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Feb. 5, 2023 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux

02:06:04

Help Me Stop Yelling at My Kids! Freedomain Call In

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	Right, Stefan. So basically, just to kind of recap my message, I'm a father to three kids, and I have a big issue with controlling my anger.
	I think I've improved over the years.
	I have went to something like anger management a couple of years ago, but just like a course.
	So I think I'm doing a lot better, but I still get these times when The kids aren't listening to me or they're doing something bad and it just piles on until I guess I can't control myself.
	I don't hit the kids, but I am aggressive.
	I yell a lot and things of that nature.
	Basically, just the kind of behavior that I do not want to do those things and I don't want to feel that way.
	But it's... I guess for lack of a better way to put it, I can't control it.
	I know that I'm responsible for my actions, obviously, and I do take responsibility, but it feels like I can't control it, I guess.
	Right, right, right.
	No, I've nobly spoken, and good for you for hanging in there and sorting this out.
	That's a tough thing.
	Do you want to tell me a little bit about, I mean, origin story, childhood, and so on?
	Sure, Stefan. Well, is this like one day I was born, or is there a particular spot where you want me to start in mid-childhood?
	I would say, I mean, this is good to remember.
	I mean, this stuff that's pre-memory, probably if we wouldn't be able to do much work.
	Right, right. Yeah, so what was your childhood like?
	Your relationship with your parents, school, how you were disciplined, that sort of stuff.
	Yeah. Okay.
	Well, I guess I'll break each of those down.
	So, relationship with parents.
	At the time, everything seemed good.
	I think in retrospect, I wasn't as close with my dad as I would have liked to.
	Certainly now, at this point in my life, I wish I was closer to him.
	He was in the military, so he wasn't always gone away, but sometimes he was, of course, you know, for however long.
	But even when he was around, you know, say when I was done school and We were both and he was done work and it was the evening time.
	He would kind of just watch TV and we wouldn't really, we didn't frequently do a lot of things together or talk a lot.
	And as per my mother, I think I was probably closer to her.
	But, you know, I can't recall like super happy memories of, you know, things that we would do every week, for example, like things like that.
	Some people might have, you know, Routines that they had or special days of the week with their parents doing certain things.
	I never did anything like organized sports or anything or clubs.
	I've always just kind of said it was average.
	I mean, nothing really remarkable.
	Either the way I grew up or my relationship with my parents, really.
	It wasn't strenuous and it also wasn't, I don't think, super close or anything.
	Yeah, I don't think about it often.
	I mean, I think about my relationship with my dad, but in terms of my childhood, it feels so painfully average that I can't pinpoint anything in particular.
	I mean, my dad had a temper problem as well, and I think to an extent still does.
	But I guess I'll leave it at that for now, if that's maybe enough for you to pick at, unless you I think I should give you some more material.
	No, that's fine.
	So, when you would have disagreements, of course, which is inevitable with parents, how would that be resolved?
	Okay, so...
	With my mom, more often than not, once I got to a certain age where I was actually confident enough to...
	Try to fight them on things.
	With my mom, I guess it would probably just perhaps escalate into her raising her voice, but not screaming, shouting.
	I do recall sometimes a couple incidents when I was younger that she would use a wooden spoon.
	We're not talking, you know, like a full-on beatdown, but, you know, I think she probably hit my behind a couple of times.
	But a few incidents.
	I'm not excusing even a single incident.
	I'm just saying it wasn't particularly prevalent.
	It happened a few times, let's say.
	But normally it would just be her raising her voice.
	And at a certain point she would say, you know, I'll tell your dad or something.
	And that's what really would scare me because, you know, my dad would shout.
	And there was a certain level of fear that I had towards my father.
	I don't know if it was fear or respect or some combination of both.
	But in retrospect, when I think about it, it kind of seems like a combination of the two.
	Because a lot of the time, I would remember seeing my dad, when he got home from work, right, he would be in his military outfit.
	So, you know, I thought of him as like a soldier, right?
	That's what he was. Yeah, more than thought of him, right?
	He was, right? Well, he was.
	And I think a lot of...
	Even today, because he's been retired a few years, but I think especially back then when he was in the thick of it...
	I'm sorry, did you say he's been dead a few years?
	No, no, no, he retired. Retired, okay, got it.
	Yeah, yeah. It seemed a bit casually spoken, so I'm glad I clarified that.
	No, no, no, no. Okay, good.
	Right. Yeah, so he was very much a regimented person, I guess, both at work and at home, right?
	So I guess that sort of says it all, but...
	Luckily, not to a physical degree.
	I mean, there was probably one or two times that it became physical.
	Again, I don't want to excuse it.
	I know it's never okay, but it certainly wasn't an everyday, here comes the beating son kind of thing.
	But it wasn't that to me.
	It was just him being loud, I guess.
	I don't know.
	I guess even though it was never really physical, I was just – I would be afraid of him.
	Like that would be – if my mom threatened with that, I mean that would usually be enough for me to say, please don't tell dad.
	I'll stop doing whatever I'm doing.
	But that would normally – if I was – if he would find out about me being bad later on in the day, it would usually just be him kind of being mad at me and giving me the business verbally.
	And that would normally be enough, I guess.
	I guess maybe part of that was the shame.
	I would be ashamed that I was in trouble with my dad.
	Yeah. Right.
	Now, what would the business be?
	Give me a kind of a sense of what kind of speech you would listen to your mother or I can't...
	Like, how would you...
	Yeah. What sort of speech would he give?
	Probably something like, you know, let's say if I were to...
	I mean, I can't remember a specific example at this point, but let's just say I was...
	What do kids get in trouble for?
	I don't even remember now.
	I guess maybe if I'm supposed to clean my room, let's say.
	Hang on. Are you making something up or are you remembering something because this too is kind of important?
	No, I know. No, no, no.
	I certainly can't remember an instance anymore at this point.
	There was no defining point in my life where this one day I didn't do this thing and then my dad shit on me.
	No. I can't think of a specific example, but let's say if I was supposed to clean my room, right?
	He would probably say something like, you know, that's your responsibility.
	It's not your mother's job to clean your room.
	When you have to do something, you better do it, basically, I guess.
	Yeah, you expect to contribute to the household, to help around the house.
	You're not a kid anymore, like that kind of stuff.
	Sure, sure, sure. Yeah, exactly. Okay.
	And yeah, it's funny.
	Lecturers can be pretty terrifying.
	And there's this heavy sense of obligation and so on, right?
	So when your father would communicate to you in this way, you said you felt shame and so on.
	Did you... Was it your father's disapproval that you found most difficult?
	Or was it like, yes, I am doing the wrong thing?
	Tell me, I know it's a little hard to remember, but I'm sure it's kicking in now with your own kids.
	What was going on for you emotionally when your father would disapprove of you to this degree?
	Well, I guess the best thing I can do is think about it in retrospect.
	And I guess in that sense, I feel...
	It must have been more shame than anything because I did look up to my father for what he did and having him basically tell me that I'm not contributing or I'm just being bad.
	I'm giving my mom a hard time or something like that.
	The fact that I was letting him down or he wasn't approving of me, he wasn't proud of me in that moment would make me feel bad, obviously.
	I think it was more that than just getting in trouble or him being loud or angry with me.
	And did you...
	It's an odd thing to ask, I guess, but did you agree with him about his assessment of you?
	Or was it just, well, he disapproves of me, I don't like that, or that feels uncomfortable, so I will conform?
	Or would you like, yes, he's right, I am this, that, or the other?
	Yeah, I don't necessarily...
	I guess it's kind of interesting, and I'll bring that up after in a bit, but for me, I think it was always I would agree with him.
	I wouldn't rebel, I guess, maybe if that's where you're getting at.
	I never had a rebellious thought in like, oh, Dad, you're full of it.
	Maybe later on, perhaps when I was later teens, but even then, I don't ever remember having a very rebellious streak to me, although...
	This might be digressing, but since you mentioned that, my brother and my older brother was like that.
	Once he hit the high school age, he was very much rebellious against my father.
	Well, now that's interesting because you can disagree with someone without necessarily rebelling against them.
	But it's interesting that in your mind, it sounds like disagreement and rebellion are the same things.
	Well, now that you pointed that out, it is interesting.
	Yeah. I guess if I'm thinking of myself as a child and I'm thinking of a child – for a child, they would either rebel or they would fall in line.
	I guess I don't think of a child having varying levels of opinion on something.
	Well, so, obedience versus rebellion.
	I mean, this is real deep down in the guts of human life, right?
	Because we have authority figures, right?
	And what happens when we disagree with our authority figures?
	What happens when we disagree with authority figures?
	Are we rebelling?
	Could we have something important or useful or helpful to say?
	Are we opposing?
	Right? I mean, that's a...
	It's a really deep question, right?
	Right. Now, I'm going to go out on a limb here, and obviously it's your life.
	Correct me, of course, if I go astray.
	But it would seem to me that your father, being in the military, and not just being in the military, but being the kind of person who could go into the military and stay there, disobedience or opposition was rebellion, right?
	Yeah, that would be – so you didn't ask me this, but I guess that would lead into it.
	If we were to have any opposition to him, let's say, he would ramp it up.
	He would ramp up the pressure. I can definitely tell you, I remember he would get angrier.
	And that would just mean his voice would raise.
	Perhaps he would swear. He definitely did that more when we were older.
	I can't recall if he sweared a lot when we were younger.
	And just kind of become more aggressive.
	In posture, perhaps.
	But, again, never an instance of hitting or punching or anything like that.
	Right. No, I get that.
	That makes sense to me. So, yeah, that's a very interesting and deep and meaty question, right?
	So, and...
	Like, here's an example, right?
	So... I'm chatting away with my daughter many years ago, and...
	We're supposed to turn left at a fountain, right?
	And I'm trying to explain something complicated and she keeps interrupting me.
	Which, you know, I mean, you're dead.
	I know exactly.
	I'm trying to explain this big complicated thing.
	Why are you interrupting me? And so you get a little annoyed, right?
	Depending on your mood and for me, whether I've had my afternoon coffee or something.
	But what happens is that At least, again, for me, what happens is I get mildly annoyed, but, you know, and she says, Dad, we passed the fountain.
	Right? So she's disagreeing with me.
	She's interrupting me. And, you know, again, a lot of times when they're kids, it's, you know, just short attention spans or their minds are wandering or maybe I'm boring.
	You know, that can always happen. Theoretically.
	Theoretically, of course. But she was right.
	Right? And I had to appreciate – I appreciated her bringing that up because there was a lot of traffic and, you know, sometimes you miss going off and it's like, you know, it's like another two miles before you can do a U-turn or something like that.
	So she was disagreeing with me, but she wasn't rebelling.
	I mean, she was trying to help, right?
	She was trying to contribute.
	She was trying to help. But at the same time, it feels a little humiliating as a parent, right?
	So I'm supposed to be noticing the fountain, you know, that kind of stuff, right?
	So can you think of a time with your dad where you disagreed, and maybe it felt like there was some kind of decent reason for doing that, for disagreeing, and what happened?
	Okay. Is it normal to not remember these kinds of things as a kid?
	Because I'm really struggling here to remember...
	A particular instance.
	Well, any instances.
	Right. I feel like we're discussing a character which we could write in a work of fiction or something.
	Wouldn't it be cool if this happened?
	It's like, no, no, no. We're trying to talk about your life, right?
	Things that happen, right?
	Yeah, yeah. So I guess that's my question is, either you never disagreed with your dad about anything sensible.
	That wouldn't make any sense, right?
	Well, it could have been that I simply just – I never disagreed openly.
	There might have been a passing, like maybe giving him some attitude for something, for example, and then he would get mad.
	But in terms of something that I was strongly in support against him about and that I held that conviction over time, I don't recall something like that.
