Couple Things with Shawn and Andrew - 317 | Answering Your Unanswered Questions

Episode Date: July 1, 2026

In this episode, we're answering your unanswered questions from tour. Thanks to everyone who sent in questions- we had a blast recording this one! Don't forget to like, subscribe, and leave your questions for the next Q&A episode :) Love you guys! Shawn & Andrew https://thecouragetocommit.com/ Sign up and get 10% off at https://betterhelp.com/EASTFAM. If it takes research to buy it, let Dupe do it for you. Stop wasting time comparing options. Just go to https://dupe.com and tell it what you're looking to buy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What did you tell your younger self if you could go back to 2008? Is there anything either of you have worked really hard at, but just stink at it? How do you motivate one another when you feel like you are in a slump? Um, that I did drink alcohol. What's up, everybody? Welcome back to a couple things. With Sean and Andrew. Welcome to version six of the new studio.

You're going to slowly see this evolve, but I think this is going to be the permanent place. Yeah. And I'm really excited about it. I feel good. Look, what you guys don't know about me is I'm like a techie at heart. And so to figure out the new camera setup, the new cords, the new interfaces, we have a monitor behind here. It's been really fun to revamp and reface our whole setup. And we'll see if it works. I was going to say, so you're the techie. You deem yourself the techie, right? Yeah. Where are you going with this? That why every live stream, something happens. Are you waiting for a live stream too? Because I would love to do it.

I really don't want to. I also feel like we should thank and apologize the listeners for the last. I feel like two of the last three podcasts we've done, I've been with different mics and different studio and the whole sound's been off. So thank you for your patience as we do settle into this new space. I think we're going to be adding several more things. So stay tuned for that. But we're just trying to deliver the best quality that we can.

and the best experience that we can. So here we are. Yeah. I would like to share a story before we get into today's episode because I have gotten continued giggles from this. It's what happened this past weekend when we were hosting with Jet, our four-year-old. After we had three families over for dinner, we had this awesome night. Sean cooked this amazing beef tenderline.

Like, where is this going? The kids, summer so far has not disappointed. It's been so much fun. We've like, I feel like this is the first true summer we've had with kids. Does that make sense? Because like we've had babies so far. 100%. And haven't had like the summer experience.

This feels like my childhood relived again all over again. I feel like we can adventure with the kids. Whereas previously they were so, you know, you need to be so hands on. You're kind of just helping them out. Now they're adventuring with us. We've had so many playdates and parties and like we're bouncing from one house to another to another to another to an event, to an activity, to We're waking up early, taking hikes, and going to bed late, watching fireflies. At the pool all the time.

It's been awesome so far. It has been so good. But after dinner the other night, Jet and all the other kids went down to the play set, and we're having a good time. And at the end of the night, when everyone left, I pulled him aside and said, hey, Jen, I just, I just want to say, I'm so impressed by you. You've been such a good boy. You're so respectful. You're listening so well. And you're making really good decisions.

And he goes, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Dad, I did drink alcohol. Oh, my God. And I was like, oh, no, oh, no. You know, I have this. He had a confession. I have this hidden room that has, I like collecting things.

And whiskey is one thing I collect. I just like the bottle. I had a lot of thoughts about this hidden room. 100%. I don't think we have a whiskey room anymore after this. Anyway, so it was like a gut check of a, oh, no, what did I just allow my kids to do? and then by extension, these other kids who have been over the house. I was like, oh, no.

He called it alcohol. Yeah. I had alcohol. That's a better way to say. Yeah, he said, I drank alcohola because he always kind of rolls his elves like that. So I was like, okay, I immediately jumped to whiskey room. And I'm like, what did you drink? Where did you find it?

