Winning means NOTHING if you lose the relationship.
Children carry an embedded option for the most common challenges of aging
something to do
someone to share experiences with
someone to love
Don’t blow it by being a bozo (at the game)
If the family has a special sport, swimming for us, then think in terms of minimum weekly frequency
None of our kids had to “be a swimmer” – all they needed to do was swim a little bit
Every. Single. Week.
Touch the water, once a week, since they could stand up
5-8 hours a week of jumping, climbing, twisting, spinning – All Summer Long
Very Consistently Undertrained
Our kids have done a lot since they were little.
What they have not done is specialize in a specific niche, or train like an adult.
I’ve also been careful to match my encouragement to the way the kid likes to train
Long days
Fast days
Mix of days
The kids decide what and how much – my role is to up-skill and keep it fun.
Ironman Finish – more than 11,000 days after I was born
10,000 Days
From the time a child stands up…
…to realizing their maximum adult potential
About 10,000 days
Longer in my case!
Several important realities flow from this timeline:
We control less than half of those days!
We don’t even control what we think we control – for example, effort at practice
It will not be the parents’ call – without a deep love of exercise, the kids are DONE as soon as they get out of the house, sometimes before!
The most important relationship in a child’s life is the quality of their parents’ marriage Choose coaches, and mentors, based on the quality of their non-athletic lives
What Do We Control?
Modeling Personal Excellence
How our children see our marriage and other relationships
Sleep & Nutrition Habits
Spending my time, and giving my attention, to create a link between Fun and Work
Leave Room To Load Later
Middle School
High School
The Collegiate Level
None are a final destination!
Give the athlete somewhere to go when they leave you.
Being a badass breeds confidence – this impacts everything
Start With The End In Mind
Where do you want the athlete to be when they are done with their competitive career?
Resilient
Courageous
Persistent
Healthy
Enthusiastic
Use sport as a vehicle to teach these traits.
Start today!
Keep these traits front of mind when you’re tempted to make it about winning.
A teacher’s job is to fill the world with positive memories for the student to carry forward
Here’s my thread on Steve’s Book, Do Hard Things. It’s a great read.
Today, I want to share a filter for the “hard things” you might be considering.
The Tour de France just finished up.
Lance and I have different views on a few things but an area where we are in alignment is fatherhood.
You may remember hearing his son defend his lie was a trigger for him (Oprah interview).
My kids trigger me, too.
My kids have clear memories of my mistakes, and they talk about them!
Well before I had my kids, Lance shared an observation along these lines…
Winning the Tour is easy compared to being a good parent
Truth, as deep as you want to take it.
Much of what we define as difficult is a thin-desire for: (a) domination over another person, (b) respect from another person, or (c) deference from other people.
Domination
Respect
Deference
We see it everywhere.
Can you feel it in yourself?
I can.
These desires lead me astray!
My drive for achievement pushes me ever forward – more money, more victory, more conquest…
My drive led me to many difficulties, eventually to a divorce.
I made a choice to leave that former life behind, but the habit of striving came along.
Easier to replace a habit, than transcend it.
Lasting satisfaction, the kind that reduces desire, comes from overcoming ourselves and, ideally, building something with other people.
Perhaps a marriage, or a family, or a business, or a community.
Reduce, and redirect, resentmentraising young kids is tough! We’ve had to “fire” different childcare people… but the marriage endures. Better to “fire” the babysitter, than me!
Kind, athletic spouse – create space so your spouse can be the person you’d like to build a life alongside. Never let anyone sacrifice their life for the “benefit” of the family/marriage.
Stay well back from the edge – there were times when I disliked being a father. Create space so you don’t act on negative feelings. ALL feelings are temporary! My marriage, and my family, needs me to not-act on temporary feelings. It is never OK for me to blow my family up.
Create happy memories – I’ve spent the equivalent of a very nice SUV on trips with my wife. Bora Bora, Napali Coast, Paris, London… these are some of the happiest memories of her life.
Over long time horizons, these shared experiences have continued to pay dividends. Much more than I expected.
Lesson: my spouse is likely to connect, and find meaning, in ways I don’t fully understand.
Some nuts & bolts about removing friction…
My body looks better when I eat salad => I spend $2,500 a year on prepared salads – I don’t care if I throw a bit of food out. I want it easily available, always.
Related, a luxury good is the ability to not price check the person doing the shopping. If quality & availability matter then provide an incentive for what you want to have happen.
I’m a better person when I train in the morning => At replacement value, there’s $28,000 worth of fitness equipment located where I live.
Weights and cardio… ZERO friction between me and what I need to do for health.
Many of my best friends, now, have kids => make it very easy for them to visit me, or visit them (with a kid).
Mantra: Spend money and time seeing good people
Who to vist? Simple filter…
Do they make me laugh?
Do they help me think better?
Do they set an example for the type of man I want to be?
Some do all three – recruit them!
Remove as many micro-triggers as possible => Twice a year I write a large check to my wife. From that check all the small stuff comes out of our family. My job is to make sure that check gets funded. Her job is to take the pain of those micro-payments.
Do not micromanage my spouse! Agree the master budget and trust your partner to run their slice-of-the-pie. I get one number a month from my wife, net cash out. That’s all I need.
Drop my worst environment – when I was younger, it was commuting. I paid a premium to live close to work. These days… driving. The goal for my family is to get my driving down to ZERO.
Anyhow, know your worst environment and throw some money at it to reduce your exposure. This is a luxury good with a good payoff… your family gets a better version of you.
Beware… you might be hooked on the drama of suffering through for the “benefit of the family” – I’m calling BS on that. Just like your health, you need to own the outcome. Your family needs the best version of yourself. You need it too!
