Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Pseudonyms Podcast, I'm sure.
[00:00:01] Speaker B: Yeah, I guess.
[00:00:02] Speaker A: I guess we're naming it. I guess we're naming it. Let's commit.
[00:00:07] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:00:08] Speaker A: What's. What's your name this week?
[00:00:12] Speaker B: You tell me my name this week?
[00:00:15] Speaker A: Brutus.
[00:00:16] Speaker B: Brutus. That's crazy. You said Brutus. You're. I was thinking you're Barry tonight, bro.
[00:00:22] Speaker A: Oh, sweet. It's the Bees. It's the Bees show.
[00:00:26] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:00:27] Speaker A: Barry. All right. I can be Barry. Like. Like Bill Hader's charact.
[00:00:33] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. The. The assassin.
[00:00:36] Speaker A: Yeah, the gentle assassin. I. I never got past the first season of that, but I liked it.
[00:00:45] Speaker B: I'm in the same boat. I was like, man, this is a good show. But after the first season, I was kind of like, I'm good.
[00:00:52] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, I could get to the root of why I didn't quite buy into it, and I could probably do that by journaling about it.
And that's what we call a segue.
[00:01:08] Speaker B: Very nice.
You know, picking this topic last week, picking this topic made me revisit my journals and look for certain questions and kind of the topics I was journaling about or the questions I wrote down saying I wanted to eventually come back and visit those.
And so it was actually good that we had said, hey, we're going to pick this for this week because it's beginning of the year.
I started off a couple years ago doing a little thing on, you know, going through my separation.
I was newly separated, didn't want to be a liar. You know, I lied my whole marriage with my infidelities, which is part of the reason why I never went into ministry, because I knew I had those infidelities.
It's also another reason why for the longest time, I wouldn't.
I wouldn't. I couldn't be the man she wanted me to be.
You know, I couldn't be fully honest with her. I wanted to be a man of integrity. So vapid. I knew I had these skeletons, and until they came out, I just couldn't get it off. And so once they.
[00:02:24] Speaker A: How long. How long was that?
[00:02:27] Speaker B: How long was what?
[00:02:29] Speaker A: How long did you live with that secret?
[00:02:33] Speaker B: Our whole marriage. I mean, I cheated probably in the first couple months of being married, so.
And it just. It never stopped. It was just, you know, opportunity. You know, sin is just opportunity and temptation.
And so, yeah, for our whole marriage, I just. I had all these skeletons. And, you know, there were certain pivotal points where she would ask, you know, or, you know, hey, if you want to fess up to anything, like you know, I'm committing to you now. We'll stay together. And I just couldn't. So beginning of 2022, my company was going through describing it itself, like, what do we stand for as a company? And the owner kind of got us all involved and was talking about more or less like a mission statement, you know, focused more on that bullshit than he did work.
But I realized I had no core values, you know, and so revisiting this maybe kind of relook at the process of figuring out what my core values were. And I wrote down integrity and conviction. But then I followed that with, like, is conviction of value or a trait? You know, I kind of came to the conclusion that it's more of a.
[00:03:59] Speaker A: Trait, more of like a feeling almost.
[00:04:02] Speaker B: Yeah, I wouldn't really say it's a value. And so other values that really spoke to me were like self actualization, generosity, and self discipline. And then I went through and just kind of defined those. What. What were the definitions of integrity, generosity, self discipline, and self accusation?
And I kind of came down to integrity and generosity and went through a process of whys, you know, asking why these are important to me. And then kind of came up the life statement, if you will. And I said life statement at this stage of my life. To live life with integrity to the extent I could lay my head down at night without justification or excuse for my daily actions, and to engage each and every person with love and generosity in hopes to make a positive impact on each individual.
[00:04:56] Speaker A: Nice.
[00:04:57] Speaker B: So. So it was cool to kind of go through and have to re. Look at this stuff and. And reread it.
[00:05:05] Speaker A: You are so structured in your journaling. From the sound of it, I mean, we've only talked about, like, key moments that you've journaled. You shared a story last week about journaling at the cigar bar and stuff.
I've tried to, like, have questions and kind of, you know, more guided, like, prompts and stuff.
Never been able to come up with good stuff.
I. One of my favorite things was I came up with like, seven questions that I would ask every week. Every day, on the same day of the week, I would ask the same question and kind of work through stuff. And one of them was like, what's the worst case scenario? So, like, the worst thing I could possibly think of that day or whatever I was most worried about that day, I would just kind of go through the whole thing. And it's like, you know, during tornado season, be like a tornado rips down the house, and it's like, all right, I mean, like, you're not going to own any of this when you die anyway. Like none. You know, you just go all the way to the, to the nth degree. And you know, at the end of the day, it's like, even if people die then, like, it doesn't matter.
It matters in the moment, but it's like it doesn't matter if you die 50 years after them or 10 years after them. In 100 years, we're all dead. So it's like, think about that. You know, just really go through like the. Sorry, that was a tangent. But I've never been good at like, coming up with like, questions, question and answer kind of journaling.
I think either next week or by the end of this podcast, you should come up with questions that I should journal about and, and do some self confrontation and maybe I'll share my results next week. Since it's pseudonymous.
[00:07:02] Speaker B: One of the things my therapist used to have me journal about was every night he'd say, sit down any time of your day and just write down what you're doing.
It was like six points. And that was the only journal I left upstairs. But. And it was basically like, how do you feel? What are your feelings? What's your body going through right now? What are you thinking about?
And. But it was just kind of quick mindfulness, basically. Yeah. And then another therapist, she had me start my mornings off with a gratitude list. You know, write down 10 things that you're grateful for and really hone in on those. And it just gave you a mindfulness for other people, I guess, you know, because a lot of things I was grateful for were, you know, siblings or daughters or, you know, moments of. With my daughters and so forth.
But yeah, I'm down to. Down to do that, man.
[00:08:01] Speaker A: Yeah. So on my monthly, I have like a monthly block of about eight pages that I fill stuff in on in my journals.
And last year, I think it was. It's probably 20, 23, I started writing down one specific gratitude for every day. In addition to like three in the morning and three at night or whatever, I would try to come up with one really unique one for the day. And I was thinking the other day, I've got 366.
[00:08:35] Speaker B: Was it a leap year?
[00:08:37] Speaker A: Yeah, it was a leap year. Like for last. For last year, I've got 366 unique things that I was grateful for. I really should go through that and like write them all down in a Google Doc or something and maybe even post them, maybe even like, really, you know, commit to the. To this practice of gratitude and, like, post it and make it known, you know, what I'm grateful for.
But it's. It's pretty. You know, it just adds up so quickly and you don't think about it. But that's one of the. The coolest things about journaling, is that there's a record left of God's goodness and his answers to prayer and things you struggled with that you can't imagine struggling with now. You know, I really wish that I was journaling more throughout my life. I've got, like, some sporadic journaling from, you know, probably like one composition notebook from, like, every year of my life that, that there's like, five pages filled in. You know, I didn't really start journaling every day until 2020, and I really wish I had because it would be so hilarious to go back and, like, read about, like, my struggles with that church that we both used to go to and like, how I, for whatever reason, I didn't want to leave and like, the things I put up with from. From them because I didn't want to leave, you know, just. It would be so foreign to read that and feel those feelings, you know, and credit to you. You were like, one of the only people in my life telling me to just get the fuck out of there and stop letting them boss you around.
[00:10:17] Speaker B: How do you. How do you write when you journal? You know, like, if your child was to pick up your notebook after you pass, how. How do you write to them? Or how do you write in general when you. When you journal?
[00:10:31] Speaker A: I'm not super stoked about that.
I'm. I'm. There are some things that I'm, like, debating, like, whether I have to tear them out or, you know, do something with.
I mean, like, I. I had journals all throughout relationships with. With other women. And it's like, you know, if I. If my wife outlives me, like, not that I think she would ever give a shit to look through my journals. I don't think she's that interested in me, but if she did, you know, she would, like, see journal entries about, like, me trying to be a better boyfriend to so and so. And it's just like, you know, that's gotta, like, for that, you know, how would she not.
[00:11:16] Speaker B: I mean, like, you pass on, and she just wants to. She just wants to hear her husband's voice again. How is she not going to pick up your journal and just, you know, not want to read your pages?
You know what I mean? Like, how you die. How is she not going to want to not hear your voice again through your pages. She's gonna read them.
