231. Life-Changing Wisdom You Need to Hear

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Welcome back to We Can Do Hard Things.

Everyone was so excited about the advice episode that we decided to do a whole nother episode just completely based on the pod squad's advice.

The best advice they've ever received, the most life-changing advice they've ever received.

And we're throwing in some of the worst advice.

Oh, yes.

Yes.

Sometimes the worst advice ever turns into the best advice ever, because when you hear the worst advice, quick example, pod squad, this is the worst advice I'd ever received that turned out to be life-shifting for me.

There's a lot of backstory here, but let's just fast forward

to the part where I'm sitting in front of the therapist saying, All right, I'm in love with a woman.

Her name is Abby.

This was my marriage therapist who was trying to save my relationship with Craig.

All right.

So

she says to me, This is just a distraction.

This is not real.

I want to die inside when she says this to me.

And I break down a bit and I say, well, if I cannot be with Abby, then I cannot ever have sex

with

my husband again.

And I said,

every time I lay down to do it, I feel like I'm dying inside.

And she says,

okay,

have you ever considered blowjobs?

Many women consider that to be less intimate.

Just stop.

I need a moment of silence.

I need the pod squad to imagine me sitting there.

And my therapist, who's been my therapist for years,

says that if I'm dying inside from sex, I should just give more blowjobs.

We can't even call her a therapist.

We need to call her a therapist.

She's a therapist.

Oh boy.

I do apologize if you've heard this story before.

I want you to know you're going to hear it again.

Now, what I want you to know is that advice, just give more blowjobs, Glenn,

turned into the catalyst I needed to get the hell out of every situation that it required me to

die inside and offer blowjobs, whether literal or metaphorical.

As God is my witness, I will never give a blowjob again, literal or metaphorical.

But thank God, what I want you to know is in the moment,

I was like,

okay, I guess I have to give more blowjobs.

I did not stand up and walk out of that office.

Never, it takes, it takes a minute.

I remember sitting in the car afterwards being like, oh my God, I'm not going to be able to have the life I want.

I'm going to have to keep dying inside.

But,

you know, when like you hear the truth and it rings so clear that it wakes something up inside of you, untruth can do the same.

Yeah.

I needed to be shocked

into consciousness by something that was so untrue that I knew I needed to go the other way.

If she had been like, well, like, I don't know, maybe we just like really try to dig in here and see if we can make things better.

No, I needed her to be like, lay down, give blowjobs.

So that was my worst advice.

Also, I just love side note: that

have you tried that?

Many people find it less intimate.

As if what we're going, I mean, putting aside the truth of whether that's less intimate or not, which big, big question about that, but also just like, yeah, what we're going for in sex

is maximizing the less intimate factor.

Yes, the least amount of intimacy.

That's what you should be aiming for.

It's wild.

And actually, I think it's worth staying here for a minute.

It gives us a context for what is bad advice.

Bad advice is any advice that says, let me help you numb yourself or figure out a way for you to slowly die so that you can survive this system that is not meant for you.

It's like...

Wow, I guess what is sex for?

I guess it's just to keep him.

I don't know.

Orgasming?

Orgasming?

It had nothing to do with my desire, my experience.

It was like, what can we keep doing to make you a good soldier in this situation?

Like, that's always bad advice.

Well, and also she mistook you for someone who

was needing to survive.

Right.

Because sometimes the things that numb you, sometimes the things that get you through,

like, this might be an unpopular opinion, but maybe some people who are in survival because they don't

have the ability to leave a relationship or to leave a job or to leave

their homes because they're children.

I don't know what it is, but

sometimes those things are exactly that.

They're very helpful survival things.

And you've done them.

You don't need to feel ashamed about that.

Good job surviving.

And then

you

will arrive at a time

where you have to consciously not choose the survival mechanism because you're not in a place of survival you're in a place of getting yourself to a better place that's right you're surviving a different way

it's like a different way of surviving right yeah but how easily our culture with women or you know can can mistake something for anything for survival.

But like, oh my God, not rocking the boat of this other person's enjoyment or the false peace of the home is the same as threat of violence.

Oh my God, what do we have to do to like not make this man feel your displeasure or your discontent or your need for something more?

To me, the moral of this story though is no matter what, even with all of the advice that we're giving today or the pod squad is going to be giving today, you have to siphon it through your own personal moral compass and what your values are.

I might say something that does not ring true to you.

Great.

Leave it.

Not here to like fuck you up.

Like this therapist is.

That's your t-shirt, Abby.