Human Capital over long time horizons. Supported by:
Nutrition
Exercise
Connection
Mood management
Conflict reduction
None of them make me appear rich, all of them contribute towards True Wealth.
Paul’s tweet gave me a nudge to dig a little deeper.
Parenting trick: When your kids reach the sullen teen stage where they don't want to talk to you, drive them places. In the car they forget they're having a conversation. It helps that you're both looking forward instead of at each other.
The “no secrets” policy can be inconvenient but it has big benefits.
#1 => it makes it difficult for creeps to enter my life.
#2 => it’s an effective technique to lower stress and anxiety – especially when combined with daily movement in nature.
This openness applies in all areas – phone, email, opinions.
Sitting in a car with a kid – we all do it.
Sitting in a car with a kid, and a culture of openness… that’s different.
Sharing a meal with a 4 yo at Boulder’s Walnut Cafe – “Dad, sorry to break it to you… you need to try a little harder.”
So there is the culture my kids were born into – openness and a willingness to hear uncomfortable truths.
Then, before there was much to talk about… we went on short 1-on-1 trips. I started this around the time of our oldest’s 3rd birthday.
There wasn’t a master strategy. I simply wanted to give my wife some relief. Later, I wanted to offer her a chance to get to know our younger kids (our oldest has had a strong personality from the get go).
The trips worked. Not just for kids, by the way – we do Couples Retreats and, as a young man in London, train trips with the partners were GOLD.
I like to connect in my best environment. Do you know yours? Mine is mountain forests.
Hauling a 4 yo up Colorado’s Independence Pass – iPad, pillow, water bottle, lunch box, favorite blanket
Some other forums that work:
Walking together
Driving home in the dark, after exercise
Somewhere disconnected – we did a five-day trip without screens/phones
Looking at a campfire
Floating on water
Phone in airplane mode, turn off the music, expect nothing to happen.
The moments of connection are a tiny piece of the actual time I spend with my family.
I need to be there, and I need to be open to whatever happens.
Wanting to lead from a position of integrity is a motivator. I’ve been setting up the teen years since our oldest turned 8.
It’s helped me make positive changes with regard to my relationship with alcohol, social media, email, bedside phones and anger.
The phrase, “you will need to decide what sort of life you want to lead” is far more powerful when my kids don’t need me to explain my choices in words.
The process of positive change isn’t a whole lot of fun but coaching a winning team is deeply satisfying.
The moms who interact with our family (pediatricians, teachers, coaches and tutors) notice our kids have a different attitude towards work.
Recently, my wife was asked “How do you do it?”
She gave an excellent answer explaining it’s a mixture of leading by example, high standards and routine.
To gain useful insight for you, I took her answer and flipped it.
What’s different about my household?
How does my approach vary from what’s used by excellent parents in my community?
For 25 years, I have acted on this belief…
Only rarely will the biggest problem in my life coincide with what I need to be doing.
Problems, toxic relationships, habits of self-harm – intractable issues and people.
Let them go.
Stalkers, trolls and neurotics – I ghost without seeking to prove I am right, without seeking to justify my actions, without seeking to turn their community against them.
COVID and things I do not control – eliminate their ability to cause further harm.
This saves energy and frees my mind.
That extra energy…
That lack of distraction…
…is the difference between success and failure.
I have another quirk.
I enjoy inconveniencing myself to do what I think is right.
Now, the sensation inside of me is not enjoyment. In fact, I spend a lot of time feeling pissed off.
However, I’ve been around long enough to know there is a hidden payoff in every repeated action. Perhaps, I’m hooked on being true to myself. Frankly, I don’t know the cause. I do know it’s useful.
I believe both of the above are trainable. They’ve played a key part in my successes.
Let’s rephrase… if you’re prone to fixating on your problems then you need to let that stuff go. Letting go is what’s going to help you get past the distractions that prevent you from consistently moving your life forward.
I’ll end with an observation on 360-degree fatherhood. It’s how I choose friends, mentors and coaches.
Spend time sharing positive experiences with exemplars, while they sustain their good habits.
The second birthday of your first child is a key milestone.
Life’s about to get real.
I think a lot of guys would be more involved if they knew, in advance, what long-term female bitterness does to a marriage.
How much risk do you want to run?
What sort of role do you want to create for yourself?
Take a dominant kid away so your wife meets the other kids (this comes later).
Taking a toddler away on an overnight trip so your wife can put her adrenal system back together.
Lock in a Daddy Day once a week.
Lock in a time slot 5 days a week so your wife can exercise.
Smart, tactical choices will help create the woman you’d like to spend the rest of your life alongside.
What do you do best?
For me, it is 1-on-1 time in nature. Whatever your skill happens to be, do not expect it to be a whole lot of fun at the beginning.
The “win” happens when your wife uses the space you create for her own needs.
To create space for meeting our own needs, I was rarely supportive of “getting exhausted together”.
Also invert the situation and consider…
What does your partner like least? …but maybe that’s outside your skill level. In that case…
What can you subcontract? Teaching your kid(s) to be put to bed at an early age from someone other than their mother is one of the best things you can do for your marriage.
I experienced some resistance to outside help with our first kid. The resistance was _completely_ gone by the time our 3rd arrived.
Subcontracting is not a clear cut issue. I can easily subcontract cleaning but it’s one of the highest return things I do in my house. Unassailable authority when I assign chores or ask for help.
Do no expect your kids to thank you => remember you’re doing this for your marriage and to hedge your bets for tomorrow.
You can not do it all => What are you willing to give up to create space for this new initiative?
In the short term, as you adjust to your new reality, it will feel like you’ve given up everything => Because you have!
Feel The Byrn 
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