if we were starting to act up
or she was starting to get irritated with me and Matt
fighting or whatever
um she would say 7
6 8 2
1 5
3 be what that meant was I'll call your dad
and we knew like if if
if mom gave us a punishment
it was go to your room for five minutes right
yeah but if you gave us a punishment
it was go to your room for a week and so
and get your butt spanked yeah
and so we would just absolutely be terrified
haha if
if she was gonna
if she was gonna dial that number and that uh
that scared us straight
welcome back to raising men
now
we say that raising men starts with raising ourselves
but in order to truly understand the men we are today
we have to have the courage to look through
the generational rearview mirror
so today's episode is a little bit different
in honor of Father's Day it's kind of a personal thing
my guest today spent decades under the high pressure
bright lights of elite television sports broadcasting
he navigated major media markets
interviewed the greatest athletes of an era
and he carried the massive
cultural
weight of what it meant to be a successful provider
in the 1980s and 90s he also happens to be my dad
Ted Dawson is sitting with me today dad
welcome to raising that thank you Sean
it's an honor to be here well
you have been absolutely instrumental in uh
in in this uh
in this entire project for me
and it is really really exciting uh
for me to sit down across from you like this
thank you I feel the same way
well let's uh
let's start with kind of a cultural mandate of your era
that kind of persists today
um so
there is a study from ecomundo
showing that 86% of US men
believe that being the primary financial provider
is the single most defining trait
of manhood now
this is something that I mean I
I gotta say candidly uh
this is something you knocked out of the park right
you provided you provided us with a life
incredibly rich in experience and
you know we didn't really want for much
we had an amazing freaking childhood and oh
thank you yeah
and more more
more than that you later reached out
and you helped me buy my first business
which is a move that literally
propelled me to financial independence
it wouldn't happen without you
I want to take this opportunity
to express my appreciation about that
and it completely like I said
it completely uh
changed the trajectory of my life
thank you um
as I know from now having my own kids
that level of provision requires a massive
internal toll
and so
I'm interested looking back at those high stake years
how do you how did you balance
that intense drive to secure our future
with the emotional needs of the family at home
did you think about that or what
you know no
how did you try to do that
I guess that's how I managed it
in that I was concentrating on my career
yeah we both know
you had an incredible mother who handled that
that was all I did was turn my check over to her
haha
she handled it she was the one that worried about it
so I was concerned with my career
I was concerned with getting the latest interview and
and going the latest sporting event
your mom is the one who faced the
the problem of providing for you
yeah and she did a remarkable job
as most women do
yeah we were
we were fortunate to have her
and we'll talk more about her uh
definitely uh
in the later part of the episode
I um
do you I mean
how do you feel about that looking back on that
was that the right call
or would you have balanced things differently
would you have done you know
how would you have handled it
absolutely it was the best thing for me
yeah I could concentrate on my career
my full concentration was on my career
and she had everything else
I did some discipline and very little
yeah I
I remember um
I I can almost produce your
your uh
work phone number in Los Angeles because there was this
um
uh yeah
it was 7 6
8 8 1
2 3
yes and the reason that I remember that that I mean
literally it's been 40 years
40 years right
um since I've
since I've heard that that number
the reason that I remember it is because Ma would
mom would say that if we were starting to act up
or she was starting to get uh
irritated with me and Matt fighting or whatever um
she would say 7 6
8 2
1 5
3 and that would be what that meant was
I'll call your dad and we knew like if
if if mom gave us a punishment
it was go to your room for five minutes right
yeah but if you gave us a punishment
it was go to your room for a week and so
and get your butt spanked
yeah and so we
we would just absolutely be terrified
haha if
if she was gonna
if she was gonna dial that number and that uh
that scared us straight
ha ha
it was more of a problem for me than it was for
for Matt Matt
um
man he did not get in trouble as much as I did yeah
well here's the story I like to tell yeah
when you were young
your mom and I would tell you to do something
no
I'm not gonna do it no
you can't make me do it no
absolutely not but then you would eventually do it
yeah Matt
well glad yes dad
what what can I do to help how
how can I help you let me do more what