Where is it? And he was like, it's down there, which is where our whiskey room is. I was like, oh, no. And I was like, wait, downstairs? He was like, no, down by the play set. I was like, okay, sweet. That's at least good news. is right there. So I'm like, what did you drink it out of? He said, oh, it's like the glass,

but not the glass. And it's like see through, but bendy. And I was like, okay, interesting. I don't know what he's talking about. Yeah. But I put Jet down to sleep and I was like, I'm going to go find this bottle because he said that he took a sip and then kicked it. So I was like, I'm assuming it's still down there. I take a little hike down there. And I find I find a Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola, not alcohola. He drank Coca-Cola. He drank Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola. He heard one of his friends say that's Coca-Cola. In his mind, he heard alcohol. He still thinks it's alcohol. He still can't call it Coca-Cola. He says alcohol, which is adorable. So anyway. Until he goes and tells people that he drank alcohol. That's an issue. It was a huge relief that

neither our kids nor the other kids drank alcohola. And as a reward for his good behavior and honesty, after church on Sunday, we stopped and got a glass bottle of Coca-Cola. And we shared it as a family, a single glass bottle, which I was like, they thought it was like the greatest thing that's ever had in their entire life. It was really, really fun. And I was saying this morning, he's like, I love Coca-Cola. The way Bear says it is so good. Coca-Cola.

He goes, Mama, do you like Coca-Cola? I was like, I really do. And he goes, yeah, I love Coca-Cola. The kids are just so good. But now it's like a daily thing where they're like, can we have Coca-Cola? Can we have Coca-Cola? I'm like, no. That was honestly straight Cokes that I've ever drank in my life, probably under a dozen.

You crushed? Crushed. I feel like I did like Coke Zero Vanilla or whatever. No, mine was like miniature glass bottles. That was like one of my most memorable summer childhood memories. Sipping Coca-Cola? Oh, because we would like pack up everything and go to the boat. and on the boat, like the kids drank was Coca-Cola.

Man. It was so good. And especially out of the glass bottles, I would have Coke before on my practices. Wow. What was the last time you had a Coke before this past weekend? It's been a minute, but you know what? It slaps.

It's good. It did not hit like I wanted it to. I'm not going to lie. I will say we got a glass bottle. And I think it might have been like an old one because I remember even back in the day, like if you have, if you get a glass ball that's

price out on the shelf too long, it's not as like spicy, fizy. Yeah. It's got to be ice cold. Mm-hmm. Dude, we're going to have to get some Coca-Cola now.

Now I want to cope. Yeah. We view it very much as a treat. We probably won't be doing that too much. But the other day, Sean was drinking it. She was wearing this Team USA tank top, drinking a Coca-Cola.

I think we had the USA soccer game on. I was like, America, man. America. America. It's great. I will say, we are people have been telling me parents wiser and more mature parents than us have been telling us for a long time that like

just wait like you're in the thick of it with babies but it just gets crazier you know better or crazier crazier oh god okay okay got and i'm very quickly starting to get glumces of that where it's becoming more complex not as black and white the black and white the black and white phase with infants is like easier where it's like keep them alive you know they're just like watch out for stairs it's very like black and white tech things now we're getting into more complex parenting where you're like I don't know how to do this yeah with each kid we're noticing that like their demeanors are wildly different in fostering confidence and taming aggression and fostering kindness, but making sure you're not, I mean, we're getting into such a crazy phase right now

where I feel lost. I don't want to like throw any kids under the bus here, so I can't give too many details, but we're a lot of discipline, a lot of consequences, a lot of like demeanor is having to be finessed and it is blowing my mind. I need a coach. I don't feel lost. I don't feel lost. It's just, you know when we had Drew? Yeah. How you're like, holy frick, like what am I doing? Yeah. Like this is uncharted territory. And I feel like you and I have talked about this before with parenting where like every time you kind of get into a groove, you're like, I got this thing down. Then the kid matures and takes like the next step. And you're like, this is new.

This is new territory. We are diving headfirst right now into very new territory. I 100% agree. That it's not that I don't know. I don't know yet. and I got to go find some mentors right now. Got to cast my net wide. Find the good people.

