Focused - 243: The Single Source of Truth is On the Fridge, with Thom Gibson

Episode Date: November 19, 2025

Welcome to Focus, a productivity podcast about more than just cranking widgets. I'm Mike Schmitz and joined by my fellow co-host, Mr. David Sparks. Hey, David. Hey, Mike. How are you? I'm doing great. How about you? Ready to talk about being focused.

I need it. I've had a focused light week, I feel like. You ever, like, show up? You're like, I'm making a show about being focused, but the last couple days I have just been a drift. Yeah. Yeah, that does happen. I think that is one of the things, hopefully, that sets focused apart,

is that we are not the gurus coming down the mountain saying just do this sort of stuff. And we've got another fellow traveler with us today. Welcome to the show at Tom Gibson. Thanks, Mike. It's good to be here. Yeah. So Tom and I met, I think, first at Crafted Commerce when we went for a run. And then again at the newsletter Marketing Summit in Austin.

And I was really drawn to what you do, Tom, because you have a side hustle, maybe we'll call it, which is titled Work from Home Dads. And you share a lot about the struggles of trying to be productive when you are working from home. So it's not just, you know, independent creators. There's a lot of people in the corporate world now who are working from home and they're facing a lot of these same challenges. and so I wanted to have you on to talk about some of that stuff. You've got a little bit of an interesting story. You want to tell us how you got here?

Yeah, I never thought I would work remote. I thought it would be really cool to work remote, but I was a classroom teacher for 10 years. I taught middle school math and robotics. Did the creator thing while I was doing that, kind of doing YouTube, newsletters, social media, all about building a teacher brand and helping other classroom teachers. And around 2020, about two weeks before the pandemic, I became a dad and my daughter was born.

And so becoming a dad and beginning to work remote literally happened at the same time for me. This school, obviously, is all schools. We went fully remote. I was teaching from home and doing Zoom school and all sorts of stuff like that. And eventually I started making my way back into the classroom. But my daughter was getting to be about 18 months in the next year after that. And me and my wife were originally planning on just putting her in daycare at 18 months. But this was still the middle of COVID.

And we didn't feel at ease about putting her in daycare. But I was like in this really conflicted space because I was like, like, okay, well, my wife is a pediatrician. So, like, her staying home just, like, wasn't financially an option for us. On top of that, like, she had wanted to go part-time for a long time and lower her hours and stuff, but just making, you know, teacher money, like, that just wasn't realistic for us. And so, you know, part of me was like, oh, man, like, I don't want to just stay home and take care of our daughter and not work, not be a teacher, anymore because it's like on multiple fronts.

Like I felt this like, I need to be working. Like I'm totally fine, not making as much money as my wife. But I don't want to put that entire financial burden on her. And like my vision before was like, I, the goal was like, I'm going to be a teacher and I'm going to build this side hustle. And then I'm going to make as much money as I can. And hopefully she'll be able to go part time with that. And then to like start working from home, it just felt like throwing all that away.

You know, I'm not working. Sarah's never going to go part time. And I was just like, oh, I don't know what to do. And I remember that summer, I started working a few different gigs from home just to kind of, you know, make a little extra money while I was working, while I was on summer break before school started. And one of those was actually working with another guy that I had met in the YouTube space that was serving teachers. And he was like, hey, why don't we work together and kind of build up this thing that I'm building? And he'd actually gotten a lot of financial success and was wanting to build out his team. on his brother. He wanted to bring me on. And so originally I was like, well, maybe I'll just

I'll do that on the side. And then I'll also keep teaching. And we got to this point where it was literally a week before school was starting. And I'm like, I don't know what to do. Like, I don't want to send her to daycare, but I don't want to stay home. But I don't want to send her to daycare, but I don't want to stay home. And so I remember I went into like a word doc. And I just started listing out the different scenarios. I was like, well, what if I just stay home? And I did, what if I stayed at school? And I did these best case scenario. I did worst case scenario, and I did likely scenario from each of those. And it wasn't until I actually spelled it all out that I realized, I was like, well, like,

if I stay home, I can maybe actually invest more in this startup. You know, instead of the startup that I was working on with Sam that was going to just be on the side in addition to teaching, what if I stayed home? And I also built that startup. And I was like, that's it. Like, I get to work. I get to do the creator thing because it was like I was making YouTube videos and newsletters and stuff.

you know, my wife is feeling at ease because we're not sending in our daughter to daycare yet. And it's like, wow, like this is, it was like the answer, but it wasn't until like actually wrote it all out. It's like, oh, this is, this is what I want to do. And so it was hard to leave teaching because I was like, oh, I'm a good teacher. I was named teacher of the year twice. Like, I'm respected in this industry and this rule. But it was like, it was a way to like meet the needs of my family and meet my own internal needs and drive to start working from home. So I started working from home full time, fall of 2021. And then worked at the startup for a little while until I eventually moved on to working at Kit, formerly Convert Kit, which is where me and you kind of connected, Mike.

I think I was doing some kind of social media stuff about you. And I was like, man, this guy does all this productivity stuff and all this other stuff. And I was like, I want to connect to them. And then we got to actually connect in person, which was super fun. And now I've moved on from Kit, but still work doing social media video marketing with the cybersecurity company. And in that time, I also founded work from home dads as a way of serving other dads that work hybrid jobs, either work full time from home or maybe they work a little bit in the office and a little bit at home. But I noticed a lot of guys were struggling with some of the same stuff I was struggling with just kind of like, how do you balance like when your home is your work? How do you create those boundaries?

How do you make time for the family, make time for work, make time for your side hustle and things like that? But that's kind of like what brings me here today. I remember when my daughter turned to, we decided to put her in daycare at that point. And the way our hours were my wife worked nights, how was it? No, I would work, my wife worked early morning. So my job was to drop her off. And the first day we dropped her off at daycare, no problem. She's like, oh, this looks like fun, you know, other kids.

Then she realized she was going to be there for like six hours, you know. And the second day, I dropped her off. it was raining and she says daddy save me and and the people at the daycare like just just walk away pretend like it's no big deal don't overreact they always you know at the beginning I'm walking away she's yelling save me it was raining sitting in my car I started crying I'm like I'm going to quit my job today this is it I literally picked up the phone I was this close you know it's tough when your kids are getting started you you even though you've got a successful career it suddenly makes you rethink a lot and good on you for figuring a way to to make that work.

Yeah. What I love about the whole premise of work from home dads is the there's sort of this inherent vibe with the stuff that you make, which is different than just the standard hustle culture, which is, well, just get up earlier and crank and you can get it all done. you kind of, I'm assuming this is intentional, but just, you know, from reading your stuff and talking to you, it's kind of like the underlying premise is life is complicated and there's all these things that are competing for our attention. And you don't have to necessarily shut out the creator side or you don't have to compromise being a good dad, but you have to constantly struggle with how do these pieces fit together.

And I just would love to hear a little bit more about how you manage to do that. What's your thought process as you're thinking through? How do I balance my full-time job plus the side hustle plus the family? What are the trade-offs that you have intentionally made? You know, what are you optimizing for, that sort of thing? Yeah, to really kind of answer that, like, I think it helps to even share a little bit of like what type of work I was looking for. I left kits and got laid off earlier this year.

And as I looked for my next role, I kept in mind and was reading all the different job descriptions, I kept in mind like that I did not want a job that was going to demand everything from me. And, you know, when I would read job descriptions and I saw things like, we're scrappy and you got to wear a lot of hats and serving the client is our number one priority. and that means sometimes we've got to work weekends and we got to work nights and that's what we do because we're trying to build something. We're trying to win. So A players only, I'm like, okay, maybe if I was like in my 20s, didn't have any kids, my wife's still in residency and working

80 hours a week and I needed something to do. But I'm like, that's not, that's not what I want, you know? And like, it was even like, I even saw a school here in Austin that was like this, like, AI school and they pay teachers, you know, $100,000 a year. And if you're a team lead, you could get $150,000 a year. I'm like, holy cow. And like, and they needed a teacher that was going to be able to teach the kids how to build an online presence. Basically, we need someone who understands teaching and social media.