what can I do for you dad and they wouldn't do it
so I always figured you were better
it was better to do it your way than Matt's way
well it was better for
it was better for Matt to do it his way
it was better for you if I did it my way
yeah
so yeah
Matt yeah
Matt used to say that I mean
he would just watch me be like
what an idiot what is this idiot doing
and I remember there was one time
uh
I was I don't remember how old we were
we were still in the Hollywood house
oh and um
I used to get spanked all the time man
I really like
I feel like I spent my childhood getting my
getting my my ass whipped by you
and there used to be this just there
it was like being on death row
there was a whole process involved in getting spanked
you'd we have to go to a room
she hated it she hated it
oh man
I I yeah yeah yeah
I imagine
well so when we would
we would we would go to our room
we did we'd be sent to our room for like an hour to
await the punishment right
and then you know
to sit and dwell on what we did
and then you know
after the hour was up
we would be brought into your room
which was down this long hallway from our room
and you'd be sitting on your bed and
and you know
you'd we'd
we'd get draped over your leg and you'd
you'd smack us and we'd scream and cry
and then it was over
and so there's only one time I remember
I I
I got spanked all the time
but there's only one time
I remember Matt getting spanked
and I don't remember what he did
my recollection is that I probably
goaded him into doing something that I knew
would get him spanked and so
like I I
I arranged for the situation
that resulted in him getting spanked and
and I remember sitting with him in that hour
before the actual event in
in the death row time and he was really scared
he was really nervous
and he was like and he was
I don't know he's probably
he was young
he was probably 3 or 5 or something like that
so I would have been yeah
I would have been eight and
and he was just he was terrified and
and he was like oh
you know what's it like
and I was like oh
it hurts a lot and I was milking it right
you know I wanted
I wanted him to experience the negativity and
and uh
he's like and he's like
and so I was telling him and he's like
well maybe I could put a book down my pants
so it doesn't hurt as bad
I said well
you know
he'll feel the book and so he'll know that you're
and then that's just gonna make it all the worse and
and he you know
he was you know
I could maybe I could put toilet paper down there
and it's the same thing man
I mean he's
he's he's gonna know that you have padding there
I said I think it's just best
you're just gonna have to
you're just gonna have to go through with it
so when he finally when it finally became time
and mom came to our room to get him
and to march him down the gallows
and I was following behind
mom draped him over your
over your knee and you gave him two quick swats
and Matt stood up and he looked around
he goes
that wasn't so bad yeah
I know yeah
and I was watching this happen and I was just
oh no
and you grabbed him and in my recollection
you beat him to within an inch of his life
I'm sure that's not what happened
I'm sure you hit him a couple more times
that was the deal
but I did give him a couple of big ones
ha ha ha I just remember watching this whole thing
happen just going oh no
oh gosh that was did you fake your kids
no you don't
no we
it's not necessarily we rough house a lot
I rough house with my kids a lot
but never it's never an angry thing
um
I have video of you throwing like across the room
yeah what
across the room I
I'll see if we can share some of that video here
because that is that
that is a a great time
he's probably 18 months old in that video
I know exactly what video you're talking about yeah
I loved it he was cackling like
like nobody's business he had so much fun
yeah we um
yeah we don't
we don't we don't use physical violence
um like that
um and I don't
it's not it's not something that I
it's not like a philosophy that we've sat down and oh
you know we don't do this or we do do that
it's just not it just hasn't
hasn't been part of our our thing
I haven't really thought that deeply about it about it
I like we we do rough house a lot
and there is no shortage of times when
I'll be rough housing with lake
and he'll end up crying or mo um
same thing you know
she'll just like I mean they'll
they'll
they end up crying a lot because things get out of hand
but but yeah
we don't we don't
we don't spank them but not in punishment
what in punishment at your house
yeah we end up
um
you know
I wouldn't necessarily call it so much a punishment
like we use natural consequences a lot
like there are just consequences of one
one of the things that we've been dealing a lot with
with lake you know
he's 7 now and
and we've been dealing with um
what are essentially honor code violations where we'll
we'll give him trust to do something
um so
for example we had an
is a situation not too long ago where
um he's not allowed to watch YouTube
and we have that lockdown because YouTube
