Speaker 1: This is cut to it with Steve Smith Senior at
Speaker 1: production of The Black Effect and I Heart Radio. I'm
Speaker 1: Steve Smith Senior and I'm ger a little John and
Speaker 1: this is cut to it. Good do it, Good do it.
Speaker 1: Let's get down to do it. Good do it. We
Speaker 1: asked the questions you always want to know, but no
Speaker 1: one ever asked, let's cut to it. You ain't heard
Speaker 1: about it, then we're about to let you know. It's
Speaker 1: all welcome in UM. This is a special one. Let's
Speaker 1: be let's let's be transparent, let's be conversational, UM, you know,
Speaker 1: obviously making sure that we honor um the circumstances of
Speaker 1: the of the topic. And basically the topic for today
Speaker 1: really is talking is for Father's Day. This Father's Day
Speaker 1: podcast really has to do with even if you're not
Speaker 1: a father, or you're heading into becoming a father, and
Speaker 1: at some point we all want to be fathers. But
Speaker 1: what and how were you impacted as a son because
Speaker 1: you are a son before you became a father. I
Speaker 1: know I was, and how that parenting and the things
Speaker 1: that I experienced as a son is led me to
Speaker 1: becoming a father and and in that father for me
Speaker 1: being a dad one of the things that I noticed
Speaker 1: what I did is a parent out of fear. I
Speaker 1: parented out of wounds that I experienced as a young man,
Speaker 1: and I believe I love my dad. I believe my
Speaker 1: dad did the best that he was capable of doing,
Speaker 1: but that also created some wounds. There are sometimes doing
Speaker 1: the best you can isn't a slight. It is one
Speaker 1: of those things where doing the best you can sometimes
Speaker 1: it's not good enough. And I'm not saying that my
Speaker 1: dad wasn't good enough, but there are some things that
Speaker 1: I missed as adult, as a engaged father that I
Speaker 1: am today that I know some of my disengagement led
Speaker 1: to or was led by me being not being able
Speaker 1: to know the difference. We got Kurt Coleman, former Carolina
Speaker 1: Panther formal, the Ohio State alumni who beat Utah in
Speaker 1: the Rose Bowl. A good friend. We got backstage Joe
Speaker 1: Um Anthony Hill, my trainer, but also a world winning
Speaker 1: journalists from Weston, Award winning journalists from West six Times,
Speaker 1: Okay flexing Um who which I believe it's interesting, is
Speaker 1: the way you motivate because there's times I've been in boxing.
Speaker 1: I know I'm terrible that moment, but yet you give
Speaker 1: me an unqualified compliment, and that keeps me going even
Speaker 1: though I'm out of breath. It's like, let's go. He's there.
Speaker 1: Sometimes he's like, that was terrible. To it again and
Speaker 1: he like, I knew it was terrible, but the way
Speaker 1: he's saying it is, yeah, it was bad. We saw it,
Speaker 1: but we got another chance. So Anthony Hill great trainer journalists.
Speaker 1: And then we got highly Taylor former Carolina Panther Chapel Hill.
Speaker 1: And so I'll start off with one of the books
Speaker 1: that I started reading. I've it's going on my third
Speaker 1: time reading it now. It's a book called Bond of Brothers,
Speaker 1: and it just talks about conversations. And so basically starting
Speaker 1: off this conversation is the importance to me, to our listeners,
Speaker 1: to the cut, to cut to the listeners, the gift
Speaker 1: to the list There's real talk about being a father
Speaker 1: and a son. Every son will become a father, but
Speaker 1: every father was once a son. Let's talk about the
Speaker 1: glory and a shame of fatherhood. The fathers and sons.
Speaker 1: Because of men are talking about things that matter. I
Speaker 1: don't believe I'm having conversations at forty at forty three
Speaker 1: mm at forty four when I turned next year, when
Speaker 1: I turned forty four, I would have lived twenty two
Speaker 1: years on the NFL the opposite side of poverty, almost
Speaker 1: literally down the middle of how many years I've lived
Speaker 1: on the right side of private poverty and then now
Speaker 1: on the left side of poverty. So I'm I've been
Speaker 1: on both sides, and a lot of the programs that
Speaker 1: are foundation my foundation does are built on the experiences
Speaker 1: that I experienced as a kid, right, And so I'll
Speaker 1: started off, when was the first time you received an
Speaker 1: unqualified compliment? And here's what I mean by unqualified. For me,
Speaker 1: I would never get I would never be able to
Speaker 1: draw a picture as a young man that was really
Speaker 1: not good picture. It wasn't a very good, really drawn picture.
Speaker 1: Ten years old, I would have never got a compliment
Speaker 1: by my folks to say, wow, look at that artist.
Speaker 1: And because of that, I know when my son now
Speaker 1: and my boys and my daughter, when they do something,
Speaker 1: I'm not lying to him, but I am building them
Speaker 1: up and try to build them up, even though I
Speaker 1: missed some things when they were young, because I didn't
Speaker 1: know that what I'm doing is showing them despite what
Speaker 1: the world may say, there are some people at home
Speaker 1: that love you no matter what. And so I had
Speaker 1: a deuce draw, drew a picture, and I'm sitting in
Speaker 1: my office and I am arguing with my seven year
Speaker 1: old because he's saying, no, Daddy, I drew that. I said, no, son,
Speaker 1: a artist drew that. He's like, no, there was no artist.
Speaker 1: It was me said no, it's not you, Deuce. It's
Speaker 1: an artist, a well known artist. He draws so many
Speaker 1: great pictures, he does so many great things. And I
Speaker 1: love this artist. And it's so remarkable of this drawing
Speaker 1: that he wrote. I had to frame it. I put
Speaker 1: in my wall because Daddy, you're so silly. It's me.
Speaker 1: I said, no, it's artists. And that artist's name is Deuce.
Speaker 1: And he just h lit up. He is not a
Speaker 1: bona fide artist, but that day he heard his daddy
Speaker 1: call him an artist. So I gave him an unqualified compliment,
Speaker 1: in which built into him that he knows that when
Speaker 1: he draws a picture, his pop believes it's the best picture.
Speaker 1: And I never got that when I was a young man.
Speaker 1: I got it when I did well. If I dropped
Speaker 1: the pass get him out, I would be my dad
Speaker 1: in the stags. Sometimes we have to realize that our
Speaker 1: standard of excellence by our family and our parents our
Speaker 1: standards in which they don't even hold themselves to. And
Speaker 1: so starting off, I can't. I know my father, Yeah,
Speaker 1: gave me compliments and deposited compliments in my emotional bank,
Speaker 1: but I know he didn't do it well enough because
Speaker 1: I can remember more of the withdrawals that he had
Speaker 1: in my life. And so my emotional bank is overwdrawn
Speaker 1: by thousands of dollars, and it also is bankrupt. And
Speaker 1: it's not a slight on my dad. It just I
Speaker 1: just know as a father today what is required and
Speaker 1: the things that I've missed that I need as a son. So, Kurt,
Speaker 1: what was the first time you experienced a compliment from
Speaker 1: your dad? I'll say, Um, I think my dad did
Speaker 1: a really good job. I think of depositing those compliments
Speaker 1: that I needed throughout the ride. I think some of
Speaker 1: the things that I was able to see because my dad,
Speaker 1: um was in the the world of education, so I
Speaker 1: spent a lot of time. My parents divorced when I
Speaker 1: was five, so when I went to be with my dad,
Speaker 1: it was a lot of one on one time I mean,
Speaker 1: my brothers and sisters were we would always travel together,
Speaker 1: but I always just found myself being the youngest male,
Speaker 1: just going with my dad to wash his car, um,
Speaker 1: going with him to coach his baseball basketball. Um, we'd
Speaker 1: go in and there were a lot of times he
Speaker 1: was telling me those things that I could do and
Speaker 1: the things I could be and um, showing me things
Speaker 1: that now I look back and I'm like, wow, like
Speaker 1: you were really speaking life into my life. And it
Speaker 1: was not until you know, you really don't have that
Speaker 1: reflection until you really do have children of your own.
Speaker 1: You are just kind of living your life thinking this
Speaker 1: is me, but you realize the impact that he's had.
Speaker 1: And I remember, and this this wasn't so much of
Speaker 1: the necessary of your of your situation with Deuce, but
Speaker 1: I remember there was one thing that he did for
Speaker 1: me that I think I was never expecting in the
Speaker 1: sense of I was actually seventeen, and I had gotten
Speaker 1: into trouble with uh with Kirk, with the law the
Speaker 1: law of the law. And I can't say what, but
Speaker 1: I'll say this, um, so um, just in case. No,
Speaker 1: I'm good. I'm good. I'm good. I'm good. And so
Speaker 1: what was great though, is like I said, my parents
Speaker 1: were were divorced at the time, and so my mom
Speaker 1: had to come pick me up. We go back home
Speaker 1: and she's like, I'm calling your that and I think
Speaker 1: we all understand, like you know, you know, my mom
Speaker 1: was gonna, you know, hit you one way. But then
Speaker 1: if if dad's coming, like there's something. And so I
Speaker 1: was really mad at my mom, like I can't believe
Speaker 1: you just called my dad and how dare you call
Speaker 1: that other guy? So I, um, I take off and
Speaker 1: I kind of like I'm walking around the neighborhood just
Speaker 1: like all right, I'm just gonna wait for listening because
Speaker 1: I already know what's about to happen. And I'm nothing,
Speaker 1: you know, see what, see what it's about, see if
Speaker 1: I'm a man. And so, um, he comes to the door.
Speaker 1: I opened the door and he just gave me a hug.
Speaker 1: And it really like literally I went to get ready
Speaker 1: to fight, and he gave me a hug and he
Speaker 1: just said, um, you know I love you. And and
Speaker 1: in that moment, I realized the power of mercy just
Speaker 1: as much as the power of infliction. And I know
Speaker 1: what he could have done, and he showed me the mercy.
Speaker 1: So he didn't give you truth and love. He did
Speaker 1: give me truth and love. He did. We sat down
Speaker 1: and talked, but he gave you what first. He gave
Speaker 1: me a hug that we talked about that. Sorry, but
Speaker 1: I'm you know what, I'm bringing that up because there's
Speaker 1: so much masculinity or de masculinity in the world right
Speaker 1: now for whatever reason. But we also understand that who
Speaker 1: you are and what you are everyone has a role.
Speaker 1: And your dad sounds like at that moment he was
Speaker 1: masculine enough to say, we can talk, but let's embrace first,
Speaker 1: which broke down where he was. You knew, you know,
Speaker 1: you knew your father knew more than you. But it
Speaker 1: was sounds like at that moment, before he told you
Speaker 1: are talked at you or monologued, he he wanted you
Speaker 1: to know how much he cared before he lets you
Speaker 1: know how much he knew. That's without a doubt, I mean,
Speaker 1: and like I said that that moment it changed my
Speaker 1: perception on what it meant to be strong too. Strength
Speaker 1: isn't always in the way that you can physically impose yourself. Um,
Speaker 1: I think vulnerability was it was a whole realm that
Speaker 1: you know again, we all grow grow up through different traumas.