	It wasn't like, despite my dad's personality, we didn't live like Spartans, right?
	We didn't have to get up at 6am every morning and make our beds and do all these chores and things.
	It was still rather fairly tame beyond when we got in trouble, I guess.
	As we got older, me and my dad butt heads a lot more.
	But even then, he was often not around as much.
	Like when I was in high school, for example...
	One year, he was just halfway across the country for that whole year.
	So in my most rebellious years, I guess, let's say, he wasn't even around for me to be rebellious.
	But... See, we're back to rebellious, right?
	Well, right.
	That's immediately what I get to, right?
	When it comes to my dad, it just comes out.
	I don't even... It doesn't even occur to me that it could just be disagreement.
	You can't have been wrong your whole childhood about everything.
	I mean, that's not possible.
	I mean, unless your father is literally the second coming of Jesus and is incapable of error, then there's no chance whatsoever that you were wrong about everything your entire childhood.
	So there must have been situations where you were right and your father was wrong.
	I mean, particularly as you get older.
	And of course, as you get older, I mean, you're in the youth culture, you understand technology better, like you understand memes better, you understand, you know, current sort of thoughts and all of that.
	So you had to have been right about something.
	And that's the question.
	That to me is really the fascinating, it's one of the most fascinating questions about childhoods.
	And parenting is...
	You aim for your children to become right.
	That's the goal, right? Your children have to become right.
	Because if they're wrong about things...
	I mean, hey, I don't have to pay these bills.
	It's like, no, you can't do it, right?
	And so pay your bills, right?
	Oh, I can walk around the worst section of town flashing money around.
	It's like, no, you really can't.
	I can go to biker bars and call people gay.
	It's like, that may not be the wisest thing if you want to come home with all your teeth, right?
	So... Or, you know, for the daughters, it's like, you know, I can show skin when I'm older and get lots of male attention.
	It's like, well, yeah, but it won't be good attention, right?
	They won't want to go that way.
	So we want our kids to be right about things in life.
	And if we simply tell them that every time they disagree with us, they're wrong, they don't get to think for themselves – And how will they know if they're right?
	Well, because they're used to just conforming, right?
	So then when they grow up, they just find someone else who's kind of authoritative and conform to that person or conform to the media or conform to Hollywood or whatever is going, Kardashian, God help us, right?
	So I guess that's my question is your father was supposed to, I think ideally, supposed to raise you so that you become more and more right And not only even at his expense, but especially at his expense.
	Like, I want my daughter to obviously question authority, right?
	Well, I'm an authority in her life.
	And if I don't allow her to question me, then I'm not going to be able to...
	She's not going to have a huge amount of luck thinking for herself when she gets older, right?
	So the goal is for you to understand...
	That you have to think for yourself and that the argument from authority is a fallacy.
	Like, your father's not right because he's bigger.
	Your father's not right because he's taller.
	Your father's not right because he's stronger or he's in the military or he's got a deeper voice.
	He's not right because he's older.
	He's not right for any of those things.
	He's right because he can make a good case that he's right.
	Right. So that's...
	And now, if you're listening to this show and the way that you were raised...
	I think there's kind of a bit of friction there, right?
	Because you're trying to teach your kids to think for themselves and not obey authority, or rather obey authority, but the authority of reason and evidence and good arguments and so on, right?
	The authority of conscience and so on.
	And so if you're trying to raise your kids that way, but your dad was, I'm right because, or I'm right by intimidation, right?
	then you're not going to grow up with a sense that you can be right against authority.
	You can be right against bigger, stronger, older, whatever, right?
	And I mean, we're sort of hitting the gas a little bit here.
	This is a little further ahead than I wanted to be in this speech.
	But I imagine that that conflict is that you want your kids to think for themselves, but when they disagree with you, that's reframed as petty rebellion to be crushed.
	Yeah, I mean, the way you've described it kind of does sort of reflect on how I feel, I think, in the moment.
	um Thank you.
	That there's a certain way that I want things to happen in a particular moment, and if the kids are not, you know, doing that, then I have to kind of set them straight.
	Right, they are in error, they are doing things wrong, and they need to be corrected, and things need to be made right.
	Right. Right.
	Sorry, Stephan, just to go back, I can think of something when I was older, when I was starting to get into high school.
	Excellent. I started to be – well, I was never much of a kid to – that's not true.
	So before high school, for those few years, like grade five to eight, let's say, I would be out a lot more with my friends.
	I had friends and stuff. I'd go out and whatnot.
	Right. As is common when you have a military father, we had to move at the end of eighth grade, grade eight.
	So I started high school at a new school.
	So my way to, I guess, cope with the fact that I was never a very confident person before my young adult years.
	So I didn't make a lot of friends very quickly.
	I was very reclusive, I guess.
	So my way to cope, I guess, would be to just play a lot of video games, be inside most of the time, even on a nice summer day, let's say.
	So I can remember very distinctly that one of the frictions we would have would be my father wanting me to come out of my room and, of course, not sitting down with me and discussing with me why I shouldn't be in my room, but rather just being angry with me and telling me to go outside.
	And not be in my effing room all the time, for example.
	And of course, to my young mind, and I think to a certain extent even now, I would disagree and say, you know, this is just what I want to do.
	It's not like I'm, you know, whatever I was doing that day, it wasn't always just video games.
	Maybe I was reading about something on the internet or something.
	So that would definitely be, would have been a point in time when I would have disagreed with my father and thought that, you know, I was right to just want to do what I want to do.
	And that he was wrong in trying to force me to do something else that I didn't want to do.
	Right. Okay.
	Now, I'm glad that you've come up with that.
	That's really a deep and powerful thing that you've just talked about here.
	So I'd like to spend a few minutes breaking that down, if that's all right.
	Of course. So, in grade 8, you said you moved and you've got to try and find a new friend group, which is tough, right?
	You get to a new place, new kid.
	Yeah. Everybody, particularly if you're going to a place, I don't know if it's a smaller place or whatever, and the kids have all been friends since they were like knee-high to a grasshopper.
	Oh, yeah. Yeah, I mean, what the hell do they want with the new kids?
	They already got their friends, right? Right.
	Right.
	Right. Yeah.
	like socialized companionship, but you're kind of in the free market of friendships.
	And unless you have, I don't know, some really spectacular thing, like unless you're like the greatest athlete known to man or the most, I don't know, high status, wealthy, attractive, like whatever it's going to be, unless you have some significant marker of high status, it's pretty hard to make friends in new friends it's pretty hard to make friends in new friends in great.
	I mean, I say this because I went to a whole bunch of different schools and then I moved from Ireland to England, moved from England to Canada, moved around in Canada.
	So I'm just constantly in new environments and so it's tough.
	It can be tough to plug yourself into...
	New friendships. Because usually the only people who are desperate for new friends are the lowest status kids.
	And of course, because we're tribal and we're hierarchical, we don't want to hang out with the lowest status kids, right?
	We want to hang out with the highest status kids, but the highest status kids are higher status because they specifically exclude people who are lower status.
	And of course, when you come to a new school, you're lower status by definition, unless you have some big marker of high status.
	So, yeah.
	Yeah. It's tough.
	And of course, if you end up just making friends with the low-status kids because you're desperate for companionships, well, then you get stuck in the low-status kids and that low-status rubs off on you and then you're doomed in a way, right?
	Again, I don't want to speak to your experience, but there are all these complicated things that you have to go through when you find a new friend or you're trying to merge into some new school.
	Right. Yeah, no, that's all completely relatable to me.
	That's exactly how I would feel.
	Yeah. I mean, there was this kid who came to my school, a German kid.
	Unfortunately, his last name is Gerhard.
	Which, of course, immediately became Gay Heart.
	And I actually thought he was a pretty cool kid.
	He had a cool train set.
	I was like 13 or whatever, right?
	A model train set, which I was really into at the time.
	And it was like, you know, he invited me to come over.
	And, you know, again, seemed like a nice kid.
	But it's like, I'm sorry, man.
	The Gay Heart thing is sticking.
	Like, I can't do it.
	And, you know, it's not something I'm super proud of or anything.
	I mean, I was just trying to survive my own childhood and all that.
	So I don't really sort of feel bad about it.
	But... And I don't know.
	I mean, what do you do with the name Gayhart when you are a 13-year-old kid in 1979, right?
	That's tough, right? So, yeah, it's tough.
	And of course, he was in your situation.
	Of course, he didn't. I'm sure you don't have the same last name and your higher status as a whole, but he's just trying to find some, you know, maybe his parents were in the military too and just came to a new Canadian school.
	And of course, I show up with a Bad bowl haircut and a British accent, you know, which is not quite as high status in Toronto in 1977 as you'd imagine.
	It might be now, but...
	So, yeah, it was tough.
	It was tough, and I eventually sort of went my way in and managed to get some pretty good friends and all that, but it was...
	It was tough. It's a little different in university because everyone's new, usually, to university.
	But yeah, trying to slide into an existing school.
	So it would seem, sorry for the big backstory, but it would seem to me that you come to a new school.
	Did your dad or mom give you coaching or set up activities to try and help you to get into the new social situation?
	Or did they just like, off you go, good luck?
	Basically, yeah. Basically that.
	Well, that blows. And that's pretty bad parenting, too, as a whole.
	Stephan, I can't remember really any times where my parents would just sit me down and explain something to me calmly and let me ask questions.
	I don't want to do them a disservice if they did.
	I just don't remember anything at all regarding that.
	Well, the more rare something is...
	Sorry to interrupt. The more rare something is...
	The more you remember the exception, right?
	Right. You know, every night you're out walking on wherever, but that one night you see that big giant shooting star, well, you remember that, right?
	Or that low red moon on the horizon or something.
	So it seems to me sort of from the beginning, I have a little note here, which is like, can't remember but really wants to.
	Right. Right?
	I mean, you'd really want to remember some positive thing, but if you can't, you can't, right?
	You say, oh, well, maybe that's unjust.
	And it's like, well, if you can't remember positive things, that means they weren't there at all.
	Because I still, I can remember, and I won't bore you with the details, but I can remember like five or ten conversations between the ages of five and fifteen that were actually deep and meaningful about something, right?
	And I remember those very clearly because they were so rare.
	Because most of childhood is just skating along the surface and whatever.
	It's just a bunch of nonsense. And a lot of it is useless, empty, but fun play, which I have no issue with at all.
	But a lot of it is just like, no, you can't have any depth, damn it.
	Sorry. Family can't handle depth.
	We don't do depth. Our ears pop.
	So, no, if you can't remember things...
	They weren't there. It's not like there's some weird amnesia.
	I mean, unless you had some giant head injury or something.
	But yeah, if you can't remember things, it's because they weren't there.
	So, I mean, that's a big thing, right?
	You take your kid to a new place.
	You've got to give your kids some coaching on how to...
	Get into social groups.
	Also, as a parent, you have to meet other parents.
	And so, because the highest quality parents are going to want to meet you to see if it's okay for their kids to play with your kids, right?
	And so, yeah, you invite people over, you have your potlucks, you get involved in some neighborhood activities or some local sports league or something so that you can, or, you know, maybe you volunteer at the school or I don't know what, right?
	But you've got to do something to get your kids noticed and to kind of get them into the social situation.
	But this, you know, just off you go and good luck.
	And so, for me, your dad takes you to an entirely new environment with new kids who all have pre-existing friendships and doesn't give you any tips or do anything to try and help get you into social situations.
	And then it's like, what the hell are you doing in your room all day?
	I don't know.
	I don't know how to say other than I can't do this job.
	I can't find my way into a social circle.
	Again, that's really, really tough.
	Just from a cost-benefit standpoint, why would people who already have You know, 20 friends that they hang out with and they've got their pecking order, they've got their who's good and bad at sports, who's trustworthy, who's reliable, who's not going to rat on the teachers, who's not going to turf you up to your parents.