I was like, holy cow. Like, I'm a social media strategist who has 10 years of teaching experience. And, but then when I started looking into it, it would require me being at the school by 745 and I wouldn't be leaving until after 5 o'clock. And I'm like, that is my whole day. Like, that is, that is, I'm not a part of drop off. I'm not a part of pickup. I am rushing to making dinners, so, like, I can say goodbye to that, you know?

So it's like, even though the money was there, and, like, the cool job idea was there, like, I didn't want to pursue that because I knew the compromises that it would make, that I would have to make with my family. And so, like, I ended up getting a role that was like, you know, it looked like there's something that there's, okay, there seems to be some sense of, like, they value work-life balance and stuff. And so I know not everyone is, like, in a place where they could just, like, go look for a new job, but that was like my mindset and like when I was approaching my work.

And a big part of it is like, I think through, like with, I try to be as intentional as I can about what are the things that I want to make space in time for in my week. And how can I make that happen, whether that is time blocking, whether that is figuring out like, okay, let me talk to my wife and let's work out a schedule where it's like, you know, are you going to take the kids to school or should I take the kids to school? Do you want to do pick up or should I do pick up? If I do pickup, then maybe you can actually go to the gym because she's still working, you know, and like works like 32 hours a week and everything. And so there's a sense of intentionality of like having the conversations with my wife, thinking through

like, where am I going to spend my week and all sorts of different kind of boundaries that I try to create in my day of like, okay, this is the time that I'm setting to work. And then if this time ends, like, that's when I'm going to stop working. And not only because I've said I'm going to stop working, but I told my wife I was going to stop working at that time, and we agreed on it. So there's a level of intention that goes with it and a lot of different facets that we can explore. But that's kind of the main way that I think about creating that balance and making the time for the things that are important for me. And I would say back when I was had a fancy job and we hired people.

I used to advocate to hire people like you, Tom. I was a big fan of hiring somebody who had, you know, 10 to 15 years experience, knew their way around, and had a kid or for whatever reason. And like maybe, also we hired somebody once who's taken care of an elder parent. They didn't have time to be a full-time employee, but they wanted to be in the industry. They wanted to work with limitations. and every single one of those hires was fantastic.

You know, it's just like so long as you understand going in, you're not getting a full-time employee, but every person was of quality, and they were so thankful that we found a spot for them. They did good, you know, and employers out there listen to this because there's an untapped group of people like Tom that you should be hiring.

Yeah, there's like, it's an interesting thing. It's like the more you have on your plate, the more you have to be intentional to make time for it, And you end up being more productive. Like, I don't know how many people I've talked to. They're like, I don't know how I'm like more productive now that I have kids because it's like you're forcing yourself to do whatever it is that you want to do in these living windows of time versus like, I've got all day.

There's no sense of urgency. There's no need to plan it all out. I'll figure it out. It'll all work out together at the end. Yeah, but it's also, don't you think it's part of that that accountability of being a parent I remember, I mean, my daughter's much older now, but when they first put her in my arms, I was like, I remember the thought that just immediately occurred to me is like, if you screw up now, she pays, you know, it's like my whole life, it was only me. If I screwed up, I was the only one that paid. But it's like, you get, that was the first thing that occurred to me when I held her is like, okay, it's on now, you know. And so suddenly you've got a real good reason to be organized and show up on time and do good work. Yeah. Motivating factor. Yeah. Now, one of the things that we chatted about prior to the call, Tom, was one of the ways that you are intentional with figuring out how all these pieces fit together. You talked a little bit about how you're doing this collaboratively with your significant other so that you both get what you need. And I know you've shared online about this Sunday meeting that you do. You want to talk us through that

process? Yeah. The realization of this came from like when I was talking to like a friend and he was struggling with the same thing about like, you know, his partner. And it's like, it felt like every day him and his partner were trying to figure out like, she's like, when do I get my time? I want to go work out. And he's like, I don't know. I got a meeting today, maybe tomorrow. And it was just like this constant like trying to figure it out as they go. And so before we, me and my wife even have like our Sunday meeting. I think whatever, you know, season of life you're in, you kind of have to agree upon some kind of default schedule. And me and my wife had to kind of figure this out when I started my new role, my current company, because, you know, our default schedule now is different than

when it was six months ago. And so what that is, is like, okay, I'm working from home. And so we are, let's agree on the times that are designated as like, this is Tom's time to work. It doesn't need to be like one big long stretch. And for us, it was like, okay, this hour and the early morning. I mean, I wake up early, so I'm working 530 to 6.30, you know, and unless, like, you know, one of the kids just, like, made a mess in their pants, there's all over the room and everything like that. And it's all on the sheets and stuff.

Then it's like, okay, you know, I, you know, she's going to take care of the kids until, you know, 630 strikes. And then I will, I'll wake up and, you know, have breakfast with the family. And then same with, like, during the daytime. You know, we say like, okay, I have the time when she's at work and the kids are at school to work, and I can say, like, at 4 o'clock every day, that is the end of my work time. And so she picks up the kids and then she brings them home and I get them and she, if she wants to, you know, go do yoga or if she wants some time to herself, like, that's the time that we have

agreed. So it's not just like, when am I going to work? But it's like, when am I going to get what I need, which is my work time? And then when is she going to get what she needs, which is, you know, just time to decompress after after working all day. And then with my friend that I was talking about this, I was like, what if you just like, I was like, when does she want to go to her workout class? And, you know, he's like, ah, she usually goes like on Tuesdays or Thursdays.

I was like, so what if you just said, all right, Tuesdays, I've got the boy, you have from nine to noon to do whatever you need to do or 11 to 1 or whatever it is, just come up with like this default that you kind of assume that week unless there's some kind of change that needs to happen. And that's where like the Sunday conversation comes in. Like every Sunday, me and my wife just look at our calendars and we say like, oh, Audrey has got an early release day this Friday. So that means I'm going to have to pick her up. My day's going to be a little bit short. So when you get home, you know, could you watch them until so-and-so time or, you know, like, you know, one of the kids has an appointment in the afternoon. Were you going to take time off

and take him to the appointment or was I going to do that? And we just get on the same page from not only just the kid stuff, but like I like to do jihitsu. And so, you know, I was like even today, I knew like, you know, like normally I go during the day. So that way, you know, like I can, I've got the time. If I don't have meetings in the middle of the day, I can go to that class. And I knew I was going to be doing this podcast today. So I was like, hey, like, you know, since I'm doing the podcast, I'm thinking about going to Jiu-Jitsu on Tuesday night after the kids go down. She's like, oh, yeah, that's fine, you know.

And she's like, well, I was thinking maybe Saturday morning. You know, we kind of come up with an agreement at the beginning of the week. about these things. So that way, it's not like, there's not these unvoiced expectations that end up becoming disappointments. It's like, oh, man,

I thought, I thought you were still going to pick them up. I didn't know that. It was, I planned on doing this. And then that starts leading to, like, conflict. And then that starts leading to resentment and leads to problems when you guys aren't, when we are not communicating with one another

about like, what are our expectations for the week? Let's just get on the same page. And if things have to change, that's fine. At least we can talk about it, but having that default schedule that you kind of assume week to week, and then every Sunday talking about any deviations that need to be made, given the nuance and the needs of that week, has gone such a long way from having just

avoidable arguments or frustrations had we just talked about it. Talking is the key. Yeah. I heard somebody say that communication is the basis of life, and that's true in a relationship. That's true in a company. I love what you said about the unvoiced expectations leading to disappointment. I feel like that's a really important concept where you can fool yourself, especially when life is busy, into thinking that, well, we don't really need to hit pause and talk. about things because this person knows me better than anyone else.