Speaker 1: You know, some people grew up without a certain parent.
Speaker 1: You know, I was the divorce household, that was and
Speaker 1: so some of the things that I never got or
Speaker 1: that I never really um felt from that divorce household
Speaker 1: was commitment. But a lot of things that I always did,
Speaker 1: always that my dad was always around. Um But again,
Speaker 1: I think, you know, we can always always go back
Speaker 1: to that socialization cycle of your life of certain pinpoints
Speaker 1: of what change your tradreactory or what is implanted to
Speaker 1: you now? And then how do you kind of break
Speaker 1: some of those cycles? So, you know, but for me
Speaker 1: in that moment, it was his very intentional way of
Speaker 1: being there for me when I needed him, but also
Speaker 1: being there in a way that I never thought he
Speaker 1: could be, you know what I mean. And that that
Speaker 1: that's where now, so there's a point that you're realizing
Speaker 1: sounds like that, even though you had did something wrong,
Speaker 1: you already portraying that your dad was gonna come up
Speaker 1: shorthanded a little bit. I mean, I don't know how
Speaker 1: we all grew up, but I know that that's that's
Speaker 1: I mean, were you're you're used to, you get you
Speaker 1: do something wrong, there's a punishment, and usually that punishment
Speaker 1: it's not a depending on what household, geographical location, how
Speaker 1: they were parented. Also, I think ethnicity does play a role, right,
Speaker 1: I'm in a I am in a interracial marriage where
Speaker 1: my wife's from Utah, I'm from l A. We were
Speaker 1: pairing it different. I was backhanded. They maybe said some
Speaker 1: things to my wife that was different. Well, I know
Speaker 1: my wife's parents spoke differently. I'll just show you the difference.
Speaker 1: My wife's Uh, my dad was he's a I mean,
Speaker 1: burly strong man. But my wife's father is the one
Speaker 1: that taught me how to tie a tie. So, yes,
Speaker 1: I know how to fight, but I didn't know how
Speaker 1: to tie a tie. I didn't know how to dress,
Speaker 1: and that's just as important than being able to fistfight, Anthony,
Speaker 1: what you got. It's kind of different with my parents
Speaker 1: because my dad comes from the south. Uh, Montgomery, Alabama
Speaker 1: share crop And you're talking about going back in time,
Speaker 1: and I wanted to give you a little back I
Speaker 1: tell you about but I love that I've been in Montgomery,
Speaker 1: Alabama and it is going back in time. Well that's
Speaker 1: where everything really happened. And uh, you know, I grew
Speaker 1: up with her dad. I didn't have to watch things
Speaker 1: like Mississippi Burning, didn't have to go to school and
Speaker 1: and uh pay attention in the fifth chapter of social studies.
Speaker 1: My dad would tell me stories that, uh, which is
Speaker 1: really teach me about life. Um, to answer your question first.
Speaker 1: I really didn't get that many unqualified compliments coming up
Speaker 1: because my dad was so old school. He was one
Speaker 1: of those guys that was like, Hey, I want you
Speaker 1: to do right even if nobody packed you on the back.
Speaker 1: So who am I to give you a compliment for
Speaker 1: something just because you're doing it? And uh, So I
Speaker 1: really didn't get any kind of un if I had
Speaker 1: compliments until I was in grade school. Probably my seventh
Speaker 1: grade teacher, Miss Scott, gave me an unqualified compliment from
Speaker 1: a from answering the question right then she knew I
Speaker 1: lived in the back of the book he got to answer.
Speaker 1: But she wanted to encourage me because she knew that
Speaker 1: I was terrified to death of math, so she wanted
Speaker 1: to let me know that I was smart, that I
Speaker 1: could do it. Then I'm on the right track. Just
Speaker 1: keep pushing. Now back to my dad. Now, my dad,
Speaker 1: UH wasn't one of those people that like Kurt Um,
Speaker 1: I didn't even hear and I love you to me,
Speaker 1: to my mother, uh, to any of my brothers, um
Speaker 1: and two maybe I graduated college, so it was one
Speaker 1: of those moments like Kurt to where you know, after
Speaker 1: I graduated college, were alone in my apartment. I'm thinking,
Speaker 1: we're just gonna pack up. He's gonna ask me what's
Speaker 1: next in life because things weren't going the way I
Speaker 1: had playing. Uh, he told me I love you? And
Speaker 1: what did that do? At that moment? Man? First, it
Speaker 1: shocked me because I just stood there. I didn't even
Speaker 1: say I love you back because it was one of
Speaker 1: those things, where is this really happening? So I just
Speaker 1: looked at him and I saw the crying. We embraced,
Speaker 1: and it was like a real embrace, not just like that,
Speaker 1: what's up? It wasn't aside Hume, Man, it was. It
Speaker 1: was probably the best beer because but think about it,
Speaker 1: I have to say it that way. Think about how
Speaker 1: when I said that you kind of you kind of
Speaker 1: went backwards. Think about it, yes, but beer to beer
Speaker 1: means that there are two men who are embracing who
Speaker 1: was showing love and saying right. Ultimately, what I'm really saying,
Speaker 1: to the core of it is, am I good enough?
Speaker 1: Has will my father give me approval? And he, in
Speaker 1: this one moment, gave you something that you have been
Speaker 1: dying for how many years prior. I didn't even realize it.
Speaker 1: I didn't. I thought that's just the way I was.
Speaker 1: I thought that's the way we were. It was an understanding.
Speaker 1: You didn't have to tell me I love you. You
Speaker 1: know when I go to bed. You didn't have to
Speaker 1: say give me a hug every time I went to school.
Speaker 1: I know you love me. I know you're gonna be
Speaker 1: there for me. I know you cared for me. So
Speaker 1: when he did that, it was it was it was
Speaker 1: one of those things that it was one of those
Speaker 1: welcomed things that I need in life. And I didn't
Speaker 1: realize how much because that was just part of who
Speaker 1: I was at shell that had developed around me just
Speaker 1: by growing up that way in my household, because that
Speaker 1: wasn't the way it was. And your parents were married
Speaker 1: how many years as long as I have been alive.
Speaker 1: I mean they never divorced some years, yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean they went through ups and downs. We had a
Speaker 1: period where I thought my dad was out of the house,
Speaker 1: you know, but I think most of us had, you know.
Speaker 1: But yeah, that was that was one of those things
Speaker 1: in life that really just uh it was an awakening,
Speaker 1: all right and I needed that and I needed ain't
Speaker 1: it changed me for who I am today. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm a hugger now. I love cut to It and
Speaker 1: I love it even more when you download us and subscribe,
Speaker 1: and you can follow us on social media too, Smithie,
Speaker 1: where where at? That's at? Cut to It on Instagram?
Speaker 1: What about Twitter? At? Cut to It? Facebook? Cut to
Speaker 1: It featuring Steve Smith singr? What about online? And you
Speaker 1: can follow us at cut to It podcast dot com
Speaker 1: where you can buy merch and you can subscribe to
Speaker 1: us wherever you listen to podcasts. I got all my answers, questions.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, I got all my questions answered. That's what
Speaker 1: I'm here for. A brother, cut to a Podcast dot Com.
Speaker 1: Hili Taylor. How did your father impact you by him
Speaker 1: being your father? So? My father? He uh, like I said,
Speaker 1: I still do this day have her. He passed away
Speaker 1: a couple of years ago. Never told me he loved me,
Speaker 1: but his actions showed me. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: It showed me that that he loved me. Um, hard worker, UM,
Speaker 1: not too emotional health everything again, so by nature that
Speaker 1: happened to me, still fighting that now, um. And just
Speaker 1: the mentality the world owes you nothing. Anything you can
Speaker 1: conceive in your mind, you can do. Ask cliches that
Speaker 1: sound and our jingus genly because of that mentality. He
Speaker 1: was a hustler. I found out some things after he
Speaker 1: passed away that he was. Yeah, I mean that to
Speaker 1: kind of tell you he had Will Smith and jazz
Speaker 1: Jeff from a small town called Lauren Bird. I don't know,
Speaker 1: you know, you know what that's said just ninety minutes
Speaker 1: a fair heavy d. So he was he was, he was.
Speaker 1: He was a hustler, you know what I mean. And
Speaker 1: I would hear a lot of about his father. It's
Speaker 1: how his father kicked him out of the house at
Speaker 1: eighteen and tol him. We had to figure it out.
Speaker 1: So now I have my mom and dad in the house,
Speaker 1: sold and he telling me, hey, like the world owes
Speaker 1: you nothing, you gotta figure it out, son, And I
Speaker 1: did that, you know I did. How tough was that? Then?
Speaker 1: It was tough? I mean, especially when you surround about,
Speaker 1: you know, other people and their parents you know their
Speaker 1: dad's an't a good job? Man, Man, that's good. You
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. You can do that. You know,
Speaker 1: It's like my dad told me without telling me, when
Speaker 1: he told me, I can put it in my mind.
Speaker 1: I believe. I believe that. But in terms of I
Speaker 1: love you son, or you know, great job. You know,
Speaker 1: his way of compliments that you the man, You the
Speaker 1: man I taught you with you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: That that was his way. It was never was I
Speaker 1: love you, you know what I mean. And the first
Speaker 1: time I attempted to tell him I love him was
Speaker 1: the day he dropped me off for college and he
Speaker 1: didn't tell me back. So it reinforced that nobody owed
Speaker 1: me anything, even my father. That ere everything that I
Speaker 1: do from this point forward I had to earn. So
Speaker 1: he on, he meant just like a lot of the guys,
Speaker 1: same as podcast. You know, he meant very well, but
Speaker 1: he didn't know any different. I tell you one of
Speaker 1: the things that I hear that before we let Joe go,
Speaker 1: that I learned by my parents, by my father no loyalty,
Speaker 1: which meant no loyalty. And I'm by myself, so in
Speaker 1: the end, I already know I'll be by myself, so
Speaker 1: I can't really depend and count on anybody. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: that that plagues itself infiltrates and poisons of marriage, poisons
Speaker 1: relationships with your children because you're parenting now out of
Speaker 1: fear or parenting in a way that I can't imagine.
Speaker 1: Got four kids, and I can't imagine all four of
Speaker 1: my kids right now, me not saying I love it.