	All of that stuff has been mapped out for like 10 years.
	And it's like some new kid, it's like, okay, well, there has to be a huge benefit.
	For that new kid to even remotely be invited.
	And of course, you know, maybe the parents of those kids would be like, hey, there's a new kid, maybe you could blah, blah, blah.
	But, you know, again, this is all pretty rare.
	But so when you're saying about, like, well, we went to this new place and next thing you know, I'm just sitting in my room all day and it's like, and then your dad is annoyed.
	Well, why is your dad annoyed? Your dad's annoyed at himself, not at you.
	But he's annoyed because...
	He hasn't raised a kid that other kids will invite.
	Now, I'm not saying you're not likable or anything like that, but what I'm saying is that if you're going to take your kids to new environments, and of course as an army guy he knows his kids are going to go to new environments, then the first thing you've got to do is try and figure out how to make your kids super appealing, right? So that they're really good at sports.
	So they're really funny or they're...
	I don't know, whatever it would be.
	Even if they're just really good at video games, practice on that.
	And then at least maybe you can get into an online group and then maybe you can get some local people to play with or whatever.
	Make your kid really good at organizing games.
	Make your kid really good at being sort of positive and energetic.
	And make your kid really good at putting people in their place so that that's really funny or fast with their tongue, so to speak.
	Make something... Something.
	So you're not just this thumbprint blur in the background of the painting, right?
	So you didn't do any of that.
	So of course you're stuck in the room.
	I mean, can you imagine if, sorry to labor the point too much maybe, but, you know, your dad says, we're going to Japan.
	I'm going to enroll you in Japanese school.
	I'm not going to teach you any Japanese or nothing about the culture.
	And it's like, why aren't you out there playing with your friends?
	It's like, because I'm not Japanese.
	I don't speak Japanese.
	So this lack of preparation, he's bothered by the symptoms of his bad parenting.
	Right. He wants you to make him feel better.
	He wants you to make him feel better because he feels bad because you're not making friends, right?
	So rather than say, hey, you know, how's it going at school?
	Are you meeting any kids? Not is there anything I can do, but here's what we're going to do to...
	I mean, you invite the kids over.
	I mean, you can invite the kids to something so ridiculously positive and expensive that they just all want to come, and then they see what a great guy you are and invite you back.
	Like, you know, take 20 kids laser tagging.
	It's like, well, that's really expensive.
	It's like, well, yeah.
	Yeah. So, yeah, it's like saying, but food is really expensive.
	It's like, well, yeah, but you kind of need that, right?
	Social life is important.
	And it also is important because if you can't make any male friends, it's going to be tough to break into any kind of dating circle, right?
	Because then you're just going to be some kid from nowhere approaching a girl who's known these guys for 10 years or more, asking her out.
	And it's a whole thing that a parent's got to dig in and try and find a way to get...
	There are kids in a new social environment.
	So, yeah, him snapping like go outside is putting the entire weight of a fairly impossible situation, which is borrowing into a new social environment without any particular high-states, sorry, high-status characteristics.
	He's just snapping at you because he's done a terrible job, right, of getting you ready for these things and helping you in.
	Right. So you were right.
	Yeah. Yeah, no, that all makes total sense to me.
	And I think wrapping around to the point of my call, Stefan, about myself and with my kids, I think a lot of the time that's why I get mad at them is because I'm pissed off at myself that I didn't – and I don't want to make this too complicated, but obviously I do have a girlfriend, not a wife, but a girlfriend with whom I have these children and we are together.
	And we don't always see eye to eye in terms of parenting, let's say.
	So there's a certain level of internal anger for myself that I haven't been able to raise the kids a certain way to where they would do the right thing, I guess, instead of... Well, you really don't want me to linger on your dad here, do you?
	You're laying all these breadcrumbs out.
	It's like, yes, but my girlfriend and myself and my frustration.
	It's like, no, no, no. We're going to stay with your dad for a moment.
	I've got all that stuff on the list.
	Don't worry about that. I also like the, well, I don't want to make things too complicated for you, Steph.
	It's like, yeah, when are these conversations ever complicated?
	It's always just A, B, C, D. So, no, I appreciate that, but we're going to stay with your dad.
	Okay, that's fine. Yeah, that's really the route.
	Okay, so let's say that your dad is, you know, I don't know, a slight military autist when it comes to human relations.
	I'm just kidding, of course, right?
	But your mom, right, she had to sort of fit into sort of some new social circle when you moved in grade A. So what does she do about herself and yourself and the family as a whole in terms of getting you guys socially positioned somehow?
	Um... The only thing I can, I guess, really think of would be the standard, you know, before you go to school every year, you would, you know, buy new clothes and stuff.
	So we would do that, I guess, so that we...
	Not that it really matters about new school because nobody knows what you wore last year anyway, but...
	Or what your backpack was or whatever, your sneakers.
	That's the only thing that I can think of.
	My mom certainly was not ever...
	Maybe more so now is, but it was never like that mom that would be at every school board meeting or that would be at all the...
	Whatever women mothers do in the community, you know, meetings and book clubs, whatever.
	Sorry, I'm just trying to peel my jaw off the floor here.
	Because if I understood you correctly, and please correct me, of course, if I didn't.
	If I understood you correctly when I said, well, how did your mom help facilitate your family's social life and your social life?
	I think the answer you gave me was, she didn't send me to school naked.
	Because she bought clothes.
	I was in fact clothed when I went to school.
	It wasn't like some Lord of the Flies, George of the Jungle, banana hammock, undergarment.
	That might have done better for me, Steph, honestly.
	Yeah, maybe, maybe.
	As long as it's not too chilly, you're heft in a tripod.
	Do you see what that's kind of jaw-dropping?
	I say, well, how did your mom facilitate?
	She bought clothing. It might be to you, but to me it's just...
	Okay, you've got to denormalize this shit, man.
	I mean, that's pretty wild.
	I've never heard anything quite like that.
	I've been doing this for a long time.
	I don't mean to laugh, but just the disparity between the question and the answer.
	How did your mom help facilitate the complicated entry into new social life?
	Cotton! Pants!
	And some shoes! That's wild, man.
	What the hell? She got you clothes?
	Well, okay. I'm going to go to school with clothes on, but what did she do about the environment?
	I mean, did she work? No, she never really worked.
	Maybe a little bit when I was younger, and she did a volunteer thing overseas the one year when I was...
	Before this move that we're talking about.
	But other than that, she never worked.
	She went overseas?
	She did like an overseas.
	It was actually in Dubai.
	She went all the way over there for like a couple months or something to do some sort of volunteer thing.
	I don't even really know what she was doing, but...
	She went to Dubai for a couple of months when you were a kid?
	She wasn't one of those...
	She wasn't doing any of that weird stuff they're talking about these days.
	Okay. She was doing...
	Never search the dark web.
	I mean, never do that in general, but I'm just kidding.
	Okay. But so, she was doing some Dubai thing for a couple...
	Were you said a year or a couple of months?
	Yeah, no. Just a...
	Sorry. It was probably just a...
	It was a couple of months.
	It wasn't like a year. It was a couple of months.
	Huh. How old were you?
	Uh... Probably 10, 11, maybe 12, but probably 11, I would say.
	And where are you in the birth order? I am the youngest of four kids, but I grew up living with just my immediate older brother.
	The other two older brothers are much older.
	Right. Okay. I'd say your older brother was taking care of you while your dad was doing his soldiering and your mom was in Dubai for some reason.
	Well, if I wasn't at school, yeah.
	Yeah, yeah. Okay. All right.
	Just wondering about that. Okay.
	So when you moved to this new neighborhood or this new place, did your mom socialize or did she socialize with army wives or was the house a tomb?
	I mean, how did that play? She probably didn't socialize any more than I did.
	No, I don't recall.
	I mean, other than if maybe one of my dad's army buddies came over, came for a visit, or her own parents or something, her own family, people that we knew that didn't live in that town, but that were coming for a visit.
	Obviously, they would all socialize then.
	But in terms of someone local...
	She didn't meet anyone new, right?
	Not as far as I know.
	Right, okay. Does that seem...
	I mean, is she shy? I don't quite understand that.
	Does she not like people? It's just odd.
	She is...
	I don't know if I would call her shy.
	Maybe she was at the time.
	It's tough to think of her in that point of time.
	But I would say, knowing her now, she kind of has a certain personality that I think a lot of people will just be like, oh, I don't really want to be around her for much too longer.
	So that might have had a part in it.
	Oh, can you hear me?
	Yes. Now I can.
	I'm sorry. Is she abrasive or something difficult to get along with that way?
	She's kind of petty. Kind of annoying.
	I know this is opening up like a can of worms that I just said that and it's like, okay, what's the context in that?
	Yeah. Like, I can have conversations with her.
	You know, like meaningful conversations, I mean.
	But then, you know, for example, she might say things about people, like, under her breath kind of thing.
	She'll say things that, like, you would just think, like, why would you say that out loud when that person's right there?
	Like, those kinds of things.
	Like what? I don't know, like, I think it kind of causes some tension sometimes with, like, my current...
	Sorry, I was just...
	Sorry about that. My girlfriend and her parents.
	Her parents are kind of from the other side of the tracks, let's say, in a certain sense.
	And my mom would maybe, like, if they're in the room, for example, especially if she had, like, a glass of wine, she might just make a comment about them, like...
	Not even...
	Not something, like, very obvious.
	Not like, you know, you're...
	You're poor or something, but it would be something related to a conversation someone was having.
	It's hard to think of an example because it would be a sort of, in her mind, subtle jab, but everybody else would kind of immediately know what she was talking about.
	Like the phrase, white trash doesn't emerge, but is that kind of the connotation?
	Yeah, yeah, yeah. She would very heavily imply something like that out loud and where everyone can hear and it's like, do you not understand social cues and stuff?
	You don't You don't say something like that out loud, even if you think that way, and even if it's true.
	Well, no. I shouldn't say even if it's true.
	It wouldn't be something that's like...
	It would certainly be something that's not...
	Yes, yes. When I was growing up, I often feel that I had a great deficiency of busted-out old cars on blocks in the front yard.
	Which is not quite that eloquent, Steph.
	No, I get it. But something similar, yeah, yeah, yeah.
	Nice tooth! Yeah, okay.
	Right, interesting. So she's a bit off-putting to people?
	I would say that's probably a big part of why growing up, and of course we moved around a few different times.
	I know we're focusing on just one particular moment in time, but a few different times we moved around and she was never...
	No, it's the puberty move that's the big one, though.
	Right, right, right. When you're younger, you don't really care.
	When you're older, you have more skills.
	But the puberty move, like the grade 8 move, is the big one.
	Well, kind of.
	I mean, there was one in grade 9, too.
	Sorry. There was one after grade 9.
	So this was the move after grade 8.
	So I only spent grade 9 in this place.
	And then we moved halfway across the country for grade 10.
	So I guess there's kind of like two.
	But the second one went a lot better overall, ultimately.
	But this one was, I guess, probably more to the point to bring up – well, I mean, depending on what you think, we could certainly talk about the subsequent move.
	But you're right.
	This was definitely like in the – I guess the – The height of puberty for me.
	Yeah, I mean, you're already feeling awkward as hell and you've got this weird robot body that you're trying to maneuver like some new puppet master.
	Yeah, it's a really tricky one for sure.
	Okay, so your mom didn't do much to socialize with anyone in the vicinity.
	Now, when you did move in grade 10, did your parents socialize more then or was it still up to you to try and carve your way in?
	It's basically up to me still, Stefan, but I can tell you because it's interesting that you mentioned that whole thing about if something was not very common, you would definitely remember it, like it would stand out to you.
	My dad actually did have a one-on-one heart-to-heart with me in grade 10.
