go to grandma and papa's house." All of a sudden, she's emotionally very rigid. Now, I have a very deep connection with Edie, a very deep emotional connection with Edie, but she's still rigid as a person. And so, again, back to Lauren and I have been working really hard to create flexibility in our relationship with her. I can disappoint her. I can say, "Hey, we were going to do this, but now we have to do this." That's life, right? Inside of a marriage, the best human beings in the world are human beings, I'm not saying the most valuable, I'm saying the human beings that enjoy their life the most, get along best, aren't the ones that have the most predictable life. They're the ones that actually have the capacity emotionally, mentally, physically, spiritually to be really flexible and to flex in the bin. That's faith. That's having a faith life. that's having a a a vision, a purpose. So, to me, part of part of why I bring this into the conversation is I think that I think that sometimes we we have this fear that we're going to raise kids wrong. we're going to I have to be careful, you know, we have to coddle and and and and we instead of creating kids that are deeply connected, responsible, have faith in God, uh have this environment that that is growing, is changing, but they're connected to people that are very solid. They're connected to a God that's never changing. we're connected to. They're getting constant feedback. My fear is that our culture is is raising very rigid kids, very rigid marriages, very rigid human beings. If you come into if you say the wrong thing in our culture, if you intolerance intolerance and instead So parents have swung the other other way to try to create a perfect ecosystem for kids. Yeah. A perfect ecosystem so that they don't get bubble the perpetual bubble. Yes. The goal isn't to put our kids in a bubble. The goal is that our kids would have emotional safety, but that they would we'd be growing resilience inside of them. I guess that's maybe a more popular word. We'd be growing grit and resilience inside of our kids, a growth mindset, not a fixed mindset. And the trash to me comes in when we start to tell them and create an environment where they think they're fragile. Where uh this the artificial yes artificial food and yes, it's it's not real but it feels real. It feels real but it's not real. where they don't feel like they have what it takes, where they feel like that our world right now is feeding young men. This um you are a victim. You're somebody else's responsibility. Uh you aren't it's not it's not your fault that you're that you're not succeeding. You're uh and you have to be coddled. Uh you know, it's all those like this environment is too much for you. And instead, like I just want to say all the things that we've already said, but the goal, what I'm trying to do as a dad is to raise a gritty, resilient uh family. My daughter can handle another child disappointing her. I don't have to keep a child from saying to Edy, "Oh, I don't like your hair." I don't have to create these zones of safety. No, no. She has a safe place in her home. And and I'll make my point with this. I'll finish my point with this. I know you have something to say. There was a point in my life when I went to school and I didn't feel like a teacher was treating me well. I I actually knew the teacher wasn't treating me well. Yeah, I remember that story. And and I remember coming home and saying, "Hey, this is totally unfair. This teacher isn't treating me well." And I remember you saying you you were going to do something in it. I first was going to go kill the teacher. Yeah. And then you realized, [Music] I can't solve all of his battles for him. I can be here as a place of wisdom. I can be here as a place of advice, but son, you're going to have to learn how to confront the obstacles in your life that are challenging to you. You're gritty. You're strong. You're And you didn't say those exact words, but that's the message that I started to get. I'm 15 years old and I remember you telling me, "Make all of your mistakes at home because you have mom and I to help you." I just continually remember you sewing these things into my life. That's how this is honestly how divorce didn't break me. It's how nervous breakdown I come out better at the end. It's how because I don't have I've been given this life in which I could be in hell one day and know it's not eternal. Mhm. I can be in a tough time and I have this safe place to come back to, but I also know that you're not going to save me in it. The last uh experience that I'll give you is I'm in the middle of my nervous breakdown. I can't use my arms. I'd signed this contract to write this book. I'd already been paid seven of the uh 15 of the 30,000 I was supposed to get for the book. And um because I have a publisher and I remember crying one night on the phone, a year into it, I can't type. I I'm waking up seeing demons in the middle of the night and I'm telling you, you know, I can't type. I can't do anything. I wrote this. I'm four chapters into a 12 chapter book. I'm done. And you said, "Son, you you signed a contract. You made a commitment. You're either going to have to lay down and die or you're going to have to figure out how to fulfill your promises." And at first, I felt like you were so cruel and didn't understand me. I was angry. And that but I've trusted you because we had this deep personal relationship. And I took a shower that morning, the next morning. And I remember in the shower thinking to myself, he's right. I'm either going to lay down and die or I'm going to figure out I'm gonna because I thought I was dying. I'm either going to give up my life or I'm going to figure out how to make something out of the life that I do have. And so I got a dictation machine. That was in 2009. Dictation didn't work very good. Yeah. And I wrote my book using a voice dictation machine. Yeah. What did it do? Dragon software. You had the the mindset of a of a father who said, "What's more important than getting your your need met today?" The the biggest artificial filler in your life is you can't do it. Yeah. You're fragile. You're weak. You're broken. You're done. You need to give up. That's the artificial filler in your life. You need your circumstance to change in order for you to be okay. In order for you to fix this, the most important thing that you continually gave me over and over and over again is you can you need to keep your word. You need to step up. Mom and I are here for you. You got to get creative. This is something that you can do. The the task that's in front of you, God's developing you for a future time. It's your job to step up and sew into this. So to me, what that creates is a life of grit, flexibility, and you create this marriage where it can handle the tough storm.