Say, help me. It is, it's interesting. Little things like we go to the pool now and Jet will just run off with a new friend. And then he comes back to us and he's like, hey, can I have a credit card? And you're like, for what, buddy? What's your pin number?

And it's like there's a new form of autonomy. Yeah, which is. It's beautiful. And then like inter-sibling issues, which are not big, but it's like resolving those looks different. You did spark a thought though where despite the phase or the context or the extraneous situation we're in, I think it will be helpful to just like say, hey, here's what our family's about, kind of like the values that we have, but maybe expand on that list.

And that way it's like an anchor, no matter that. situation those always apply and it's like hey you didn't do you didn't live up to this which we expect from our family or you did a great job doing this you know what I'm saying it is interesting the way my brain works though and I think that's kind of how it's worked even since we had kids as infants but like the casting the net I find so much security in finding you know those three to five to seven mentors where I'm like, I need to ask you a question. I don't know what to do or people who are pouring into our kids. I'm a firm believer.

You and I have talked about this before. You're a firm believer in like the coaches that will surround our children. Having phenomenal coaches, whether they're teachers, mentors, coaches, counselors, like whatever. But I will give a brief, like a vague title of coaches. I think finding great coaches. for our children will be a game changer for their life. And I'm already in my head.

I'm like, okay, I know one person I need to call today and be like, we're going to get you on the schedule. You've done a phenomenal job at that with our kids. And it's been cool to see, I've benefited from it because you really led the charge in the parenting realm. But like, it's always been, okay, new phase. We feel the overwhelm. And then you've reached out.

Mallory was a huge resource for you. And it's like, and it's like. Julia, right or guy. Yeah, because her kids are just beyond ours and age. And very similar. But it's almost like, you know, if you're walking down a path, I feel like we're at a turning point in the path where we can see where we've been clearly. And like even with our friends having new kids, it's like, oh, yeah, we've dealt with that.

We can do this. That's no problem. Do this. But then if you turn around the corner and you look where we're going, it's like foggy. You can't see clearly. And you just need someone. who has been there and said, oh, yeah, here's how you're going to navigate through this. You'll be fine.

This is not also the episode that we were planning on talking about, but I think we need to talk through some things. An example, let's give a direct example of children, is like Drew. Drew is very, like, academic type A needs a lot of, I don't want to say coddling, but like she needs poured into emotionally with like patience and time and not intense one-on-one, but just like enough, she really needs to be seen. Yeah. And I love that about her.

I have been so on the fence this summer. Drew got into this academic program at Vanderbilt for her age. I mean, which not like college. And I was so on the fence of like, that feels too intense for summer. She should be running and jumping and playing and being free with everyone to go crazy. And we finally, I pulled, you know, ripped the Band-Aid and, We ended up sending her. Because she wanted to.

Yeah. She wanted to. She has thrived. The amount of times I've seen a full smile from Drew, like just bright with joy in a way that I really haven't seen. It's like a new awareness that she has that leads to this joy. It is so beautiful. So like that's an example of very specific to her.

I was on the fence of like that mentorship or coach role, but that one has like really paid off. They poured into her. And you could even tell, like, driving up and dropping them off, the demeanor of the teachers and the professors that were with her. And they've been spectacular. On the other hand, it was surreal to see Drew walking out of your college campus, the college campus that I went to when I was 18 and now she's there when she's sick. Six. Six. Sorry. I thought she's there when she's six. Yeah. It's amazing. But then another like mentor or coach that is, I foresee going to be incredibly beneficial to Jet

is his wrestling coach. Yeah. And he's the guy we're going to call today. And he's like, you're going to get on the books. Because Jet has so much excitement and zest for life. And he's so strong and he's so big. He has to learn how to control that. Yeah. There's a saying, as far as boys go, it's been really fascinating as Jet

turns the corner from being like a little child to a top. What do you call him now? He's a kid. He's a kid now. Physically he's different. The way he interacts with kids is different. And I don't want to suppress his abilities. But I do want to teach self-control and self-awareness.