	The only time I can remember such a thing happening.
	It was after my first day in the new school after I had just sort of got acclimatized to what was previously the new school.
	And now there was a second new school halfway across the country.
	And it was a bad day.
	It was very hard to have to go through that again.
	So I came home crying.
	It was very emotional. And he actually came in and sat down and talked to me, you know, like calm.
	It wasn't like a screaming thing.
	It was him just trying to, I guess...
	Help me out and make me feel better.
	So I do remember that.
	Well, what did he say?
	He probably was trying to give me tips and stuff.
	I know it's hard, but you need to maybe just try to talk to other kids.
	Maybe just try to talk to other kids?
	Really?
	This is me trying to fill in what he might have said.
	If there was something useful, you would remember, wouldn't you?
	I remember that he did that.
	I remember that he came in and said what must have been nice words because otherwise I wouldn't have remembered this fondly.
	But unfortunately, I don't necessarily remember the substance of the conversation.
	I was also emotional and very sad.
	So it obviously wasn't very impactful because I don't specifically remember what he said.
	But it was enough, I guess, for me that just that he came in and gave a shit, right?
	Well, but it's also very reactive, right?
	Well, yes, true.
	I mean, of course you're having difficulty.
	And also part of you, this is the other thing, of course, with the constant moves, is part of you is like, well, really, like with grade eight, it's like, well, we're just going to move again.
	Why on earth would I want to make friends?
	Like, let's say that I make some great friends here, right?
	Well, I'm just going to, we're going to move anyway.
	There's no point. Like, what do you mean?
	You want me to get out of my room.
	Why? Just keep yank, getting yanked from new, and we're not, we're not designed for that at all.
	Just getting yanked from new place to new place to new place all the time.
	Right. That's not going to do me any good.
	So, yeah, that's tough.
	Okay. Can you think of a time in which your parents did give you some sort of useful coaching or helpful advice, so that kind of stuff?
	I'm not sort of talking school, but, you know, socially and other things.
	I can remember...
	A couple times when I was older, like not a kid anymore, but I don't know if that's really what you're looking for.
	No, no, as a kid. Because you're really parenting.
	Right, right, right, right. Okay.
	Did this have to be a package deal, like both of them at the same time?
	Because I really can't remember anything. Either one's fine, yeah.
	Either one's fine. Okay. I feel silly.
	silly i i can't um i can't recall i think i can't recall a time where my one of my parents or both of my parents sat me down and said listen let's talk about this let's Let's have a conversation about this thing and let me explain what this thing is and you can ask questions.
	That's what I do with my kids now because I'm very much about explaining things to people and giving them the context as to why things are the way they are.
	I don't know if that's what you're referring to, but I don't recall anything like that growing up from either of my parents, let alone both.
	Sorry, like you were saying earlier, it was mostly reactive stuff.
	Like if I got in trouble for a certain thing, then I would have some kind of maybe talk about that thing.
	For example, before the puberty move, I think there was an instance where a lot of us kids were going to get suspended or expelled because we had participated in what was basically like a fight club incident with a new kid.
	With a new kid and one of our friend group.
	And they were basically just fist fighting.
	And then that became a big thing.
	So I'm almost positive I got a talking to from my parents about that.
	Well, but a talking to is like don't do it, right?
	Right. Yeah, okay.
	But never just out of the blue one day like, hey, let's talk about this thing.
	Yeah. Like I already explained, that just never happened.
	So, is it fair to say that you were basically unparented?
	Certainly, I guess, as it regards to my actual parents.
	What now? I'm sorry.
	Are there other mystery parents that I need to know about?
	My point was obviously I spent a lot of time reading or sometimes watching TV, sometimes playing video games and all of those things.
	It sounds really pathetic the way that I'm putting it, but I learned a lot that way.
	I am who I am thanks to everything but my parents.
	Right. So, unparented.
	Sure. And this is a crazy common thing.
	It's just wild how this has occurred in life, right?
	Where it's just like, yeah, we are the most complicated species on the planet, but we're just going to let our kids raise themselves.
	Yeah. And we're going to turn it over to video games and just all kinds of crazy stuff, right?
	Yeah. Right.
	And that's just wild.
	It's just, Stephan, I'm thinking about it now.
	It's like, since I know that my mom didn't really do anything anyway, I don't know why.
	I mean, I'm not just putting it all on her, but I'm just saying, you know, she didn't work.
	So what excuse did she have to not offer me, to not give me anything of that nature?
	Right. There's no excuse, right?
	And my dad's not absolved either, but at least he was working all the time.
	Not all the time, but normal hours, right?
	Nine to five or whatever.
	Well, your dad is also not excused because there's a lot of education in the army.
	I mean, they don't just give you a bunch of weapons and no training and say, go to it, right?
	Right.
	So, yeah, the army thing is like even wilder in a way, right?
	Yeah.
	So, that's wild, man.
	Thank you.
	Thank you.
	Yeah. See, I'm laughing.
	I don't mean to...
	I'm not laughing because I... It's a coping mechanism, I guess, right?
	No, no, no. I get it.
	I mean, because it's kind of jaw-dropping when you think about it, right?
	Yeah. And it's not funny, but it's...
	I'm going to use that word...
	If I were to sit down with my parents and bring this all up to them, they would probably be flabbergasted and probably upset with me because we've had similar conversations before.
	I'm sure you've heard this a lot, Stephan, but their reaction is, of course, to say, well, you're putting all the blame on us for all the bad stuff that's happened to you since you've become an adult.
	You're just putting all the blame on us so you don't take any personal responsibility of anything.
	Right. Is the response that I always get, ultimately.
	Right. Right.
	No, it's really wild.
	And this is just the kind of funny decision that people kind of made.
	We're just not going to parent anymore.
	Somehow, it just was like, after, I don't know, a couple of million years of evolution, people were just like, no, we've decided that we don't need to parent.
	We're just going to not do it.
	And it's just crazy.
	Yeah.
	And so I think that's kind of an important thing to understand, first and foremost, about this stuff.
	and Yeah. That, uh, you kind of raised yourself, if that makes sense.
	That's what I tell people.
	And, um, uh, well, I don't, I don't tell everyone that, but like when I talked to my girlfriend about it, I, uh, yeah, that's kind of the conclusion I come to is that, um, Just a minute, sorry.
	Yeah, no, no, just fine.
	No problem.
	It's about parenting.
	So please feel free to parent.
	Sorry about that.
	- Listen, if you need to take a moment, That's totally fine. No, no, no. I dealt with it.
	Don't worry. I wasn't screaming at them.
	I just... No, no. I told them just to go get the older child to help him with something because...
	Yeah.
	So it's all good. Yeah.
	Trust me, kids. You want me to be having this conversation.
	Right. I got it.
	Right. Right. Yeah.
	All right. So...
	Let's get on to where you met your girlfriend and all of that and the inevitable, you know, what was the marriage choice or not choice about all that kind of stuff.
	Sure. It's weird to me, Stefan, actually, because we actually did have a conversation a couple of years ago when I told you all about this stuff.
	So it's weird for me that I remember telling you about all this stuff.
	I know that you wouldn't because you talked to...
	I mean, you've talked to thousands of people since then, but I will explain again.
	The last time we had a call, it was about me and my girlfriend, and there was some stuff going on.
	So anyway, I'll just get into it.
	Yes, I originally met this girlfriend on online, the dating website.
	Uh-huh.
	And just went from there.
	Yeah.
	We met up once.
	And then a year later, we met up once.
	We had a one-time kind of...
	I'm not going to beat around the bush.
	We hung out for a couple hours and then we had sex.
	And then, for whatever reason, I didn't...
	This is going to sound like in a humorous way, but for whatever reason, I didn't call her back.
	I don't recall now why that was, but I was a young male, so one can only speculate.
	And then a year later, she just happened to live close to and come to the store that I was working at, so we kind of reconnected that way.
	We were kind of just sort of doing what they call friends with benefits for a couple months.
	And then we actually decided to be girlfriend and boyfriend officially.
	And then, surprise, surprise, we got pregnant.
	She got pregnant, obviously, a couple months after that.
	And the rest, as they say, is history.
	Right. And what was it that was attractive to you about her?
	She was attractive.
	She was good-looking, Stefan.
	That was it. And when did you and I talk about this, just to remind me?
	It would have been probably about six years ago.
	Right. Okay. Good.
	Good. Well, good to know that you're still together with the mother of the child.
	That's a good thing. Yeah.
	You know, I... Or children.
	Sorry, children. That's rude. Right, right.
	Well, at the time, it was only child, but then, of course, over the years, you really helped me out a lot, I think.
	One of the conclusions that you came to during that video – sorry, not video.
	It became a video eventually, but during the call was that I was a woman pleaser and not in the Austin Powers sense.
	Well, that sense too, but in like a – A sense of over-pleasing.
	And I've definitely moved away from that quite a bit, which my girlfriend has noticed.
	And it's funny, Stefan. She's actually said that.
	She appreciates me more that I'm not such a pushover now.
	Imagine that. So that part of it's good.
	And you also taught me what a shit test was, which was helpful to me.
	Because I didn't know what the hell that was before you told me.
	But moving on from that, Yeah, so it's about six years ago.
	So we're in a pretty good place right now, me and her.
	But it's been kind of a bumpy road over time.
	But obviously we didn't meet under the best circumstances.
	It's better to meet somebody that you've kind of known for a while.
	Same social circles and someone that you can talk to other people about that they know.
	I know what's the ideal.
	I kind of just stumbled into that.
	I was a really stupid young guy and I just...
	Did we talk last time about how helpful it is to attack yourself in this way?
	Did we go over that?
	Was that a thing? Oh, that I'm, like, blaming myself?
	Yeah, yeah. Stupid young guy, right?
	We probably did. Probably did.
	Right. I just wanted to check and see whether we had had that positive conversation because it may have skipped you.
	We may have skipped over that part if there was some kind of emergency.
	Yeah, I guess there's still a part of me that's immediately blaming myself without saying, well, hold on.
	And I do think about, I still consider nowadays that, yeah, it wasn't just me, obviously, that there was this other person involved that made these decisions as well and could have at any time said, okay, this is harmful for both of us and stupid.
	Let's just break it off, which never happened, of course.
	So... Right.
	Well, and you're untutored, right?
	Right, right. And if you're untutored, of course, that means that you have to make your decisions based on lust, right?
	I mean, what else are you going to make them on, right?
	Right. So, okay.
	Exactly. I mean, as I told you, in my childhood, I received no sit-down conversations explaining things, so as one can probably guess, I did not receive that Into young adulthood either.
	So, obviously, even as a 17, 18, 19-year-old, I knew how a baby was made, but I didn't appreciate the consequences, nor did, of course, my baby.
	My girlfriend. Right, right.
	And had you guys thought of getting married?
	I guess you've had those conversations, but how's that gone?
	So we were engaged a couple of years ago, and then the relationship didn't...
	We broke up.
	That's the word I'm looking for.
	So the engagement, of course, was broken off, and these days we have talked about it, and it's something in the near future, of course.
	I shouldn't say of course.
	Yeah. I'm sure you have a lot of questions now, because that was kind of...
	Yeah, and what's the age range of your kids?
	So their oldest is six...
	Then it's four and then three, and they're all a year older in the spring, so they're close to seven, five, and four.
	Right. Okay. All right.
	Now, you said that, to some degree, the parenting decisions or the parenting approaches between your girlfriend and you are a little different, and how is she in terms of her parenting philosophy?
	She is very much...
	You know, let the kids be heard at all times.
	Kind of, you know...
	I mean, in practical terms, at least the way that I see it, it's kind of like almost always just kind of give them what they want.
	She's not exactly like that, but from my perspective, it kind of seems that way.
	She's still a lot more lenient on things, and...