Not here to fuck you up.

Yeah.

Like this therapist was put in a position of power,

was your marriage therapist.

And that is a very important position.

I remember you called me after and you told me this.

And I was like, wait, that doesn't sound right.

I called you from the car.

Yeah.

So upset.

I know.

And I I just think that we just have to be careful on the advice we get and who is giving it to us and for what reasons.

Yeah.

And like what kind of power we give over.

Yeah.

Because if somebody is giving advice, if they have a different

agenda or goal than your well-being, which when you think about it, often a marriage therapist, I could see how they could get confused because is their client two separate human beings or is their client the marriage?

Is that woman who is my therapist thinking I have to do whatever I need to do with this person in front of me because my client is their marriage and I have to keep their marriage together?

Move it to churches.

I'm coming to my minister for advice.

Is the minister confused?

Is the minister's highest, highest goal the survival of the institution?

And I have to get this woman to be quiet because I need to, this is my client up here, which is the church.

We just have to be really careful.

I think one of the reasons that bad advice was so jarring for me is that I had made a bit of a religion of therapy.

I felt like that was the one place I could go where there was no other agendas.

You can never fully give over.

You can't give to anyone else

power over that

instinctual voice inside of you that's like,

yeah.

And that's true even with people who love you completely and fully.

Yes.

Your family members, your parent can come in and say,

oh, God, that's so scary.

And my whole objective is protecting you.

And I think protection looks like keeping you safe.

And I think the safest thing is not doing something

crazy and imploding your family.

And I love you so much that I'm going to do everything to try to get you to stay safe when safe.

might be the most dangerous place for you.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's like that Moby Dick thing where it's like this, the most dangerous place you can stay is inside the harbor often.

You don't go out to the sea because you think it's dangerous out there, but you're going to die in the harbor.

But in that way, it's that idea of what throws us the most is not angry people that hate us.

It's like the quiet concern of people who love us.

That's the most dangerous

off course thing.

What I'm saying is bad advice, it can be wonderful because untruth can make us go, oh, wait, that's so off base.

I can, I know exactly what I need to do.

That insults my soul.

It insults my soul.

Dismiss whatever insults your soul.

That's exactly right.

Yes, yes, yes.

Yes.

And also, by the way, every time I tell the story, I have a friend who's like, just so you know, I love giving blowjobs.

I just want to explain that I'm not actually talking about like blowjobs in general.

I'm not judging blowjobs.

Mostly, I think of this as a metaphor.

If your soul and body and heart is screaming for something and you say what you need and want, and somebody tells you, you know, what would be great is if you just numbed that out by

doing something that's a survival technique that will not cause outer conflict, but will help you quiet your inner conflict.

That is what I mean by giving a blowjob.

Also, if you like giving blowjobs, great.

Give the blowjobs.

Do it.

Big market for that.

All right.

Let's hear

some pod squad good advice.

Is this Amy first?

Yes, Amy first.

Hi, Glennon and Abby and sister.

This is Amy.

I just finished grad school and had a great job, all lined up in New Orleans and was on my way to move there from grad school.

And my boyfriend and I at the time, now husband, had been dating long distance for a while.

And I decided I was not going to take that job.

I was going to move in with my boyfriend and not have a job instead.

And my parents were quiet and but supportive.

And I was there that summer with my boyfriend, not having a job, not having anything to do.

He had a job.

And I remember my mom visiting and her saying, just kind of looking at me quietly and just saying,

I just kind of wanted you to have your own thing.

I just wanted you to live on your own.

And that was all she said.

And it just kind of

brought me online a little bit.

So I called the recruiter who hired me and said, I would actually like that job.

And he said, okay.

And so I packed myself up.

My boyfriend at the time was very supportive and said, you do you.

And we got married a few years later after being on visits again.

So

do your old days.

Live on your own for a little bit.

That's the best advice I ever got from my dear mama.

Okay.

Bye.

I love this so much because so many of us make the decision.

I don't want to say easier decision.

Make the less

lonely decision.

Whether it's like the easier path or whatnot.

And then she went back.

That is so fucking ballsy.

She's so brave for saying, oh, that was a mistake.

I'm going to actually do this thing.

Just flagging that.

It's not ballsy.

It's more vagina-ish.

Yeah.

Sorry.

I should stop saying that.

I don't know what that is.

It's a sports thing.

I just want to say shout out to Amy's mom.

Yeah.

This Amy's mom is a

black belt of parenting because that's what I read here.

Quietly.

Quiet.