it turns out is very addictive for him and
and it will he'll like
end up wanting to do nothing
yeah right
I mean it's not just for
for him it's for us too and
and so um
we had a we had a situation a couple months ago
where
he lied to us about getting his morning checklist done
he said he had it done when it wasn't done
because he just wanted to get to YouTube faster
and so then of course
when it was time to go to school
he had nothing done and we're like
wait a minute what the heck happened
and like dude
you lied to us you just lied like
and he doesn't lie and so times like
that's a really serious thing for him
and I um
I got very upset with him
I I made it really
really clear about how disappointed I was and that
that really affects him
um a lot
and he um
he actually started asking me for a while after that
what's our level of trust
you know and he wanted to
he wanted to know what it was in percentages
oh and
and I was like okay
you know our level of trust is like
like 40% right now and he's like 40%
he's very upset and then
and then but as
as you know
we gained more trust he was
what's our level of trust now
and I said well
you know
I think it feels to me like we're around 60 or 65% now
he's like really
oh that's great
and so it was weird and um
so we had this situation where we started
we let him watch YouTube again
same thing happened I just let him watch a couple shows
and the same thing happened
he didn't get his whole checklist done
it's like okay well
you know I mean
you know what the consequence of this has to be
we can't we can't let you watch YouTube in the mornings
and you know
he's like yeah
I understand it's and he's sad about it
but you know
I mean we do
we do a lot of that
there are often times where we get overwhelmed
like I I
I really don't want to lose my temper with them
but I'm really tempted to a lot um
I get really mad at the kids um
not a not a ton
but there are things that they do that just really
really tick me off and
but I don't want to be screaming at them
and stuff like that and so in those circumstances we
we we
you know we count them
which means we count to three and at three
you know
they're in their room for a period of time like
and they hate that and so
you know that's
that's probably about 90% of it okay
I I do want to correct something though
you weren't a bad kid I mean
he's stretching the imagination
so you didn't get spanked that much
ha ha ha it may seem like it
but it wasn't
I I feel like I was at odds with you and mom
I feel like I argued with mom constantly
I think you were at odds with her more than me
yeah yeah
we just um
we just I
we are a lot alike I think
and we just butted heads quite a bit and she
she didn't have to let that happen right
I mean she could have just shut me down
or she could have called you in
and there were times she did
but I think she wanted me to
I think she wanted me to be able to stand up for myself
and be able to argue be able to yeah
well I want to explain something to your viewers
and that is
and I think you you know this
whether you admit it or not
but you were always the smartest person in our family
always from the time you were 3 years old
you were smarter than anybody else
so we had to deal with that
we had to deal with your intelligence
so that was part of our challenge
yeah I
I I get that I
I have to deal with that with lake
he's unbelievably smart
I think he's smarter than I was
and it's it's
it's very very difficult
I'll tell your viewers a quick story
when you were 12 maybe I'm not 11
12 you play baseball and you were pretty good at it
but you wanted to pitch and you want a lot of people
so being a sports caster in Los Angeles
I arranged for the Dodger pitching coach to work with
you
remember we went to Dodger Stadium
I do I remember why
we went to the bullpen
and the pitching coach worked with you afterwards
he came to me and said
really good thing he's smart
hahaha
yeah
yeah I don't uh
you know that's funny cause I
I came away from that
with the feeling that I was a really good pitcher
from that whole session like
I mean it was
it was a formative um
it was a formative thing in my life
and like I remember it and it's sort of emblematic
of the kinds of opportunities that I had as a kid
that nobody else would have had right
you couldn't pay any amount of money to get an hour
with the Dodgers pitching coach
yeah as
as an 11 year old kid and yet I got that
I don't know if it was an hour but
but it was something and um
but I came away from that like feeling like I was
like I was this great pitcher and that I
you know because I had access to this stuff and I
and you know and I wasn't
and I don't know whether or not
it would have been better for me
to have been disabused of that
or what I like what should have
you know what
what what should have happened there or what
I know and I end it
go ahead
there's no question in my mind I did the right thing by
by
supporting you yeah
and pleasing you and pushing you
there's no question in my mind
even though I knew you you didn't have the talent to