Speaker 1: It's tough. My seven year old right now if he
Speaker 1: every time I leave a house, Hey, doll, were dapted,
Speaker 1: you know, high five? I said, I love you. Listen
Speaker 1: to your mama. Be a good boy. Yes, sir, I
Speaker 1: didn't do it with all for my children, but the
Speaker 1: last one I'm learning and doing some things differently. Where
Speaker 1: I'm I'm telling him who loves you more than who
Speaker 1: loves you more than Jesus? He knows your daddy. I
Speaker 1: missed that with Boston. I missed that. But Boston he
Speaker 1: knows I love him because I tell him. My little girl,
Speaker 1: she knows I love her because I tell her leave
Speaker 1: her messages. Hey, just let you know, Hey, Punkin love you.
Speaker 1: My wife and my my oldest boy who trains with
Speaker 1: Anthony too. We see each other we'll becoming. He'll he'll
Speaker 1: train early now I trained later, and make sure we
Speaker 1: dap each other up, you know, tell him, hey, I
Speaker 1: love you. What about you, Joe? Well, I mean it's funny.
Speaker 1: Almost everybody's go to was those words I love you.
Speaker 1: As I'm sitting back here going last, Um, a lot
Speaker 1: of you guys starting the table or friends of mine today,
Speaker 1: and there's we've told each other we love each other.
Speaker 1: That's something that old school folks like Anthony said, would
Speaker 1: never do. So I say that the transition to my father.
Speaker 1: My dad always told me he loved me, but my
Speaker 1: dad never gave me a compliment. Talked about old school.
Speaker 1: I'm fifty years old, um so my dad's eighty six now.
Speaker 1: So going back in the day again, I knew I
Speaker 1: was loved, but my dad was all performance based. If
Speaker 1: he was going to give me a compliment. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of athletes sitting around this table um backstage Joel
Speaker 1: back in the day was was pretty good at something,
Speaker 1: but if I pitched well, or threw a no hit
Speaker 1: or did something, he would always cut me down. So
Speaker 1: even though he was the hold on, you're a picture
Speaker 1: of which I know, no, no, no, I'm I'm giving
Speaker 1: context thinking about it. You're a picture. What'd you throw?
Speaker 1: I mean, no, no? What was that? A no hitter? Multiple? No, No,
Speaker 1: I'm not I'm no base I like so let me
Speaker 1: get this right. Picture no hitter, and he's still cut you.
Speaker 1: The scoreboard says no one hit the ball. There's not
Speaker 1: a lot of pictures that are doing no hitters, because
Speaker 1: a no hitter requires a lot of other people's contribution,
Speaker 1: and and and so a no hitter is beyond just
Speaker 1: throwing a whole bunch of heat. Is ball placement, understanding
Speaker 1: the process of the each individual batter, and you not
Speaker 1: coming in, but you starting the game, and that doesn't
Speaker 1: happen in baseball today, and finishing the game, and baseball
Speaker 1: could be long. Yeah, are you out there on the mount?
Speaker 1: What could he break down when no one hit the ball?
Speaker 1: It was anything that he could do to put a
Speaker 1: knock or a chink on me. And his methodology was
Speaker 1: again going back to people's comments. He meant, well, don't
Speaker 1: fall in love with yourself, right, You're only as good
Speaker 1: as your last play, You're only as good as your
Speaker 1: last pitch. But he would carry that throughout my whole
Speaker 1: entire childhood. Now I'm no valedictorian. I mean I got
Speaker 1: enough to get by it up to play, so he
Speaker 1: had merit there to come at me for grades. But
Speaker 1: anything else from friendships, relationships in the you know, accolades, anything,
Speaker 1: everybody else be tapping you up, like hey ma, congratulations,
Speaker 1: you know you you get in the paper or whatever.
Speaker 1: And he would never be there to say those things
Speaker 1: to me. So as we migrated through life and we
Speaker 1: all go out on our own, you go to college,
Speaker 1: and you keep on moving, I could almost understand why
Speaker 1: he wanted to keep me grounded. But while you're going
Speaker 1: through that, you're like, yo, like what else can I do?
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, you do everything which you believe
Speaker 1: to be as close to perfect as you can do,
Speaker 1: whatever it may be. Pick a topic, and to always
Speaker 1: get that backhanded compliment, well you did pretty good, but
Speaker 1: you know that one dude did hit it pretty far foul,
Speaker 1: Like what you mean I mean say that? So so again,
Speaker 1: I knew I was loved. I knew if I needed anything,
Speaker 1: I could always go get it. Um, But I found
Speaker 1: myself wanting and I would actually in a moment in
Speaker 1: my life like I try to pursue things to do
Speaker 1: things well, just to look over to get that at
Speaker 1: a boy from him that I knew I was never
Speaker 1: gonna get, but it still drove me because that was
Speaker 1: my dad. You know, he'd give other folks compliments, he
Speaker 1: would he would do that in front of me, so
Speaker 1: you know, you kind of get and then just get
Speaker 1: used to it, you know what I'm saying, Like Anthon,
Speaker 1: like your your father finally said to you I love
Speaker 1: you at the at the age of eighteen, and you
Speaker 1: froze up because you didn't know how to react. You
Speaker 1: didn't know what to say. And that's kind of how
Speaker 1: I got to So no, I never got a unqualified compliment.
Speaker 1: I didn't really get many compliments at all. It was
Speaker 1: all negativity to drive me to go do better again intentions. Well,
Speaker 1: but that's something that I never received. And I was
Speaker 1: growing up and I ain't bringing up any felonies because
Speaker 1: there might be some pending. So who in here? How
Speaker 1: to the group I wanted to be like their father?
Speaker 1: They can't see you as a podcast? Kurt raised his
Speaker 1: hand very eloquently. I okay, So so Kurt, you want
Speaker 1: to be like your father? Yeah, all right, yeah, not professionally,
Speaker 1: but yeah, whatever, almost every other way other than his
Speaker 1: job that he went to every day. I wanted to
Speaker 1: be like my dad, and I am in a lot
Speaker 1: of in a lot of ways, Kurt wanted to be
Speaker 1: like his dad Anthony Highley. Yes, I want to be
Speaker 1: like my dad. I wanted to be like my father
Speaker 1: until I was about twelve, because emotionally, I knew there
Speaker 1: were some things that I was starting to piece together
Speaker 1: that I'm I was missing out on. I'm right around
Speaker 1: that same time as well too, as a young young child, absolutely,
Speaker 1: but as you start to formulate your own thinking and becoming,
Speaker 1: you know, a young adult, I'm about with you. Around
Speaker 1: that age, my parents were together. My parents separated and
Speaker 1: worked together pretty much most of my uh young childhood,
Speaker 1: and my dad used to pick me up on the
Speaker 1: weekends and there would be times, what I remember growing up,
Speaker 1: there was one particular time we were on seventy nine
Speaker 1: an avalon Cross Street for Freemount High School and I
Speaker 1: fell asleep Friday night. I believed the reason why my
Speaker 1: dad didn't pick me up when I was older, or
Speaker 1: he didn't pick me up that Friday because he didn't
Speaker 1: want to wake me. But I started to realize that
Speaker 1: it wasn't here. He didn't want to wake me, he
Speaker 1: didn't come. And because of that, that made me start
Speaker 1: to see and feel like, and if I'm not good enough,
Speaker 1: if I'm not worth picking up on the day that
Speaker 1: you've signed up for. Because I'm a boy, I'm I'm,
Speaker 1: I'm a boy, I don't I don't know anything about responsibilities.
Speaker 1: All I know is my pot was supposed to pick
Speaker 1: me up. Ye. And I bring that up to really
Speaker 1: say that for a long time, I was a horrible
Speaker 1: father because it was based on performance. I was tough
Speaker 1: on my kids because I didn't want them the world
Speaker 1: to chew them up and spend them out, especially being
Speaker 1: a young black man in America today. Just facts, and
Speaker 1: so I just realized by twelve, I didn't want to
Speaker 1: be like my father. But prior to that, I thought
Speaker 1: my father was my he was my hero. But the
Speaker 1: the part that's even crazier is h m hm. There
Speaker 1: are sometimes when I walk down the hallways of my
Speaker 1: home and I laid my children down and I kissed
Speaker 1: my boys good night. There are sometimes that I wrestle
Speaker 1: Steve Smith Singer is wrestling when he just used to
Speaker 1: be Steve Smith. When I used to be a little Stevie.
Speaker 1: I'm walking down the hall feeling overwhelmed and filled as
Speaker 1: a father, but empty as a five gallon keg as
Speaker 1: a son, because I know what I needed as a
Speaker 1: little boy, which is a good night kiss, hey when
Speaker 1: you wake up, that he'll be here, what we're having
Speaker 1: for breakfast in the morning, Just that commitment. So this
Speaker 1: is what just about. It's not putting it out there
Speaker 1: like to to shame my dad, but it's more to
Speaker 1: put it out there to say the effects as a son,
Speaker 1: what you learn or not learn with their strength and weaknesses,
Speaker 1: how they play a role in impacting you as a man.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you, is I mean because we you
Speaker 1: can always learn just as much from a situation of
Speaker 1: what you were given, just as much as you weren't given.
Speaker 1: Are you hyper sensitive as a father now to all
Speaker 1: those things that hyper sensitive overall? Just calling a spade
Speaker 1: a spade. But you know what I'm saying, like, because yeah,
Speaker 1: I I sometimes I make a I make a mole
Speaker 1: hill into a mountain. Rights it's hard sometimes for my
Speaker 1: wife back in the day, really, um, I got man
Speaker 1: would be knocking knockout dragouts at the soccer game because
Speaker 1: he could you know, somebody didn't push themselves, push themselves
Speaker 1: because I know what it takes. So it's uh yeah,
Speaker 1: very hypersensitive. Almost ten steps ahead. I'm thinking about, like
Speaker 1: what kind of man it's gonna be, what kind of
Speaker 1: what kind of daughter? My daughter, what kind of wife
Speaker 1: will she be? Bro? Just chill dog, you know, let
Speaker 1: them let him watch bubble guppies. That's not the way
Speaker 1: we came. And and and and I'm saying, to some
Speaker 1: degree that was a strength, but also I believe it's
Speaker 1: a weakness because it allows us not to be present
Speaker 1: in the moment. We're always thinking about when they're twenty one.
Speaker 1: When they're ten, we're thinking about when they're about them
Speaker 1: doing right at when they're seven, when they're three, they're
Speaker 1: still in pull ups. They can't hold that p overnight.
Speaker 1: You over there talking about hold a job. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean your kids are a little bit older than my
Speaker 1: seventeen and seven, and I mean I think you know
Speaker 1: with my kids, my four kids, it's it's the same
Speaker 1: thing obviously. And I look to you sometimes as how
Speaker 1: how how do we do it? Before? I mean, and
Speaker 1: defense that's real though, um, but then I look at
Speaker 1: it at the same time, so to your point of
Speaker 1: being present in the moment. And sometimes what I'm trying
Speaker 1: to do is let them. I tell my oldest I say,
Speaker 1: all right, this is your journey. All right, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: help support whatever you want to do within your journey.