Quietly.

And I bet she's the kind of parent, like the older our kids get, the more we are committed to offering our opinion almost never.

Oh, it's so hard.

Because then,

and this happened just recently.

Yes.

You pick your battles.

They make all the little mistakes and you just be so quiet, quiet, quiet, because it's going to come.

Amy's going to come to you and say, after all you've taught me, mom, I'm moving in with my boyfriend and not taking that job.

And Amy's mom, just with the look of her face, is going to be able to destroy that entire plan.

Because when you don't nitpick,

when you actually do have an outward opinion, the kid's like, whoa,

you get to really shoot your shots.

That's right.

Been waiting on the sidelines for a while.

Yeah, well, they'll be listening when you do

pick and choose your moment.

Did you know that mom did that with me?

What?

No way.

I was in my first year of law school, totally miserable because, you know, that's the plan.

That's the idea of your first year of law school is that it's supposed to be awful.

And I got engaged halfway

through the year.

I was in Charlottesville,

got engaged.

The next morning, my mom was at my doorstep and she lives a few hours away.

This was not expected.

And she just came in and she sat on my floor.

And I remember thinking, wow, she must be really excited about the engagement.

This seems a little out of character.

And she sat on my floor and she said,

I just

wanted to tell you that I really hope

that

you continue

with your law school.

And I was like,

oh,

wow.

It was so important to her.

And I could see in her eyes how deeply she felt it.

And it was very quiet and very light.

And it wasn't congratulations.

This is awesome.

Let's celebrate and start planning.

It was, I want to check in to see what's happening here.

And that thought had not even crossed my mind to not continue my law school.

So it was kind of interesting that I was like, oh, is that what you would expect right now?

That since I'm getting engaged, I'm leaving.

And for generations before, I'm sure that was exactly what it was.

You know, you get engaged and then you stop the pursuit of whatever you're doing because now it's superfluous.

Because you met the goal, because you really only went to college to find a dude.

So I just always remember that.

I remember exactly what I was wearing, exactly what she was wearing.

And I was like, oh yeah, mom, I'm not, I'm not leaving law school.

I'm also not planning a wedding.

So good luck to all of us with that, but I'm not leaving law school.

When I told mom I was pregnant, when I was still an addict, total shit show,

had been a nightmare, and told them I was pregnant.

And I said, don't worry, we're getting married.

I probably hadn't even looped Craig into the plan by then, but I was just treading water at that moment.

He He was with you when you told them.

Oh, yeah, that's right.

That's right.

Oh my God.

And then, that's right.

And my mom looked at me and said, in front of Craig, said,

you do not have to marry him.

We can raise this baby together.

Now,

what I hear through Amy's mom and these two moments with our mom is

this beautiful thing that's generational.

These women perhaps were of a different time where you did have to give up so much and you did have to marry.

And that made you make decisions that maybe you wouldn't have made if you had more freedom.

And then you were stuck.

And many of them, I'm sure, had beautiful marriages, but perhaps compromised a hell of a lot more than they wanted to.

And so these little moments with their daughters are like, please use the freedom and power that you have to make sure.

So when you decide you love someone, I love you, make sure there's like a big I in that I love you.

I think that Amy's mom and Tisha, I know this to be true for Tisha, this was an honoring of the work that they had put into themselves on not attaching themselves in that way to a man.

Like your mom has

taken care of herself.

She's had her own job.

She has done it herself and she was laying the groundwork and she wanted that for you too.

I know.

This reminds me of a very important piece of advice exactly like that.

The best advice I ever got from my mom, just realizing it in this moment when you're saying that, Abby, is

always have

your own bank account.

Yeah.

My mom married 55 zero years,

and that woman has had her own bank account with her own money for her whole life.

And they share things.

My dad will have to write her checks for shit.

She will have to write him checks for shit.

And she keeps her money separate.

John and I do the same thing.

That's so amazing.

Abby and I do not do that, but we're lesbians, so it's different.

Our bank accounts are as codependent as we are.

Good job, Amy's mom and Amy.

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all right let's hear from Callie hi my name is Callie I am 20 years old and kissed a girl for my very first time and I called my dad and I told him and I said dad I kissed the girl and then I went to almost justify or explain my actions and he cut me off and he said Callie please don't feel like you need to explain yourself.

This is what life is all about is constant exploration.

That is beautiful.

I'm so happy for you.

And it was just this moment that was so

perfect from my dad that he gave me the permission to be who I was and continue to explore who that was without the need to justify that person to anyone else.