[00:11:43] Speaker A: Yeah. She's never read my book.
[00:11:48] Speaker B: Well, you wrote a book.
Really? I wrote a book too.
[00:11:53] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:11:54] Speaker B: Yeah. It's published. Yeah.
[00:11:56] Speaker A: Self published.
Yeah, mine too.
[00:11:59] Speaker B: I don't know if it's self published, but it's published.
[00:12:02] Speaker A: I want to read yours. Do you want to read mine?
[00:12:06] Speaker B: I'll read yours. So mine is not really mine. I. My name was.
[00:12:10] Speaker A: Oh, your mom.
[00:12:13] Speaker B: Yeah, I reworked it, edited it, you know, she. And then she put my name on it. I'm like, this doesn't line up with my theology.
[00:12:20] Speaker A: I remember that. I remember she told me the entire plot at dinner that one night, and I was like, all right, so I don't need to read it now. I guess she told me the whole ending and everything.
[00:12:35] Speaker B: Yeah.
So some of the things I've. I've journaled about that have come to mind or, you know, lessons I've learned from those in my life, I'll pick someone and write down kind of the. So I paint the picture, you know, like again, I'm writing so if someone picks this up, they kind of have an idea of where, where, what's. Where I'm at in my life, you know, And I do the same with, with, you know, thoughts, you know, like, you know, doing the work, see if you were stuck, you know, of course, the gratitude list. But then, you know, new thought, you know, like I write down, I try and write down my thoughts, you know, and it's like, you know, things that stick with me throughout my day. I will definitely write about, you know, if it's something that's a constant thought, thought through my head, constant thought, you know, I finally had to work out, like even Adam and Eve, you know, like, you know, I view. And maybe you don't have this view, but I view God is spirit.
And therefore, you know, Christ was spirit. You know, we have a triune God. And so you have the Holy Spirit, you have God the Father, Jesus Christ. I think the Son was also spirit. And when in Philippians, Paul's talking about, he, you know, did not consider equality with the Lord a thing to be grasped, but kind of like derogued himself.
We see in Romans that he put on flesh, which is the nature of our sin.
It's the.
It's the way in which temptation hits us, you know, is through our flesh. And so I often thought, what about Adam and Eve? Could Adam and Eve have been spirit until the moment they.
They, you know, they. They Sinned. I don't know. I can't really work it out. I mean, I can argue against it more than I can argue for it, you know, but it was always just a thought of mine. And so those thoughts, like, thoughts like that I will write down and try and work out the best I can.
But yeah, just. Just thoughts in general, you know. Like a lot of mine, I do title, you know, I title them and put a date next to them, you know, you know, new thought, you know, and I write it down, you know, do I fall easy? If so, why is it to fill a void? Am I dependent? You know, like, what. Where am I at with, with this stuff? Why do I tend to fall easy for women?
But then, yeah, I'm writing as if someone's going to pick this up and read it one day. Because I don't, I. I don't reread them for the most part.
[00:15:26] Speaker A: I used to. I stopped.
I. I think I stopped because I was not succeeding in life. And still I'm not. I'm pretty sure I. I've reread some things. I'll talk about New Year's Eve in a minute because we talked about sharing that story. But I'll go back to certain times and certain pages, but I don't just read them cover to cover. Like whenever I finished one, I used to just read it cover to cover before I put it away, see if I could gleam anything from that. And I just stopped because the last time I did it, I got depressed. Like, I was talking about all the same stuff, you know, just coming up with ideas to make more money and not making more money, you know, like, it was just. It was just sad after a while, so. Haven't done that in a long time. But, yeah, I try not to.
[00:16:22] Speaker B: So what's up with, with New Year's Eve?
[00:16:25] Speaker A: Oh, New Year's Eve. I.
So my wife went to bed at 11. So we got home on the 30th. We were out in Orange county for 10 days with my family. And it was just really good to be with family again. My sister's boyfriend is living there and he's a really cool guy. And we would just stay up talking by the fire pit every night till like 2 o'clock, having some drinks. Just a great time, fantastic time. Christmas, you know, it was the first, like, good Christmas in a while because every Christmas has gotten up, like basically since 2019.
I, you know, I'm not gonna run through all of them, but, you know, Covid. Fucking flights getting canceled. I got sick in 2022, you know, we didn't really get to celebrate Christmas last year because we were having the baby. So we get home on the 30th, and Ashley just.
I'm feeling a little bit lonely because I'm not with, like, a big group of people anymore. It's just Ashley and the baby and I. And then Ashley just goes to bed at 11 o'clock, and I'm like, cool, so I'll do this alone, I guess.
And I thought, you know what? All right, I'm gonna journal. Because thinking back to the horrific depression that I felt in, like, 2021, 2022, 20, like, at this time of year, you know, Christmas to New Year's, I really got through it by journaling because I don't really talk about that stuff with her. She doesn't really get it. I don't have a lot of friends out here, you know, the only friends I have would be, like, people I'd call up on the phone. And it's not really, like a phone kind of conversation, you know, and it's kind of bitchy, too. I feel like a bitch. So, like.
So I was just like, you know, I'm gonna journal and. And I'm also gonna, like, look through this period from, like, 2020 on to this year, and same. I mean, same thing. Just like I said, it was just like the same kind of depression, the same kind of, you know, like, oh, next year will be better. It wasn't, you know.
And, you know, I always, like, write down ways that I will make next year better. And then none of those things ever happened, you know, but, you know, it is still. It's not really about that so much as just getting something. There's actually studies. Andrew Huberman has talked about neurological studies where people have written about the worst things that ever happened to them for 15 minutes straight without stopping. It's like free writing almost.
And as long as you do it four times, no more than a week apart, they were able to measurably see, like, improvements in PTSD and depression and. And all these things. So it's neurologically proven that just writing about everything just kind of helps you process things better and. And feel better about it and. And just kind of heal from whatever, you know. And I do look back on those times not as grimly as I did at the time, you know, Like, I've definitely, like, compartmentalized it in a healthy way, you know, and I'm not feeling that all the time, you know, And I'm able to kind of step out of it and recognize it for. For what it is.
[00:20:07] Speaker B: That's awesome. I.
That's one of the things that one of my therapists had me do, you know, it was a shitty day, dude. I just remember sitting on his couch and he goes, you know, I really. I really want to know more about, like, your parents. And I'm like, well, you know, I'm gonna be honest. Like, my parents did a lot of bad stuff, but, like, I don't have any ill will towards my parents. I don't have, like, animosity. Like, I love them. I've totally forgiven them. And he's like, I feel like there's some trauma there. And I said, you know, my. My. I don't think my parents woke up every day and was like, you know what? Let's up Bruce's day. Let's just. Let's just make his day hell. You know, I don't think they. They did that. I think they woke up with the best intentions, but just couldn't. Couldn't make it happen.
[00:20:58] Speaker A: And. And for most, for I think both of us, our sets of parents did way better than their parents did.
[00:21:07] Speaker B: Even if they didn't, they did the best they could with the tools they had, you know, and. And I don't think they were. Even for mine, at least, I don't think they were emotionally as healthy as they possibly could have been. And so I think the substance abuse to deal with their emotional trauma was just, you know, how they engaged with me was a side effect of that. And so.
But with that, it was just like, okay, so. But he was like, this is what I want you to do. And he's looking at me and he's asking me, certain, when was the first time you had sex? Let's talk about your sexual experiences with me. Let's do this. And I'm like, okay. And he goes, I want you to go home and I want you to write down.
Now, I did like, I think it's called EBT therapy. I think that's of welfare or edt.
It's something like that. EMR therapy and then CMDR therapy and, you know, and.
And so I went home. And he's like, I want you to write down every trauma and every sexual experience you could remember.
And I did that. I just wrote down every memory, every bad memory I had, every trauma I had. But I remember sitting on his couch that day, and he's looking at me, and I'm like, oh. And he's like, what's going on? I'm like, man, I Feel like.
I feel like I'm lost and I don't even know it. Like, you make me feel like I'm lost and I have no clue that I'm lost. Like, I'm just out in the wilderness. Like, fuck yeah, dude. Like, life is good. And there's. Over the. Over the summit. There's some other, you know, civilization that's way better than where I'm living right now, and I don't even know that.
[00:22:50] Speaker A: And he's, like, contacting you from that civilization, but, like, not telling you where he's from.