So they should just know what I need. They should just know what I want. And I can pretty clearly, I'm sure there's very close to 100% accuracy. You know, the times where things have been hard and our relationship has suffered, it was because we just dropped the ball in terms of communicating. Yeah. Yeah. it's like it just creates the opportunity to be on the same page every week and then just talking

about what you need it is such a difficult time in your life i mean having young kids you said so you have a few now yeah we have two we have a five-year-old daughter and a three-year-old son so you know in the thick of it with with toddlerhood yeah but it goes fast so yeah sounds like you guys are figuring it out, though. So when you sit down on the Sunday meeting, you've got kind of the ideal week or the general you make variations, then what are the tricks to then actually execute on this stuff and get through the week? I put everything of mine inside of a Google calendar that I share with my wife. And so that kind of helps her see if I've got anything that's any like bleeding things bleeding into the evening or in the morning or during the day or whatever. But she very

much likes having like a physical calendar. And so we have two calendars on our refrigerator. We have a monthly calendar and a weekly calendar. And she goes in every week. And like for her, she even says, like, I just feel better when I just have like written everything out and it's all color-coded. And we know, like, we've got the meals that are written down on each day of the week. We've got Audrey. Oh, Tom's picking up the kids on this day. And Sarah's picking. them up on this day and Tom's got this, you know, happy hour with his former colleagues on this day. And it's like, it's all mapped out. And it's just kind of like a, okay, it's all out in the open. We can reference it. You know, it's available. And so she, she looks at my digital

calendar and that's where we keep all the appointments. But the actual, you know, this is where we look to see what's going on. That is, the source of truth is those two calendars up on the refrigerator. The single source of truth is on the fridge. I like that. There have been times where I'm like, I had something on my, my calendar, my Google calendar, but I forgot to like add it because it was like a last minute edition. She's like, well, if it's not on the calendar on the fridge, then it didn't happen or it doesn't exist. So it's like, fair enough. You know, something you've said there, though, I think that is important is that you go to her space on this. Like if you're, if you're setting this up for your company, your home, your spouse, you need to understand where, where they're

comfortable with this stuff. I feel like a lot of people listening to the show are probably the people who are going to be more geeky and want to have Google calendars and automations and things set for these. But if you're working with a team or other people, you've got to go where they're comfortable. And just adapting to that, I think, is an important step. Yeah. Yeah, you can't force systems on anybody else. but it's not just in a family like you were kind of alluding to, David. I saw this when I was the integrator at the Digital Marketing Agency as well. One of the things that helped us out a lot was everyone in the organization took the Colby

assessment, which is kind of like your working styles. And I'm a high fact finder, so I need to have all the information. Let's assume that Tom is a high quick start. He just wants to get in there and do stuff, right? So there's natural friction anytime Tom and I work together because time's like, what's the deal, Mike? Let's get, let's get going. And I'm like, no, no, no, we got to figure it all out first.

And just recognizing that improves the working relationship, it was interesting. Colby actually came out with a version of that for couples that Rachel and I took. And there wasn't anything completely earth shattering in there. But what it did is it painted a picture of like when you're trying. to communicate what you need as a high fact finder to your significant other who is a high quick start. Opposites tend to attract. You should maybe try framing it like this. And those little tactical tips, they didn't change what we talked about, but it changed how I presented it. And I think that's the key. You were talking about kind of like alignment and agreement in terms of

getting on the same page. And there's give and take with that. So it's not just, well, this is who I am and this is how I naturally communicate. So get on board or we're not compatible. I mean, you can't say that when you join an organization. And I don't feel you should do it when you join a relationship either that you should figure out, you know, how do we actually make this work? Yeah. And that's like back to that, you know, conversation. It's like, it's discussing not only what I need, but like how can we create space for, you know, you, Sarah, to get what you need, you know, because then it also creates a lot more buy-in and it's a lot less like what you just said. Like, this is what I need and this is what we're going to make happen because I work

from home and I need my time to work and then blah, blah, blah. And that perspective feels a little bit counterintuitive, especially if you're coming into it as someone who is single and just focused on managing your own stuff, but really the key to getting what you need is making sure that the other person gets what they need. It feels kind of counterintuitive, but that really is the secret, I guess. I don't know. And I mean, obviously there are work cultures where that is sort of broken, but in good work cultures, company organizations, there's a little bit of that aspect too. I mean, the whole idea behind the daily huddles that we did back in the day, you know, you're sharing your roadblocks is not so that everyone can hear where you're stuck

and then go back and crank on their own things. It's so that someone who's listening and values the team over the individual, oh, I know how to do that. Let me connect with you after the call and 10 minutes will straighten it out. Yeah. So what's your process for mapping out the week? You look at your calendar, which is digital, and you compare it with your wife's calendar, which is analog. But then how do you make sure that the real important stuff gets done? Are there some sort of like rules or frameworks that you use here? And then does that translate into like daily planning at all? Yeah.

So how? Yeah, the system I use, I actually came up with it. It's this very revolutionary system that you'll find out about the second. When I came back from like being out of office for like a week and that I was just like, oh, I just got, I got to catch a, I don't even know where to start with all of this stuff. And what I did and now what I do every day or at the start of every week is I just make one massive list of everything that I need to do, particularly when it comes to work. And then I prioritize it by everything that's a top priority, medium priority, low priority.

So the way that I approach it is I have like a checklist where, because like, you know, when you're working with an organization, you have tasks that are just sprinkled everywhere. You've got stuff that's come in through email. You've got stuff that's come in through Slack. You've got stuff that's come in through your project management system. You've got bookmarks of Slack that are not new Slack, but you bookmarked them last week because you're like, I've got to come back to them. You've got all sorts of different notifications that are coming in all different directions.

And so I just had like a checklist where it's like, okay, let me first look at my calendar. What are all the things on my calendar, meetings that I need to go to, different people that I need to talk to. Let me add that to this big to-do list. Now, what's Slack conversations? What's stuff in my project management system? What are things that I need to? I go through all of it. And then I just add it to one big list.

And if you're using a digital task manager, I will always, like, if it's like, oh, there's that Slack thread where I kind of need to give like some input on this, I'll always like link to that thing that I'm putting on the to-do list. So it just makes it a lot easier to click through it, whether it's an email, a Slack conversation, a Notion page or whatever it is. And then once I have the big list, I go through, it's like, okay, what are the things that are like they need to happen this week? They're big projects. They're things that move the needle. those are my top priorities, things that I would love to try to get done this week, but if they end up getting pushed off, that's okay. That's going to be medium priorities and things that, like, you know, if I don't get

to them this week, like, totally fine. I'm going to put them on the low priorities. And I even have a separate space for meetings because I was always like, is this meeting a top priority, a medium priority? I don't know. It's a weekly meeting. We have every week. So I just have like a separate space for meetings.