to make it in the picture in
even maybe in high school
but at your age I wanted to support you
yeah and I would do it again
I wonder
you know I ended up falling in love with sports much
much later in life I
I fell in love with volleyball when I was 30
right and I was pretty good
I think if I'd
played volleyball when I was in 8th grade right
no I
I
I would have had the talent to do something meaningful
because I ended up
having the talent to do something meaningful
as an adult almost right
I just didn't have the years of experience
everybody else did and um
you know I
I wonder like
I worry about that for my kids
I want my kids to be excellent athletes
and I
I actually have to suppress that in myself because I
because really and I've
I've talked about this a lot on the show
um where
where
you know a lot of that is my own ego
I want to be the dad of a
of an elite athlete and I
I really struggle with that
and I I don't know
I wish that I guess I
you know I
I'm glad that you didn't
one thing that you absolutely did not do is
force me into a a particular rut or
or anything like like you weren't
if I if I wanted to play football great
if I didn't want to play football
that's great too
and you know I
I think you probably you instilled in me
you and mom both instilled in me that
you know if I committed to something
I had to finish it out but other than that
I wasn't forced to do anything in particular
but the drawback to that was that I
I didn't you know
I was a
little kid trying to figure out what I wanted to do
and I was kind of stupid with respect to that
maybe I would have benefited
from some of the parental wisdom uh or
or some guidance there I don't
you know
there's a tension there between those two things
and do you feel like
like how do you feel like you navigated that tension
you think would you do it differently now
no looking back
absolutely not because we let you do a lot of things
yeah I bet your viewers don't know that
you were a great actor
you were a wonderful actor when you were young
so that was your outlet yeah
and you started as Edmund in a Lion
the witch and the wardrobe
yeah that was a pretty yeah
kind of a major production
yeah yeah
and you were the star at 10 years old
or 11 or something so
and you were really good at it
so you made me buy my first video camera
hahaha yeah
I still remember having those VHS tapes laying around
somewhere
man too bad we don't have any video of that
I'm glad we won't be showing that
that's kind of funny
what
you know what do you think that
as a family
what do you think we did great
and then
what do you think we should have done differently
uh
well we all loved each other because
because we we all gathered around your mom
she was the central figure in our family
and her goodness shine down over all of us
she made us all better that's what I think we did best
now what we could have done better
I don't I honestly don't know
thinking back and I have
I can't imagine what I could have done different
yeah I
I
yeah she was a kind of a
kind of a rocket ship for us and
and it was
you know she was never out there in the arena right
but man
was she just an unbelievable cheerleader
and that's for sure and yeah
I mean I
I I'm with you
um
yeah yeah
I think we we really did do that great
she can make friends with anyone
I mean she had friends who were bumps on the street
and she was friend with Princess Diana
so I mean
she was that kind of person
I mean how do you look back on
I mean it's so
I don't I don't know
the audience might not know
we lost her when I was 21 years old
um which is
it was weird for me I mean
I have talked about this on the show
it was weird for me
when I finally crossed the boundary of
I became older than she ever was
and that was actually
that's part of the motivation for even doing the show
because it was like
in my mind she was this giant like
she could do no wrong
right and her memory is so powerful it
it's actually her memory is probably
far more powerful than she would have been
if she were a person now
probably
and because you would have gotten old and like me
crippled up and
and our voice wouldn't be as strong as it was
and all those things so to us
she will always be perfect
yeah yeah
she man
she crushed it
what do you
I mean how do you feel about the path that you guys
worked together what would you
what would you tell her now
if she were still around or
boy did we have a great time
I wouldn't change a minute
not one thing
she she supported me at every step of my career
she never said oh
I enjoy living in Portland
why do we have to move to Los Angeles
she never said that
they just had a new brand new house
we just bought a brand new house
I got offered the job at CBS in Los Angeles
and she never blinked an eye
and we moved into a condo in Los Angeles
from a beautiful house in Portland
Oregon and she never blinked an eye
yeah and you had a one year old kid me yeah
yeah
yeah yeah
she was
yeah she was gun ho like yeah
I mean yes
yes and in every
in every way and she
she always used to say that
you bloom where you're planted and