Speaker 1: At the same time, if she says that she wants
Speaker 1: to do something, though, do you, as a father holder
Speaker 1: accountable to her own word? You see what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: because you tell me that's the that's the part, that's
Speaker 1: the rough pardon. So what I have to do is
Speaker 1: what I'm learning to do, is I let my wife lead,
Speaker 1: and letting your wife lead. Some people can say, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, she's running the house. No, we're running the
Speaker 1: house together. But there are some things that my wife
Speaker 1: is excellent at that I'm a horrible wife at. And
Speaker 1: there are some things that my wife is a horrible
Speaker 1: husband at because that's not her role in that in
Speaker 1: that particular subject, like my wife's role in our house.
Speaker 1: She homeschools our son. I'm not the principal. I support
Speaker 1: because that's she's a giver, she's a server. So she's
Speaker 1: educating our seven year old son. He's already tested, he's
Speaker 1: above where she is, where where he needs to be?
Speaker 1: Like he's he's in the second grade, but he has
Speaker 1: a the reading level and some of the other stuff
Speaker 1: as a fourth grader. And then there are some other
Speaker 1: things he's a third grader, chucks. But what I'm doing
Speaker 1: and attempting to do is ask my wife, especially with
Speaker 1: our daughter, what what have you what did you need
Speaker 1: from your father when you were her age? And she
Speaker 1: tells me love and from a guy who was paring
Speaker 1: it out of I mean, we're all old school, my mom,
Speaker 1: my parents, parents, out of figure. I got my ass
Speaker 1: with a lot. I know that's a shocker. I got
Speaker 1: a lot of but whippers, and so I'm not used.
Speaker 1: I am conditioned for punishment. I know how to receive punishment.
Speaker 1: You know what I struggle with love compliments, that's true
Speaker 1: statement about you and being close to you. Um, but
Speaker 1: you continue to get better at that. And one thing
Speaker 1: you do, Comma do is you always make sure you
Speaker 1: give your children, all four of them a comment. A
Speaker 1: gotta handle it the right way. I've got to not
Speaker 1: do it this way because I know what happened to
Speaker 1: me and I don't want to negatively. Oh I've done
Speaker 1: I've had enough mess ups, I know anything. We can't
Speaker 1: be the bull in the China closet. Well, and I
Speaker 1: go back to Kurt's original namement because it triggered something
Speaker 1: my mind is, are you hyper sensitive about that? Um?
Speaker 1: I'm looking around the table at four successful men um
Speaker 1: parenting our father. I can't look at myself, but but
Speaker 1: thank you, I appreciate it. Kurt threw up a five everybody.
Speaker 1: He's on a pot just in case. But I look
Speaker 1: around the table, norma, and we're all success full man.
Speaker 1: So whether our parenting was good, bad, or in different,
Speaker 1: we've we've taken something from that and we make sure
Speaker 1: that we lead in ways our parents didn't, but also
Speaker 1: the ways that they did lead us. Well, um, we
Speaker 1: all want to take that and roll it into into
Speaker 1: our children. You know. Highly he's a a new dad
Speaker 1: over here, so I know he's just now getting the
Speaker 1: ball rolling on. I said, best right now? How well,
Speaker 1: that's the best life, you know? Why wipe your butt,
Speaker 1: stick a pacifier in your mouth, stick a bottle in
Speaker 1: your mouth. What's the baby girl's name? Oh yeah, I forgot.
Speaker 1: I just thought i'd throw my daughter some credit at that,
Speaker 1: since it's named after a my it's not but I
Speaker 1: used that but what was? But think about it. The
Speaker 1: most informative informative years four childs in the first five
Speaker 1: okay to that point too, and when your child was
Speaker 1: first born, and what is the most important thing for
Speaker 1: that child to have? Skin time? Yeah, absolutely, chest to
Speaker 1: chest time. And as adult I believe in that too,
Speaker 1: beard to bear. But but also and then as as
Speaker 1: you're going through this too, and um, I know everyone's
Speaker 1: pushing for the what's the crying out method and all
Speaker 1: that and to get them to sleep don't work, but
Speaker 1: well it works for some. But you'll see like a
Speaker 1: lot of times people are the scientists are saying that
Speaker 1: it's so important though, like you're like my wife, she knew,
Speaker 1: like the baby needed to sleep with us. Then the
Speaker 1: baby's sleeping next to us. It's not just cried out
Speaker 1: and because psychologically that baby is being informed and it
Speaker 1: wants to feel what love it's it's it literally happens
Speaker 1: from the moment that they're born and they and they
Speaker 1: feel that impression. And that's why I loved um. You know,
Speaker 1: when my kids were born, I didn't take the truth
Speaker 1: what we would call night shift. Um, you know, I
Speaker 1: would stay awake as long as I couldn't let my
Speaker 1: wife get three or four hours. But at that time,
Speaker 1: I'm staying away and we're just having like that was
Speaker 1: the best time of my life, just um, catching up
Speaker 1: on Shark Tank and all that. But I mean it was.
Speaker 1: It was a really important time and I cherished those moments.
Speaker 1: So you're still in that moment. My best snaps, some
Speaker 1: of the best snaps. Who's with your child on your chest?
Speaker 1: Good do it? Good do it. Let's getting down to
Speaker 1: do it? Good do it? Hey, Gerard, why did you
Speaker 1: get that T shirt? You mean this thing? Oh yes,
Speaker 1: I got it from cut to a podcast dot com
Speaker 1: where we have exclusive merchandise. Shout out to our guys
Speaker 1: at seven or four shot. But yeah, you can go on,
Speaker 1: buy you a T shirt, subscribe to us wherever you
Speaker 1: listen to podcasts. And then you start off. Man, Um,
Speaker 1: what did your father teach you that you carry on? Now?
Speaker 1: That's your strength, hard work, and in Layman's terms, just
Speaker 1: a sense of responsibility for everything that I do. Everything
Speaker 1: that comes from something that I do. Um, I always
Speaker 1: have that and that definitely comes from him. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I don't know how to elaborate more on
Speaker 1: uther than they're just saying. You know, just that sense
Speaker 1: of responsibility just comes from my dad, and I recognize
Speaker 1: it when when it comes about. Maybe it comes from work,
Speaker 1: maybe it comes from a personal life. Um, but I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: that's my dad, and it's my dad all the way
Speaker 1: right there, and let me let me change up a
Speaker 1: little bit, me cross over, But all comes back to
Speaker 1: that same base shot and my dad talk. You know.
Speaker 1: So yeah, honey, Yeah, just basically can control what I
Speaker 1: can control. So on every situation, there's something I want
Speaker 1: to do out here in the back of my head,
Speaker 1: like figure it out, you know. You know it's interesting
Speaker 1: about that. That's a great philosophy, the truth. We can't
Speaker 1: control anything. Half of this world is out of our control.
Speaker 1: We can get in the car, drive home, but we
Speaker 1: actually have zero control of if we get an accident.
Speaker 1: All we can control is hitting the gas, break, turn
Speaker 1: it on, turning right, left, reverse, neutral. But yeah, we're
Speaker 1: get in the car thinking that we're in total control. Yeah,
Speaker 1: if you're in a car, you can be on the
Speaker 1: road with a hundred cars and because you're driving right,
Speaker 1: you think you are in control. But if if one
Speaker 1: out of those ninety nine come up in your lane
Speaker 1: and t b on you. It ain't nothing you can
Speaker 1: do about it but brace yourself. Yeah. So it's like
Speaker 1: my dad, he was huge on that and then this
Speaker 1: big thing was covered or what else? Oh yeah, that's
Speaker 1: we that's way too much. I say that cover though, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that we call that plane by not playing being what
Speaker 1: people think, but plan bes and like, well, I know
Speaker 1: this is gonna happen, and that's gonna happen, so let's
Speaker 1: be ready for this. The mental gymnastics. Oh that's so
Speaker 1: exhaust Oh my gosh. You know how many times I
Speaker 1: was cutting my sixth in year career that every training camp, man,
Speaker 1: they're gonna see this or that. Let it go. I mean,
Speaker 1: you guys are great because what I what I see
Speaker 1: and I know from not just you guys, is that
Speaker 1: you have to be so much more creative as a
Speaker 1: parent as our parents were, especially as fathers, because your
Speaker 1: dad because just yell at you are you. Your dad
Speaker 1: can just give you a look. Oh, they can just
Speaker 1: say go to your room. When they can give you
Speaker 1: a spanking. None of those things happen nowadays. You have
Speaker 1: to come up with weaty ways of doing things. You
Speaker 1: have to come up with smart and less intimidating ways
Speaker 1: of punishing your kid are teaching him or her a lesson.
Speaker 1: So that's one of the things that I just noticing
Speaker 1: being a parent now compared to what it was like
Speaker 1: for most of our most of the man, Oh, it
Speaker 1: was tough. Beat your neighbor's parents. I got beat by
Speaker 1: my neighbor's dad. Your neighbors, the neighbor parents gave your buhop. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then you got I didn't even tell him because
Speaker 1: then I was going to get another one. But do
Speaker 1: you remember you get dropped and they say, hey, take
Speaker 1: care of that. Whatever happens as your house, And it's like,
Speaker 1: oh no, you just took it. You didn't even ask why,
Speaker 1: You just walking into it. Like we get whooped today
Speaker 1: and then you walked outside and you played. I wasn't
Speaker 1: walking outside after whooping sometime, ginger, what woldn't have beating?
Speaker 1: I remember my grandpa gave me a whooping in the
Speaker 1: backyard because he thought I said something to our neighbor Angel.
Speaker 1: And what's interesting is Angel's son now owns the house
Speaker 1: next door to my grandparents old house that they you
Speaker 1: know what they've passed on and I don't even say
Speaker 1: anything to Angel, but I took a hell no apology.
Speaker 1: He was covering the whatever. What was um My thing
Speaker 1: that I used today is um my dad would always
Speaker 1: tell me people will show you who they are eventually.
Speaker 1: Something you can't keep up that facade that your buddies
Speaker 1: or your friends they're they're nice. But eventually people will
Speaker 1: show you who they are. So I've took taking that
Speaker 1: through my whole entire life. Is just when you look
Speaker 1: at people, taking at face value, race, age, gender, whatever
Speaker 1: you want to call it, They're always going to show
Speaker 1: you who they are, whether it's good, bad, or in
Speaker 1: different um So today, you know, I take that with me.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, we travel around, we meet a
Speaker 1: lot of people, and you know, you can tell in
Speaker 1: the first three or four or five minutes sometimes whether
Speaker 1: someone is someone you want to rock with or not.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it takes weeks, months, heck even years, depending upon situations.
Speaker 1: Right when certain situations arise, that person may you know,
Speaker 1: do a detour and turn into that individual that yep,
Speaker 1: I gotta keep my eye on him. So that's just
Speaker 1: one of those things that I've always taken throughout my life. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I would say, um, a couple of things, just my
Speaker 1: my dad's work ethic. Um. Like I said, it was
Speaker 1: just one of the I cherished the weekends when I
Speaker 1: got to go spend time with my dad. We would um.