	But I guess the most – the big takeaway is that she's very much about listening to what they want and – but gives in a lot more than I would appreciate or rather that I think is healthy for the kids because I don't want them to be – I don't want them to expect that they will always get what they want simply because they throw a tantrum or get upset.
	Okay, so would you say it's a bit too far on the permissive side for your particular preferences?
	That's right. Without going into whether or not it's the right way to do things, based on my own feelings, that's how I feel about it.
	And what effect do you see this having on the kids?
	Well, I would assume that an effect of that would be that they find it hard to be told no and they find it hard to be – sorry, another part of that too is she's not very strict on them in terms of having them clean up after themselves or keep clean in general or keep their area clean, pick up after themselves. So, of course, a big consequence of that is that they – trying to get them to clean up.
	Is quite the task.
	Usually, sometimes they will perform magic and do something that I ask them to do very quickly, which is great.
	And other times, it's quite literally like pulling teeth.
	Right. Okay. For the kids as a whole, what are your sort of ideal set of standards for them?
	Like, what should they be doing in terms of cleanups and that kind of stuff?
	Well, ideally, they would clean up anything that they're not using anymore as soon as they're done using it.
	That way, you don't wind up with a huge mess, which you then have to clean up all at once.
	It's just less daunting that way, so it makes more sense to me to just teach them to clean as they go.
	And if they don't do that, then they have to just clean it all up.
	When I tell them to clean it up, like, for example, just earlier today, they want to have some screen time, right?
	They want to watch TV or be on their tablets.
	Yes, we're a modern family, so all of my young children have tablets.
	That's just kind of the way that it is.
	But, yeah, so I told them, well, you need to clean up the basement.
	Basement's kind of like their big play area.
	So that was like pulling teeth.
	Because every two seconds, one of them is accusing the other one of not cleaning up.
	So my thing to tell them, Stephan, is that, okay, well, it's not about what everybody else is doing.
	You have your own job to do, which is to clean up.
	If I find out afterwards that this person didn't clean up at all, then we'll deal with that.
	But anyway, yeah, so it's just very difficult to get them to do anything like that in an efficient manner.
	Right. So the oldest one is seven?
	Just about. And it's sort of five and three?
	Yeah. They're a year apart, so five and four more.
	So, yeah, seven, five, and four.
	I'm certainly happy to hear this and, you know, everybody has their own approaches, but can you help me understand why they have to tidy up at this particular phase in their life?
	Well, my approach, Stefan, is that they're learning, they would be learning to, that I guess that's my response.
	I didn't think about it until you just brought it up, I guess.
	Yeah, and right or wrong, I just want to sort of understand the philosophy behind the parenting.
	What's the idea behind the parenting?
	Okay, so let me frame it another way then.
	I will tell them, why should I have to clean up your mess if you guys made the mess?
	That's not fair to me that I have to clean up your mess.
	You guys made the mess, so you should have to clean it up.
	But they're little kids.
	I mean, in a way, that's almost like...
	And again, I could be wrong here.
	I'm just giving you my thoughts, right?
	Which isn't that sort of like saying, well, why should I have to pay for your groceries?
	I'm not eating. I mean, if they're older, sure.
	But, you know, that seems like a lot to put on kids who are sort of three and five and seven.
	Because, I mean, it's not working, right?
	Well... It does work.
	Like I said, it's not very efficient and there's a lot of… Tell me what it means when you say it works.
	I'm not disagreeing with you. I just want to make sure I understand what you mean when you say it works.
	Well, I'm currently looking at a very clean basement, which I didn't have to clean.
	Now, that sounds terrible.
	They only clean up, obviously, their own toys and stuff.
	I'm not telling them to clean my work desk.
	Yeah, yeah, I get that. It's still as messy as I – well, technically they made it messy, but that's fine.
	I don't mind that part of it.
	I guess another part of it, Stephan, was to say, okay, if you guys want the reward, which is screen time, then you're going to work for it because I want them to understand the value of hard work.
	And then you want something nice in life, you have to work for it.
	Right. So that's part of the philosophy as well.
	Okay, and is that working?
	Are they understanding these abstract concepts of sort of working in reward and wealth and all that stuff?
	Is that working? Well, it's hard to say because the only reason why I think I'm able to get a...
	I'm going to phrase this as get away with it, but, you know, because my girlfriend's actually out of town right now with a friend.
	The friend is a girl. It's not something weird.
	Yeah. So, you know, I'm kind of...
	It's just me here.
	So I feel like if she was here, I wouldn't have been able to be kind of as hard-line about it.
	And by that, I mean I was just telling them, you have to clean it up.
	You have to clean it up. I know that you want to go do something else.
	You want to play, but we have to clean up, right?
	We have to get it done.
	You guys have to get it done, which would be a lot harder if she was here because, like I said, she's a lot more lenient and kind of just lets them do whatever they want to do.
	And if they don't clean up, then she'll end up doing it, that sort of thing.
	So normally she is here, of course.
	It's rare for her to just be gone for the weekend.
	So it's hard to really say if it's working out because I'm not able to really do this all the time with them.
	Right.
	So that's part of what I meant about the whole parenting thing.
	We're not on the same page, so we're not able to consistently put them...
	Give them the same responsibilities I guess because it will fluctuate between them having no responsibilities and them having these responsibilities.
	Right. Okay. Now, I apologize if all of this is out of sorts or out of form or incorrect.
	So, you know, feel free to, you know, put me in my place if I say things wrong.
	So, my first thought is something like this.
	If I could speak for the kids, we say, okay, so dad, it's really important to plan, to be responsible, and to take care of your things, right?
	Sure. How will we be conceived?
	Sure. Because, you know, it's really important to be responsible, right?
	Well, what my response would be to them?
	No, no. Honest. The truth.
	The truth. How will we be conceived?
	Yeah, yeah. Well, no, no, no. I'm going to give them...
	Yeah, yeah. Okay. I would say...
	Oh, like the actual nitty-gritty.
	You want me to...
	Like, yes, I... How are you...
	You know, we had...
	We had sex...
	Obviously without protection, which we did not...
	And Dad, how long had you known each other for?
	Well, it depends which kid is asking me that.
	Well, I'm going to assume it's your eldest who'll be asking first.
	The eldest? Okay, well then it was eight months.
	Six months, probably less than eight months.
	Probably like six months. Oh, okay, sorry.
	I thought it had been more rapid than that in terms of you guys.
	No, we waited a little bit longer.
	Well, it just kind of happened after the six months.
	We had never really used protection.
	Oh, so she got pregnant after six months?
	Yeah, I guess eventually.
	We obviously had a steady sexual part to our relationship and it just so happened that eventually nature...
	And how long, because I know you met online, but how long after you met in person did you have sex?
	Well, like I said, the original meeting happened a year before we actually went out, so that time it was like the first meeting we had sex.
	Okay, so the first meeting you had sex, right?
	Yeah. And unprotected sex?
	Yeah. Right.
	And how old were you then, Dad?
	I would have been 19, I believe.
	Right. Right. So, you're asking kids, give or take a decade and a half younger, to be far more responsible than you were at 19.
	Right. About something that's even way less important.
	Yeah, yeah, of course, of course, right?
	Now, listen, this is not to say that as a parent, you can't have any authority if you've ever made a mistake, right?
	Of course, right? But in terms of, I guess, just humility as a whole?
	Because you sound sort of very stern and authoritarian without the humility of...
	You're speaking to kids about serious responsibilities, about inconsequential things when they only exist because of serious irresponsibility on your part when you were way older.
	Right. It's the humility, right?
	Right. You know, your dad is all about responsible.
	Be responsible. You got to be responsible.
	Right? And you got to participate in this family.
	You got to take care of your environment.
	He didn't parent you at all.
	How responsible was he as a parent?
	Do you see the disconnect, right?
	Right. He's lecturing you all about responsibility while not parenting you at all.
	Right. That's...
	So you've got these heavy abstract rules that you probably feel very harsh and serious about, which I guarantee you, when you were a kid, all you did was try and evade those rules as best you could.
	Oh, I'm sure.
	I mean – When your dad said, I want you to get the hell outside, did you just say, yes, you're right, father, and go outside?
	Or did you just go outside a little bit?
	There was this meme of the dad says to the kids who are playing video games, go outside, so then they sit by the basement window with their controllers on the outside of the house playing video games.
	It's like, letter of the law, right?
	Yeah. Yeah, that makes total sense.
	So you've got these rules.
	You're distancing yourself from your own experience, both as a child and as an adult, right?
	And you're saying...
	Where authoritarianism, which is kind of heavy and negative, where it comes from is when you detach yourself from your own rules.
	And you impose the rules like they're physics, like they're gravity.
	Your kid wants to jump from a high wall.
	You say, don't jump from the high wall, right?
	But the thing is that with the rules that you're imposing, you didn't follow them yourself as a kid.
	Or you may have followed them, but it was only to not get nagged at or yelled at.
	And I guarantee you, you didn't follow them when you were a young man, which is not so long ago now.
	And... In terms of, well, you've got to be really careful and you've got to...
	Well, I mean, I'm glad that things have worked out with your girlfriend, but you really rolled some dice there, my friend.
	I mean, it could have gone a very different direction completely, right?
	Oh, it could have and almost did it a few times and luckily I didn't lose my head over some of those things.
	So, you know, yeah. For the sake of the kids, completely right.
	I would never put up with a lot of stuff, if not for them, but I was never...
	I'm never going to abandon my kids.
	It's just... No, no, but I mean, it could have.
	I mean, I'm not saying this with reference to your girlfriend's personality, but some guys who get involved in this kind of stuff, they end up with alimony, with child support, with false allegations, like their lives can get really wrecked, right?
	Oh, yeah, no, completely.
	Estrangement and, yeah, it's going to get really nuts.
	So you're saying to your kids in a sort of very heavy, negative Old Testament way, well, you've got to be responsible, you've got to clean up, why should I have to clean up, blah, blah, blah, right?
	Now, the most honest thing we can say about cleaning up, I think, is this.
	Kids, who hates cleaning up the most?
	Right? If minus 10 is the worst time and plus 10 is the best time, how much is cleaning?
	Oh, minus 5, minus 8.
	It's like, I agree with you. Cleaning sucks.
	And when I was a kid, I tried to avoid cleaning because it's no fun.
	So I'm right there with you.
	And I, I mean, I don't know, is there any place that's your environment where the kids can go that isn't perfectly tidy, like your car or your workbench or your study or someplace?
	The car is just pretty dirty.
	Oh wait, your car is pretty dirty?
	Yes. Oh, dude.
	Oh, no. Please.
	No, no, no. You didn't just say that to me.
	Let's rewind and just lie to me.
	Lie to me. That's it. I've given up on honesty.
	This show, this day, Year of Our Lord, February the 4th, 2023, is when I gave up on honesty.
	Just lie to me now. Just tell me.
	No, no, no, no, no. I'm imposing all of these rules about clean and tidy, so my car is perfect.
	My kids would never, ever come into my environment and find it dirty and messy after I just gave them a half-hour lecture when they're five years old about how important it is to tidy up your environment.
	No, no. I'm sorry, I misheard.
	Can you just repeat that? Well, do you want the truth?
	Of course, I'm just kidding, but it's a little jaw-dropping, right?
	Once in the last year, it was clean.
	It's very clean. A couple times in the last year, it's very clean.
	I didn't even put it into perspective until you pointed it out.
	You said something about a workbench, but I think you said that they messed up.
	A work desk.
	It's got a couple of textbooks on it.
	It's not dirty.
	It's not crusty.
	Just a little messy, though. Cluttered, but cluttered because there are things I want within arm's reach, so it's not...
	Oh, so you have good excuses for not tidying up.
	Steph, if they ever gave me a good reason why the floor was covered in toys, I would allow it.