And there's a saying that goes, it's better to be a warrior in a garden than a gardener in a war. and so my approach has been to date you can wrestle and be aggressive and punch anytime you want as long as it's with me yeah anywhere else you cannot do it but if you want to do it and you want a roughhouse I'm your guy so like giving him full allowance and permission to to be that way in certain situations i.e. me um but we'll see how that pans out if you guys have any tips or tricks, please let us know. We are accepting any and all.

You're going to be a mentor or coach, your children? This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. I feel like people talk about mental health way more openly than they used to, which is such a good thing. But even with all of that progress, actually asking for help can still feel really hard.

That's right. And BetterHelp's latest research really highlights that. Better Helps' 2006 State of Stigma Report surveyed 2,000 Americans and revealed that 85% of Americans believe getting support is wise, yet 74% say society discourages people from doing so. That is such an interesting disconnect. We all say it's a good thing to ask for help, but then somewhere along the way people still feel like they should just figure out everything

on their own. I think one of the best things we can do is normalize those conversations and encourage the people we care about to reach out if they think therapy could help them in any way. And BetterHelp has over 30,000 licensed therapists and has helped more than 6 million people around the world. They also have an average rating of 4.9 out of 5 for a live session based on more than 1.7 million client reviews. They do the initial therapist matching for you based on a short questionnaire, and if your first match isn't the right fit, you can switch to another therapist anytime for tailored recommendations. Don't let stigma stand in the way of support. Start therapy with BetterHelp. Sign up and get 10% off at BetterHelp.com.com slash EastFam. That's BetterHelp.com.

com slash E-A-S-T-F-A-M. Speaking of Mentor and Coach, so today's episode is a revisiting of the tour that we did in the sense of questions that were submitted on tour. We had a little QR code that hundreds of questions were submitted through, and we have some that we were not able to address due to time constraints that we will go through here. And the first one that I feel like you teed up well, Sean, is that, okay, this is from Aaron and Isaac who ask, we just move to a new state and are really struggling to build a new community.

Any advice for us? We also have two kids, age six and four. Who do you feel like is more social between us? Ew. So I think you might have good advice on how you've made friends. I'm the best in growth over the years in that department. How have you done it? I was a hermit for a really long time,

and I was afraid to go out and make friends and build community. But I'd say especially now with kids, I don't want to rub off my hermitness on them just because that's how I am, because they seem very social. So I have told myself different things in making friends and communities, which is one every year that our kids are in school,

I make it a point to learn all their classmates and learn all their classmates' parents, or at least one. And then you do a great job when we're at, you know, the first day of school orientation, you're like, oh, are you Jack's dad? You do a great job. It gives you a little confidence in approaching that situation. I think especially with the community,

if you have children immersing yourself into your children's life with their friends and then meeting their parents, you're going to be going through all the same things. for the foreseeable future. So those are really great peers to befriend. And so for us, we'll do like play dates at our house where Drew will get to invite one or two or if you were doing a big one,

like five or the whole class of her friends and their parents. And so their parents will hang out with us and the kids will go play. And then Jet will do one or we'll do a big night where anybody's invited. But I think that is probably the easiest way to make friends? Because if you are a parent of a child

and you're like, how do we make friends? I guarantee you someone else in your kid's class is thinking the same thing. I'm also trying to think new friends that we made have done a great job

at inviting us into things. So like whether it be birthday parties, like or I'm thinking of two kids' parents that we know who have just like said, hey, we're doing this. You want to join us

or you want to do that? You want to join us? And if you're, the one inviting, I feel like it just like provides your own opportunities to start hanging out with people. And then you're like, oh, sweet, let's hang out with them more. You know, you can kind of just get the wheels turned on that way. I will say that is something that Andrew and I weren't good at and we're trying to get better at. It's like if you get invited to something, you should try to go, especially on behalf of your kids. Yeah. Like if your kids get invited to birthday parties, you should go to