Speaker 1: He was a teacher, principal, coach, but also as a
Speaker 1: um you know, as a side hustle. He was a landscaper.
Speaker 1: So as those are side hustle and main hustle, all
Speaker 1: people driven and hard work that requires a lot of
Speaker 1: the people's input and decision making. As a principal and
Speaker 1: then obviously as a landscape, landscape is tough and to
Speaker 1: and and that was one of those things where I
Speaker 1: would start with him. First thing in the morning, I
Speaker 1: tapped out about two o'clock, Like, it's I'm done the
Speaker 1: first thing in the morning. You tap out at two o'clock,
Speaker 1: the first thing in the morning til two that's that's
Speaker 1: that sounds good. But my dad would go until the
Speaker 1: night like and then I would look at him like,
Speaker 1: how are you doing that? And in his philosophy was
Speaker 1: until the work is done. Um. And that's just kind
Speaker 1: of how I've been wired now. UM. And it's probably
Speaker 1: it's good and bad because I get so task oriented
Speaker 1: sometimes like I lose track of everything else that I
Speaker 1: need to be doing. But that was the thing that
Speaker 1: I was tasking myself. So, um, that's one thing. And
Speaker 1: then UM, through his three different cancers and tumors and
Speaker 1: and all the other miscellaneous things that he said, UM,
Speaker 1: it was just don't have a bad day, have a
Speaker 1: bad moment. And so when I go through things throughout
Speaker 1: the day, I try not to use that particular thing
Speaker 1: and let it just ravel into other things and um,
Speaker 1: you know, and so I kind of took his manitra
Speaker 1: and said, have a bad day, have a bad day tomorrow.
Speaker 1: And so I would always try to just say, you know,
Speaker 1: there's gonna be something good that's come out. I may
Speaker 1: not see it at this moment, but usually when you know,
Speaker 1: when you reflect on things, there's so many good things
Speaker 1: that can come out of that that bad moment, that
Speaker 1: bad situation. Um, but you have to give it life.
Speaker 1: You have to give us some room to breathe, um
Speaker 1: and to speak life into other things. So those things, UM,
Speaker 1: you know, you could look, I could always point to
Speaker 1: things where you know, like I said, you know, one
Speaker 1: thing that you know I'm very high per sensitive about
Speaker 1: is um because he you know that my parents divorced
Speaker 1: when I was five. You know, I'm very hyper sensitive
Speaker 1: about the sanctity of my marriage and and how do
Speaker 1: I pour into my marriage? Um? Because I find it
Speaker 1: very easy, um, you know, to be a be a father. UM.
Speaker 1: I love being at all my kids events and coaching
Speaker 1: and doing this and that, and UM, I feel like
Speaker 1: I'm providing, you know, because I'm working these jobs and
Speaker 1: doing all these things. So that feels But then you know,
Speaker 1: you get so caught off in that, and you're like,
Speaker 1: am I really taking care of my marriage and my wife?
Speaker 1: And and am I pouring into her and I lifting
Speaker 1: her up and my letting her guarden grow into what
Speaker 1: it needs to be that she can be the best
Speaker 1: that she needs to be for our for our family.
Speaker 1: So that's something that I'm you know, and I think
Speaker 1: some of the things that may I may have missed,
Speaker 1: you know as a child growing up, of how what
Speaker 1: does that? What does that look like? Um? At all times?
Speaker 1: And so that that's something that I'm learning. UM. And
Speaker 1: I think I'm a process, not a perfection. I'm trying
Speaker 1: to continue to learn. And I can easily go into
Speaker 1: a situation where I've messed up and I've did something wrong,
Speaker 1: I left something now whatever, and I can humbly like
Speaker 1: go to and say, look, you know, just tell me
Speaker 1: what I need to do or what is it that
Speaker 1: I could have done, Like I'm I'm always trying to
Speaker 1: do that. I'm not I can't read your mind, but
Speaker 1: I'm willing to listen. I'm willing to listen. And so
Speaker 1: we just had that That's something that I would say
Speaker 1: for myself that I want to continue to work on.
Speaker 1: I think, um, one of the biggest things that I think.
Speaker 1: You know, we talked about strengths, and as athletes, you
Speaker 1: also got to talk about the weaknesses. I think something
Speaker 1: that I've had to battle with. It as a weakness
Speaker 1: that my father has given me. Us is early on
Speaker 1: in my marriage, early on in in being a young man,
Speaker 1: early on in in parenting. Silence that's sometimes avoiding in
Speaker 1: the silence actually is a destroyer that my dad really
Speaker 1: didn't talk about a lot of things, didn't really share,
Speaker 1: never really saw vulnerable and so you know, and then
Speaker 1: that silence was it does and for me, I actually
Speaker 1: made a list, um m hmmm, for me, Uh, what
Speaker 1: a silence do m mm hmm. So one of the
Speaker 1: things that when I'm sitting in silence, I figured out
Speaker 1: that's where a lot of fears built up. Well, I
Speaker 1: can allow the unknown to just it could be a
Speaker 1: forty mile train of concerns that are allowed to just faster, worry, hurt, loneliness.
Speaker 1: Because I think anybody trying to develop or improve in anything,
Speaker 1: you need three things. Are three allies to help you develop.
Speaker 1: Need someone to affirm you, someone to ask you the
Speaker 1: right questions so you can achieve the things that you're
Speaker 1: looking for. And I think silence is a you know,
Speaker 1: we're talking about where we are today and mental health.
Speaker 1: Silence is right now is one of the It's a
Speaker 1: deadly killer. It's leading people to sit in silence of suicide,
Speaker 1: sitting silence of opioid addiction, divorce. I think the pandemic
Speaker 1: was one of the worst times for some people, but
Speaker 1: some for other people. It's a time to connect sometimes
Speaker 1: to root out. We talked about inflation of the economy
Speaker 1: and there was an inflation or deficit in homes prior
Speaker 1: to the pandemic, a lack of connectivity. It was mass Oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: it was right. Yeah. I think as men, it's hard
Speaker 1: for us to be vulnerable. That's how we're wired. Um.
Speaker 1: So as we get older again, the silence pieces, you know,
Speaker 1: going back to your question, is my father's weaknesses I
Speaker 1: never really knew because he wasn't a good communicator. Um.
Speaker 1: Other than the you know, like I said earlier and
Speaker 1: I love you, there was no sit down conversation how
Speaker 1: was your day, what's bothering you? How's it going? Which
Speaker 1: I never really had that in my life as a man.
Speaker 1: Probably within the last you know, three or four years,
Speaker 1: was you know, some of my close friends to where man,
Speaker 1: it's okay to be hurting, you know, it's okay to
Speaker 1: not know the answer, whether it's financially, relationship, whatever it is.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I took that my whole life. I'm good.
Speaker 1: You know how many times people ask how you doing,
Speaker 1: ma'am good when maybe you really aren't. Um. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: that was a weakness that I never knew my dad
Speaker 1: had any because it never reared its head, so I
Speaker 1: was never had the ability to talk about it. So
Speaker 1: it's just something that I've just you know, you start
Speaker 1: putting the pieces together as you get older, and uh,
Speaker 1: those pieces starting to come together. I think it's important.
Speaker 1: I mean, like you said, is you know whether it's
Speaker 1: I think with with men um, you know, how do
Speaker 1: we how do we become more vulnerable with each other
Speaker 1: to each other? I think something that I always enjoyed,
Speaker 1: you know, dependent upon the team in the year, but
Speaker 1: typically in a locker room setting, you would have a
Speaker 1: few guys that you would just sit down and you're
Speaker 1: you're really talking about I mean, you're talking about a
Speaker 1: lot of stuff, but sometimes you're really talking about stuff
Speaker 1: that needs to be talked about. You need to get
Speaker 1: it off your chest, off your mind, whatever it is.
Speaker 1: And I know when I was younger, you know, you
Speaker 1: had your older guys that you could go to um,
Speaker 1: but you knew who that was. And sometimes now that
Speaker 1: you know, I know that since I've been removed, it's
Speaker 1: I still have certain people that I can go to,
Speaker 1: and you need people. I think that you can be
Speaker 1: vulnerable at least even ask the question like but too
Speaker 1: often or not? Like we we asked each other, you know, man,
Speaker 1: how you doing good? Like? But are we giving that
Speaker 1: that guy that that's like? Are we giving you the time?
Speaker 1: Like when we ask the question are you're doing? Are
Speaker 1: we allowing the time for you to actually say how
Speaker 1: are you and give it seriously. We're not We're asking
Speaker 1: and passing. Yeah, it's it's not a genuine like how
Speaker 1: are you doing? Because you really some people really don't care.
Speaker 1: They're just programmed to ask it so they don't come
Speaker 1: across rude. I think we need to come with like
Speaker 1: a better way of doing that, because, honestly, I think
Speaker 1: to your point though, I think there should be like
Speaker 1: if you if I have time to like actually like
Speaker 1: catch up, like let's catch up, and I'm here to
Speaker 1: Like I said, I try to listen and not really
Speaker 1: impart my ideology on you, but I want to listen
Speaker 1: to what you have to say, um, and then like
Speaker 1: whatever response from that, let's do that. But we I
Speaker 1: think it's it's we have to we we are filled,
Speaker 1: our lives were busy and not purpose. And how do
Speaker 1: we like find that purpose that we can literally pour
Speaker 1: into other people and allow them. There's just so much
Speaker 1: and I think, you know, I go back because we
Speaker 1: all too many, too many of us already know what
Speaker 1: other people need. I think we we think, yeah, oh,
Speaker 1: I know what you need. Right. We talked about just
Speaker 1: the way the government said, well I know what I
Speaker 1: know what pop black folks need. We don't. We're not
Speaker 1: asking our friends, asking people beyond the weather, like you're
Speaker 1: asking asking someone how do you really feel? Or what
Speaker 1: do you need? Mhmm. Do you want to know something?
Speaker 1: Ask someone of significance? How can I show up for
Speaker 1: you today? First of all, they I'm like, oh you okay,
Speaker 1: then say then ask them how they gonna show up?
Speaker 1: But I've asked my wife's I've asked my wife in
Speaker 1: the last year, how can I show up for her today?