[00:22:58] Speaker B: Exactly.
So that was definitely something I, I did. I, I sat down and wrote down everyone, and some of them were hard. I think it was. It was harder to write down just because of the, the great number. I think it was harder to write down the females I've slept with, you know, and a part of me, you know, like, even. Even to this day, I was talking about my daughter. I was. Like, a part of me wants to go back and, like, address my exes and just let them know, like, I'm sorry if I've ever hurt you. I'm sorry if I, you know, didn't love you as a man should have loved somebody or treated you like a man should treat some. Somebody.
But, yeah, I definitely write down hard questions, vivid memories, main events in my day that affected my attitude.
You know, it's, it's. And sometimes they're victories, sometimes they're not, but, you know, reoccurring thoughts, goals, and, and, you know, if I read a book that really kind of impacts me, you know, I'll definitely sit down and write down some notes on that one as well.
[00:24:02] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, same. I, I, if I don't know where to start, I'll just sort of write down what happened that day. And usually that gets me on to some kind of thought process, and I can, you know, kind of work something out, you know, ran randomly, like, David lynch dying.
I wasn't a huge David lynch fan, but that was just so all over my Instagram feed. Every picture in my Instagram feed was some musician I follow with David lynch, you know, like, that was all that I saw.
[00:24:38] Speaker B: Oh, okay. Thank you for explaining that, because I don't know who David.
[00:24:41] Speaker A: Oh, he's a. He was a movie director.
He did Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive and, like, really Eraserhead, like, really, really weird. He was a surrealist director. And before Rick Rubin kind of became like this creativity guru. And now, like, you see reels of Rick Rubin talking about creativity and the creative Process. David lynch was kind of that guy before, and it's pretty hilarious. But, you know, just. Just seeing that in my feed got me thinking about death and legacy and, you know, do. Do I want every person to post something nice about. About me when. When I die, you know? And, like, what would people say about me when I die?
I asked Mario once what he would say if. If I died before him, and he spoke at my funeral, and this is what he said. Word for word. He said, well, you know, ultimately I would just have to say, you know, was just really misunderstood.
And I was like, I don't. I think you think you're complimenting me.
[00:25:54] Speaker B: But isn't he wheelchair bound?
[00:25:56] Speaker A: Huh?
[00:26:00] Speaker B: Isn't he now wheelchair bound?
[00:26:01] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, he's. He's got als.
[00:26:07] Speaker B: What is als, man?
[00:26:09] Speaker A: It's basically like your muscles start dying, so you just stop being able to move.
He can't really talk anymore more. And he. He's. Yeah, he's got limited use of his hands. He's using a tablet that tracks his eye movement so he can type and. And it'll, like, speak it for him. But it's not very good.
[00:26:37] Speaker B: Well, yeah, I mean, for a good one, it's probably a lot. A lot, a lot.
[00:26:40] Speaker A: Yeah. I think they did spend a lot. I think they spent like five grand on the. The system.
But it says the N word.
[00:26:46] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:26:47] Speaker A: I know that.
[00:26:52] Speaker B: Very nice. Very nice. I'm glad, you know, that. That was probably the first year. You're like, hey, let me see it.
So what ended up happening on, you know, I'm in. You brought up your New Year's Eve story. And I was sitting tonight on the couch, and. And honestly, man, like, I'm fearful. I mean, I'm going on three months of being laid off.
Unemployed's a hard word to say, but I'm going on three months of being laid off, and I'm just like, I've applied to every GC in the Valley. You know, do I.
Do I switch up? Do I. Do I switch careers? Do I go back to school? Do I pursue something else? Like, lord, what are you trying to get me to do? Do that. Maybe I'm not doing. Like, is that what it is or is it just what it is? You know, like, everybody at first was saying, wait till the beginning of the year, then we're hiring. Okay, check. Then they're saying, well, let's. We want to wait and see what Trump does in office.
Cool. That's tomorrow. But, like, what Trump does while he's in office is, like, another 40 years. You know, it's. It's not like, just the 20th. And so I'm really. Yeah, I really don't. I really don't. Don't know what to do. Like, I'm just. Just at that spot in my life where I'm like, you know, like, is the Lord trying to push me to something greater? Because I'm the type of guy that'll just go work at Home Depot to make ends meet and then I'll probably never leave Home Depot, you know?
Or is he pushing me out to actually do something, to start something, you know? But then again, what am I good at? You know, I'm good at everything in a sense of jack of all trades I get, but I'm not a master of none, you know, all the guys I know in my industry that are struggling are like, yeah, I'm starting to do handyman work. And I'm like, well, I don't want to go back to that. I don't want to. I don't have any of the tools I had because my ex sold them, you know? So, like. Like, what am I supposed to do? You know, It's. It's a scary spot, man. Yeah.
So that's. That's my journal entry for tomorrow is kind of exploring that and questioning myself on where I want to go, what.
[00:29:07] Speaker A: I want to do.
Yeah, I. In these moments, all you want to do is, like, find some kind of helpful advice, but it's like, literally, what could you do? I mean, there's nothing to do.
You're doing it. You're doing the only thing you can do right now.
You know how New Year's ended for me? So I. I had a beer. I stopped journaling at about 11:55. I went and watched the. The Countdown on TV. Whoop Dee. Fucking do whatever. I go back to having my beer and journaling at about 12:30.
Got a fever, and then I just slept until, like, January 6th. I just. I got so sick, and that was the beginning of my year.
Yeah.
[00:29:57] Speaker B: No way. Just came on like that, huh.
[00:29:59] Speaker A: And. And I was just in bed until I just had to go back to work because I used up all my vacation time and just couldn't stay home any longer and just feeling better in the last couple days.
[00:30:11] Speaker B: New Year, man, it kind of re. Reset your. Reset your vacation, your pay time.
[00:30:14] Speaker A: August, it's. It's my anniversary. Yeah. And I used almost all of it on the trip, so I was already pretty much out.
So I took two days off, and then I had to get back at it. But, yeah, I always get sick.
Never helps.
[00:30:34] Speaker B: When was the last time you journaled before then?
[00:30:36] Speaker A: Before when?
[00:30:39] Speaker B: Before New Year's.
[00:30:40] Speaker A: When was the last time I journaled? Every day?
[00:30:43] Speaker B: Yeah.
Oh, you still journal every day? Yeah. Oh, that's awesome. How long are you journaling, Treece?
[00:30:50] Speaker A: Oh, I try to do a page a day.
Usually just a couple sentences in the morning. Just something I'm thinking about, whatever I'm feeling and then fill in the rest of the page later that day. I used to do two pages a day, but that started getting out of hand because I was going through a journal, like, every four months. So I was like, I don't need to fill, like, half these pages up. You know, I. I can just do a page a day. So now it's a little bit more dense and a little more economic, I guess.
So it's a little more meaningful. I'm not just filling space with stuff.
[00:31:34] Speaker B: Where do you find your time to journal at night?
[00:31:37] Speaker A: After my wife and baby are asleep, go in the library and journal for a while. Just until the page is full. And, you know, when do you.
[00:31:51] Speaker B: When do you go to work?
[00:31:52] Speaker A: What time? Hit the road at 7:30, get there at 8.
[00:31:57] Speaker B: I didn't get.
[00:31:58] Speaker A: Okay, yeah, I get up at 7, but if. If the baby gets up, I've got the baby. So if she gets up before seven, then I'm just. I'm just dealing with the baby. And I won't have time to do any journaling or meditation or anything, so I save it all for the night.
[00:32:17] Speaker B: Your wife goes to bed earlier than you.
[00:32:20] Speaker A: I. I figure you're about to break down the exact thing that I say every single day.
[00:32:27] Speaker B: Doesn't work.
Has the luxury of staying home.
Maybe has to bend at the waist. Well, we don't want to use DVDs anymore, so you could just pajama the thing all day.
And it's like, hey, you gotta go to work in an hour. But the baby's up. You're up.
[00:32:51] Speaker A: Yep, that's how that works.
Apparently she doesn't sleep. That's what she says.
Apparently I wake her up when I go to bed, and then she's up for hours. And then every time the baby makes a sound, she's up for hours. And so.
[00:33:09] Speaker B: Oh, she's a lightsaber.
[00:33:10] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And. And that I know for a fact. I know she's not bullshitting me on that, but I. I gotta think. If you're in bed for 11 hours, I mean, you gotta be getting some sleep. You Know.