I mean, there's seasons for everything, but if you're in the favor of trying to make friends, then yeah, I agree. I agree. Okay, next question. It says, Sean, tell us more about your dad running a sprint car. I don't know, like, a lot of details, but I know my dad race, as my mom would say, and as he would say, anything with wheels for like 20 years. So he raced dirt bikes, BMX for a while. Three wheelers, four wheelers, sprint cars. And I've heard stories of how he's broken every bone in his body, and they've snuck into the Daytona 500 multiple times. It was like the whole thing that they did. And he just like lived in the racing world his whole life. Yeah, it's been clutch now that Jets into motocross,

having Poppy there to mentor him has been really big time. And then that when he like retired and he stopped racing, And he stopped racing when they had me. And they had me at the age of 32. It all transitioned into like leisurely hobby riding. So my entire life, my dad has always had a motorcycle, like a Harley Davidson style motorcycle like a cruiser. And he would pick me up from practice every single day on a motorcycle.

We would go out to the lake on the motorcycle. my dad would go on like um what are those called snowmobile trips yeah snowmobile trips or motorcycle trips where he would like bike across the country with like they're called but yeah with like a thousand of their bikes yeah you know rallies rallies that might be the word I'm not sure I want to say crawl but he wasn't drinking and riding motorcycle he was and then he taught me how to ride my first motorcycle at the of five, I think, or six. And I got my own motorcycle at the age of eight. It was a Honda 70.

Beast. So yeah. That's where the motorcycle stuff comes from. Sean's dad is a legend. Okay, this one is from Carly. Sean, are you excited about the LA Olympics? Will you be going? And what are your expectations for the gymnastics team?

I am so excited for the LA Olympics. We will be going. We'll be taking the whole family, especially since it's in the United States. I mean, we're ecstatic. What will we be doing? Don't know yet. That stuff is slowly getting booked out,

but I would assume we'll be doing very similar to Paris, a lot of like lifestyle commentary and coverage. And my expectations for the gymnastics scheme? I don't know yet. I'd say we're in 2026. the team build, the building of the team usually starts around now. Like in 2026, strategically you'll start seeing the debuts of like who you could probably put on the team. You don't usually see many people come out of the woodworks the year before, though some can.

But I'd say 2026 is when people will like start their path. Like we just saw Caitlin O'Hashy make a comeback. America Classic. So starting today, we'll start seeing it. But obviously I feel great because we're the United States gymnastics team and we're always boss. Let's go. Okay.

Andrew. Yeah. You mentioned in chapter one, the NFL gig, while also having other options you focused on. Is there any thoughts on possibly approaching the NFL as a job and paycheck as opposed to a career? I think the question they're asking is, we write a lot about finding our passions and our values and stuff and then finding the

paths that align with that. I think they're arguing why not just approach it like you're getting a paycheck and it's your job. Yeah, it's interesting. No, I've not had thoughts on that until just now, but thank you to Mike who asked that. Gosh, I was always like a bubble player in football And I feel like what pushed me over at the edge of qualifying for teams in high school, college, and the pros was like my buy-in. And it meant so much to me. I dreamed about it ever since I was a kid. My dad played. My family played.

I loved it. I lived for it. And so that's what helped me, like, turn my bubble playerness into, oh, yeah, he'll make the cut because he's bought in. And then, yeah, that thing. just changed in the NFL and I couldn't I couldn't deal with it that probably would have been helpful to de-escalate my buy-in because I was so intensely obsessed with it in an unhealthy way in the NFL but I was not able to do that until I found another passion which is making videos and cameras and I feel like I had another team and all these YouTubers that were meeting it was really amazing in

in taking away the urgency and the desperation that I had attached to football in the NFL in a way that allowed me ultimately to, yeah, I guess I did at the end treat football, not as a job, but as like content. When I was playing for the Redskins, you know, I'm not saying I did it right. I share all of my mistakes in the book, but like I was just like, oh, what a fun thing to make more videos about. And as opposed to, oh, my gosh, I need. this. So yeah, appreciate the question, Mike. I haven't thought about it that way, but thank you.