Speaker 1: But I have missed twenty years of asking her how
Speaker 1: can I show up for her today? But what does
Speaker 1: she need from me? So I know I'm falling short
Speaker 1: as a husband, so I damn near no. And I'm
Speaker 1: missing an opportunity to be transparent with my boys and
Speaker 1: my daughter. So I'm trying to take that opportunity now
Speaker 1: to be intentional. And she's usually pretty honest with you
Speaker 1: when you say how can I Sometimes she's like, I
Speaker 1: don't know, that's a great question, And another time she
Speaker 1: was like, just be gentle. I got you right. That's
Speaker 1: what she needs. That's that's what she needs, and you're
Speaker 1: not doing what you think she needs. Correct. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: like that. It's tough though, because sometimes sometimes you'll get
Speaker 1: asked you like, oh, because just it's an answer that
Speaker 1: says that you haven't shown up for her. We're shown
Speaker 1: up for them. Good do it, Good do it. Let's
Speaker 1: getting down to do it. Good do it man. A
Speaker 1: couple of years ago I did an intensive where I
Speaker 1: went to actually flew to Tennessee, staying in the hotel
Speaker 1: with my counselor for two days, and we did this
Speaker 1: thing called a trauma egg. And then the trauma egg,
Speaker 1: you you write all the feelings you brought out your life,
Speaker 1: you know, insecurity, hurt, all that stuff. And then we
Speaker 1: sat for two days and just kind of went through everything.
Speaker 1: And then he put two chairs up, the chair of
Speaker 1: my mom and my father talked to them, and then
Speaker 1: put a chair of my grandfather and grandmother and talked
Speaker 1: to them. It was pretty interesting to go back and
Speaker 1: you start to relive your life. And one of the
Speaker 1: biggest things that I know that I struggle with you.
Speaker 1: Right again, this isn't this isn't to be mean, but
Speaker 1: it is to be transparent. I struggle with my father
Speaker 1: to day, not because he did anything wrong. I know
Speaker 1: as a son what I was missing because I see
Speaker 1: that this is a safe enough place for my children
Speaker 1: and tell me what I'm missing, what they miss, order
Speaker 1: what they need from me. When you go and do
Speaker 1: that and m it's kind of like, how do you
Speaker 1: The first step is when you went to go to
Speaker 1: Tennessee for two days? Right? Yeah, it's two days? I
Speaker 1: mean how And I say this because again it's kind
Speaker 1: of like the the stronghold I think that men have
Speaker 1: had is how do you be vulnerable with your own
Speaker 1: self to allow yourself It's I don't know if that
Speaker 1: makes sense, but yeah, I mean, how do I be
Speaker 1: truthful to myself? I'm because we don't think. I'm trying. Like,
Speaker 1: as you're talking, I'm thinking to myself like could I
Speaker 1: do could I? I know I could show up, but
Speaker 1: could I do it and be truthful about it all?
Speaker 1: Because that's why you have to go out. I went
Speaker 1: offside out of the state so we can we could
Speaker 1: sit there and kind of we we walked and talked
Speaker 1: and and just be able to not be on right.
Speaker 1: Steve Smith said, you the football player did not go
Speaker 1: of Tennessee. Steve Smith, the man, the son, the father,
Speaker 1: the husband, and nephew went to the intens of it
Speaker 1: and then it peeled back some things and it was exhausting,
Speaker 1: not exhausting, and like exhausting is physically and mentally, Like
Speaker 1: I had no appetite because reliving some things that I
Speaker 1: didn't even know we're there that affected me on why
Speaker 1: I responded this way to that person this time in
Speaker 1: this situation, like we have to get beyond talking about sports,
Speaker 1: course talking about the weather and really start talking about
Speaker 1: things that are tangible, textual that actually will improve the
Speaker 1: real things that we can control wrong, which is ourselves.
Speaker 1: Did you ever read the book from Jason Wilson, the
Speaker 1: one you're talking about that we were talking about last
Speaker 1: I read about halfway through and then I had to stop.
Speaker 1: And I've been backtracking on you know, Bond of Brothers
Speaker 1: like this, Yeah, you about that book about ten Am.
Speaker 1: I'm just three dep just because of just all the
Speaker 1: stuff that's going on. I mean, but it you know what,
Speaker 1: we talked about, all this stuff, and I'm gonna check
Speaker 1: out that book Band of Brothers, But I mean, when
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not sure if you guys are familiar
Speaker 1: with Jason Wilson out of Detroit, UM. He has two books,
Speaker 1: Cry Like a Man and then Battle Cry, which is
Speaker 1: the sequel to it. But it's it's it's a lot.
Speaker 1: It's allowing yourself. Like we talked about, you know, what
Speaker 1: is it like to become a man? I think he
Speaker 1: gave it an analogy one time of m all right,
Speaker 1: let's say you're at the house. No one's there right now,
Speaker 1: and so you got all your chores whatever you felt
Speaker 1: like you need to get done. And then you're laying
Speaker 1: on the couch right and you may may have sports on,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter, and you know he started doze off.
Speaker 1: And then you hear that door, whether it's the garage
Speaker 1: door or something, and you pop up and you act
Speaker 1: like you're doing something like you and it's like that
Speaker 1: it's the nature of like do you give your like
Speaker 1: the vulnerability of like I needed to rest, but like
Speaker 1: as a man, it's like that productivity of you have
Speaker 1: to constantly like like I told you one of the
Speaker 1: things that like it was until the job is done.
Speaker 1: But it's and I've I've tried a doze off and
Speaker 1: then I hear I'm doing something like just so she
Speaker 1: sees me like because as if I wasn't doing anything
Speaker 1: like um, But it's it's a phenomenal book. If you
Speaker 1: guys have and I'm interested. You're not a father, are
Speaker 1: you not? That you know all? You're not a father,
Speaker 1: so why are you on here what I You are
Speaker 1: a son? And I think it's interesting as a as
Speaker 1: a hearing a guy talk about how you had a
Speaker 1: great relationship with your folks, how they built in instilled,
Speaker 1: hard working you. Because I know how you do your business.
Speaker 1: But yeah, you you coach and training boxing where people
Speaker 1: are walking out feeling like they can box until they
Speaker 1: come in the next session and they sparre with you
Speaker 1: and they really nope the game box. How do you
Speaker 1: How is your coaching style different from your dad's parenting
Speaker 1: style because I can see your polar opposite and it
Speaker 1: sounds intentional. Now now I can connect the dots on why. Wow,
Speaker 1: that's a great question. Um, that's a great question. I
Speaker 1: think that I can say I can tell you how
Speaker 1: they're similar before I can tell you how they differ. Um,
Speaker 1: just with that encouragement, you know, my dad would say
Speaker 1: go cut the grass. Um. I could be midway through
Speaker 1: it and he can just look at me and see
Speaker 1: that I needed a little something to keep going as
Speaker 1: I wanted to leave or stop. It's uh, just knowing
Speaker 1: when they say something, when the when the press a button,
Speaker 1: then encourage And that's kind of translated through my coaching,
Speaker 1: Like I can look at somebody and tell when they're
Speaker 1: tired and when they don't understand something, press a button
Speaker 1: or you understanding that right? Or hit him right here
Speaker 1: or you understanding that right. So it's just it's just
Speaker 1: kind of translating what's really being said without communication and
Speaker 1: being able to do the same thing to respond or
Speaker 1: to reply to what's being said and not said. So
Speaker 1: that's basically how I do my coaching through business. Uh
Speaker 1: you know, I can just see what needs to be
Speaker 1: said and uplift you or encourage you or teach you. Um.
Speaker 1: So that's pretty much the same thing that that my
Speaker 1: dad did through work, you know, something like cutting grass.
Speaker 1: I like it. So I'm gonna tell a quick story
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna go to Holly to you highly on
Speaker 1: the next question. M. I don't know if this is true,
Speaker 1: but I heard it, and I can't remember which book
Speaker 1: I read it in, but it's a story back in
Speaker 1: historical times and villages, there was a ceremony and then
Speaker 1: that ceremony you were not allowed to get a name
Speaker 1: in the village until you were able to slay a
Speaker 1: lion or a jaguar cat and the you know, this
Speaker 1: is old times. And if you did not, you go
Speaker 1: through the ceremony. But if you are not able to
Speaker 1: get a name, you had no value in the village.
Speaker 1: You are not allowed to marry because you had no name.
Speaker 1: You're not allowed to live on your own until you
Speaker 1: accomplish this. Once you slay that object, that lion, then
Speaker 1: they had a ceremony which you earned your name. You
Speaker 1: were given a name, which you mean you were allowed
Speaker 1: to marry. And by being allowed to marry, you were
Speaker 1: able to have your own hut, contribute farm, contribute to
Speaker 1: the community, which means you you were part of the community.
Speaker 1: So my question at that time they learned and had
Speaker 1: a ceremony for manhood here in the States. For me
Speaker 1: growing up as a kid, I don't know it would
Speaker 1: like to be a man. I thought having sex was
Speaker 1: man being a man, but actually it's not. It's the
Speaker 1: most laziest, easiest thing to do out of manhood. So
Speaker 1: highly when what can you relate or you and if
Speaker 1: you can't be honest to say that you have ceremony.
Speaker 1: But what would you relate to what that what you've
Speaker 1: done that signifies you were a man? Shoot August six,
Speaker 1: the day my daughter was born, by far, just because
Speaker 1: I had a moment where she was that was about
Speaker 1: to start delivering her. And I've never had that film before.
Speaker 1: Like I got light headed there was like she's like baby,
Speaker 1: so yeah. But then after that I snapped back and
Speaker 1: just I think that's the transition, right theoris, I go
Speaker 1: from passing out to Okay, come on, watch your daughter
Speaker 1: get born, looking at the placenta, looking at all the blood,
Speaker 1: like not even worried about it. Come on, baby, push
Speaker 1: push push, and then seeing my baby wearing waiting where
Speaker 1: and then hold on my chair for me. I became
Speaker 1: a man probably about a year and a half ago,
Speaker 1: probably forty two, forty three years old. Oh yeah, forty two.
Speaker 1: What was it to happen? M hm, discovering where my
Speaker 1: faults were? Anthony? We wanted you want us to come
Speaker 1: back to you? Yeah, because I mean that's deep right there.
Speaker 1: Why don't you talk more about because that's that's actually
Speaker 1: kind of interesting, Um that you said that, So I
Speaker 1: would like to hear more of what you mean. So
Speaker 1: I can get a better understanding of that, sitting sitting down,
Speaker 1: understanding where I didn't show up for my wife, sitting
Speaker 1: down understanding where I didn't show up for my for
Speaker 1: my sons, for my children. Provider, yes, but emotionally provider deficit.
Speaker 1: I can tell you how many times aren't the work,
Speaker 1: I mean paychecks I got. I still, you know, I
Speaker 1: still have all of my contracts from the league in
Speaker 1: my little drawer to show you know, hey, I did it,
Speaker 1: But I don't have million dollar contracts with my family
Speaker 1: to say, look what I did. Emotionally. Now, I'm making
Speaker 1: it up and I'm trying to and I'm and I'm
Speaker 1: not doing it with an end goal, but I'm doing
Speaker 1: it with the purpose of saying allowing them to see that,
Speaker 1: hopefully that they've realized that I would do anything for
Speaker 1: them at my own expense instead of I would try
Speaker 1: to get whatever I need financially or or social status
Speaker 1: at their expense. Yeah. I don't think I've ever had
Speaker 1: I don't think I've had a ceremonial moment. I think
Speaker 1: I think my my life is the backup a little bit.