[00:33:23] Speaker B: You really only need six to function, so.
Okay, so let's transition real quick to your parenting.
I, I, My kids are deep sleepers, but I think there's a way you could train kids to be deep sleeper.
Like, in my family growing up, whenever a kid was put down, there was never a, hey, keep it down. The baby's asleep. It was like, nah, man. Like, if we're partying, we're partying. If people are over, we're still talking. Normal level, we're playing music. It's still on. Like, the baby. I don't cater to the baby.
I wonder if her parents were always quiet after she went to bed.
[00:34:11] Speaker A: I doubt it. They were drug addicts. I don't, I don't think there was much consideration of anything. I have noticed.
What.
[00:34:20] Speaker B: Where'd you meet her?
[00:34:22] Speaker A: She was a barista at a coffee shop I went to.
[00:34:27] Speaker B: Nice. Nick.
[00:34:29] Speaker A: Yeah. You know, most, Most guys don't get the barista.
[00:34:33] Speaker B: You figured with being a barista, her ass would be a prison pretty early every day and be probably used to it.
[00:34:38] Speaker A: She, I'm telling you, man, she, she did that opening shift when I met her.
[00:34:42] Speaker B: And now you're like, hey, can I get a cup of coffee? And she's like, yeah, it's, it's, it's in the cabinet.
[00:34:52] Speaker A: She, yeah, she won't make me coffee. She swears I make better coffee.
I quit caffeine this week. Did you we. Yeah. I'm worried about my blood pressure, so I'm on, I'm trying to eliminate things that affect my blood pressure, but it's always, it's always normal when I take it at home, so I don't know what to make of that. It was, it was 170 over a hundred when I was at the urgent care a week or two ago.
And it is, It's.
[00:35:24] Speaker B: You know what? You might not. You might just be like one of those kids that doesn't test well.
[00:35:29] Speaker A: Yeah.
Yeah. They call it the white coat syndrome. It's literally like you're just more nervous at the doctor.
The last doctor I went to, like an actual gp, he wanted to put me on a medication. And I was like, I don't want to do that. You know? And he's like, well, okay, take your blood pressure at home every day for 30 days and we'll see how it is. And it was normal. All but one of those days. There was only one day where it was a little bit high, and I was like, I'm not going on a medication when I'm Almost always normal. Like, I'll have low blood pressure, you know.
[00:36:13] Speaker B: Was there something that happened in that day?
[00:36:17] Speaker A: No, nothing I can ever. I mean. And last time when it was really high, just like two weeks ago, I was really sick. And I think that was affecting me because I was coughing a lot. And you know, that does stuff to blood and the brain and all sorts of wackiness.
So I think it was that, but I think I'm just nervous. I. I hate getting my blood pressure taken too. Like, it hurts my arm, so I'm being a bitch. So, like, I'm anticipating the p.
Yeah, man.
Anyways, I derailed us.
Yeah. What was it? Oh, yeah, the baby. Every time we have my parents or my sister come to visit and they're like way louder than us, just naturally.
I do find that she is a heavier sleeper every time they go home.
Like. Like every time they've come to visit, she's gotten just a little bit more of a heavy sleeper. And then like at my parents house in California, she was really good because that house is super fucking loud. There's no insulation. It's all an open concept house. You know, it's super thin walls. Like, you know, it's just the worst. Everything's tile. There's no carpet left in the house. All the. The rooms are all hardwood now. And it's like the worst, like, noise.
Worst situation for noise in a house. And she did pretty well. She didn't really wake up at all, so.
[00:37:49] Speaker B: Dude, your backyard's probably one of my favorite, favorite jobs.
[00:37:52] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, it was great. Dude, the fire pit. We used that fire pit so much over Christmas.
[00:37:58] Speaker B: That's awesome. There's a water fountain. Still work. Waterfall.
[00:38:04] Speaker A: It wasn't on, but I think it still works.
[00:38:08] Speaker B: Yeah, that's cool. I love that place.
[00:38:12] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:38:13] Speaker B: So journaling.
I feel like with journaling it could sometimes be daunting.
Kind of like. Like when you were saying you do two pages, sometimes I'm like, wow, that's. That's a lot of time to commit to journaling, you know, like to fill up two pages. Unless. Unless you're just writing, you know, like, again, I write in the sense of like, I want someone to be able to read it. So if I'm throwing out something that doesn't necessarily make sense as a reader, I will go in. Not in depth, but I will definitely throw out enough to kind of like bring that person into understanding what I'm writing about. Because I am writing with the hope that someone one day will read it.
[00:39:08] Speaker A: Whether it's Family or not, I'm the total opposite.
I used to write more like, what if someone found this? You know, like, my biographer is clearly gonna take a peek at this, so I better.
I better really get this ship shape, right? And I've. I've worked pretty hard to get out of that so that I really am just writing to work through and just, you know, some of what I write gets pretty abstract at times, and. And I look back on some stuff and I'm like. I don't even know what I was talking about here.
What do I mean? The. The sunset was wistful or whatever.
[00:39:51] Speaker B: The.
[00:39:51] Speaker A: I said, you know, like, you're trying.
[00:39:54] Speaker B: To creatively write, like, descriptive. You're just trying to throw in some. You're like, yeah, so really struggling today with this thought, and this guy at work was being a jerk, and, man. But as I look at the sunset and how. How it crests over the. The mountains, I see the reflection glisten on the star blanket. Yeah, it's.
[00:40:15] Speaker A: It's not even like that. It's like, when I read Jack Kerouac, it affects my writing.
Like, he'll.
I don't know. He'll. He'll describe. It's hard to come up with a thing because it's so fucking random, but he'll describe the. The apple pie he ate as, like, patriotic or something. You know what I mean? Like, I had a patriotic slice of apple pie by. And I'll just find myself doing shit like that, like when I'm editing my stories or when I'm looking over at journals. Like, I can tell when I get to parts where I was reading a lot of Jack Kerouac when I wrote it, because it'll just stop making sense. But it'll. It'll describe a feeling perfectly, but it won't make any intellectual sense.
[00:41:03] Speaker B: What books you find yourself reading most, what genre?
[00:41:08] Speaker A: Right now I'm reading a lot of fiction last year.
See, I can't even. I mean, I've been reading more fiction in the last year or two.
Some political stuff, some theology, kind of all over the place now.
[00:41:31] Speaker B: You don't throw up.
[00:41:32] Speaker A: My good reason.
[00:41:33] Speaker B: Is that a different genre or is that just. That's also in your fiction?
[00:41:38] Speaker A: What?
[00:41:40] Speaker B: You said fiction, theology. I mean, like, are you throwing theology under the umbrella of fiction or. No, it's a different genre. That's cool.
[00:41:49] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. Let me. Let me pull up my Goodreads and see what I read last year.
[00:41:57] Speaker B: Yeah. Get your updates.
[00:41:58] Speaker A: Yeah, I'll grab some. Like, I'll grab Some, like, psychological stuff.
Mind reader, the science of deciphering what people really think.
[00:42:11] Speaker B: I think readers always go down that for like, how to read body language and.
[00:42:15] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, it's all horseshit. I mean, like, what's not horseshit is stuff you already know. You already know like what crossed arms means. Yeah, it's such a grift every time. And I never pay for them. I always get like a free audiobook on hoopla or something. But every time I listen to one, I'm like, yeah, I know all of this.
I read Candace Owens's book. That was good.
[00:42:42] Speaker B: Which one? Her personal book.
[00:42:44] Speaker A: Yeah. Blackout.
[00:42:46] Speaker B: Oh, I didn't read that. I wrote. I'm reading Chaos. I'm at the very last chapter of Chaos.
[00:42:52] Speaker A: Nice.
I read a couple. Couple books about, like, punk history.
[00:42:58] Speaker B: What's your. What would be one book? You got to give someone special to you and you're just like. Because I'm. I asked this because I'm in this stage of life where I don't want to waste time. So, like, Candace Owens, when she did her thing on Kamala Harris, I was all about listing every day. And then after the Kamala Harris thing, she'd have some CIA agents on or some rocket scientists and you know, I'll listen to those ones, but for the most part, it's like her talking about Diddy or Justin Bieber, and I'm like, miss me with that, like, until everything's final. In that case, I don't care to hear about the assumptions, you know?
[00:43:36] Speaker A: Yeah, it doesn't interest me.