How has faith impacted your perspective from Mariah? Whoa. I think one of the ways I've always tried to explain it is it's given me a compass to know, like, which ways up, which way's north, which way to go. I feel like my faith really strengthened and kind of started to take off around the Olympics when I was a teenager really confused with identity and I had the whole world saying I was a gymnast and that's like what my worth was rooted in and that you know the whole like gold medal did you get a gold medal or did you lose type situation I think I started leaning on faith then and realizing that like I was more than that. Yeah, it's just kind of been a guiding light. We had a whole episode on faith,

which, spoiler alert, you know, I'm not the first one to try to paint a convincing, I don't know, debrief on what faith can bring. Do you think you convince anybody? No, but my point is no one ever has. Oh, yeah. And that's not the point. It's like if someone, people have been talking about this issue for thousands of years and I'm not some unique I can't solve that problem but it's interesting I feel like it's a choice in a lot of different ways and it has to be a choice and that's what that's what makes it faith as opposed to certainty but I do want to do another episode on what if you're gonna apply an adjective to each of the different major religions gods what would that be and what the side effects

would be. So like Christianity talks about Jesus who's sitting with God in heaven and he comes down to be a man, not just a man, a man on a cross. You know what I'm saying? It's like humility is the term. So faith and that is interesting, the side effects that can have, you know? As opposed to some other gods who maybe it's more about like strength. or maybe it's more about goodwill. Like what's the one thing you're focused on? Thank you for the question, Mariah. I'm gonna stop talking about this,

but some people love that episode on faith and some people did not like it. One question says, what would you tell? This is to me, sorry. What would you tell your younger self if you could go back to 2008 and what would you say about courage and commitment and where it would get you? I'm interpreting that question.

I'm interpreting that question differently than I did the first time I read it when I would say. I would say what would I tell myself about courage and commitment in 2008? I think I had it figured out in 2008. And I don't mean that in like a self-centered way or like a, you know. arrogant. But like I had learned how to literally be blind to what would happen in a split second later and like try something absolutely insane and have all the.

courage to do it and go out in the biggest arena and I had mastered that. I think what I would say to myself in 2008 is like, don't forget it, don't lose it. Because I thought you didn't need the courage or the commitment outside of elite athletics. And so I got lost in life for a while before I went back to that approach and just used it in every other place in my life. You feel like you've been decent at it recently? I do. I'm proud of you. Do you?

I think so. Do you feel like you've been Dysenetic? I think I've, yeah, I think I'm learning. Actually, you are outpacing me in a lot of different areas anymore. I think that, well, really? I feel like we're a good team because in, I don't know, we just balance, we ebb and flow really nicely. We ham and egg it.

But this is a question. This is a question from Tara, who asks, is there anything, either of you have worked really hard at to excel, but just stink at it. Still just stink at it. Throwing a ball. You have not worked really hard to do that. Sean, for whatever reason, with athletic as she is, she cannot throw a baseball. I have a ball. It must be from holding on to the gymnastics bars all those years. My hand doesn't like to let go over the ball. So the ball goes like this, straight to the ground. One in every 10 throws, she'll just throw it in the dirt. One of my favorite things to do, one of my favorite things that we do is the celebrity softball

games for charity. But I get so cripplingly nervous on those, because I'm like, don't throw it into the ground. I go with a freaking ball hand, just let go. Now you know how my NFL career went and felt when you're focusing on entirely the wrong thing. You know what my career would have been like, had my hand. just like not held on though. Yeah. You're saying if you're swinging around a bar

and it released spontaneously. Yeah. That'd be an issue. I would say this. When I went from high school to college, I was like really good at writing in high school. And I thought, well, I have to be a well-rounded man. So I'm going to study engineering

and all these STEM programs, you know, because I wasn't as good at that as I was at writing. That was a mistake. I feel like the way that I approach life now is have awareness on what I'm good at and try to do more of that, like specialize in that. And then if I love doing something that I'm not good at, just accepting that as what it is like golf. Like, okay, sweet.