Speaker 1: I'm not married, I don't have any kids. Um, both
Speaker 1: of my parents have passed away. My dad passed away
Speaker 1: since we're talking about follows in two thousand nineteen. Uh So,
Speaker 1: to be honest with you, everything I did in life,
Speaker 1: from elementary school up until being an adult and getting
Speaker 1: my first job was to make my parents proud. It
Speaker 1: wasn't because I needed to get a paycheck, wasn't too
Speaker 1: justify college degree. Um. It was to make that phone
Speaker 1: call or tell my dad, Hey, guess what happened, Guess what.
Speaker 1: Guess who I met today, Guess who I talked to.
Speaker 1: Guess our interview, Guess what I'm going next week. Uh.
Speaker 1: Just that justification. And I don't have any kids, and
Speaker 1: I battle with that sometimes because sometimes I feel like,
Speaker 1: just like my dad, I'm always working to try to
Speaker 1: not think about reality. Did not think about the things
Speaker 1: that are hurting me when I sit down and actually
Speaker 1: think about those things, because I don't have that chiliad anymore.
Speaker 1: I don't have that barometer to try to reach anymore.
Speaker 1: I don't have that child to try to bring up.
Speaker 1: So when I'm coaching, UH, when I'm talking to friends, UM,
Speaker 1: when I'm dealing with people that are going through something,
Speaker 1: I try to be my father two them um and
Speaker 1: and at the same time, I don't have that ceremonial
Speaker 1: moment or that person that's the father to me. And
Speaker 1: even even through these years, I have not had that
Speaker 1: father because my father is gone and we've always had
Speaker 1: that understanding which was either real or not real, but
Speaker 1: it wasn't satisfying emotionally. Uh So, it's just always just working, working,
Speaker 1: always helping other people, always just kind of being an
Speaker 1: actor like Robin Williams. Did you ever really know who
Speaker 1: Robin Williams was? Because he was always that character every
Speaker 1: time you saw him in front of the camera. So
Speaker 1: that's that's kind of subliminally what I'm what I'm dealing with,
Speaker 1: um and just hearing your set just the way you
Speaker 1: put it, the ceremonial moment, I never had that ceremonial moment.
Speaker 1: But I can tell you and this Sarah, if there's
Speaker 1: a ceremony, ultimately it's a ceremony as a man for
Speaker 1: me is financially wealthy, emotionally how it's poor. That's I
Speaker 1: would say probably the last twenty years of my of
Speaker 1: of my relationships, friendships, marriage, not because my wife wasn't
Speaker 1: doing she was supposed to because she was she is
Speaker 1: it's more of what I was failing to see inside myself,
Speaker 1: and she was a reflection of what I was lacking
Speaker 1: to step up and be present emotionally in the house.
Speaker 1: You're looking at me, you want me to go. I
Speaker 1: was waiting for your um. So my my ceremonial moment
Speaker 1: was a little later in life as well too, not
Speaker 1: as late as as yours, Steve, But from an age perspective,
Speaker 1: I'm older than you. Man, we got so It's why
Speaker 1: I got my nickname Pooky. And I'm just playing so um,
Speaker 1: you know, going going through life and always being performance
Speaker 1: space because that's what was instilled in me by my dad.
Speaker 1: If I wasn't doing the best, even though you're still
Speaker 1: getting knocked down, it it's it's just creating situations where
Speaker 1: you can strive and succeed. So playing sports, we all,
Speaker 1: we were all the performances you perform or you ain't
Speaker 1: getting that paycheck. We all we all know that, Um,
Speaker 1: even if the team fails, you know a lot of
Speaker 1: times if you perform well, you still get that paycheck
Speaker 1: or you get that contract extension. So playing sports, going
Speaker 1: into my business life, train everybody, Kurt made a train
Speaker 1: signal with his hands. So going to the business life,
Speaker 1: I always work for an organization, so the buck always
Speaker 1: stopped with them. You know, if I was working for
Speaker 1: a big company, I mean, even if I've screwed up, Hey,
Speaker 1: they you know, they still getting paid. So I'm gonna
Speaker 1: get paid. On two thousand sixteen, and I decided to
Speaker 1: step out on my own. Now I'm the buck where
Speaker 1: it stops. And to talk about being a man when
Speaker 1: it's not guaranteed you're getting a paycheck, it's not guaranteed
Speaker 1: you're taking care of your family, is not guaranteed you
Speaker 1: gonna have food on the table if you don't grind
Speaker 1: and get after it. So I knew at that point
Speaker 1: in time, like, yo, I need to you know, success
Speaker 1: is what I make it. I just can't sit back
Speaker 1: and and not do anything, you know. I transition quick story,
Speaker 1: and some of y'all know that. But um, when I
Speaker 1: left the organization I was with, I made a joke.
Speaker 1: I said I could walk around this building for two
Speaker 1: weeks and do absolutely nothing and nobody would know. So
Speaker 1: for almost two weeks, I would literally walk around this building.
Speaker 1: I would knock on people's doors when there was a
Speaker 1: bunch of people around I peecked my head and go, yo, Highly,
Speaker 1: I took care of that for you and walk off
Speaker 1: realistic when so, of course Highly did. Wasn't gonna ask
Speaker 1: me everybody else like yo, Joe's doing stuff right, Hey,
Speaker 1: hey Anthony, I gotta don't worry about you. I'll let
Speaker 1: you know what happened, and walk out of the room.
Speaker 1: So I did that for two weeks and I still
Speaker 1: got paid. And it was a running joke like how
Speaker 1: long can I do this? Because I had already transitioned out.
Speaker 1: I knew I was transitioned out. When you're on your own,
Speaker 1: you can't do that right. You can't look at yourself
Speaker 1: and go, I took care of that thing for you,
Speaker 1: because then when that direct deposit goes in, it is short.
Speaker 1: So talking about being a man, it's funny. Steve said,
Speaker 1: there's the financial, the emotional. There's there. There's so many things,
Speaker 1: but one always affects the other. Financially, if you're struggling struggling,
Speaker 1: your emotional side is going to be a wreck too,
Speaker 1: because we're not admitting we can't make that mortgage payment. Right.
Speaker 1: And so when someone asked me how I'm doing, Oh,
Speaker 1: I'm good, knowing that I'm not good. So they play
Speaker 1: off of each other and getting that balance, and you know,
Speaker 1: I looked to my right and my friend. It's a
Speaker 1: successful career in the NFL financially now, you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's well documented. Speaking out of class, some of the
Speaker 1: interviews he's done from could he have done a better job,
Speaker 1: you know, enjoying the time? You know, I mean you
Speaker 1: might not have been the same player. I know there's
Speaker 1: a lot of moving pieces there, but just looking at that,
Speaker 1: even in the in the thralls of of everything, saying, um,
Speaker 1: there was that emotional in that relationship side that you know,
Speaker 1: you weren't there for that at that time. So that
Speaker 1: was a good word. You know, I want to see
Speaker 1: if you I'm gonna looking up later to see if
Speaker 1: you're using I believe, I am, I believe I am.
Speaker 1: I almost got that. I almost got a degree. I
Speaker 1: was close, but academic fraud different podcasts, let that go.
Speaker 1: But no, So that's what it really was, just going
Speaker 1: out of my own and saying, hey, I'm gonna bet
Speaker 1: on myself and I'm gonna take this company and make
Speaker 1: it successful, which in turn is gonna you know, make
Speaker 1: my family and friends success. Hopefully. Yeah, I mean I
Speaker 1: would say, I mean there's a couple of things I
Speaker 1: think that played into my least. Well, I guess what
Speaker 1: I deemed what I felt like was masculine. And my
Speaker 1: moment was I think once um, I went to college,
Speaker 1: so obviously before I got to college, I had that
Speaker 1: moment with my dad and that was I felt like
Speaker 1: one of the veils that needed to come down to
Speaker 1: my eyes of what is a masculine man? Veils A
Speaker 1: good word, I mean interrupt, but that what you used
Speaker 1: all so I'm trying to um. So that was something
Speaker 1: that I that I you know, I was like, okay,
Speaker 1: so that's something that I need to be able to
Speaker 1: be um and have within me. Um. So then, because
Speaker 1: it was three weeks into my spring practice at Ohio State,
Speaker 1: I graduated high school early slight flash, smart guy, and
Speaker 1: I'm just I mean, I know we got six six,
Speaker 1: so I'm just trying to they graduate a little early
Speaker 1: and um almost graduating late. And then I made a
Speaker 1: routine tackle but I had paralyzed one of my teammates
Speaker 1: and that was a moment of again, can I be
Speaker 1: vulnerable with myself and allow what really needs to be
Speaker 1: happening right now? Is I know he's physically, um who
Speaker 1: was a good friend of mine, Tyson Gentry Now, Um,
Speaker 1: he's physically going through it. But emotionally, I was wrestling
Speaker 1: with myself, um, you know at at and so that
Speaker 1: was something that you know, I had to deal with myself,
Speaker 1: and that was a part of that process. Later on,
Speaker 1: right before we went into my freshman year of camp, UM,
Speaker 1: I had given my life to Christ. And and so
Speaker 1: I think once I started to learn again I've seen
Speaker 1: my my dad be my dad and be a father
Speaker 1: and be be a male in this in this society,
Speaker 1: when I had to deal with um, a really trauma
Speaker 1: traumatic experience in my life, and then when I was
Speaker 1: able to give myself and look at what a father
Speaker 1: actually truly is, and I started to read the word
Speaker 1: of what it's like to be a son. And then
Speaker 1: you read the tale of Jesus talking about the Father
Speaker 1: and the two sons, and and then the more you
Speaker 1: read about that, and how do I incorporate, you know,
Speaker 1: what my God is to me and how do I
Speaker 1: do that? And how do I replicate you know, who
Speaker 1: he is in my life to give to other people.
Speaker 1: I realized at around I would probably say that nineteen
Speaker 1: year old time of what it's like to be masking
Speaker 1: and now did I mess up? Without question? I messed
Speaker 1: up when I was young. And then I think that
Speaker 1: final kind of that loophole that kind of tied everything
Speaker 1: together was I think the birth of my first daughter. Um,
Speaker 1: it really was a moment of you have to die
Speaker 1: to your old self and give yourself away in in
Speaker 1: in the sacrificial way to um, to your friends, to
Speaker 1: your family, to your loved ones. And it's not that
Speaker 1: I'm thinking of myself any less, but it's like that
Speaker 1: is that sacrificial selflessness. But you gotta you gotta also
Speaker 1: know yourself. There's you know, do you you have to
Speaker 1: know yourself because there are something to say to say
Speaker 1: that you know, you gotta die to yourself that oh wait,
Speaker 1: part of you though, never dies right in that transformation,
Speaker 1: because you aren't really being who you are like to
Speaker 1: the core of it, as they say Adam and Eve,
Speaker 1: like we're all sinful nature to the core of it,
Speaker 1: we're all selfish and act like we're not would be
Speaker 1: fooling ourselves right, so that we can't necessarily completely be
Speaker 1: unauthentic in ourselves like I don't want to have peanut
Speaker 1: butter right because I don't want my significant other to
Speaker 1: feel a certain way, because I actually like a great example.