[00:43:38] Speaker B: Yeah, it doesn't interest me. So I've been listening more to Sean Ryan lately.
But if you were to give a book to your child, your wife, a good friend, and you had to suggest three two to three life changing books, what would they be?
[00:43:58] Speaker A: Well, my wife wouldn't read it, so I'll pretend that I'm just recommending them to you.
Like, I would have one for politics. I'd have to think of, like, the perfect one for theology.
The first one that comes to mind is.
Terrible title, terrible cover. But it's called the Secret to Selling Anything by Harry Brown.
And if I was doing this guy's marketing, he's dead now, but if I was doing the marketing for this book, I would have said, this is not a sales book. This is a book about how to live your life. And it is all. It's about, like, ethical sales without lying, without having to be, like an extreme extrovert. And in the process, he really breaks down, like, your life should be about providing value to people. Your life is about helping people and solving their problems. That's what a job is. Doesn't matter what the job is. The job solves some kind of a problem and you're the guy who steps up and solves that problem for someone, you know. And so the whole thing is, is just really helpful for light. I mean, you could take all of this and apply it to a job interview, which I did. And I got the first job that I did an interview with after reading this book.
[00:45:18] Speaker B: Now you're just rubbing it, you know, go on.
You're pouring salt on the wound now, but cool, dude, keep going.
[00:45:27] Speaker A: I think my, my success rate in job interviews has got to be under 1%. It's got, it's dirt low, but yeah, it's just a really good book about just simple things like solving problems and finding, you know, listening to people and finding where the root of their problem is. You know, like he used to sell advertising in the phone book. And so he would go to, you know, a client who was, you know, a client for three years, but they don't want to renew their contract this year. And he had to go and talk to them and see why. And then they would say, well, I can't afford it anymore. And he would end up selling them twice the pages that they originally had because he convinced them, hey, if you need money, this is the way to make more money. You advertise more, you know, and it's just, you know, really good book.
[00:46:23] Speaker B: Two thoughts. Marketing seems to be the first budget cut in companies that struggle, especially sales based companies. And then that's why I like being a superintendent in construction. Because every day there's a problem. And I love being able to step up to the plague and saying, we have a problem. We also still have a deadline and we have to figure this out. I love that aspect of construction. Okay, so selling, what was the name of it?
[00:46:58] Speaker A: The secret to selling anything.
[00:47:01] Speaker B: I think he just gave me an idea because I did have a United Rentals guy. United Rentals guy say, I would love for you to come work for me. He called me one day. I called him one day. I said, hey, I need a, need a forklift on my job. I need a boom lift on my job. I need it like tomorrow. I need this size. We got it. We got to get this, this, this, this task done. And he was like, oh, okay, sounds great. And I was like, you know, I heard that you brought burritos once to somebody else's job. Like I heard they were really good. What was the name of that place? And he was like, oh, it's this place. And I was like, cool. Why have you not brought me burritos when I do work with you? And he was like, shit, dude, I kind of want to offer you a job right now. And I was like, hold on to that thought. I'm about to call him up tomorrow. I appreciate you bringing that to mind. Sales might be where I need to be going.
All right, so what would be your theology book?
[00:47:57] Speaker A: That's a tough one.
It. I guess it would depend on, like, who I'm recommending it to.
[00:48:07] Speaker B: What would that change?
What would that change?
[00:48:10] Speaker A: Well, am I. Am I. Am I gonna give, like, hey, you're not a Christian, but I want you to become one. So here's the book you should read. Or is this, like, you. You've been a Christian for 20 years, and here's a book you should read? You know, like, that's. That's kind of a different recommendation in my mind. So Desiring God comes to mind. That was a pretty big deal for me when I read it. I don't know if it would hold up. Yeah, it's possible that I would detest it if I read it now. Really?
[00:48:45] Speaker B: Yeah, because I have it, but I haven't read it.
[00:48:49] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, I remember it being really good.
It's probably. It's definitely not theologically, like, where I'm at, but it, like, fully where I'm at. But, I mean, it definitely did stoke, like, does, like, literally the title of the book, like, it made me desire God and to get closer to God. So, I mean, can't go wrong with that.
Yeah.
[00:49:18] Speaker B: All right. So what would your last book be? Your political book, you said.
[00:49:22] Speaker A: You know what it'd be? Anatomy of the State by Murray Rothbard.
It's 65 pages. There's a free PDF online.
It will completely change your outlook of the government, of the world you live in, of power, of everything.
[00:49:45] Speaker B: I don't know if it completely changed my mind or reaffirm it.
[00:49:50] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:49:51] Speaker B: I'm listening to a lot of Sean Ryan right now, and reading that Chaos book is also another one where I'm like, man, you guys are just crooked.
Yeah.
All right, so I'll list my three.
My.
My one that would fall under theology would be Philip Yancey's the Jesus I Never Knew.
Great insight to kind of look at Jesus differently. For sure, for sure. And then the mind, it's. It's called.
It's by Carol Dweck, and it's It's. I don't know if it's called the mind, but it's by Carol Dweck. I won't say it is called the mind, but it's basically fixed mindset versus growth mindset. And I didn't realize that people with fixed mindsets, the suicide rate, the depression rate, is a lot higher than a growth mindset.
They test harder.
And basically, to sum it up, like, if I were to call Paul, if I was to get an argument with you and say, you're a loser, and. Yeah, you could. You could edit that one out, Brutus.
If I was to get.
I would.
[00:51:15] Speaker A: I would just. I would just be like, yeah, you got a point.
[00:51:18] Speaker B: But that's the thing.
But the fixed mindset, they take that identity on and they say, I must be. I must be a loser.
But the growth mindset is someone that's going to say, oh, okay, you called me a loser. Let me show you I'm not a loser.
And so it points out what fixed and growth mindsets are. And then it gives you tools to get out of being in a fixed mindset and into a growth mindset. And one of the things that helped me do as a father is I don't complicate. Like, I will not, not compliment my children on how smart they are. Oh, I love how smart you are. No, what I love is, is that you invested the time to not be satisfied with what was there. Like, you invested the time to. To do X, Y and Z. Like, I love the fact that you will study your butt off. You know, I don't. I don't commit. I don't comment on their beauty. You know, my daughters are beautiful, but I will never say to them, like, man, I think you're beautiful. Like, I think you're beautiful because you're so kind. That's what I think. I think you're a beautiful person because you're so kind. Because the day that they get in an accident or something happens to their physical beauty, it's going to mentally affect them. But if I could compliment their personality traits, their characteristics of their personality, it's different. You know, their focus is in a different place. Like when I asked my youngest what is true beauty and she says it's being kind to others. Perfect. That is true beauty.
And so. But that's just something. Like, I want them. Like, it changed how I spoke to my kids as a father, and it also changed how I sit in my depression. You know, like, my second youngest struggles with depression just like I do.
But I Try and, like, walk her through it. We were talking the other day, and I said, here's the great thing about depression. It's temporary.
Like, it's not. It's. It might be a week, it might be a month, but it's temporary.
And the other thing I do now is I try and sit down and journal what is the root of my depression right now? Where is it coming from?
And so I think it's called Mindset. Mindset by Carol Dweck is a book I would highly recommend to anybody that possibly struggles with just a fixed mindset. Maybe you don't even know it. I didn't know I had a fixed mindset. I didn't know. But once you start seeing the statistics of those that have a fixed mindset, you're like, wow, I think I have a fixed mindset, you know?
And so that's one of them. The second or the third one, I guess, because Philip Yancey was the first. The third one would be the DNA of relationships.
And it's by Dr.
I forget. Dr. I want to say Dr. James Howley, but I don't think it is.
It's called the DNA relationships and it's. He's the father of the guy who started Focus on the Family.
[00:54:30] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:54:31] Speaker B: And he's. He runs an organization that basically counsels. They do weekend, like, weekend getaways for couples that are on the brink of divorce.
And his success rate is better than nine out of ten.
And it was the book I was reading when Dr. James Smalley. It's Smalley do. I don't know if it's James, but it's Dr. Smalley. And his book was the book I was reading when the Lord clearly told me in the.
You know. You know, you say the Lord clearly told me. I've said this to so many people, and they're like, the Lord doesn't talk to people, you know, he directs them. And. Cool.