you know she didn't man
I mean she had
she had like you said
she had so many friends and was so powerful in that way
she could make friends with anybody any
in any station or anything
and yet she it was like
she could be friends with those people from far away
that's fine like
she didn't have to like
she could be anything she could do anything
it was yeah
she was really really amazing in that way
yeah she was pretty amazing
I'll tell you a quick story that you may not know
but once you your kids were in school
she wanted to get a job
so she went out and she got jobs for people
whatever that career is yeah
yeah she got jobs for people
and her greatest accomplishment was one year
she made more money than I did
and and she thought that
that was the best thing that ever happened to her
it was that good that's amazing in
in her side gig
yeah yeah
that's fantastic
you know what
what do you think you know
if like looking back on it with
you know sort of the wisdom of years now
my recollection of your relationship with her is
it was bulletproof
like I didn't
I mean you guys would get in one fight a year
and it was usually a pretty bad one
I never really knew what they were about
or anything like that that was
that was sort of beyond me
but you know
I could tell when it was going on and but man
like it just seemed like
you guys were just really in each other's corners yep
what do you think are there
are there you know
strategies that you were intentional about
to make that happen or you did you just get lucky
I mean was it
well part of it was getting lucky
part of it is a mental thing where you just gonna
I'm gonna support you no matter what
I'm not gonna criticize I'm not gonna question
I'm not gonna
give you grief about anything
I'm gonna support you
and that's the mindset we both had
and she was better at it than I was
because she was an expert at everything she touched
you know you know what I mean she was in real estate
and she may not have sold a house
and I know she didn't sell very many
but she made 500 friends
that remained friends all her life yeah
that was her gift yeah
there's something about that that
kind of unwavering support
I'm behind you all the way that I mean
I definitely witnessed that and I would second that
I'd I absolutely think that was the case
and I think that that
she didn't
wait to make sure that you were worthy of that
if you know what I mean
she didn't
she made you worthy of that by trusting you to
be worthy of that and as a result
you became worthy of that
you might not have started out worthy of that kind of
support but you were in that relationship
you ended up worthy of it
is my that's at least my sense
or at least the vast majority of the time
I'm sure you fell short in some way
well I
I definitely felt sure we were dating
because I dated a lot of women haha
including while I was dating your mother
hmm and she hung with me despite that
interesting
yeah I
uh that's
I'll tell you what almost ruined this
once I had a penis I was going to San Jose
I was flying to San Jose to broadcast a football game
and over the Sierra Mountains
I had an a a a
a pancreatitis attack
and it turned around go back to
I'm not I'm serious
go back to Reno and have the numbers happen back to me
the hospital my mother came to see me
well one of my six other girls
she was not happy
but that's when we knew that I had to stop this
and she knew that I better stop it
or that would be the end
wow
your relationship with your own father
how did that influence how you became as a father
both in positive and negative ways
well my father was very supportive of sports
my mother was very supportive of music
my mother wanted me
involved in music my dad in sports
so I had to do both to please them
I was always trying to please my parents
and they were child of depression
they were never really satisfying
so you never could please them
so that was
it was difficult yeah
but
an interesting thing happened
that your viewers might appreciate
but when I dropped out of medical school
become a sports caster
my parents very upset
and they wanted nothing to do with me
so
you know I had nothing to do
I married your mom I had
we had you
and my parents weren't involved
but when I went to Los Angeles
I was invited to play in the big Crosby National
Pro am golf tournament
and my parents saw me playing golf with Lawrence Welk
he was my playing partner
and my parents
who had danced to Lawrence Welk in South Dakota
as teenagers
decided that oh
I must be OK
and that got us back together again
wow
wow yeah
um
well your parents
your mother uh
sure loved Matt hahaha
she she didn't care for me at all because
because Matt was yes
yes grandma
anything you want that's right
yeah man
she uh
she and I did not get along
she did not like conflict
no no
I mean she like conflict
if she was a child she likes conflict plenty
ha ha ha
yeah she just wanted to be on the
on the winning side of it all
right
well
you were a teacher
you think that
I mean do you think
there are any aspects of your relationship