So I don't have to actually, like, decide where they go. I don't do a ton of, like, you know, when am I, even though I have like, you know, when I'm going to Jiu-Jitsu and all this other stuff, kind of like on like the calendar and stuff, that doesn't go on this to-do list. This weekly map of mine is really for me to focus on my work task to make sure that I'm focusing on the highest leverage work. Because at the start of every day, I look at that list, that weekly map, and I'm like, okay, which of my top priorities have I not gotten done yet or which ones, you know, to still need

progress. And I try to make sure like that stuff's happening when my, my energy level is a lot higher at the beginning of the day, my focus is a lot more. And then a lot of times I'll either try to either have meetings in the afternoon or I'll push some of those medium to low priority stuff that doesn't need like as much of like my creative and mental energy. But I really want to focus my efforts on the top priority stuff. And I just grab and note card at the beginning of the day. And then I just write M-I-T's most important things. And I list three or four of the most important things that I am working on that day. I like having the digital note card. And every time I don't do it, I'm like, why am I not doing it? I should go back

to the digital. I'll go weeks without doing it. And then I'll restart doing it. I'm like, oh, yeah, this is way better to do it way to do it. Because I like having that, one, I don't have to jump back into my task manager, which then I see that big list. I'm like, oh, I still have so many things to do. But I just see like, okay, there's three or four things to do here. There's something just so satisfying of taking

a Sharpie and checking it off, but not only checking it off, but also drawing a line through it. It's like, yes. And then at the end of the day, like, I have a physical representation of the things that I got done that day. Because when it's like

just your big to-do list and you checked off the things that you did, and then they disappeared because you did them, you end the day just feeling like, oh, look at all the stuff that I have done as opposed to being like, oh, look at the high priority, most important things that I worked on today. And so I have just recently got back into doing the note card system. And even now, like, I will, I'll write three bullet points for like my main work stuff for my, the cybersecurity company work at. But then I'll also write one bullet point for work from home dads like in that 30 minutes to an hour that I'm going to devote to work from home dad stuff like what's the one thing that I want to work on

because I found like I was I wasn't ended up I was I was getting to my time that I've allotted to work on work on work from home dad stuff and I was like what I work on to write a newsletter to want to like schedule out next week's LinkedIn stuff I've got all those YouTube videos I can edit and then I was kind of like I didn't know what to do so I just did the easy thing you know And whatever it was, like, low energy as opposed to being like, that's the thing that I want to work on. So the no card system is kind of like for the daily most important things. And if I have a ton of meetings, I'm not going to put like seven most important things that I'm going to try to cram when I have like six meetings that day. It's like I'm going to have like one thing on there if I've got a meeting heavy day.

So I don't want to treat those days as if I have no meetings and I've got all this extra time. So the weekly map, prioritizing work tasks, top, medium, low. and then my daily MIT's on an analog note card to keep me on track and focused on what I need to work on next. You know, getting the actual items on a physical card or book or whatever, I don't think I've ever talked to a single person that tried that and didn't appreciate its value. I think a lot of people avoid it because it feels inefficient. It's like, well, now I got to write it down on a card too.

I mean, I already have a great system and that's good. And I think I felt that way for a long time until I started doing it as well. And now it's an essential part of the system. It's almost like the, you know, just like getting away from the mothership and just saying, okay, these are the things that today will get done. It allows you to really focus on what's important. And if you're hesitant to try it out there, just stop by the stationary store on your way home and get a pack of note cards, get a piece of paper, get some paper, cut it in half.

You don't have to make it fancy. There's fancy ways to do it if you want. But I just don't think I've ever talked to anybody that tried that didn't appreciate its value. And it takes seconds. In terms of this inefficiency thing, it literally takes you less time than one commercial break. And the ROI is there.

It's like such a good return on the investment of eight seconds to like write it down. Yeah, most of the time you talk about a return on investment and you're like, oh, for every hour invested, I'm going to get to. But like you said, this is very, very small, but it still provides a big benefit because you're not having to go back to the screen and look at that stuff. Yeah, your approach, I love that. And I think David and I have similar approaches where we have digital task managers, which we don't want to become task masters. That's going to give me recommendations for things that I should consider doing. But then I'm going to make my own decisions and put those on a analog list.

I think it was your newsletter that kind of used. I like that term. Like, this is a list of, these are recommendations of what I could work on. I was like, I like that framing a lot. Yeah, it's a recommendation engine. Because I experienced the same thing you described, where if you're working off of that list, you can go in there, even if you have a separate, you know, perspective or flagged items, and you get through all of those,

it's still one click away and then you see all the stuff that you haven't done yet. And there is not a quicker way I know of for zapping your motivation to do anything than looking at all the stuff you have yet to do.

Yeah. Yeah. I've come to calling it a list of lists. That's what my task manager is. Just a list of lists, you know, disarm it a little bit. And then choose what you're going to do from there, put it on a card and go make a difference.

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it happen? Well, in the minute I've been talking to you, 23 hires were made on Indeed, according to Indeed data worldwide. There's no need to wait any longer. Speed up your hiring right now with Indeed. And listeners of this show will get a $75-sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at Indeed.com slash focused. Just go to Indeed.com slash focused right now and support our show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. I-N-D-E-E-D dot com slash focused terms and conditions apply. Hiring, Indeed is all you need. and our thanks to Indeed for their support of the Focus Podcasts and Olive Relay. Tom, one thing I wanted to talk to you about is the topic of dad guilt,

like something that I never, my kids, I didn't work at home when my kids were little, but I don't know how you guys do it because when that little sweetheart walks in and wants to play with Daddy and you're supposed to be getting work done, how do you deal with that? Yeah, definitely when you do work from home, it is so needed to have those boundaries. I am in a spot right now where both my kids. My son, he's three, and he goes to like a preschool. And my daughter, she is now in kindergarten. So they're both in school for a good part of the day. And that is my primary work time. But there are

times where, you know, like they either are home or, you know, for whatever reason, I have to work and their home. Unless I decide, like, to take the day off, which I can do, I have work to do. So a lot of it is just really communicating both with, not only with my wife about like, hey, can you watch the kids? I got to make sure this work is done, but also communicating with my kids. Like I've told my daughter, like, when she comes in, I do have like one of those doorknobs where it's like, it's kind of kidproof.

My five-year-old, she can get past it, but my three-year-old just kind of like, it's like, I can't figure this out. So I will close the door if I need to get work done, but sometimes my daughter will come in. And I will just let her know. It's like, you know, sweetheart, I have to get some of this work done. And I'm going to be finished at 11. But if you keep coming in here, it's going to take me longer to get my work done.

And I'm not going to be able to come out and play as soon as at 11. It's going to take longer. And so at 5, she kind of understands that a little bit. and, like, we'll, you know, kind of go back out. My three-year-old doesn't understand that. So it's mainly with, like, my wife trying to make sure, like, he's preoccupied and busy and just playing with him. But I think just even having that conversation of, in a way that a child can understand,

because I think, you know, I've been guilty of just, like, getting frustrated with her. I'm like, I'm trying to work. Stop talking to me, you know. And she's like, I just want to play. Yeah, sure. From her, very funny. You know. So it's like if I don't have that conversation, I end up just kind of reacting out of frustration.

And so other things that help with that, like, for example, like this Friday, my daughter will have, you know, a half day at school. So I'm still going to have to get some work done, but I'm already doing my due diligence to first, like, make sure, like, all of my meetings, I'm moving them to the morning. So that way I don't have to have a meeting when I am with my daughter. Additionally, you know, I know that there are certain things like we can do that she can preoccupy herself with a certain level of involvement for me. So if she's coloring, sometimes she'll ask me to color and I'll, I might be working on

my computer, but I'll be like, when I'm done working on this, we can color. Or I just started teaching her, letting her use a website that teaches you how to code. It's like built like as a game and she's like learning how to do little coding things. But now she's getting to the part where she can't figure it out herself and she needs help. And so like, I'm like, okay, that one's probably not the best one to put her on while I'm working. But there's also times where it's like if I have to get something done, you know, I will, I will have her watch TV for a little while, whether it's 45 minutes or an hour. And I'm going to say, okay, you're going to watch TV during this time and I'm going to get some work done. And I have, I have told myself to not feel guilty about that because that's another one of the things, the screen time stuff, everywhere you look.