But it wasn't of myself that this thought came about, you know, And I was reading this book and there was such a strong kind of like, thought, if you will, that kept going through my mind. And it was, I'm going to get you and your wife back together. You and your wife will be back together. Like, this isn't over. This isn't like, I'm not done with you guys. And I remember, like. Like stopping reading. I was at work and I had a co worker that was also going through the book. And I looked over and I was like, the Lord just told me, like, he's going to get Me and my ex back together. And he was like, like, what are your thoughts on that? I was like, I want no part of it at all. No part of it at all. He was like, do you think God would do that?
And I'm like, you kidding me? That's like. That's, like his business. Like, that's what he does. He does the impossible. He does the.
[00:56:19] Speaker A: The thing that just makes people do things they don't want to do. That's all he does. Yeah.
[00:56:24] Speaker B: You know what I mean? Like, this is how he is glorified in moments that you think are impossible, that can never come about. This is what he does. And so it was those three books. But it also just helped me realize, like, when people are like, what did you get from the book?
It helped me realize, like, you have to take time to understand if you've done something, you know, like, to your wife, you were dishonest or whatever.
The wall that she has up is the wall that you built, and there's no way for you to go in. And just like, you know, I picture this. This kind of like Rapunzel tower, but she's not at the top. She's. She's in the base of it, but it's still a tower that just kind of circles around her with all the cinder block. And, you know, I'm. I. I put her in that tower, you know, with my distrust and dishonesty and so forth. And now I'm trying to get her out of the tower to show her that, hey, I won't do it again.
You can't go in there with a sledgehammer and a chisel, you know? I mean, you can't just be like, I won't do it again. I told you I wouldn't do it again. Like, just trust me. Like, now that don't work. You know? Like, you can't.
[00:57:36] Speaker A: Your wall.
[00:57:37] Speaker B: Yeah. You can't just do whatever you want to it, but it doesn't work. Man.
[00:57:43] Speaker A: It sounds like she needs to start respecting the guy who locked her in a basement. Like, why don't you get a little less lippy? How about that?
[00:57:52] Speaker B: Why don't you get up and get the baby in the morning? No, but you have to go in and show that you could be trustworthy. The only way to break it down is to be trustworthy.
[00:58:04] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:58:04] Speaker B: In that scenario, the other scenario that he paints is your family is a team.
So if you kind of put it in the realm of sports.
Yeah. Michael Jordan. Michael dropped 45 points, but the Bulls still lose, lose that night, there's no victory, you know, I mean, like, cool, you scored 45 points, but you still lost.
And so, like, the example he uses is, like, arguing with your kids about something. You know, they don't want to do something. And he's like, you have to get creative. You have to sit them down and say, hey, how can we both win out of this? And he goes, you know, it's not always going to work if your kid's in a position as a teenager saying, I don't want to go to school anymore. Well, you can't be like, okay, like, let's not know. But you could get creative and look at different avenues of homeschooling, online schooling, you know, like something, you know, like, I don't know. But you'd have to get creative in order for the team to win. You both have to walk away feeling victorious. And that doesn't happen when you just get your way. You say, no, Boom. I'm putting my foot down. You're going to school. Don't matter. Like, it's my way of the highway. That's. You didn't win. You know what I mean? So those are the three books I would recommend.
[00:59:18] Speaker A: Yeah, I definitely want to read the last two.
I don't know. Philip Yancey. I want to read all three. You know what it.
[00:59:28] Speaker B: Philip Yancey, dude, I'm not gonna lie. I've had the book on my shelf for a while. I kept looking at it, and I said, you know what?
I'm gonna check this out. And so I opened it up, and he kind of goes on like, he. He. He was raised in the church, and he was like, you know, it was this. And, you know, we had Sunday school, and, you know, they're. You know, they have the little felt guys on the thing, and they're showing how Moses crossed the Red Sea and, you know, all this other stuff. And he's going on. He's like. But I never intimately, like, got to know Jesus, like, what he went through, what he. What he did. He starts breaking down certain chapters of the B. He uses certain.
Certain.
Not scenarios, but events. He uses certain events in the Bible, and he kind of breaks them down with how he views them. And it's like, wow, dude, I never viewed that like that. Like, I never really viewed that. One of the things that I love that he said. He said, the Old Testament's like the father, and the New Testament like the mother. The Old Testament's discipline, which is what you get from your father. The New Testament is the mother that Loves her son so much that she. She tends to put up with a little more stuff and reinforces her care by love versus discipline. Where, like, the Old Testament, they're sin the camp. You ain't. You ain't win the next war. They're saying your camp can clean it out, kill the dude, move on. Where the New Testament is more like, hey, like, I got you. You're not in this alone. I'm here with you. Like, we're gonna make it through. And so it was just a really cool way to kind of look at Old and New Testament. For sure. For me.
[01:01:10] Speaker A: Yeah. I want to change my theology pick to God's Glory Through Salvation by Judgment. Is that what it's called? It's a really long title. God's Glory through Judgment by something. But it's.
It's by. Let me. Let me look it up. Damn it.
[01:01:38] Speaker B: Another good one is the Gospel Primer.
[01:01:47] Speaker A: It's a biblical theology book that goes through, like, the entire Old Testament and just, like, draws all the lines of, like, thematic things that are fulfilled by Christ. And really. Yeah, it's really cool.
And here it is.
Any second now, I am gonna find this.
Here it is. God's Glory in Salvation Through a Biblical Theology by James M. Hamilton, Jr. Really good book.
[01:02:34] Speaker B: I'll have to check that one out when I get money again.
Yeah. On my book list right now that I. That I have with my Amazon cart is the 44 laws to peace.
The 44 laws of power.
And, dude, they have this set that I really want to get, man.
It's only. They only have it for the New Testament in the nasb, but it's.
It's each book of the New Testament. They're separate books.
And like, let's say you're reading Romans. Left page is the verses. Right page is for you to make your notes.
[01:03:16] Speaker A: Oh, is it Journey? Is that what it was called?
[01:03:21] Speaker B: Yeah, it is adjournable.
[01:03:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:03:22] Speaker B: But it's not like my ESV journal where, like, has a wide column for. For. For notes.
[01:03:29] Speaker A: Yeah, it's.
[01:03:29] Speaker B: It's like the whole page, which is cool because the church I go to has the same thing. Like, if you. If they're in the Book of John, you walk in, you grab your. Your Book of John from. You know, you keep it for the whole series. But it's left side verses, right side notes. It's awesome.
[01:03:47] Speaker A: Nice.
[01:03:48] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:03:48] Speaker A: Yeah.
If you want 48 laws of power, it's free. The audiobook book is free on hoopla.
I. I listened to it recently, and I Thought it was pretty overrated.
[01:04:02] Speaker B: I did, too, when I first read it. When I first read it, because I've read it before, and I must have given it away because I don't have it anymore. But when I read it before, I was kind of like, cool, we're quoting some old Asian dude.
[01:04:15] Speaker A: Yeah, well, it's like, I'll edit his name out, but it's. Everything would do. And it's like, anyone who did any of these things, I would see through it immediately. Like, I wouldn't trust anyone who did any of these 48 things.
I'd be like, hey, this guy's a fed. This guy right here.
[01:04:36] Speaker B: So that's how I viewed the book. I viewed it as manipulation.
[01:04:40] Speaker A: Yeah, but, like, not even good manipulation.
Like, manipulation that everyone would recognize as such.
[01:04:47] Speaker B: You know, that's good. I'll mark it off my list then.
[01:04:51] Speaker A: But I'm not telling you not to get the book. I'm just, hey, I've had it before. You're really. You're really acting in a fixed mindset right now. I need you to be.
[01:05:02] Speaker B: Well, I had it before, and I remember thinking the same thing. Like, man, like, this book was really hyped up, and it's not what I thought it would be a really, a good book for, like, a daily reader. Each chapter's no more than six pages.
It's the way of the superior man.
And it's. You know, the intro kind of goes into. I'll save you the. The heartache of reading the intro, but the intro goes into, like, hey, look, it's not for just men. It's for the alphas in the relationship. It's not necessarily for only men. You know, he's like, if you're in a lesbian relationship, there's an alpha, there's a beta.
This is for the alpha in the relationship. But he goes, you know, that's a long name to put on. And I'm already in a long name. You know, the way of the superior alpha. You know, person in the relationship is a long title. He's like, so I just made it the way of the superior man.