I like to golf with the boys. I don't like to golf for score, but I like to golf with the boys and just hang out there so I'm not going to go golfing by myself. I will go golfing in like a group of that guys that I like. But, you know,

it's like you just are able to game playing a little differently. I also don't really like golfing like that. So that was just an example. Tangent. Yeah. This episode is sponsored by dupe.com and I have to say this has become

one of my favorite websites recently. We buy a lot of stuff for our house for the kids, for travel, and every once in a while, order something that looks incredible online, then it shows up and you're immediately like, well, that's disappointing. Mine was when I ordered the travel backpack. I spent forever reading reviews, watched videos, thought I had found the perfect one, then it arrived and it was uncomfortable, didn't fit, didn't have everything I needed. And I ended up dealing with the whole return process,

which was a huge waste of time. That's why we've been using dup.com. Their new research for me tool is amazing. Instead of spending an hour opening 25 tabs, trying to figure out what's actually worth buying. You just tell it what you're looking for. I'll literally type something like I need a backpack for a three-day hiking trip or what's the best cordless vacuum for a house with kids and a dog. And it does all the research for you. What I love is that it doesn't just tell you what to buy. It also explains why. It compares features, pricing, and even points out products you should probably skip. It honestly makes you feel so much more confident before you actually hit buy. If it takes research to buy it, let DUP do it for you. Stop wasting time comparing options. Just go to

D-U-P-E.com and tell it what you're looking to buy. That's D-U-P-E.com to finally feel confident about what you're buying. Do you think that is the same approach with children? Do you think you need to utilize weaknesses and compensate for them? Or do you think they should just find what they like and what they're good at and run with it? I think you should help them build awareness on what their gifts are, right? Mm-hmm. So...

Do gifts mean good? Yeah. Yeah. What they're good at? Yes. I'm not saying force him into doing that. I think they should know, oh, I am really smart or I can do puzzles really well or I'm really fast. I don't think you're doing any injustice and like trying to make it a whimsical experience of like, oh, it's just, yeah, everyone's good at something. Help them find that. And if they want to do that, great. If not. not, that's totally fine too, but like at least they have some rubric. What do you think? In my mind, I keep thinking like, what if our kids choose something that they're like absolutely not good at?

But I also think. Choose something for what? As a hobby or as a profession or what? Either. That's not the same thing. That's why I think having an awareness on, hey, you know what, I'm going to do this professionally and I like it and I'm good at it or I don't know. You just got to like, you got to know.

You don't think about that a little more. Me? I do. No, no. So. But I also think the likelihood of anybody choosing something that they're terrible at because that's their favorite thing in the whole entire world is like, probably less likely.

I agree. I think you just got to like it helps to have awareness. There's this in stoicism, which I want to do a whole other podcast on Christian stoicism, which is kind of a, yeah, I'm making this category up, this philosophical school up.

but they say you want to approach your life as an audience member to how you're living. Like be a viewer of your own life. And to me, I interpret that as like, hey, if you know what you're good at and know what you're bad at, then you can laugh at things and not be surprised by things you're bad at. And you can, I don't know, learn or dig into the things that you're good at. good at if you want to. And if not, at least you know, yeah, I'm good at this. And it gives you some source of confidence or boundaries to navigate through. So that's just a thought. You want to do two more questions? Yes. Let's do it. Here's one from Benchinsa. How do you motivate one another when you feel

like you are in a slump? Hmm. Hmm. How are you in terms of how am I motivating you when you're in a slump? I'm interpreting it. We've been in some slums. We have. We've been in some slums. You're going to emphasize that somewhere? I sloughs. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but I feel like if I reflect back on like when we've been on slums,

both of our approaches at the beginning are like leading by example and supportive. Does that make sense? So like if you're in a slump, my first approach is to not say, you're in a slump, you got to change it. It's, I will take the initiative to, I don't even, let's do an example, like you're in a workout slump. Say that.