Speaker 1: For the longest time, my wife used to cook pork jobs. Bro,
Speaker 1: probably for the like the first five years of our marriage.
Speaker 1: I never said anything about pork jobs. But pork chops
Speaker 1: were a trigger because my mom used to make liver
Speaker 1: and fried like pork chops to make me believe it
Speaker 1: was pork chops. And one day I was sitting at
Speaker 1: the kitchen table and I got a nose like a
Speaker 1: hound dog. I sip. It looked like pork child, but
Speaker 1: this romans coming off like a taste, a smell that
Speaker 1: out my palette, my register, my process system was like, uh, incomplete, incomplete,
Speaker 1: this is not pork chops. No, it was liver. I said.
Speaker 1: Before I can say something, my mom said, eat it, bro.
Speaker 1: I pushed that pork chops. He said, you are not
Speaker 1: leaving the table until you eat this food. I pushed
Speaker 1: that food away from the away from in my proximity
Speaker 1: to eat so I can lay my head on the
Speaker 1: table to go to sleep. I did not eat. My
Speaker 1: mom woke me up by slapping the mess out of
Speaker 1: slapping me in the back of the head, go to sleep.
Speaker 1: I went to bed. I would have been hungry. M hmm.
Speaker 1: What's the purpose of the story. Because of how I
Speaker 1: would what I experienced as a young man made me
Speaker 1: so uncomfortable that I wasn't willing to tell my wife,
Speaker 1: who I leave your mother and father, cleave and become one.
Speaker 1: I was uncomfortable, unauthentic to say I really don't like
Speaker 1: pork chops. And when I finally told her, she said,
Speaker 1: how long have you not liked pork chops? Since? I
Speaker 1: was like for sin, I was a young kid. She's like,
Speaker 1: why he didn't tell me. I was like, no, I
Speaker 1: don't know. And it's something that simple. So you if
Speaker 1: you take it even deeper, man, if we if I
Speaker 1: came telling my wife about pork child, you know, dann Well,
Speaker 1: I'm not telling her about all the others things that
Speaker 1: I'm inefficient in. So all I'm saying is I understand
Speaker 1: and I respect the way you're saying it. But there
Speaker 1: are some people listening who may roll eyes, or some
Speaker 1: people who may be going talk not me. I'm good,
Speaker 1: I'm perfect. Sold. That was just something I know that
Speaker 1: I gotta sit there and just I gotta pull the
Speaker 1: veil off my eyes. I wasn't even willing to talk
Speaker 1: to the wife about not liking pork chops. But and
Speaker 1: from my conversation, it wasn't with my wife. My conversation
Speaker 1: was with God, and where I knew that there was
Speaker 1: not in a part of the thing that you've said, though,
Speaker 1: was you know, well, why haven't you told me this? Well,
Speaker 1: maybe because you didn't want to disappoint her. I mean whatever,
Speaker 1: whatever that whatever that means. I wish I was a
Speaker 1: but you know what I mean, like for me, it's
Speaker 1: for me. It had nothing to do with her, and
Speaker 1: it had everything to do with me in regards of
Speaker 1: I was uncomfortable in my own skin, right, I struggle
Speaker 1: a long time with my heavenly father because of my
Speaker 1: relationship lacking with my earthly friend. That's that's my journey.
Speaker 1: So that's what I'm saying is you can't die to
Speaker 1: self completely if you don't even really know self. And
Speaker 1: that's that's a fair point. And I'm and I'm raising
Speaker 1: my hand and saying I'm just learning self. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: I think that's a very fair point because, um, because
Speaker 1: it's a lot, it's a lot of Christians out here
Speaker 1: still playing behind closed doors with a laptop in the computer. Yeah,
Speaker 1: looking at uh porn hub. And you know, for me,
Speaker 1: for a long time, I had sexual integrity issues looking
Speaker 1: at pornographical stuff. I mean that I think everyone has
Speaker 1: a as a stronghold, or had a stronghold in their life,
Speaker 1: or still has something as I said, it does or
Speaker 1: did without a doubt. And I mean, like I said,
Speaker 1: there's I'm not gonna sit up here and say I'm
Speaker 1: perfect on progress. I'm in progress. Just continue to have
Speaker 1: those three dots that are just just going because I
Speaker 1: think that's the thing about it always, at least for myself,
Speaker 1: is when I have when I did start to go
Speaker 1: through that, it was the like I said, it was
Speaker 1: my dad in that moment. It was the traumatic experience.
Speaker 1: And then it was you know, the birth of my child,
Speaker 1: y'all's child. I had no birth. I did not. Sorry
Speaker 1: you watched I was. I was the greatest cheerleader in
Speaker 1: that room though. Um but yeah, she she did give birth. Um.
Speaker 1: But I think those those moments and then like I said,
Speaker 1: but it was it was the reading of the word
Speaker 1: and how it transformed me. But I had to be
Speaker 1: authentic with myself. You have to be you can't. You
Speaker 1: can't fake your own self. And if you are, then
Speaker 1: I mean you really Yeah, And so I had to
Speaker 1: be authentic with myself. And there was actually a time,
Speaker 1: I mean we're being transparent, Like so you know, I
Speaker 1: had my wife and I we we had our child
Speaker 1: at a wedlock right and before we got married. I
Speaker 1: kept telling I said, I need to work on me.
Speaker 1: I have to because if I wasn't at a position
Speaker 1: where I was stable, not just I'm not speaking financially,
Speaker 1: like just stable as a as what we talked about,
Speaker 1: what is a man that I can be for you
Speaker 1: as a husband, be for you as a father in
Speaker 1: our like the marriage piece is only just literally a certificate,
Speaker 1: and like I said, I I'm still trying to protect
Speaker 1: that sanctity of our marriage. Those vows that we made
Speaker 1: to each other, Like those weren't just words written on
Speaker 1: a piece of paper. I mean to me, that was
Speaker 1: a covenant and I and I've kept those very sacred
Speaker 1: in my heart because I had to be authentic with myself.
Speaker 1: And where do I need to go? Like just because
Speaker 1: society is telling me this is what I needed to do,
Speaker 1: Like that doesn't make it what I needed to do
Speaker 1: and I had I personally had to get myself in
Speaker 1: a position where I could leave my family. But I'm
Speaker 1: not not necessarily I'm not necessarily leading from the front.
Speaker 1: Sometimes sometimes I'm leading from the back. Sometimes I'm leading
Speaker 1: from your side. Some you know, like we're but those
Speaker 1: are the positions of where and sometimes you gotta lead
Speaker 1: me like you have, And it's amazing, Like when you
Speaker 1: have you know that that spouse or significant other in
Speaker 1: your life that if you they have so much intuition,
Speaker 1: wisdom and sometimes again trying to be a mascular man,
Speaker 1: like I know what we need. But she has led
Speaker 1: our family in a lot of situations where I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: I'm thankful that you did what you did. It was
Speaker 1: me it would be a blaze. But I mean it's
Speaker 1: just amazing though, like like I said, that a part
Speaker 1: of it, what is it? You know that it was?
Speaker 1: It's it was those moments. But then again, you know,
Speaker 1: finding that woman for myself in my life, who is
Speaker 1: my wife that as a man, I don't always have
Speaker 1: to be the quote unquote leader. We are leading, we
Speaker 1: are leading, and there's times where I have to take
Speaker 1: that front position and there's times where I'm taking the
Speaker 1: back inside, like but that's I think. Sometimes you just
Speaker 1: gotta be the lookout guy in the in the tower,
Speaker 1: just looking out because I was needed, right, it could
Speaker 1: be needed and other family members. Just manhood is so
Speaker 1: complex and it's not about having sex make a whole
Speaker 1: bunch of money and then you you would think that's
Speaker 1: what that's what it is though, Yeah, it's it's a facade,
Speaker 1: it is. So I mean, it's been a great conversation.
Speaker 1: It's been dope. I like how deep this was, and
Speaker 1: I mean, I appreciate you guys, this was this was
Speaker 1: this is what we men need, we all need. Yeah
Speaker 1: about appreciate you all coming in, Appreciate it spending time. Yeah.
Speaker 1: From Steve Smith, Sr. Joe Fushi, Kurt Coleman, Anthony Hill,
Speaker 1: Highly Taylor, Brian Balta, Chevis, Wesley Robinson and Taylor and
Speaker 1: Meredith Carter. We like tell you Happy Father's Day, taller
Speaker 1: men out there also to all the daddy's too, because
Speaker 1: there's some fathers who are paying to be fathers, but
Speaker 1: then there's some daddies. That's what we're talking about investing in.
Speaker 1: So Happy Father's Day and I appreciate you guys sitting
Speaker 1: and listening to this conversation about manhood, fatherhood and also
Speaker 1: just being transparent. This is cool. Honored to be part
Speaker 1: of this. Honor too. To have men who's supporting and
Speaker 1: willing to be vulnerable. That's that's not that's not easy,
Speaker 1: you know, to basically put yourself out there what you've
Speaker 1: experienced and has impacted you. So appreciate it. Thank you,
Speaker 1: Thank God, bless and catch you on next episode. You
Speaker 1: are a unique person. You are well worth it, you
Speaker 1: are competent, and most of all, you're lovable. I'm Steve
Speaker 1: smith Singer, I'm Gerard Little John and this is cut
Speaker 1: to It. Cut to It with Steve smith Singer. That
Speaker 1: Is Me is a production of Cut to It LLC,
Speaker 1: Balto Creative Media, The Black Effect and I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: For more podcast from I Heart Radio, visit the I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio Apple Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen to
Speaker 1: your favorite shows from Cut to It. Executive producer Steve
Speaker 1: Smith Singer, co host Gerard Little John, talent in booking
Speaker 1: manager Joe Fusci, social media teamer Wesley Robinson, and John
Speaker 1: Show from Balto Creative Media. Cut to It is produced
Speaker 1: by Brian Baltaschevic and Meredith Carter, with production assistance by
Speaker 1: Alex Lebrek, Production coordinator Taylor Robinson. Theme music by Alex Johnson,
Speaker 1: Lyrics and vocals by Anthony Hamilton. You had him about it,
Speaker 1: then we're about to let you know. It's it's all
Speaker 1: Cas