It's like you would assume that if you just let your child look at a screen before the age of five, like, they're done. Like, that's it. You know, there's no chance. They're never going to learn how to focus. They're never going to learn how to read. They're just going to be zombies. And I found that I think there's a little nuance to that conversation. I think if you approach any kind of screen time with intention and intentionality and boundaries, I think that that is a much more realistic and a much more healthy.

approach than just like all or nothing kind of thing. And so for our kids, their normal TV time is when I'm making dinner. And when I'm making dinner, my wife is usually making their lunches for the next day. And the kids know like, okay, you can watch TV. You can watch any of these shows or any of these channels right here. And as soon as we say it's time to eat, we're turning the TV off. And if there's any crying, if there's any, yelling about turning the TV off, you're just not going to watch TV tomorrow. And so the kids know, like, okay, we've got this time. We can watch these shows. And so they know when it can happen. They can know what they can watch. And they know that if there's what their behavior

needs to be. And if they're trying to ask for TV outside of those times and they keep asking, I'm going to say, if you keep asking me, you will not watch TV today. My three-year-old understands that. He's like, I want to watch Blippy. I was like, if you keep asking, you will not watch blippy today. Oh, okay. You know, Eddie stops asking. You know, so I think just having those boundaries and making those boundaries clear to the kids is what allows it to be something. It's like, yeah, they're watching TV and we're getting work done and we're getting dinner ready and we're getting lunch ready and all that kind of stuff. And totally, you know, parents don't want their kids watching any TV at all. Like, of course, just like set that up. So that's like, you know, if that's,

that's the value that you want to instill and you want the kids to do other things. But But if you find yourself like, man, I just, I want to give the kid, I want to give my kids an iPad when we're traveling a little bit just so I give some peace. I want to let them watch TV so I can, you know, cook dinner, whatever it is. Like, you don't have to feel guilty about it. Just create those boundaries and set that intention around it and let go of the guilt. Yeah, I mean, if it makes you feel any better, I've seen the experiment run. I'm old enough now, you know, that we had friends who didn't let their kids watch any TV.

and now the kids have grown up and turned into TVaholics. We had another friend who would not let their little boy play with guns. That was their big thing. And then he would come over and play with my kids. And anything was a gun, a stick, a Lego, whatever. This notebook is a gun. Yeah. And then now he's like 30 and he owns a lot of guns.

And, you know, just like you get, I feel like sometimes you can go overboard as a parent and actually cause the inverse thing. of what you're trying to do. Yeah. The other thing that's when you were talking, I was reminded, when you're with talking to kids, they have no subtlety, they don't read between lines. You just have to be direct with them.

They just don't, you know, as an adult, you think, well, doesn't you understand what I'm trying to say here? No, they don't. You have to just say, you know, don't, don't keep doing this. You just have to stop. Yeah, fun times, sometimes. Yeah, I think it's tough, though, right?

You know, but it sounds to me like you're handling it well, And, you know, the other thing I would always tell people is there's nothing wrong with not being able to give every miniature kids. They come out weird if you do that. But at the same time, as parents now more than when I was had little kids, you really have to focus on being present with them when you are present with them. Because, you know, I just wrote a newsletter post about this a few months ago that got a lot of traction. We were at Disneyland because we live close. My wife works for them. So we'd go there often.

And we were at Disneyland. We always see these strollers being pushed around with kids in it that are just staring at an iPad. It's like you spent all this money to be here. If the kid cannot be entertained at Disneyland, where can they be entertained? And then we sat down for dinner at a fancy restaurant and there was a family of four. Mom, dad, and two kids, and they were on their phones, all of them. Well, the kids were on iPads, the parents were on phones. They didn't, it became a game.

at our table. It's like, are they going to talk to each other at any point? You know, and they didn't. There's nothing sacred. Even Disneyland. I just, I don't know. I just feel like it's weird. You know, it's like as a parent, don't you realize what you're doing there, you know. Well, you hit on the largest problem I have with the screen time stuff, David, is that a lot of times kids just will reproduce at a higher intensity level what they see their parents doing. Yeah. So you don't realize that you're spending hours on your phone scrolling TikTok, but your kids see it. And then you see them absorbed in whatever kids app they're trying to play on their iPad. And then they throw a fit when you take it away, at least when they're little. And you're

like, oh my gosh, I see what this is doing to you. But you can't see what it's doing to yourself. So you kind of have to model the expected behaviors here. I like what you said, Tom, about teaching them to use it with intentionality too, because I was that kid who was told you can't play video games. So every chance I got, I would go to a friend's house and play video games. So your kids will figure out a way around it. You're not really protecting them from being exposed to it. But you got to teach them how to navigate it. You know, they have to figure out for themselves how to have success. How to have success controlling the urges and fighting back against the dopamine hits of the free apps and the social media as they get older and things like that. And I feel like if you can teach them to

manage it well, that's the best thing you can do for setting them up for success and are increasingly digital world. Yeah. And it also kind of comes back to like a lot of what you you write about, Mike was just like what are your values because when you're talking David about like you know sitting at the dinner table you know like we value talking to each other you know even at age five at age three we're going around the table and saying like hey what was your high today what was your low today you know what was the thing that you had to like persevere through what was what's something that you're you're thankful for and just having those conversations at the dinner table um and so just like it's it's the intentionality you know and like and also like when we when the kids

watch TV while we're making dinner, like that also creates space and time for me and my wife to kind of connect about our days because she's making the kids lunches. I'm making the kids dinner. We don't have kids screaming at us at that time because they're zombieed out in front of the TV for a little bit. But that, but it's like intentional that way. And it just, it reminds me too. Like, I read this book called Hunt Gather Parent. That was all about how we live in a culture that's kind of like, you know, to that point where you're like, you're spending all your time with your kids and doing kid stuff. We live in a culture that's very much like doing kid-centered activities versus family-centered activities. And it talked about like the

kid-centered activity is like, oh, let's go to the play museum. There's nothing for me to do as an adult, but the kids are just running around and playing. Whereas like a family-centered activity is like, let's go on a hike together. I like going on a hike. I like being outside. You guys like being outside. It's something we can enjoy as a family. And that really stuck with me because it's like, you know, if I am going to spend time, you know, with my kids, I want it to be, you know, like, family-centered, you know, like even if we go to the park, you know, sometimes I'll play with them, but sometimes I just want to sit and read my book and not feel guilty that I'm not like the dad that's like crazy and wacky and having a great time on the park and going on

the slide with the kids and stuff. It's like, okay, we're at the park. I like being outside and reading a book. You guys like playing at the park. This is now a family activity versus just a kid activity. So that was a, that was something that is kind of, it kind of gave language to something that I had kind of felt, but didn't really know how to articulate and was like feeling guilty about to. Yeah, this looks like a fascinating book. I think you just cost me some money. Another thing that helped me with some of this, when you're working from home specifically, was actually Chris Bailey in his book Hyper Focus has one of those two-by-two productivity grids where you've got dealing with distractions essentially and on one access you've got

was it avoidable or is it avoidable or is it not avoidable and another one is it enjoyable or is it not enjoyable and I realized I was falling into I'm going to call it a trap but exactly what you described where a kid will walk in while you are working and you get frustrated, they interrupted your flow. Now you got to stop and you got to deal with this thing that you hadn't planned on dealing with. So that is a distraction or an interruption that I could not have prevented. I did everything I could to prevent it. I put the childproof thing on the door. The light is red in the hall. I'm wearing the over here headphones, all the visual cues. I've talked to my wife ahead of time. So we know like dad's working right now.

still happens, right? So what do you do in that moment? Yes, your flow is disrupted. Yes, you now, you know, have been interrupted with something that you were doing. Now you have to deal with this thing you hadn't planned on doing. And I realized that a lot of times they would come in and they would want to, you know, play a game quick or go shoot hoops or something because we got a hoop in our backyard. And I realized, well, my, I'm already been interrupted. What if I just enjoyed the break? Because that's kind of the grid, you know, If you can deal with it ahead of time, go ahead and do that. But if it's something that you enjoy doing and it happened and you couldn't have prevented

it, maybe you should just redeem that time. Maybe you should just go play a game of horse. And 10 minutes later, you can come back and restart what you're doing because you've got restart it anyways. Yeah. And that was kind of revolutionary for me. Now, my kids don't go to school. We homeschool our kids.

