Speaker 1: Hello, Come on in and make yourself at home. I
Speaker 1: want you to kick off your shoes. I want you
Speaker 1: to get comfortable, and I hope you'll do what I do.
Speaker 1: When I sit down and get a chance to connect
Speaker 1: with you. While I'm in the studio, I make myself
Speaker 1: a cup of Twinings tea of London. I'm holding my
Speaker 1: cup of Twinings tea right here right now. In fact,
Speaker 1: I want you to put the stress and the cares
Speaker 1: and the worries of the day aside. Normally, when you
Speaker 1: listen to me at night on the radio, I have
Speaker 1: to stop talking every few minutes and play music because
Speaker 1: it's a request and dedication show, and that's what I do.
Speaker 1: But here on this podcast, I don't have to do that.
Speaker 1: I can talk as much as I want. I can
Speaker 1: talk as much as you want, and we can talk
Speaker 1: about things that matter, things that really truly matter in life.
Speaker 1: And you want to know, of funny thing, the things
Speaker 1: that matter most in life aren't things at all. Things
Speaker 1: don't really matter. I want you to respect stuff. I
Speaker 1: really want my children to respect my stuff and other
Speaker 1: people's stuff. I don't want my children growing up to
Speaker 1: be self entitled, spoiled brats who think that they are
Speaker 1: entitled to stuff and things and who don't respect other
Speaker 1: people's stuff and things. When we grow go grocery shopping,
Speaker 1: after we've put the groceries in the car, I want
Speaker 1: my children to take the cards and put it away
Speaker 1: in the little card holder so that it doesn't go
Speaker 1: rolling through the parking lot and hit someone else's car
Speaker 1: and do damage or cause an accident. One of the
Speaker 1: ways I teach them to respect other people's things when
Speaker 1: we go shopping. If we go into a store, I
Speaker 1: tell them to look with their eyes and out with
Speaker 1: their hands. Keep their hands off stuff, because I don't
Speaker 1: want them breaking it or spoiling it or soiling it.
Speaker 1: I don't want to walk into my kid's bedroom and
Speaker 1: find their clothes that I just worked really hard to
Speaker 1: earn money to buy to put on them. I don't
Speaker 1: want to find their clothes, their nice clothes piled up
Speaker 1: in a big heap with wet towels on top. That's gonna,
Speaker 1: you know, if it's odd, they be moldy. I want
Speaker 1: them to take care of their things, but I never
Speaker 1: ever ever want them to think that things have great
Speaker 1: value in life. What do I mean by that? I
Speaker 1: mean that things are just things. I want them to
Speaker 1: take care of them, but I want them to understand
Speaker 1: things are just things. I tell my kids when they're
Speaker 1: learning how to drive and they're so worried that they're
Speaker 1: going to scratch the car, get a bump, or get
Speaker 1: in an accident, and they do. They scratch the car,
Speaker 1: and they get bumps and they get in you know,
Speaker 1: fender benders or whatever, And I say, are you okay, honey?
Speaker 1: Is everybody okay? Because if everybody's okay, cars are just
Speaker 1: metal and rubber and plastic held together with screws. That's
Speaker 1: all they are. Cars will come and cars will go.
Speaker 1: But your health, your life, your safety, that is what
Speaker 1: is important. Things are things, and we can attach emotional
Speaker 1: value to those things. I got a lot of stuff
Speaker 1: that I've collected over the year just because it reminds
Speaker 1: me and my mama, or my grandma or my dad.
Speaker 1: And when they passed and I didn't get any of
Speaker 1: their stuff, I started collecting stuff that they would have
Speaker 1: owned or that reminds me of something they had at
Speaker 1: one time. But it's just stuff, and the only emotion
Speaker 1: attached to it is the emotions I attached to it.
Speaker 1: The things that really matter are respect, kindness, being there
Speaker 1: emotionally for your family and your friends. Playing a game
Speaker 1: of cards or Shoots and Ladders, go fish far more
Speaker 1: valuable then giving your kid a tablet and letting them
Speaker 1: sit there zoning out, playing angry Birds. When they're setting
Speaker 1: there zoning out, they're not connecting with the world around them.
Speaker 1: They're not connecting with you. They're not learning life skills. Okay,
Speaker 1: they're developing handby coordination. They can do that with a
Speaker 1: baseball too. But when you take the electronics away and
Speaker 1: you have your kids play cards with each other, or
Speaker 1: you have them play Monopoly or Apples to Apples, and
Speaker 1: you listen to their conversations, it's priceless, Absolutely priceless. Over
Speaker 1: the holiday weekend, I took five of my children and
Speaker 1: three of their friends, and my sister and a girlfriend
Speaker 1: and we went away for the weekend. And I laid
Speaker 1: on my bed, which is up in aloft in this cabin,
Speaker 1: and the living room dining room area is right below,
Speaker 1: so it's an open loft. I can hear every word
Speaker 1: the kids are saying. And they thought I was taking
Speaker 1: a nap, but I was actually laying up there listening
Speaker 1: to their conversations, and I was priceless, priceless the conversation
Speaker 1: my twenty one year old daughter was having with my sister,
Speaker 1: explaining her views on dating and how she accidentally accidentally
Speaker 1: kissed a boy, and my sister said, no, honey, that's
Speaker 1: not an accident, that's an on purpose And it just
Speaker 1: was a delightful conversation about young love and about hopes
Speaker 1: and dreams for the future, and checking to see if
Speaker 1: she was on the right track, asking my sister important questions.
Speaker 1: All that happened over a card game at the table.
Speaker 1: Had they been in separate rooms on their electronic devices,
Speaker 1: that conversation never would have taken place, and I wouldn't
Speaker 1: have had the joy of eavesdropping and hearing my beautiful
Speaker 1: daughter with great values talking about what she's looking for
Speaker 1: in a forever love, and my sister, who could be
Speaker 1: very jaded in her situation, instead offering so much love
Speaker 1: to her niece. The things that matter in life aren't things,
Speaker 1: their people, their relationships, taking care of our planet, picking
Speaker 1: up trash, talking to a neighbor, picking flowers and giving
Speaker 1: them to somebody in a nursing home, adopting a child
Speaker 1: out of poverty. These are the things that matter. These
Speaker 1: are the things that will change the world. M