But it's really good. You know, it talks about, like, not doubting yourself, you know, because, you know, like, for. For us males, it'll say, like, you know, don't just do what your girl tells you to do, because, you know, like, definitely take her opinion, but make the best decision. Because if you just follow her, it shows her that you don't trust your own instincts. And there's nothing weaker than someone that doesn't trust their own instincts. That's just one of the chapters.
It goes through your relationship with your father, you know, briefly.
So it, it's. It's definitely a book that I would definitely recommend. Mine is my thought on, On Fathers, if you will, is if I've already surpassed you, I don't care.
[01:06:50] Speaker A: Surpassed in what way?
[01:06:52] Speaker B: Like, if you can't. If I've surpassed him as just a father, I've surpassed him as a construction professional. I've surpassed him as in ethics, in morals.
And for me, it's like, it would be different if he was maybe a reputable dude where I was like, man, people respected this guy.
I don't find a lot of people who respected my father. And so for me, it's kind of like, I don't care if you approve or disapprove of how I am. This is how I am, you know?
[01:07:29] Speaker A: Yeah, definitely. I, I feel similarly not a high bar. In, in my opinion.
The fact, the fact that I change my daughter's diaper is already putting me, like, at a. At a much higher level.
I gotta thank the guy for setting the bar so damn low because I just leapfrogged that immediately.
Maybe that's why I'm willing to get up with the baby in the morning and I don't put up a fight about it.
[01:08:06] Speaker B: Dude, there's definitely, you know, like, there's. There's people that ask me, like, yeah, I'll tell people this. Even in interviews.
I.
I can't say much about myself in the sense of if I'm the best friend that people have ever had, if I've been the best husband or if I've been the best son, even. But there's two things I can say. I'm a damn good employee.
I. I usually let them know I'm a damn good superintendent, and I'm a damn. I'm a good father. Like, I take pride in being a good father.
My kids come first. Which is why my love life right now sucks. You know, even the female I'm currently trying to have a relationship with, it's almost non. Existent because when, first of all, the circumstance I'm in of being unemployed, I don't want to dwell on that circumstance all day, and I need to be doing something, journaling, reading for edification purposes or, or looking for work.
And when my kids are home, you know, whether they're not home or not, I'm trying to do something to make their life easier. Whether, you know, it's. It's making dinner or you know, doing, you know, writing them a letter or, you know, just something where, you know. But they're my thought when they're present. I'm not distracted on my phone, you know, and trying to sit there and text somebody. Hey, how was your day? No, no, no, no. My kids are home. They've requested my time, whether it's playing video games or, you know, watching a show. And I'm gonna give them that time. You know, I feel it's rude to sit there and just be on my phone the whole time, like, no, no, no, I'm listening. No, I don't do that.
So. Yeah, man. All right, so we're getting to the tail end of this. Let's. Let's. Let's. Let's give you some questions, man. Some questions.
[01:10:06] Speaker A: Oh, you got some for me?
[01:10:09] Speaker B: I always got questions, though.
[01:10:12] Speaker A: I'm the man with the questions.
Guilty as charged. Charged with the stories.
[01:10:25] Speaker B: Don't say it. Don't say guilty. Is charged with the stories. Well, okay.
[01:10:32] Speaker A: Step brothers.
[01:10:34] Speaker B: Yeah, it is. Step brothers, right?
[01:10:35] Speaker A: It was Derek. What scene? It's.
[01:10:39] Speaker B: Oh, it's the brother.
[01:10:41] Speaker A: When Dale ruins the story. He's. He's like, yeah, it's. It's not his fault for rooting the story. I got more stories. And then they all start laughing like, oh, yeah, you got so many stories. And he's like, guilty as charged with the stories.
[01:10:56] Speaker B: It was him and Mark Rubin. The fishing for Bonita. Bonita Dale.
[01:11:01] Speaker A: Are bonita fish big?
[01:11:02] Speaker B: I'd say it's a.
[01:11:04] Speaker A: What?
[01:11:04] Speaker B: Say it's a pretty big fish.
[01:11:10] Speaker A: It's what they call a trophy fish, so, yeah, they're pretty big.
[01:11:18] Speaker B: All right, so how do you view. You might want to grab a pen, bro. I mean, we're recording this. You always listen back to this. Yeah. Yeah, I guess we are. How do you view marriage?
How do you view yourself? I mean, I want some brutal honesty here, dude. I want, like, you know, you have a pretty good view on yourself, in a sense, and. And I'm not judging. I'm just going off kind of what I've picked up from you. But you have a pretty good view on yourself from reading your journals the last couple of years, where you're like, hey, I'm still in the same spot I was that last year and the year before. So how do you view yourself? You know, and I'm looking for. I'm not looking, but I really want you to kind of dive into, you know, pitfalls or. Or, you know, maybe areas that need improvement, if you will, you know, and then maybe follow it up with how you can improve those things. You know, what do you. I know for me, I never wanted to be a senior pastor because I felt I'd make a better assistant pastor, because I do need that someone over me to hold me accountable. I just know that about myself. You know, I'm a great wingman. I'm not a great pilot. You know, on jobs, I'm the pilot. But I always have a super, a general superintendent or an owner of a company that's over me when I own my own company. Like in California. Doing your guys stuff.
Yeah, if it was raining. Yeah. I don't feel like working today, so I'm sure, guys, we don't have to work today. It doesn't really work like that sometimes.
And then.
Yeah. How do you view marriage? How do you view yourself?
And I don't think you're in a bad spot, so this question might not apply to you, but put yourself in your shoes, in the shoes of your spouses, of your spouse, and maybe look at how she might view you and her current circumstances. But I think even more than that, pick an individual in your life that has taught you a lot, whether it's about yourself, about life. For me, it was. It was.
The year I picked was following death is suicide.
Straight up. Use his name and everything.
[01:14:01] Speaker A: I'll edit his name out.
[01:14:04] Speaker B: All right, cool. Let's start that over. For me, Brutus. It was Dolly. His suicide.
[01:14:14] Speaker A: Sounds so disrespectful.
It was dingbat, you know, Dingbat. Really?
Just say his name. I'll edit it in.
[01:14:26] Speaker B: All right, well, all right.
[01:14:29] Speaker A: No, this is all staying in.
That was gold.
[01:14:35] Speaker B: All right. For me, it was him, and it just taught me to be kind because I didn't. You don't realize when someone. When. When. When someone. Last day, you know, like, there was another guy that. That really impacted me that. That died overnight from work. His name was Cesar, and he was our safety guy. And he only came out like once a week. And he just drove around the site, but he would talk to the guys, get to know him. And, you know, one day we get a call that he passed away in the middle of the night.
And everybody from our job site that literally didn't, you know, only knew the guy maybe, maybe two, three months, literally came in and shared stories about how, you know, he made a mixtape for their son because their son's trying to get into music. And, you know, he was out there and, man, he'd pull up and he'd hear my music and he would dance and we would talk and, you know, it was just a funny little dance. But, like, he impacted people. People. And it just made me, you know, think about, you know, what. What impact am I having on people? You know, like, you know, am I. Am I making their life harder, easier? Am I showing them something about themselves that they didn't see that I may be see, you know, like, did I inspire them at all or did I make their life hell? You know? And so, yeah, I'd say pick one person.
How do you view yourself? What's your view on marriage?
And, you know, it gives you a couple things to think about. You don't have to write about all three of them. Maybe pick one that you. That really speaks to you the most, you know, that's. Yeah, that's. That's for me. Do you have any for me, maybe?
[01:16:25] Speaker A: No, I didn't think you'd ask me that because you already do that pretty well.
I really liked the one you did on why did I never go into ministry? Like, that's a question I wouldn't think to ask myself. You know what I mean? Like, I would write about it, like, in the moment. I would write about how, like, my mind is changing on that, and maybe I don't want to do that anymore. And maybe I've, you know, because I've done that. I stopped barbering. I gave up on a couple different things in life, you know, not gave up, but, like, I made an active decision to go a different way because I was afraid of sinking more time into something that was not going to come to fruition, you know?
[01:17:11] Speaker B: Yeah. You pivoted. Yeah, for sure.
[01:17:13] Speaker A: Yeah. You like that? It's. It's law 46 of the 48 laws of power pivoting.
No, I would. I. Here's what I want. I'm really interested in you not getting back together with your ex. So I want you to journal about what life would really look like if. If you two reconciled.