	Oh, so like the four and five and seven-year-olds are not giving you reasoned arguments as to how efficient it might be?
	If they're just going to take a break and come back and play later, or they're in the middle of a complex game, or they're just not giving you those things, therefore they're just invalid?
	I guess that's the way that I've been treating it.
	Right. But I agree with you that it's not invalid.
	I mean, it comes back to...
	Again, I'm not excusing myself, but when I get in a certain mood, it's like all logic just sort of...
	It goes out the wayside and it's just like, okay, I'm telling you to do this.
	Yeah, yeah. No, listen. We'll totally get there.
	I understand that static.
	Every parent does. I totally understand the static.
	So you want to have credibility instead of authority.
	The authority is when you tell people to do things.
	Credibility is when they accept it and believe it.
	Now, if your kids accepted and believe it, sorry, if your kids accepted and believed what you were saying, then you wouldn't need to escalate, right?
	Right. So why do you have to escalate?
	Because they don't believe you.
	Right. Now, I mean, one reason why they don't believe you maybe is they see your car.
	If you say, kids, you need to have self-control and you need to do things that you don't want to do, you need to have willpower and do things that you don't want to do or not do things that you do want to do and you've just got to have that willpower, but you're yelling at them, then the form of your statement contradicts the content, right?
	Right. Kids, you've got to have self-control!
	What? Right.
	Dad, you're just yelling at us.
	So that's why you don't have credibility.
	Right. Because if you don't have the self-control to not yell at your children, then trying to give them lessons in self-control by yelling at them is saying, you know, do the opposite of what I do.
	Right. Do as I say, not as I do.
	Well, it's even worse than that.
	It's do the opposite. Right.
	Right. If you want your children to have self-control, and really, I think that's what we're asking, right?
	Is when we say to your kids, can you tidy up after yourself?
	You're saying, don't just follow the whim of the moment.
	Don't just follow what you want to do.
	Do what's important, even though it's against what you feel like doing in the moment.
	Does that make sense? Right.
	But if you're indulging in the hedonism of bad temper while telling your kids to be monks, well...
	Right. Not going to work, right?
	Now, they can't articulate that, but kids have this blinding instinct for hypocrisy.
	Like, I'm not kidding.
	I mean, and you know this as a parent, right?
	I can have said something, I'm not kidding, three months ago, in passing...
	If I say something different or opposite now, what does my daughter do?
	Hey, wait a minute. Three months ago you said this.
	Now you're saying... Right?
	It's like lightning crossing across the solar system.
	Right. I mean, that's just the price of kids and it's a real benefit.
	It's a real blessing because they can point out where your little knots and hypocrisies and the ripples in space-time occur in your conscience.
	Right? They're wonderfully helpful that way.
	Yeah. I get that a lot.
	So that makes sense.
	Right. So you are, it's a trap, and it's the same trap that your father had for you, which is I'm going to model behavior while telling you to do the opposite.
	That's a no-win trap for your kids.
	Do you know why they can't win?
	Why? Because if they do what you're kind of yelling at them to do, like they clean up or whatever, right?
	Then they lose respect for you.
	Because they're doing what you are failing to do, which is to have self-control.
	To do what you don't want to do or not do what you do want to do.
	And so if they obey you while you're breaking your own rules, they just lose respect for you.
	And they don't want to lose respect for you.
	So they'll fight you. It's an odd form of attempting to retain their respect for you as a father.
	When your kids copy your actions rather than listen to your words, it's because they don't want to experience the contradiction between your actions and your words in order to retain their respect for you.
	They're literally trying to help you.
	That makes a lot of sense. By copying your behavior.
	It's a form of respect, in a way.
	It's emulation, right?
	Kids will photocopy what you do.
	I mean, you've gone through the language generation phase, particularly with the older one, where you're like, I don't ever remember using that word, but somehow he or she knows how to use it.
	It's just bizarre, this sponge thing that happens with the language.
	It's like, what are you, uploading a thesaurus at midnight?
	I don't know what the hell's going on, but it's going on ridiculously rapidly, right?
	Yeah. They're just sponges and absorbing, and they're doing that.
	With your behavior. You can't ask them...
	I mean, obviously you can do whatever you want, but it's not going to help your parenting or help you enjoy parenting if you say to your kids, you know, don't eat any candy, it's bad for you, with your face full of candy, right? Yeah.
	I think that's a big part of it for both of us, you know, me and my girlfriend.
	Yeah. You know, the anger is one part of it, but just in general, you know, I want the best for them, right?
	That's why I tell them these things.
	But at the same time, you know, for me, I'm like, the car is messy.
	I mean, that's just one example.
	Or you could do eating well, for example.
	I don't necessarily eat the best.
	Not that they see every meal that I eat, right?
	Oh, they see it in your eyes, man.
	They see it in your waist.
	I don't know. They see it somewhere.
	Well, yeah. Just a second.
	My kid's here again. What do you need, buddy?
	No, no, no. You can't.
	I'm doing something right now, okay?
	I'll be done. I'll be done soon.
	Yes? Okay, I'm back now.
	Yeah, no worries. Yes, I can't recall what we were talking about.
	Oh, you were talking about how your eating, not ideal eating may also be visible to them?
	Right. I've certainly gained weight over the years, that's for sure.
	How much have you gained? Well, when I first was born, I was probably like, I probably gained 50-60 pounds.
	I'm not a big person anyway, so my weight post-high school would have been like 155, 160.
	I'm 5'10".
	What do you weigh at the moment?
	I'm probably around 220.
	I haven't the heart to step onto the scale.
	Do you have a scale in the house?
	I do. Okay, go do it.
	Let's do it. Do it.
	Come on. You've got all this thing for your kids having discipline, right?
	Tell me what you get.
	So bear with me.
	Yeah, yeah. Go do it. Come back.
	Let me know. Okay.
	Yes, I was actually almost exactly right.
	220.4.
	And your pant size?
	Well, that I can check right now.
	What does that say?
	36 by 30, and these ones are pretty comfortable.
	And so, I mean, you were obviously fairly slender before, and, you know, you chunk a little.
	I mean, trust me, it's a bit of a dad thing, the dad bod.
	Yeah, yeah, I'm not... It's not a dad bod, it's a father figure.
	Right, there you go. And how does your girlfriend feel about this?
	Well, I don't think she...
	As far as I can tell, I mean, she hasn't said, oh, you're too fat.
	You know what, Stefan...
	I don't think she would – I'm going to use the word care because I can't think of an alternative word, but she's also gained weight, so I think she's more worried about that.
	Mutually assured destruction.
	Let's not talk about the weight, right?
	Right, right, right. And the weight gain, do you think it's – and I'm sorry to be poking around this stuff, but I think it's important.
	Is the weight gain to do with lack of exercise, increased eating, poor sleep, sitting too much?
	What do you think it's to do with?
	Probably the eating part of it, because I can recall when I was living with my parents still, as a young adult, I would almost never drink pop.
	I would almost never eat out at all.
	I would pretty much just eat whatever was at home or whatever my mom made.
	Whereas now I eat out a lot.
	I'm drinking soda every day.
	I'm less active overall.
	I mean, maybe...
	I don't know if I could say that because I was kind of a couch potato when I lived at home still.
	But I would still get out for walks and stuff.
	So I think I was a bit more active, but definitely the eating part of it has been a real killer.
	And why do you eat out so much?
	Well... It could be for business reasons.
	I'm just curious. I eat out a lot of time at work because part of it is I can't be bothered to make myself a lunch.
	The other part is I just – I mean I guess in fairness, that's basically the reason why.
	Well, no, that doesn't follow.
	I mean, obviously don't reveal your location, but when you're at work, what's the healthiest thing that you could possibly eat if you were to go out and buy yourself lunch?
	I mean, just because you're eating out doesn't mean you have to eat badly, right?
	Oh, I see. Well, Stephan, I also live in Canada, so as you can imagine, there's a Tim Hortons across the street, so I can get whatever they have there.
	They have healthy stuff there.
	I could eat a healthier option.
	I generally tend to go with the options with a higher caloric value because it's more energy.
	More energy?
	Yeah. You know that's not quite how it works, right?
	That if you go high calorie, don't you just get tired later?
	I wouldn't know. Is that how it goes?
	I think so, yeah. I mean, I think it's like the sugar thing.
	It's like, hey, I've got sugar, and it's like, yeah, but doesn't it just kind of wipe out your energy going forward?
	I mean, usually there's a bit of a price to be paid, but anyway.
	Okay, so you could eat at Tim Hortons.
	You can get like a chicken wrap.
	There's things that you can get that are going to be fine, right?
	That's true. So what is the story with that?
	Well, I guess, sorry, another part, actually, the main part of that, I'm not changing my answer now.
	I just, I wasn't, I was kind of on the spot.
	Typically, if I eat something that's like, you know, like a salad, let's say, I'm not going to be full.
	So I go with something that's like, you know, beefier, not necessarily like literally beefier, but, you know, something with some more, something denser, you know, like a big sandwich compared to a salad, right?
	If I wasn't. Right, right.
	Okay, no, I get that. I mean, obviously, you can't live on a tiny number of calories, right?
	Right. But again, there's things that you can eat that are not going to be too bad for you, and they are going to fill you up, right?
	This is like the only way I can fill myself up is with sugar and carbs or whatever.
	That's a bit of a...
	It's a bit of a false dichotomy, right?
	Like I'm either starving with a salad or it's burger time.
	Right. I mean it comes down to – I know that it comes down to self – what's that word?
	Self – willpower I guess because a couple of years ago I did lose all this weight and I got down to like one – 175, I think, was the lowest I got.
	I was looking like a real beefcake again.
	It was nice. It was good.
	Then I lost it all because some stuff happened in my life.
	Me and the girlfriend broke up again.
	I kind of just went back to not having that willpower anymore.
	Basically, I just did that by counting calories.
	I never really worked out much.
	But... I have that willpower in me somewhere, but ultimately, I guess ultimately, I just don't see the point in losing weight, if that makes sense.
	I mean, I know there are health reasons.
	Because I feel like I can continue to live this way, and my life will just stay the same, and I'm comfortable with that.
	If I have to force myself to eat a lot less...
	And count my calories every day.
	And all of that, then I'm putting a strain on myself just to essentially just to look better.
	And I mean, I wouldn't assume my girlfriend is leaving because I'm a little chunkier.
	I don't expect it will create some great joy in my life beyond what I already have.
	I would just, I would look better.
	I'd be slimmer. Probably wouldn't snore as much, but I guess it's like a Input versus output is not worth it to me, I suppose.
	Right, right. Okay, so that's interesting, right?
	So my first thought with that is – and again, there's nothing critical.
	Like we all have our sort of, you know, got to watch what you eat.
	It's one of these annoying things about life and so on.
	I remember I was at Mark Wolbach had to gain weight for a role and he said, you know, eat whatever you want.
	And he said it was fun for about four hours.
	And after that, it's like, oh, God, right?
	And we all know that feeling where we've overeaten and it's just like, right?
	Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so the theory then, if I understand this correctly, is that if you don't understand the purpose of something, or it's not really going to materially affect your life very much, then why would you bother, right?
	Okay, I see where this is going.
	You see where I'm going, right? Of course you do, right?
	And that makes total sense.
	So yeah, what are your kids doing, right?
	Right. I don't see the point.
	We're just going to get messy again, right?
	Right. And, you know, it's kind of hard to make the case, right?
	Because you're living this way, right?
	And again, regardless of, you know, whether it's right or wrong for you to lose weight, you know, it may not be the worst thing in the world for you.
	But as far as, you know, kids, you got to just do things even if they don't make sense to you because it's just for the best or whatever, right?
	But that's not how you're living, right?
	Then it's just going to be tougher, right?
	To make that case. No, that's completely...
	And it's cool how quickly you got there, right?