So literally any point in the day, they can walk in. And they do. but by getting upset about it I was actually causing myself even more delay and loss of productivity than I needed to have I needed to have so yeah that was a big thing for me yeah and they'll be grown before you know it and you'll wish they were coming in and banging on your door and asking you for something dude that is happening my oldest is a senior in high school and soccer season just wrapped up and I was like getting emotional watching him in the last last game, you know, he just helped out with the fall drama. The last time he'll do that,

you know, all of these, these milestones. I was like, where did the time go? Tom, I know you also are a journaler. I am. I do journal. Mike and I, that is our Achilles Hill. If we have a guest, the journals, we can't resist talking about a little bit. This is our little subtle campaign to get everybody journaling. What are you doing? One of my favorite quotes about journaling comes from Penn Gillette. He did a interview with Tim Ferriss where he really got into the weeds on how he journals. And he said, journaling is the closest thing we have to time travel. And I loved that perspective because I will look at journals from 2009 when I was in college.

And I was writing about my first semester, you know, being away and all this other stuff. And it's like, it's like I'm being reintroduced to just like this other person, this person that no longer is this because I'm not that person anymore. And to see those those just raw and unfiltered thoughts and emotions, it's like, whoa, like, it's, it's very eye-opening. I've journaled very regularly since probably college. I did journal like very sporadically in high school. But it was kind of interesting, like even in college, like before newsletters were a thing, I would remember, like, I would go up, I went off to Texas State and I would, I had a list of like all my family's emails. And then every few months, I would just like send an email newsletter to everyone. It's like, hey, everyone, just saying what's going on and stuff like that. And it was like, even though that one was on that personal journal, it was like just like this, this account of just how things were going and back before newsletters were even a thing. But I, I really started. journaling every day, probably in 2015, I think because a colleague of mine had just had a kid. This was five years before, you know, me and my wife had our daughter.

And so we didn't have any kids. And my colleague was like, now that I have a kid, I just think, like, what the heck was I doing with all my time before I had my kid? Like, how did I ever say I didn't have time for something? And like, when she said that, it just stuck with me. And I'm like, I want to know what I was doing in my. life, pre-kid. I want to know what happened on an average Tuesday in the summer. When my wife was like in residency working 8-hour weeks, I was on summer break from being a teacher. Like, what did I

do with all of my time? I made YouTube videos was what I was doing. And I journaled like every day for a long time where I would just journal like not only what I did. I was talking about my workouts and like all sorts of stuff and my thoughts on things. But recently I have changed my journaling practice because at the end of the year what I would normally do is I would just reread my entire journal for the year and I would just kind of like anything that kind of like stuck out or like that's kind of a memorable thing like I would I would have like this notion doc and I would just like type out like journal entry from this date and like you know I remember this was the day that Audrey you know first said these first words or whatever it was

but I remember as I got to the end of a couple years I was reading them it was less of an exploration of like what I was experiencing in that time and literally more just like a record of everything that I did just a diary which was not that actually yeah it wasn't that interesting to read as I read through it I was like the stuff that's interesting to me is like when I'm like writing about a story or writing about my my feelings about a certain things or when the kids were doing certain things for the first time and So I think when I was doing it daily, it just kind of felt like I got to write down everything that I did today.

So recently, I decided, like, I'm just going to journal once a week after like six years of just journaling every day. I'm just going to journal once a week. And that allowed me to like not, it kept me from getting so into the weeds of everything that I did. Like, I went on a run a day and I ran five miles and like, I ran at this pace and like my right knee was kind of hurting. And then I made lunch and I ate this for a lot. And it's like, who cares? I was just like, I was more like reflecting on a broad sense, like how my week went.

Like, oh, like, yeah, last Wednesday, you know, I had, I had lunch with like that new guy that I met at Jiu-Jitsu. And, you know, like, we actually talked about, like, faith and, and talked about, like, where he was coming from. And I shared, like, where I was coming from. And he's, you know, he had this going on. And, you know, it was interesting because it made me feel, you know, And I'm just, like, writing about, like, my own thoughts on just, like, how that interaction went or, like, me and my wife, like, recently went on a marriage retreat. And I was just kind of sharing some of the things that we were working through and, like, takeaways that we had from it. It gave me these broader strokes of what the week was like. And it also, it helped me actually write about the things that I think would be, are going to be more interesting to read back later on because it's just like, I end up sitting and thinking about what stood out to me last week. about last week. And there's still the little stuff like, oh, I finally got a submission

from that one guy at Jiu-Jitsu that I never get. And I finally got him with this kind of submission, yeah, kind of like a little win. And I recently read Anne Laura Lecomf's book,

Tiny Experiments, and she's written a lot about, like, reflective practices, and she has this one called plus minus next. And so that kind of intrigued me, but I didn't want to replace my journaling practice

with the plus minus next. next. So what I did was like I, every Sunday, I sit down for about 45 minutes, journal on the week, and then as a recap to that journal, I do a plus minus next. That's just bullet points. And sometimes it's just a bullet point version of what I've written above. Sometimes it's other additional little things that I didn't actually write above, but it's like this next week, I want to focus on this thing for work from home dad's business. And, you know, I want to do this or this was like a negative thing. I didn't really write about it, but it was like a negative is a minus. And so that kind of coupling, I really like it because whenever I start next week,

I actually, I don't reread last week's whole journal entry, but I do look at last week's plus minus next. And I'm like, did I get that next? Was there still a little that minus that was going on this week? So it kind of serves as just like a small summary. That's easily just kind of glanceable. So I've really been enjoying that, but it's just really fun to also just go back and read stuff just from like, you know, I went, I went with a campus ministry back in 2009 to Greece for five weeks to do ministry and talk to people on campus about their thoughts on religion and God and faith and stuff. And it was really interesting to kind of go back. That was another one where I was journaling almost every day while I was there. And like, that's now 16 years ago.

You know, it was like a 20, 21 year old kid. And it's just so fun. It truly does feel like the closest thing we have to time travel. Do you find the, because it sounds to me like you get a lot of reflecting on old entries going back and reading them, do you find the process serves you at all? Like, when you create an entry, do you find that it pushes any buttons or helps you through thinking through stuff? Yeah, the actual process of writing, I don't know. I just, I just, I feel this need to just like get it out in some way. And I don't know what that, where that comes from but it's just like even when I finish books like I feel this need like even if I don't write a journal entry about the book I'm like I got to create like a notion page where at least I just

write some of the things that I thought about otherwise it just feels like it's just lost to the ether and I just I feel like I've got this there's something inside of me that just wants to document and just like put stuff down like when it just thinking back to like that 2009 me in college and just writing these newsletters to my family members. Like, I don't know. Clearly, there's a value in it because I feel compelled to do it. And I've just felt compelled to do it for all these years. And I think it's just there's some sense of like, okay, I got it.