[01:17:39] Speaker B: Okay. I get. I definitely am down for that because I've already put a lot of thought into it. It's been something that does consume me.
To give you brief recent. Recently, like, we. We had the family together on Thanksgiving, which is a Thursday.
I spent all day Friday there. So we. We went over Thursday afternoon. I spent all day Friday there.
Ended up leaving, like, Saturday morning or something like that.
I just stayed at her house the whole weekend.
It was.
It was hopeful in the sense of. Of like, we seemed normal. You know, we. We were into. We were affectionate, not intimate, but we Were affectionate.
And then it just seemed like I was pursuing someone that. Because I told her, I said, I'll pursue you. You know, that's what you want. I'll pursue you and solely you. But it seemed like she wasn't interested in. It was almost like, well, you treated me so bad for 20 years. Yeah, you should pursue me, but I'm not going to give you the time of day, you know, like. And so when Christmas came around and we had already decided to do the Christmas Eve, spend the night there. Kids wake up in the morning, you know, they get. Open their gifts as a family.
You gotta hit that one out.
[01:19:00] Speaker A: I. I got it. I'll get all the names.
[01:19:02] Speaker B: Beast Bees. Loved it. You know, her favorite gift was having the family together. So that's the hardest part, you know, because God didn't create families to be divided. Yeah. And so I'm like, okay. You know, like. But it was so telling on, you know, affectionate when the kids aren't around, almost like as if she had to, like, put up an. An error of like, I don't need him. But when they weren't around, it was like, okay, now we can hug, now we can hold hands type thing. And, you know, I was just, just honest with her. I said, you know, this, this weekend was telling, you know, I said, it's gave me a lot to reconsider and a lot to kind of think about. And so, you know, I, I wanted, I wanted that, you know, as hard as it's going to be because my family hates her, you know, But I, I was willing to do it for the kids, you know, and for, for the glory of God. But at the same time, it's like, maybe now's not the time, you know. Although her word for 20, 25 she said God gave her was redemption.
But at the same time, it's like, I don't know, man, it's hard to be around her. All she does talk about herself, you know, and it's just like. And plus, she still, she still has, you know, her relationship with, with dickwad that, you know, comes around, brings her groceries. She's got a tattoo that, you know, on her arm that she got with him, you know.
Oh yeah. Like a, like not even a month after we separated, she went and got a tattoo, you know, and, you know, with him, you know, some little cute saying on her arm. You know, sometimes the best hand is no hand from Cool Hand Luke. I'm like, okay. You know, like, you know, she's like, what's your next tattoo My next tattoo is covering up anything with your name on me. That's my next tattoo. Really? Yep. You know, I got the W covered up already. I was like, I'm. I'm. I'm doing it. Yeah. The W.
Yeah, the west side of my arm.
[01:21:07] Speaker A: Oh. What significance did that have?
[01:21:11] Speaker B: It was just not. Not to her, none. But with the charges she put against me, it was. I was looking at like 25 years.
[01:21:20] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, that could be like a gang sign or something.
[01:21:23] Speaker B: Yeah. I wasn't going in with that on my arm.
[01:21:26] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:21:26] Speaker B: So.
[01:21:28] Speaker A: But yeah, dude, ADHD is a. I read Slash's book and Slash got arrested for drug possession. He was in just the. The drunk tank, I think. And they. Without telling him what was going on, they took him out, chained him to a guy in front and a guy behind, loaded him up on a bus, and told him, you're going to County. And the first thing he started doing was chewing the black nail polish off of his. Off of his fingernails because he's like, I'm not going to county with nail polish on my fingers.
[01:22:10] Speaker B: Yeah, my. My mom was really worried. She's like, if you're looking at 25 years and you go in with a W on your arm as a white guy, you're gonna get some slack. She's like, so we, we put our money together and I think we paid 1200 for an eight hour session for someone to cover it up.
[01:22:26] Speaker A: Would you. Would you get on there?
[01:22:28] Speaker B: The statue of David, the bust.
[01:22:31] Speaker A: Nice.
[01:22:32] Speaker B: Because the guy was like, dude, you need something dark.
[01:22:35] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:22:35] Speaker B: You know, what about like Zeus or Poseidon? And I'm like, what? No, dude, that's like, I don't believe in Greek mythology. Like, no, dude. And I have a bust of David on one of my bookshelves. And I was like, can you do that with the statue of David? Like that artwork with the David? He was like, yeah, we could do that.
[01:22:54] Speaker A: Sweet. Yeah, the. The thing I see most of all is a panther head because it's super black and dark and it, you know, that's the thing that people always get to, like, blast stuff.
[01:23:06] Speaker B: I feel like that would commit me even more to that side where they'd be like, why you have a black panther on your arm?
[01:23:11] Speaker A: Nah, it's just a traditional tattoo. Everyone's got a panther.
[01:23:17] Speaker B: Yeah. So. Yeah, but you can't even see the W. It looks great. It looks great.
[01:23:23] Speaker A: Nice.
[01:23:23] Speaker B: So, and is there.
[01:23:25] Speaker A: You want. We don't have to get into it on the podcast. Is there still any risk of any.
[01:23:29] Speaker B: Of that catching up for another three years. It's open for another three years of the D.A.
[01:23:36] Speaker A: Oh, my God.
Yeah, dude.
A mutual friend of ours who will remain nameless, got into a road rage incident and stabbed a guy in self defense.
Called the cops. He was the one who called the cops. After he stabbed this guy. They arrested him. There was blood on his pants. So they took his pants as evidence, threw him in jail over the weekend with no pants.
And then a couple months later, the D. A. Was like, hey, you know, there's not much of a case here. A year later, threw him in jail. He went to jail for like a year.
[01:24:18] Speaker B: Really?
[01:24:18] Speaker A: Yeah. Sucks.
[01:24:20] Speaker B: Can you give me. Can you give me some initials?
[01:24:23] Speaker A: I'll say it and bleep it out. It was junior.
[01:24:27] Speaker B: Oh, really?
[01:24:28] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:24:29] Speaker B: Oh, wow. He. He seems to be doing well.
[01:24:33] Speaker A: Yeah, he's out in Tennessee. He's good. Yeah, I talked to him a fair bit.
[01:24:40] Speaker B: Was the one that went in the military, right?
[01:24:42] Speaker A: Yep. Just in time. Just in time for WW3.
Oh, yeah, dude, I. Yeah, I'm so glad that I didn't talk to him before he did that because I would have given him an earful about that and not doing that. And I would have been hated in that family for the things I told him.
[01:25:05] Speaker B: For sure.
For sure.
You talk about lone survivor the wrong way.
[01:25:11] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:25:12] Speaker B: You get a earful.
[01:25:15] Speaker A: All right, you ready to wrap this up?
[01:25:17] Speaker B: No, we're ready to wrap it up. What are we discussing next week, man?
[01:25:21] Speaker A: Next week?
Oh, man, we hit a lot of things that I wanted to talk about.
Let's see, I wanted to make a whole thing about, like, sacrifices for kids. And I was going to talk about my blood pressure thing. Thing. Not sacrificing kids.
[01:25:41] Speaker B: Okay. Yeah.
Like, holy.
What biblical argument are we going old testament? Are we talking about now?
[01:25:52] Speaker A: No, sacrifices for kids.
And I was going to talk about my blood pressure thing, but we kind of already talked about that.
[01:26:02] Speaker B: Well, we can still write that down.
[01:26:04] Speaker A: Yep.
[01:26:05] Speaker B: We could still definitely write that down.
You know. You know what? And other topics I do want to discuss are, you know, let's. Let's do sacrifices for kids and cutting people off because of continued sin.
[01:26:20] Speaker A: Oh, yes. Yeah, that's the one I want to do next. Yeah, I really liked that when we talked about that on the phone.
[01:26:25] Speaker B: Oh, I did write sacrificing.
[01:26:28] Speaker A: Sacrificing kids.
[01:26:34] Speaker B: All right, man. I look forward to it as always. Love talking to you.
[01:26:38] Speaker A: Yeah, man.
[01:26:38] Speaker B: And yeah, let me know when pseudonyms actually gets posted, man.
[01:26:43] Speaker A: Yeah, I made it. Oh, are we done recording? I could put this down, right?
[01:26:49] Speaker B: Yeah, we might as well. Let me. Let me turn mine off.
[01:26:51] Speaker A: Okay. Goodbye, everyone.