	I mean, I'm a smart guy to begin with, but I just think that's kind of neat, right?
	Well, that's why I called into you, Stephan, because I knew that I would get the truth from you, and it's like these days...
	Well, no, you got this one.
	Well, no, no, but you can't talk to yourself and come up with the truth.
	Right, right, right. You need to bounce it off of somebody else, and it's not like anyone in my life is going to say, oh, well, your kids don't listen to you because...
	You don't do those things.
	The people in my life, I guess, don't have those.
	Well, it's very rare as a whole, right?
	There's a reason why this show exists.
	Hopefully, it won't need to exist as much in the future, but there's a reason why it does at the moment, right?
	Right. Yeah, so, I mean, then your kids are going to be like, because they can see you're expanding waistline and they would understand sort of where that comes from and what that's all about.
	And then they'd be like, hmm, you know, having a little trouble following how this is so super important to do, right?
	You got to just do things even if they don't make any sense, even if you don't want to.
	Dad indulges himself, you know, why would we need to indulge ourselves?
	You know, that kind of stuff, right? Right, right.
	And again, if, and so in a way they're trying to help you, right?
	I mean, again, it's this odd thing that kids do where it's like, yeah, they really do want you to make better decisions and they won't affirm the decisions that don't make any sense to them, if that makes sense.
	No, that does make sense.
	And do you know why it could be the case that – or why it might be the case that your wife has gained weight?
	I think honestly, Stefan, it's just the classic – Maybe we disagree on this, but when we got together, of course, she was thin.
	I'm not saying she's not good-looking anymore, but...
	And then when she kind of settled down, just didn't worry as much about her appearance.
	Right. Right, right.
	And would you prefer it if she had remained more slender?
	It kind of depends.
	I mean, let's say it didn't have anything to do with you being more slender or anything like that, but...
	No, I don't think it does.
	I like women that are on the heavier side, you know, the double C thick, right?
	So I don't mind that aspect of it at all.
	So I don't really care.
	I mean obviously I want her to be as healthy as possible health-wise, but that doesn't really bother me.
	Yeah, I could go either way, really.
	Right, okay, okay. I mean, again, I'm no expert, but as far as I understand it, there are some sort of reasons, health reasons why it would make sense to, particularly for men, like that waist weight is pretty tough from a health standpoint, that sort of middle section weight.
	Yeah, that's my sort of understanding of it, that as far as risk factors for weight goes, for men, it's that belly, the belly, hip, waist stuff that's pretty tragic.
	Right. But again, that's neither here nor there because, you know, I'm not exactly running a nutrition show, but it just may be something you look into for that kind of stuff.
	Okay, so what do you think it would look like if you followed your own advice?
	Like if you did all the stuff that you want your kids to do, what would that look like, do you think?
	I would probably be a monk somewhere, living like a stoic.
	You've got some pretty strict standards for these kids, right?
	Right, right. Yeah, I mean, when you reflect myself in a mirror for me, I guess, to put it that way, it does seem – well, I'm just being a hypocrite, really, I guess, ultimately.
	I mean, to put it bluntly.
	Yeah, I mean, I would be concerned about, you know, maybe going this sort of like, oh, no, now I'm just a terrible person.
	And that's just another kind of punishment stuff that isn't going to be too helpful, right?
	I think the interest is why, right?
	Like, why... Would you not empathize with your kid's desire to not do things?
	Because that's a human condition.
	The human condition is, yeah, we don't want to do stuff, man.
	Of course, right? That's natural, right?
	So to say to your kids, well, you've just got to do this stuff, you know, it's like, well, that's not how you live.
	That's not how I live. That's not how anyone lives.
	Nobody does all the things that they're supposed to when they're supposed to do them, right?
	Like nobody. And nobody wants to.
	I mean, I'm sure when you've got a bunch of paperwork to do or whatever it is, you're just like everyone else.
	It's like, yeah, fine, I'll get it done.
	But there's a certain amount of grumble, grumble, grumble that goes on.
	And so, yeah, I mean, for the kids, it's like, yeah, welcome.
	Being a human being is a beautiful thing.
	But one of the things that comes with is you just don't want to do a bunch of stuff.
	The fortunate thing is, unlike animals, we can kind of make ourselves do these things.
	But, you know, it doesn't mean that it doesn't suck, right?
	Right. So, yeah, I mean, I think to empathize with kids in that way is pretty important.
	Because, yeah, it does suck.
	And guess what?
	How do you have authority if you make mistakes?
	It's one of the fundamental questions of parenting, right?
	How do you have authority when you make mistakes?
	Because you do, and I do, and everybody does, and nobody follows their own rules perfectly, and this, that, and the other, right?
	So how do you do it?
	That's a really big question.
	Because if you're going to say, well, in order to be a parent who has credibility, I have to be perfect, well, you know, that ain't going to happen, right?
	Never going to happen. So, yeah, then you're going to need some other kind of standard, right?
	And I think... So the real question is, and I think sort of where we can get some real meat on the matter here is, okay, so given that this is everyone, why is it something that you don't want to deal with, right?
	Like, why is it that you...
	This very obvious thing, why is it so tough for you to say to your kids, yeah, I mean, it really blows to have to do this stuff.
	I completely understand.
	I'm with you 100%.
	And...
	But we're still going to do it.
	I hate cleaning up.
	You've seen my car, right?
	To just be honest, right?
	Yeah, there's times when I don't want to clean up.
	There's times when it doesn't make any sense to me at all.
	And so, yeah, I mean, we have to try and figure out a way to do all of this stuff that nobody wants to do.
	And that's a challenge in life, right?
	And it's a challenge that I don't always work at perfectly, right?
	So then you're with your kids.
	You're not ordering them around.
	You're with them. And you're in an honest situation.
	Does that sort of make sense? No, no, that does, Stefan.
	And I do say that.
	Sorry, go ahead. Sorry, I do say to them sometimes that, you know, I don't like cleaning either, but we have to do it.
	But I don't, I haven't until now made that connection between my own vehicle, my own space that I'm mostly responsible for.
	And your body! Yeah.
	Right. And again, this is not to, you know, again, this is everyone, right?
	Me too. You know, I love doing these shows.
	There's some times where I don't want to do these shows.
	I'm happy to talk today. You know, there are times you got a headache or you just don't have any energy or you just don't feel like it and it's grumble, grumble, grumble, right?
	And, you know, so when my daughter doesn't want to do something, I'll say, hey, you know, I completely understand that.
	I generally will do the show because usually it helps, you know, with this kind of stuff, right?
	Like if my headache goes away and, you know, I've got more energy and I'll feel better after I do it, that kind of stuff, right?
	But, oh yeah, there's definitely times where it's like, yeah, this kind of blows, right?
	Right. Yeah, so that's the question.
	So the question then is to sort of talk about, you know, simple, normal human difficulties, right?
	Which is, yeah, I don't want to do this stuff either, man.
	I'm with you. So the reason, and, you know, you've been a listener before, you've listened for a while, so we know all this stuff, right?
	But the reason that's so tough to do that is because you couldn't do that with your dad, right?
	Right. Because your dad was like Joe, a hypocritical authority guy, right?
	Right. Yeah.
	So because of that, then you have the real challenge.
	You can't be...
	If you haven't processed that kind of stuff, then it's going to be tough to be really honest with your kids because that's not how your dad was with you guys.
	Right. And then because of that, because it's tough to sort of counteract that father's side of you, then...
	You're going to end up reproducing this stuff with your own kids, right?
	Right. And then you don't have to follow your own rules.
	You just have to impose rules.
	And you'd never have to talk about whether you are or are not following them because that would be – what was that thing we had at the beginning, right?
	That would be rebellious. Right.
	It would be just terrible, right?
	Yeah, that makes perfect sense.
	Well, you're in Canada, right?
	Yeah. Do you prefer bossing people around or do you prefer following orders?
	It's like, no, no, I prefer bossing people around.
	It's like, yeah, that's because you're a human being and that's how we roll.
	That's what we do, right? And then making kids aware of their shadow side, so to speak, I think is pretty important.
	Because if you pretend like you have no shadow side, right?
	And the shadow side is just, you know, the things that we don't really want to admit.
	They're just kind of part of the human condition that is how we evolved and kind of what we need to struggle with as people and all that, right?
	So if they're not particularly aware of their shadow side, right, that they – all kids want to avoid homework.
	All kids want to avoid cleaning up.
	All kids want to eat crap and sneak candy.
	Like every – all kids want to see something that they want at the candy store.
	They want to just take it, right?
	Every single kid.
	That's without exception.
	And so, yes, I am the same way and this is just part of life.
	And it's something that we have to learn how to manage and all of that.
	And that way they won't think of themselves as bad for having just ordinary human aspects to their personalities, if that makes sense.
	Right. No, it does make sense.
	Because they're not bad for not wanting to clean up because you don't want to clean up any more than you're not.
	You're not bad for wanting to drink pop and eat crap, right?
	I mean, that's life, right?
	We're programmed that way.
	That's how we do things as human beings, right?
	Well, that makes sense. Yeah, just tell them that, yeah, I mean, I'm the same way.
	I struggle with it too, and it's a real challenge.
	And then you have the challenge of you have to explain to them why they should tidy up.
	Right? Now, all the stuff which you're saying, yeah, I'm not saying I disagree with it, for sure.
	I'm not saying I disagree with it, but that's not the real answer because you don't do it yourself either sometimes, right?
	Right. So, I don't, you know, you can say, very honestly, there are times when I don't have the faintest clue as to why you should clean up.
	And it's not as simple as, well, it's just good for, like, there are times when it's more efficient to not clean up.
	You know, if you're running late for work, it makes sense not to make your bed, right?
	So, because you don't want them to just follow rules, you want them to think for themselves, right?
	Right. Now, what you can do, of course, is when they can't find something, right, then you can make the case.
	It's like, well, you know, if the room were tidier, but without the I told you so stuff, which drives kids completely mental just as it does everyone, right, and just say, well, you know, here's an example of, you know, maybe why it might be a good idea to tidy up because, you know, it can be tough to find stuff, right?
	Right. But at the same time, you don't necessarily want to spend your entire life cleaning up just because, you know, once every year or two, it ends up with, you can say, five minutes, right?
	Like, that's not, right?
	So it's got to be somewhat rational, right?
	Okay. No, that's, yeah.
	Because following rules is not what you want to do.
	You don't want to just get your kids to follow rules, right?
	And you want to get them to think for themselves and see, you know, do these rules actually make sense?
	Do they follow? Because if it makes sense, right, then they'll do it.
	And, you know, again, grudgingly and sometimes annoyingly and they won't like it.
	I understand all of that, right?
	But I think that way...
	You can get them to follow rules, recognize that, yeah, everybody wants to weasel out of this stuff.
	Everybody wants to not do this stuff for sure, right?
	I mean, that's just natural.
	Me, you, everyone, right?
	And then you're all just trying to deal with some of the challenges of life as a whole, which is, you know, It's not going to go away, right?
	The desire to not do things that you need to do, right?
	It's not going to go away, and I think if they understand that you struggle with it, they struggle with it, and there's no magical answers, but, you know, it does kind of have to make sense.
	Like, you can't spend your whole life just tidying up, because some people do, right?
	They spend their whole life tidying up, and they don't actually have any fun.
	They don't enjoy their lives that much at all, right?
	Well, that's no good. At the same time, there are some people who you can't walk anywhere, you can't do anything, because...
	Your place is just such a stink pot of a mess that it's no fun, right?
	Then that's no fun either, right?
	And trying to find that balance, yeah, that's not easy.
	That's not easy at all.
	And yeah, just working through that kind of stuff, I think that gives them...
	About life and what's good, what's bad, what's indifferent, what's right, what's wrong, what's a good balance and all of that, right?