I got it out there. And maybe it's, there's times, like I said, when I was trying to figure out what I was going to do about, you know, whether I was going to stay home or we were going to put our daughter in daycare. And that was very clearly a moment where it's like, unless I got it written down, like that clarity of mind would not have come. But yeah, I think that couple just... I think you just hit it.

I mean, because for me, I have the same thing. Like, I read a book. I have to write about it. I have any sort of momentous event in my life. I have to write about it or even just making an important decision. And for the longest time, I couldn't figure out why I felt this compunction, but I realize that's how I clarify my thoughts. It's like when you write it down, it becomes...

it's a nebulous thing in your brain you know this is generally a good idea you're not really sure why or you know you generally like that book or didn't like the book but you're not really sure why but when you force yourself to write it down you clarify your thoughts and it feels really good to kind of put order to the chaos at least that's me yeah yeah I agree I concur I am curious how you express these thoughts are you doing it analog are you typing it somewhere what's your process? Yeah, through the years, I've done both. I even, in college, I did a lot of typing

because I really enjoyed the stream of consciousness like being able to type as quickly as a lot faster than analog. And so I have those actually printed out, though, because I knew I'm like, if I just put these on a hard drive, like, they're going to get lost of the ether eventually. So I have like quite a bit, quite a few printouts of things. But after college, it was almost exclusively handwritten journals. using a moleskin, 7mm pilot G2 black ink is my favorite pen to use.

And I found that it forces me to kind of slow down, maybe think a little bit more about what I want to say. But there are other things like, you know, whenever I do a book review and notion, I've just recently started just doing dictation. and then, you know, voice dictation, AI voice dictation, and then having AI kind of clean up stuff because I found it was like pretty cumbersome to like a lot of times I would want to like put the quote in.

And so now I'm like, I just literally now go through the book with my microphone on and then I'm like, okay, on page 45, there's this quote and it says blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, end quote. What I find interesting about that is it relates to so and so thing and it made me think about this. And then I just keep going through until I see a note that I made or whatever. And then it just, you know, has it, that becomes a little bit more of a, I just want to get it all out there. And that's a more streamlined way to do it, whereas just reflecting on the week, I want it to be a process that actually slows me down a little bit.

And I really, I do really like to see the handwriting. And it's funny to see, like, that handwriting looks like aggressive. I mean, it seems like, or that handwriting looks like it was going really fast and I must have really been trying to get it out. You know, I think there's something that's communicated and just the way you wrote something, you know. I'm not a doodler, so I don't really draw anything in my notebooks or anything like that. But, yeah, for the most part, it's analog. We live in an interesting time because the AI dictation has got to a level now that it's kind of a solved problem. And if you want to just sit there and talk for 15 minutes, sometimes you're going to surface ideas that you wouldn't with pen and paper.

because we often edit ourselves when we write out longhand. And that is absolutely valuable. But we just did a whole show in analog because I think that process is valuable as well. They're different. But I think deploying both of them is the smart way to go because there are some things where you want to kind of clarify your thoughts, talk through it, even have the AI trying to organize it for you, just don't have a thing for you. But then there are times when getting, you can't see it.

I've got a writing desk behind me. And just like physically pushing my chair over there, getting away from the screens, that releases a different set of chemicals that are useful, you know? Yeah. All right. Guys, you want to talk what's shiny new objects in our lives? Anybody bought anything fun? It's always fun to kind of talk a little bit about just rampant consumerism at the end of an episode of Focus. Yes, this is the ironic part of the show where we talk about shiny new objects on a podcast called Focused.

Yeah. Okay, so as we record this, the Green Bay Packers just played on Monday Night Football, which is on ESPN. We have YouTube TV, which is currently in disagreement with ESPN, so no ESPN on YouTube TV. You can up your Disney Plus subscription for like an extra $30 a month, which I had no interest in doing. So I was trying to figure out last night, how do I watch? the Packer game on cable television. And I wanted to watch it on our, we use an Apple TV box, but I didn't want to try to stream it from some sketchy site

and airplay it to the TV. We don't have an antenna that works currently. So I was like, well, I got to find something. Turns out that Sling TV allows you to get a daily pass for five US dollars, $4.99. So that's what we did. And I thought that was really cool because I'm sure there are a few other cord cutters in the audience who every once in a while there's something on TV that they want to

be able to watch NBA finals, Super Bowl, whatever. With Sling TV's daily pass, you can do that occasionally and it literally gives you 24 hours of access to the whole, I think they call it the orange package. So when we log in, you know, it says your access will expire at 7, 11 p.m. tomorrow or whatever but i thought that was actually pretty brilliant to allow like a daily pass for for that kind of stuff and i wanted to mention it here just in case other people had it used for that sort of thing yeah we just did the because the world the dodgers were in a world series that's the local team we bought a month of youtube tv that was our like we often like during the olympics will do that if the dodgers in a world series will do it but it's not inexpensive but you get a

month of TV. And what I learned by that, by the way, is I don't want TV anymore. It's terrible. Yep. What about you, Tom? I have, this is not a brand new shiny object, but I feel I've just rediscovered it in a new way, and that is the stream deck. For those who are not familiar, a stream deck is just a little physical, tactical device

that you can plug into your computer, and it's got a bunch of buttons, and you can program those buttons to do whatever you want. And, you know, basic stuff, it's like if you want to open an app, you got a button there. If you want to paste something, you got a button there. But what I have found is that there are a lot of new things on the stream deck that have kind of like remade it something that's like super helpful and super valuable to me because like I wasn't using it for a long time except to paste like emojis because I'm a social media manager and I don't want to search through the emoji library to be like,

hands up yeah but like little things like okay i've got two apps open i want to just move this app one to the left and then the other one to the right i can push a button to do that and then whenever i was putting like my sd card into my computer to download or put all of my footage like on my computer it's like okay i got to open up the finder i got to find the sd card i got to find the folder that's four folders deep in the sd card then i got to open up a new finder find the current projects folder and then I need to copy and paste those things over. And it's just like, it's just so many clicks. And now when I push a button on the left side, it opens up the folder with the footage. On the right side, it opens up the folder that I need to drag it

into. And it's so seamless. And so I've just been rediscovering some stuff. Like when I first tried using the stream deck, it didn't connect to my Phillips hue lights, which I have in the background where it's like these blue and these oranges. But then I've also got different colors for like when I'm doing work where it's only the work blue. And then if I'm reading a book, then it's this reading color. And so now all of that is just at the push of a button. And then it's also got a bunch of like really complex quick keys that are in my video editing program where it's like hold shift control command four, but then hit enter twice and then move the arrow down three times and then hit enter one more time. And it's like that's to like add this special effect.

And so it's like I don't have to remember any of that. I push a button and it just goes through all of those steps in like less than a second. So just rediscovering the stream deck and really, really enjoying it. Yeah, Elgato has really done a good job of improving the stream deck software. If you've got one in a drawer, pull it out and update your software, you may find that it's more useful now than you remember. David, you should do a stream deck field guide since you have so many of them. I have, Tom, I have three of them. If you saw my desk, it looks like the Starship Enterprise here. But they're useful. And I do a lot of video production.

You push a couple buttons, turn a couple dials, and things happen. Yeah, it's pretty, I don't have the one with the dials. I still have the old school one. I might have to bite the bullet and get the one on the dials. Well, they're really nice, and they're quite useful for the type of work you do. So maybe you will. The one that didn't stick with me, I bought the pedal years ago. They had a stream deck pedal.