with your dad that you felt was a counter example
that you that you wanted to not do
yeah my dad was always soft spoken
it was always gentle
it was always friendly and lots of friends
and I wanted to be like that
yeah I never wanted to be critical like my mother was
yeah yeah that's for sure
yeah that's interesting
I can I can see that
but I can see that I mean
my mother's background
I think I've told you the story about your grandmother
yeah your grandmother
my mother's mother
was born in the back of a wagon on the Oregon Trail
in 1876
that's how old I am
so when they went to their homestead in South Dakota
and built a homestead there
she was one of 12 children
wow and they had this homestead
and one day
a tribe of Lakota Indians attacked the homestead
killed her brother and kidnapped her
so you your great grandmother was a captive of
of an Indian tribe for eight years
until she was 12 years old
so that's the background my mother had growing up
so that's that's pretty tough
yeah
yeah yeah
she was a great story about how she was rescued
a 19 year old cowboy
saw her washing clothes by the river in Montana
and that night snuck into the camp
got a hole in her tent
pulled her out
threw her on the back of his horse and raced away
and I returned her to her family
wow and seven years later
that cowboy became my grandfather
that's funny wow
what a cool story you know
they were tough people yeah what a cool story
I uh
I like to finish up these conversations um by asking
people more or less the same question
and you've listened to the show
so you've you've heard the question
and that is oh shoot
actually before we get into that um
I think one of what you know
obviously
one of the central aspects of your entire life
has been sports you covered sports at every level
from high school basketball teams
all the way up to the Olympics
yes and
I mean you've seen athletes at every level
give me a sense of
what do you think the importance of sports is
in raising excellent men
teamwork
working with other people
depending on other people
even in individual sports
other people have to coach you
they have to direct you they have to motivate you
you have to work with other people to be good in sports
and that to me
is the best lesson that you can learn in sports
hmm
you know I guess sports is
in fact you don't have to be good to learn that lesson
yeah don't participate
it helps you learn that yeah
my wife um
I mean
you know this but she was a professional athlete and um
that open so many doors for her just in and
and you know it helped get her in the law school
it helped get her first um
her first jobs outside of law school
it's it's an interesting you know thing to talk about
but it's also it it also signals
to the kind of people who are wondering
whether they should invest in you
that you can
you can stick with it right
you and it's
it's not it's not gonna be here something with you yeah
music does the same thing sure
if you're involved in music
it does exactly the same thing
you have to rely on people you're part of a team
uh
I don't know whether you even know this or not
but as a teenager
I was a trumpet player and was named to the America
All American Orchestra
and I played
first trumpet for the All American Orchestra
and we played at the White House
nice for President Eisenhower and President Kennedy
so wow that had a huge influence on me
I was able to meet those people and uh
it's just because of my grandmother again
who was born in the back of a wagon
flew in an airplane to Washington
DC to meet President Eisenhower and President Kennedy
he stood next to President Kennedy
and Kennedy loved her story
she just he thought she was just really incredible
and my grandmother says you know
you're an awfully nice young man
but I could never vote for you
I'm a die hard Republican hahaha so
and and President Kennedy said
I don't care you don't ever have to vote for me
just don't never lose that smile
that's what he said to her wow
I bet you would have voted for him hahaha
after that no
maybe never would have
maybe not never got the chance I guess
but that's your heritage
interesting yeah interesting
yeah I remember uh
I remember the so I had never seen you play the trumpet
um
I never knew that you could
we didn't have a trumpet at home or anything like that
and I broke my hand playing polo
so I couldn't use it anymore
yeah oh interesting
yeah okay
and I but I remember going like
we were at a
um
we went to a fair and they had like a little band there
and somehow you ended up playing the trumpet with these
with this band I was like
I was blown away when I was a kid
I was blown away that you wow
you know how to play the trumpet
it was really interesting
yeah that was a big part of my life
yeah that's so funny
well you don't have to do sports if you're not inclined
and and if you do sports
you need to love it you need to absolutely love it
it's like you need to love music
if you go that direction or
or studies I mean this
whatever it is yeah
I think you need some kind of discipline in your life