	And say, yeah, I could eat better, but there's some people, they're basically hungry all the time because they just don't eat enough.
	And that's really tough for them, right?
	And we probably don't want to be that way either, right?
	And you also, you know, human beings need to enjoy things, right?
	You need to have fun in life.
	And food is, you know, candy is more fun than vegetables.
	Yeah, welcome to life, right?
	And trying to find a way to have fun Because it's all about balancing the now with the future, right?
	I mean, yeah, we want to enjoy life, but at the same time, we don't want to shorten it unnecessarily by eating just crap all the time, right?
	And then, hey, I enjoyed my life, but I lived 20 years less, right?
	Then you have 20 years less enjoyment.
	And so these can be great conversations.
	If you give orders, you're not having a conversation.
	And I find this stuff really fascinating.
	Personally, right? I mean, this is why I do these calls and I have these great conversations with my daughter about deferral of gratification and having fun in the now and we've all got these crazy balances and hey, guess what?
	These balances shift over the course of your life.
	I was much more willing to, quote, waste time when I was younger, but now I'm in my 50s.
	It's like, yeah, I kind of get that there ain't an infinity of time left, so am I going to learn how to play Elden Ring?
	I am not, right?
	Because it's just too complicated and I don't have time and it's kind of a solitary activity and all that, right?
	Especially it's the last couple of years, my parenting and all that.
	So you can have all these great conversations about, yeah, you don't want to clean up.
	And you can also say, I find it annoying that you don't want to clean up, but that doesn't mean you're doing anything wrong.
	That just means I find it annoying.
	And that way, you're teaching them that you can have feelings and they can have feelings, and it doesn't necessarily mean that the other person is automatically wrong and bad, but they can just have their feelings, right?
	Right. Okay. Yeah.
	Well, that all makes sense, Stephan.
	So, yeah, those are my particular thoughts.
	Does that help as an approach in these kinds of conflict situations?
	No, it really does.
	It just kind of wraps around to I'm angry because ultimately I'm angry because I'm trying to get them to do things that I don't necessarily do myself in my own life.
	Well, no, no.
	That's an effect. Sorry to be annoying.
	But you're angry because...
	You've been given this burden of being ordered around by a hypocrite who was your father, and to confront that is difficult.
	Because you had to conform to your father when you were growing up, because he was a military guy, he was aggressive, you were scared of him, so you had to conform to him.
	And now you've got this scar tissue called ordering kids around, which comes from your dad.
	And that's tough to overthrow, right?
	Because that means criticizing your dad, which you're not really allowed to do in your head or in your history.
	Right. Because your dad should have had, instead of just giving orders, have conversations.
	Your orders don't teach your kids anything other than, I'm scary.
	And, you know, they're just representing you.
	And, of course, the other thing, too, especially when you've got three kids, what's going to happen, sure, at sunrise, is that your older kids are going to start bossing around the younger kids because they want to be like dad, right?
	And then you spend the rest of your natural-born life trying to moderate sibling fights.
	No fun, right? No.
	Sorry, I did interrupt you though when you were saying about ways forward.
	Yeah, just deep breath and just humility.
	The humility of like, I struggle with this, you struggle with this, right?
	Yeah. My daughter likes to bake cookies, right?
	So every day I'm walking past the cookie jar and I'm like, I really shouldn't.
	And most days I succeed.
	I'm not saying it's 100%, but most days I succeed.
	And yeah, there are times when I... Don't want to tidy up.
	There are times, oh, I've got to find this document, right?
	I'd much rather be working on my novel.
	It's like, well, yeah, but you can't spend your whole day working on the novel.
	You've got things to do, like everyone else, right?
	So, yeah, I would just say that humility of like, yeah, we're all in this together, and I'm not perfect, but we'll try and figure out a way that people can not drive each other too nuts about this stuff.
	Anything else that you wanted to mention or ask?
	I don't know.
	Maybe just if you have any of your own tips for when someone – and I don't expect that you're kind of the same way as me when you have these kind of anger problems.
	But when you get into these situations where you're, as the saying goes, seeing red and you feel like you're not in control anymore, what would you suggest?
	It's all about preparation work.
	Right? It's like, you know, you have these dreams where you have this exam that you haven't studied for or whatever.
	It's like, well, if you're in the exam that you haven't studied for, what can you do?
	It's like, well, you can't much, right?
	So the work on temper occurs when you're not angry.
	You can't just have a magic solution to grit your teeth when you're angry and make it stop, right?
	It's like not getting a toothache, right?
	How do I not get a toothache when my tooth hurts?
	It's like, no, no, your tooth's already hurting, but the way you would try and prevent the next one or whatever, prevent it from happening in the first place.
	So, I'm sure your kids are smart and verbal and all of that, but, you know, certainly sit down with your girlfriend and say, you know, look, this boss and the kids around, I mean, and That's not really working and sort of get her – maybe she can listen to this and sort of get her speed on that.
	And the other thing is sit down with your kids and be vulnerable, right?
	So again, I don't know what you should do.
	If I were in your shoes, I'd sit down with my kids and say, you know – I'm going to teach you a new word today.
	The word is hypocritical. Can you say hypocritical, right?
	And say, how many times a day do I tell you to tidy up?
	How many times do I tell you to clean up?
	How many times do I tell you it's important to be tidy, right?
	Oh, so many times. Kids will say all of that, right?
	And it can be fun, right? And then say, okay, kids, I'm going to take you on a little tour, right?
	I'm going to take you on a little tour. Let's go out to my car.
	Okay, now, who can tell me, like on a scale of minus 10, totally messy, plus 10, totally perfect, where would you rate my car?
	And, you know, can have fun with this, right?
	And say, look, it's noticed and I got to apologize because I've been nagging you guys about tidying.
	I haven't been super tidy myself.
	So I'm sorry about that.
	And I want you to remember this because it's got to be 360, 360 degrees.
	If I'm going to nag you about being messy, you can nag me about my car.
	And in this way, we can have balance.
	And also, how many times a day do I say, eat better, right?
	And then you can grab your little man bun, your little muffin top, right?
	And you say, this is some physical evidence that daddy hasn't always been eating the very best.
	So, you know, I have been giving you guys these orders like I'm somehow immune.
	Like I'm floating with no gravity telling you guys to be careful you don't fall down.
	But I'm actually falling down all the time, right?
	So, I'm sorry for that.
	This is hypocritical.
	Now, this doesn't mean that we're just going to throw all of this stuff to the wind and eat starbursts and be neck deep in garbage, right?
	But it means that we're all going to struggle with this.
	Look, I don't like to tidy. And I don't tidy.
	I don't like to eat well sometimes, and I don't eat well sometimes.
	I'm going to work to try and improve, but I'm not going to pretend that this hasn't happened because you guys have eyes.
	You can see that I nag you to clean up your toys and then you come into my dust bunny of a car.
	You've got eyes. You understand, right?
	So I'm sorry.
	My dad was really bossy and I guess I just thought that was the right thing to do, but boy, I'm really just looking at it and I'm looking around my car going, oh my God, who might have told these kids you've got to tidy things up, right?
	And eat well when I got three days of McDonald's trash in the backseat or Tim Hortons cups in the floor of the passenger side or something.
	So, yeah, just have a conversation.
	The kids will be relieved.
	They'll be happy. And you will gain credibility out of that.
	And when you have credibility, you don't need to escalate.
	You don't need that kind of heavy authority.
	Does that make any sense? No, that makes complete sense.
	Sorry, we get aggressive when we generally get aggressive to overcome our own hypocrisy.
	Whenever I see someone being overly aggressive, I'm like, boom, hypocritical.
	Hippocritical. And for me too.
	I struggle with this stuff too, like we all do, right?
	So I'm not coming from any, let's say a million times, any sort of floating head guru of perfection or nonsense like that.
	So yeah, I struggle with this stuff too.
	Whenever I find myself getting aggressive, I'm just like, okay, what am I being hypocritical about?
	And then that humility, humility is like, if there's a fault in the environment, the first place I'm going to look is me.
	If there's a fault in the environment, the first place I'm going to look is me.
	It may not be the only place.
	It may not be the last place. It may not even be the right place.
	But, you know, when you lose your keys, you usually have a place where you put your keys, right?
	The first place you look, if you want your keys, is there.
	It doesn't mean that it's the only place, but it's certainly the first place, right?
	And so just as a whole, if something's going wrong with your kids, you're getting mad and so on, okay, well...
	The first place I'm going to look is me.
	And if you have the conversations and say, listen, having this conversation doesn't mean I'll never be snappy again, ever.
	There's no big magic solution, right?
	I'm just writing about this in my novel that this woman has these big breakthroughs and then she's like a total witch the next scene because it's not a straight line up, right?
	So you say, listen, what should we do when I'm getting snappy?
	Here's my thought. We need a signal.
	Who can make the sound of an owl?
	Or just something that's just going to be too ridiculous to, in a sense, be taken too seriously.
	And we all do this, right?
	Because I'm sure your kids get grumpy and all that too, and everyone does, right?
	So what are we going to do? Do we have a signal, right?
	Maybe it's like a...
	Some sort of a car honk or whatever it's going to be.
	The sound of a cat.
	What are we going to do? Because I don't want to make you guys nervous.
	I don't want to lecture you guys because I'm supposed to teach you.
	I'm not supposed to frighten you.
	That was my childhood. I don't want that to be your childhood too.
	But yeah, I think the work comes when you're not mad and knowing that you will get mad.
	Because what happens is, in general, and certainly for me, I'm like, oh, I've had this breakthrough.
	Great. This problem is gone.
	Yeah. Spoiler!
	The problem is not gone, right?
	Got to chase it away with this big blinding insight, but it hasn't gone.
	And so then I'm like, I just get tripped up again, right?
	And so, yeah, just recognize that it's going to take a while.
	It's going to have humility. And just you constantly stay in conversations with your kids.
	So if you start to get annoyed, say...
	Is it the fault with myself?
	Am I being hypocritical? And it may be, of course, that your kids are doing something really annoying.
	That can happen, right? Because you've got to be honest with your kids, right?
	A lot of parents hide their feelings from the kids and then tell their kids not to lie.
	It's like, hello? No, no, that's not how it is.
	I'm really getting annoyed. I'm not saying it's anything to do with...
	I'm not saying you're doing anything wrong.
	I'm just telling you I'm getting annoyed, right?
	Right. And that kind of honesty teaches them that their feelings are things to talk about, not to act out.
	You can talk about your feelings without them becoming physics commandments for everyone else to obey, right?
	So all of that stuff, I think, gives them really good skills as a whole and I think will really help.
	The temper then won't be, I think, nearly as bad, if that makes sense.
	No, that does make sense.
	Right. Okay. All right.
	Will you keep me posted about how things are going?
	For sure, Stephan. Yes, I really appreciate the time that you spent with me today.
	It's just kind of flown by crazy.
	It's been like two and a half hours.
	A, it's my absolute pleasure, and B, I just want to end this, like super congratulations, like mad props.
	I'm so glad that we talked six years ago.
	I'm so glad that you stayed together with your girlfriend, and I'm so glad that your kids are incredibly lucky to have...
	And aware and curious and open to feedback parent like yourself and like, holy crap, what an incredible thing to do for your kids to break a cycle and...
	Man, just mad props and respect for what you're doing.
	It's a beautiful thing to see.
	And this, to me, is like really manly stuff.
	I'm talking to a man.
	If it was a woman, it would be different, right?
	But this is real masculinity and manly stuff and taking care of business and doing the right thing.
	It's just massively heroic.
	And I hope you take great pride, legitimate pride, in what you're doing for your family.
	It's a beautiful thing to see.
	Thank you, Stephan. I appreciate that.
	You're very welcome. All right.
	We'll keep you posted and to all the best, man.
	Thanks for the call. Bye. Thanks again.

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