And I tried to turn it into a mute button, but the way my mic works, it doesn't really work. that that's the only one that didn't work for me. I heard the pedal is great if you use the Elgado Prompter and you use the pedal to kind of control the speed of the teleprompter because they have a voice one where it's supposed to follow your voice, but when it came out and I tried it, it didn't really follow my voice. And then I would have to just kind of like have my mouse off to the side

so I could scroll down because sometimes it would go too fast or too slow. But I never got the pedal, but that's the one use that I'm like, maybe I should get the pedal. Yeah. Mine is a weird one. I haven't really talked about in the show, but about six months ago, I got hearing aids, which is weird, right? You know, is you start getting older. But I was really having trouble with tinnitus and not hearing. I feel like an old guy that I don't know why it keeps coming up. But it was funny because I went to my doctor and he says, you should get your ears check. I check. And they're like, oh, you definitely need hearing aids. And I never thought I was the guy that did. But then when they gave me When you go to get them, they give you an interview form that your wife needs to fill out, your spouse needs to fill out. And one of the questions on it was, does he ever, you know, ask you to repeat what you say? And she wrote in it, she's like, no, he just pretends like he could hear me, but usually he doesn't know what I said.

And I thought, that's terrible that my wife thinks that, you know, but it was kind of true. And so I made a video about it for the Max Sparky Labs that went public at some point. It's called Sparky's Bionics. I'll link it in the show notes. But if you're out there and you're of a certain age, just go get yourself tested for hearing AIDS. I mean, it really has been kind of life-changing. Like we had a family dinner the other night with my in-law and a bunch of family members,

and it was just nice sitting at the table and being able to hear everybody after I got them. I started reading about it, and there's a huge connection between hearing loss and dementia. So there's a lot of good reasons if you're of a certain. age and you're starting to fill your hearing going go get them they're cheap you know they're not cheap but my insurance covered it but they're um you don't see them i mean when you i think in the video i was wearing them you couldn't even tell um so uh you can get them at costco get tested there if you want but uh if one person listening to this goes and gets tested i'll feel like it's a mission accomplished awesome all right what are you uh what are you reading tom that's the other thing we do

all the time as we talk about books. Yeah, I am reading a book by Sal Hill Bloom called Five Types of Wealth. I think it's a New York Times bestseller at this point. Should be. I am pretty impressed because I feel like, well, he just figured out how to make a time management book, a social networking book, a self-development book, a physical fitness book, and a financial literacy book, all in one with like the through line of like building the life that you want. And so, and it's like very, very practical. It kind of reminds me at least the time

management one. One of my favorite books is make time. It kind of reminds me of that style where he kind of talks about, you know, what it looks like, but then he gives you all these different exercises of like what you can do. And, you know, there's all these assessments on like the areas of life that you feel you would, you could, you could stand to improve or the ways that you would like to grow in. And financial wealth is like the last one that he gets to. Because he's like, don't Don't play the game where financial wealth is the only metric, is the only thing. If that's the game you're playing, you're going to lose because it's not the only game that there is. So I appreciated that perspective.

And yeah, that's what I've been reading in the nonfiction world. And I don't normally read fiction, but I did start reading dungeon crawler Carl. And it is just a fun book. It's like Hunger Games meets Ready Player 1. and it's it's just it's a little vulgar but it's just a fun fun read so those are what I'm reading nice big fan of the five types of wealth that is a great book not surprised that that one is checking the boxes for you given your whole work from home dad's bent yeah what about you mike all right so I'm an episode behind you David you mentioned wisdom takes work by Ryan

Holiday. We just finished that one for bookworm. Holy cow, I like this book. I was nervous going into it because I feel like I have reached my stoicism quota. It's not for me. And I like Ryan Holiday's writing style, but the fourth one in the series, I'm ready to be ready to be done. So I kind of went into it skeptical, but I think this is my favorite one out of all four of those books. It's just, it's so good. actually my favorite part of this have you gone all the way through it david yeah okay so the afterward is amazing yeah because in the book he's he talks a lot about historical figures and then in this one it feels a little bit weird because he's calling out some people who are currently living and not just like oh these people are jerks because they believe something different than me but

he's talked to specific people and knows like the decisions that they made and like this doesn't line up with the principles i'm talking about in wisdom takes works one of the one of the of those people is Elon Musk. And in the afterward, he talks about how, like, he really respected Elon Musk, and he's been invited to his house. And he actually has his, uh, his bookstore in the same town as, as the Tesla factory. Actually, you're, you're in Austin, Tom. So maybe you've been to the painted porch.

I have, yeah. Made it out there last time. It's a really cool bookstore. And so, like, I just really appreciated the end of the book where he shares all this, this context, not in a like, well, I'm smarter than these people. and you should totally just listen to what I have to say. It's kind of like, this is happening and it's kind of sad, which is sort of what he does with all the historical people is like, well, they were doing well, and then they, you know,

did these sorts of things. And this is what we can learn from it. So I thought it was really just like the topic was great. There's a lot of stuff in here about kind of like critical thinking and writing as a process to that and figuring out what you think. I don't know. This one just pushed all my buttons. I really, really liked it.

So we talked about last episode because it was a book I was reading. At the end, I had made kind of the statement that I don't want to hear people calling Ryan Holiday a broicism guy that he's like, you know, because that's a thing now, guys who, you know, want to go to bed with women to make a lot of money and they call themselves stoics. And that's, I feel like that is not Ryan Holiday. And I felt like the afterward was really what inspired me to say that. But I didn't want to call it out in the show. But yeah, I feel like this guy, this guy's for real. And we had Donald J. Robertson on the show who's really an academic and probably, I think, understands the historical importance of stoicism maybe more than Ryan Holiday. He's certainly in the league with him.

And I think he is equally, if not more, a valid authority on this stuff. But, you know, don't call Wright Holiday, you know, pop, you know, psychologist kind of stuff. This guy is for real. So my book this week is Notes on Being a Man by Scott Galloway. A book just came out. It's an interesting book. Scott made a lot of money. He kind of tells his story.

He grew up with a single mom. He didn't have, you know, his father, you know, left them. And he had a tough time. But he really made, you know, he was very financially successful. And I think as he's gotten older, he's became very much more mature in his own feelings and he it's just such a great advice guy. This is a book that I wish I had read when I was 20 because he talks about things of the importance for men to have friends and to you know share emotions and and things that you know he's learned in his life. It's just an interesting book

because he spends a lot of time talking about his story and I think that will turn some people off but it's also just sprinkled with really good advice. I've actually bought two copies of this and given it away to some young men in my life. And uh, I just think it's a, you know, we're at an interesting time where young men are struggling. And this book provides an alternative narrative that isn't the brooicism stuff we were just talking about. And reading the book makes me want to mentor some young men. You know, after I read the book, I'm like, I want to help some young men through this time because I think they have a harder time than I did when I was their age. And it's a good book. Check it out Notes on Being a Man by Scott Galloway.

all right you cost me some money too yeah it's it's a light read honestly because it's very narrative and he's had an interesting life and he's made a lot of mistakes and he's he's openly shares them and but i think the the underlying message is a good one awesome tom where do people go if they want to keep up with all the stuff you're doing you can check out uh w f h dads dot com slash playbook, work from home dads.com slash playbook. That is going to be a free playbook that is going to walk through a lot of the stuff that I shared here, where like what it looks like when I have that weekly conversation with my wife, how to take inventory of your time each week with the whole, the goal of the playbook is to create a six-hour workday. So that way you're not just

burn in the midnight oil all day, every day, and you have time for yourself, for your family, for your side projects. And I walk you through a lot of the stuff that I shared here. It's absolutely free. WFH Dads.com slash playbook, and I'll send it right over.

Thanks, and we are the Focus podcast. You can find us at relay.com slash focused. If you want to be a member of DeepFocus and get the ad for extended version in the show, you can do it right there. Thank you to our sponsor this week, indeed. For Deep Focus today, we're going to be talking to Tom about Jiu-Jitsu.

He's been mentioning through the show. I have questions, and we'll see you next time.