other than just book learning
yeah but either music
music and sports work for me
you know those are
those are some of the institutions that are
getting really strained I mean
there are still sports teams
but you know
it used to be the case you could just play
you'd you'd play sports in high school
and in high schools you know
schools had teams and then you would just play there
and that was the deal and now
you actually
can't really get into sports in any major way
unless you play club sports
and essentially
you're turning pro when you're 12 years old
if you do you have to
you have to focus on a particular sport
if you want to excel at it
and that's the only way you're getting into college
it turns into this freaking profession right
and so the institution has gotten
you know it's gotten corrupted and and
and we don't have
we don't have true amateur sports as much in the
in the way that we did even when I was a kid
and I really struggle
I really struggle with what to do with my kids about
you know my kids have the genetic material
to be unbelievably great at a sport
or maybe more than one sport
and I want them to
for my own reasons and for their reasons
and I wanna cultivate in that
that in them I also don't
necessarily have the time to drive them to 1,000
different sports games
and try a thousand different things
and you know
I don't even know that they're gonna be into it
that they're gonna love it the same way
you know I didn't right
I you know
I played football a little bit
I didn't love it I
I didn't enjoy going to football practice
I didn't enjoy I
I never enjoyed sports
until I started playing volleyball
and then I fell in love with it
and yeah I just don't
I I
I I think that
I think you have to take your ego out of it
I think you have to
and I think you just have to cultivate the love of it
for them and
and it's not the love of excelling
it's the love of doing the thing participating yeah
yeah and I
I really struggle with that I
because I think
part of the reason that I loved volleyball
is because I was really good at it
from the very beginning and I excelled at it
you know compared to what I could have done and
and and lake has that same sort of drive
he loves being good at things
and he hates being bad at things
and it's it's a real
it's a real struggle for me yeah
just point it out to them
and I'll let them I'll try everything
well I like uh
I always like to finish these conversations with uh
by asking everybody the same question and um
you've listened to the show
so you you probably know what the question is
so you you have the benefit
that a number of other people don't
which is that I'm not necessarily springing it on you
but here's the question
if you had one principle that you would share with
parents
listening to this show about raising excellent men
what would it be
support your child
support them no matter what they do
support their their drive
support their passion
give them everything you can
and it doesn't mean money
and it doesn't mean the greatest coaching
it's whatever you can do to support them
and the biggest thing is to praise them
and tell them that's
you're not the greatest but you've increased today
you've got a little bit better today
always praise your kids
that would be the advice I would give
no dad
I uh
I really wanna thank you I wanna thank you not only for
uh for
for being on the show today
and for kind of having the courage to
to look back through uh
the rearview mirror with me and sit in
in this space together but more importantly
for all the support you've given me
throughout my whole life you know
thank you I
you know no
nobody's perfect and there are certainly ways that I
there are things that I will
that I'm changing about my approach to fatherhood
that are different than what you would do it
because I feel like I can improve upon them
but man you
you're you
you are a great dad thank you
thank you very much you're a great son
haha and I
I just appreciate it and uh
thanks for marrying mom she
man she was amazing
and you know
I miss her every day
oh I really
I really enjoyed it I really appreciate it
I appreciate what you're doing and what you become
and the kind of father and husband you are
it's very special
well thanks for that and happy Father's Day
thank you and to everybody listening
I want to challenge you this week
you know it's coming up on Father's Day
so pick up the phone and you know
think about dropping the kind of safe
performative
small talk about the weather with your own dad
if he's still around
just call him up and ask him a real grounded question
yep
about the choices that he's made and in your childhood
and it's I'll
I'll tell you from experience
that's what I tried to do in this little session
and it's it's really
really rewarding
and uh
and again dad thanks uh
thanks for being part of it
thank you for asking me
until next time I'm your host
Shawn Dawson keep uh
keep it up keep showing
up and remember that you are a great parent
raising men is produced by Phil Hernandez
this episode was edited by Ralph Tolentino