I agree and I I think you know just the in closing we live in a society right now that as you pointed out earlier it doesn't do disagreement. Yep. It it it sees a person with a different opinion as a bad person. That's a bad person. I'm a good person. Yep. Um, it
Doesn't it? Doesn't do confrontation unless it's online, and then that confrontation is destructive. Why? It does con, it does destructive, not constructive criticism. And so therefore, I get in real life, and if I've been trained by the machine, yeah, you know, I, I am way not ready for any kind of conflict because I learned to blow up people that I don't agree with. Yep. And I learned that it's about, it's, it's better to be right than it is to be together. And these are all values that have nothing to do with the kingdom. No.
And and then I, then I try to create that around me. I try to, like, I get yes people around me. I punish people who don't listen to me, including my wife and my kids. And, uh, and then, you know, usually it, it ends in a disaster, ultimately. And I end up in some psychologist, psychiatrist, or some pastor's office learning how to actually do real life. Yeah. Where you're right, it, it, I have a plan every day, and that plan changes every day. Every day. And it's not predictable. Life isn't predictable. And and I was built to be flexible. Yeah. I, I'm inside. I am built to be led by the spirit. I am built for the wind. Yeah. I am, I am a sail. I am built for the wind. I am built for the changing winds of the spirit. I am built for the changing directions of, of God in my life. Yeah. And for what's happening with my wife and my children. And so I have capacity. I, the, the deal is weird because I have tons of capacity to adjust. Like, like it's like, it's like I'm a 10-ton dump truck and I'm hauling around 300 lbs. Yeah. And when someone puts 400 on, I'm like, I'm going to crash. It's like, no, you were built for 10 tons. Yeah. But you just don't know it because you never carry 10 tons. Yep.
And and so you, you know, we were built. You know, when I look at what the Iraqis are going through, when I look at what the, Israel is going through, what, you know, the Ukraine's going through, what, Russians going through, and I, and I'm like, how would you like to live with bombs flying over your head every day? But you, you know, you have pictures, uh, videos of of Israelis with bombs flying over their head, and they're shopping. Yeah. You, you adapt to it because you have to. Yeah. And so we complain that someone wrote a bad post about us. I'm like, "Bro, you are 10 times bigger than that. Look at the Ukrainians, you know, their their countries, I don't know, 30% destroyed." And every day they wake up with bombs over their head. Our our son was there, my grandson, your son. And yet those people have had to pick up their lives and the uncertainty of tomorrow, you know, and move on. Yeah. It's real. Giving your son lots of challenges in which he can build confidence. Confidence is is not is not something a a man's born with. It's built through competency. So over and over and over again, I learn, I build the this belief system that I can, and constantly allowing himself appropriately to find the end of himself and to grow beyond that. As such a gift that every dad can give to a son. It builds resilience. It builds grit. And it helps him to build a life in relationships that are so incredibly deep and rich because he knows as long as I keep going, as long as I don't give up, I'm going to get there eventually. So, yeah.
So, let's finish with this thought. You know, you're you're watching us today and you're maybe you're thinking about getting married. You're 17, 18, 20, 25, 30, and you're like, I don't feel prepared. I'm like, normal. Yep. I don't feel complete. Normal. I don't know if I have what it takes. You do, and it will it will emerge in the battle, like it will emerge in the responsibility, and it, it will emerge in love. And so I just want to say, you do have it. God's with you. And the prep, and part of the preparation is realizing that you need the woman. She needs you. And if your parents were the helicopter mom or dad, or they coddled you, they put you in a bubble, it's like your life isn't over. Like you're going to learn what you should have learned. Yeah. As as a as a child, what things we're trying to teach our kids right now, by the way, not perfectly. None of us do it perfectly. You're going to learn that as an adult. But all the capacity you were built as a 10-tonon truck. All the capacity you need to be successful in life, you really have that capacity. It's in you. It's your job to mine it out. It's your job. Mine. There you go. All right, man. Stay brave this week. We will see you next week. Love you. Hey, Brave Co. Hopefully, you loved this week's episode. Listen, if you have not subscribed to our podcast, you are already behind. Go ahead and click right here to subscribe to our podcast. And if you have not watched last week's episode, you can click right here and watch last week's episode. And listen, if you want to upgrade your wardrobe, you can check out some of our new hats that we have in stock and all our other swag. Go to braveco.org and you can look at our store there. Have a great week. We'll see you next.