I'll try to lead the charge by saying like, oh, I'm headed to workout, you know? And like show by example, if that makes sense. And then do everything I can to be supportive in our rhythms of life and be like, hey, do you need any times this week for personal time, work out, see the guys, whatever. And then if it ever got to be like an issue, it would be, I would take it to a different step where it's like, how can I support you to get back into your goals?

And that's weird to say with working out. I'm thinking like close-partum when I was in my worst slum. I feel like that's one of the worst slums we've been in. whereas like I was in a rut you were so supportive without saying anything about my slump you know for a while

you would randomly say like let's go sit outside and you'd be trying to get like sunlight for me vitamin D and you'd be like let's go for a walk and like you were you were doing all of these supportive things and it wasn't until it got

worse or it was there for a prolonged period time where you finally We're like, you know what? I think we need to take this a step further. I think we need to go find like a therapist for you. You know, I don't know how to say that. I'm going to answer this question differently. Okay.

Because I was like, we have been in some slumps. But it's never been like a catastrophe yet. I'm trying to think what we owe that credit to. One, I would say, are daily routines like, Sean, to your credit, and I've never vocalized this to you. Even in those postpartum phases or whatever slump we're in, you keep showing up. You know what I'm saying?

Like the actions are still there. And like the morning routines and the date nights and the church. And it's like you still are there. Which I don't know if everyone does that. So thank you. And we've never been in like a, there's a tragic health problem or you're concerningly out of shape in any way.

And I think it's because we keep showing up. You know what I'm saying? To that. And that's just one example. So I think routines helps a lot. I also think we try not to catastrophize anything. That's what I mean to say. Even like the worst things we've been through when we lost dad or, you know,

we always try to approach things with a perspective of like this is really sad this is really hard but we will get through this you know we always try to like at least have one of us that is on the upside of life and saying it could always be worse we will always get through this yeah well to that to your point there I totally agree

takes me back to the faith question this idea of loving the Lord of God with all your heart and your soul without your mind with all your strength and then love your neighbor as yourself I do think we have tried to in moments of slumps still say how can we help other people

the dad example being one I feel like we needed to show up for a lot of people and help a lot of people so that's helped and it gives you a little momentum because you're like okay well I'm not feeling it but I can help somebody else.

This is when we're at our best, by the way. This is what we strive to do. And then lastly, though, I was thinking, and this goes along with not catastrophizing, us having a lot of conversations helps specify the slump and thus not catastrophize it. So like, we are always touching base.

We've told you we do nightly check-ins, weekly check-ins, monthly check-ins, date nights, we do mornings together. I do think a large part of us being able to carry on as we have is like we're always poking around and finding, you know, just like with athletes, you're getting soft tissue work or like, you know, people have rollers at home or get massages and, you know, that one little pinpoint spot on your hamstring or like, oh yeah, I didn't even know that was there. That thing on my calf right there. that's that's the issue it's not my leg is broken it's like oh yeah just right there

and those conversations have really helped with that you know what I'm saying I like that I like that I like you we got day night tonight we do thank you for your questions we made it through about I don't know a handful eight of them eight of 160 back um welcome back to the normal podcast I think we're getting our groove back we'll see See? We got to hit stride a little bit. I feel like we were shaking some ruts off there. I was.

Same. I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing. Thanks for listening. I'm curious. We got to get one. Been loving the feedback on the book. So thank you.

Two, tips and tricks for the next phase that we're walking into with the kids. Three, your thoughts on any of the questions that we just walk through. Please comment down below. Four, just want to say thank you. for patients the last couple months, I want to say thank you for showing up and listening. We're so freaking grateful. We're so grateful.

That's all I got to say, okay? I hope you have a great day. Wherever you're listening, whenever you're listening to this, I hope you have a great day. And we will see you next time. I'm Andrew. I'm sure. Out.