So,

yeah, that was the best advice I've ever gotten.

I love all of you.

I love this podcast.

I have listened to every single episode and just thank you so much for all that you you do.

Callie.

Callie's dad.

Callie's dad

goes in the hall of fame with Amy's mom.

I think like sometimes the biggest rub between

fathers and daughters is fathers being able to see and understand and honor and hold a daughter's full humanity, including their desires and appetite and sexuality and all of that.

That's why daddy's little girl, you can be a daddy's little girl.

It's harder to be a daddy's teenage girl.

It's harder to be a daddy's adult woman because once your humanity enters the picture, dads lose their shit.

And so Callie's dad

is somebody who, when Callie came to him and said, my humanity is emerging.

To say to a daughter, life is for exploration instead of control.

Hell yes.

That means Callie is going to share the rest of her life with her dad.

Yeah.

That's the blessing there.

I would like to have Callie's dad on because this didn't just start with this advice.

No.

The fact that Callie was 20 years old

woke up the night after her exciting makeout session and was like, you know who I'm going to call?

My daddy.

Pops.

Call him daddy.

I can't wait to call dad and tell him about the awesome woman I made out with yesterday.

Oh, what's the dream?

That is the dream.

Yeah.

That is the dream.

Good job, Callie and Callie's dad.

Let's hear from sweet Emma.

Emma.

My name's Emma.

And the best advice I've ever received is to look for something in three places before you ask someone where it is.

Oh, my God.

Can we just replay that one three times?

Let's replay that comment for the rest of this podcast.

To all the kids out there.

Say it again.

Emma anyway.

The best advice I've ever received is to look for something in three places before you ask someone where it is.

It's this kind of common,

rare intelligence that we need in this world.

You know what I just thought of, though?

If our kids listened to that advice,

I think our communication would be cut in half.

I don't know what we talk about.

That is mostly what we talk about.

Mostly what we talk about is someone yells at us, I can't find the thing.

I can't find the thing, which doesn't mean no one's ever ever looked.

Can't find implies looking.

No, looking.

I feel like if we were to say this to our kids, they'd be like, one, two, three, I can't find it.

Yeah.

They would just like look at their

hands.

Yeah.

And then I looked at my hands.

They're not in my pockets.

It's not in my pocket.

I have an ancillary to this.

Okay.

I feel like,

unless someone else is being compensated for the time,

you

not ask someone a question

that you can google the answer for.

No shit.

Oh, you guys, I'm sorry.

Drives me.

Seriously, my whole family, I'm the person, I'm the Googler.

They're like, hey, do you know it, da, da, da?

And I'm like, oh, let me see.

And I pull my phone out and I'm like, oh, look, it's this.

Like, they couldn't do it.

What is wrong?

Because it's my fault.

That is where my worth lies.

Yes, exactly.

You like being the one that knows the stuff.

So yeah, yeah.

Because I feel like it's just insulting to other people's time.

It's saying like, hey, what time's the game or something?

But

we all know that we're on the same email chain

where they told us the time of the game.

So what you're actually, you're not actually asking me what time the game is.

You're saying, can you please take the time to search the email box, find the information that I don't currently have and then report it out to me because I don't feel like doing that.

That's what that's saying.

I just want to say I was not prepared to be directly criticized during this podcast.

You have a relationship of remuneration with the people that you Google.

And

those people, so Glendon will like send

like urgent text that's like, hey, how do you post something to something?

It'll just be like, so easy, the most googly thing possible.

And then Allison or Dina will write back the answer.

And then on the side, they'll like text hashtag job security.

Yes.

Hashtag when Glennon learns Google, we're all going to have to buff up our resumes.

That's how I feel.

I mean, and our kids, they come to us with all these technological issues.

Like, I'm a certified technologist.

Like, no,

because your people, they're like a concierge Google.

Yeah.

They, that's right.

Right.

You know, they like know for sure.

They know, I don't know who I'm trusting if I Google it.

You know what I mean?

It's, it's, it's a, it is an extension of feigned helplessness when really it's laziness.

It's like, I couldn't possibly know because I can't possibly exert myself.

But it's just as exerting to send the text as it would be to Google.

Let's hear from Katie.

This is Katie.

When I went off to college and was a little nervous about not knowing anyone, my mom told me to just carry gum with me to class.

She said, everyone likes the person who offers them gum.

And six years after that, I offered a guy some tic-tacs in a training I was at on my first day of teaching.

And now we've been married for 12 years.

So turned out to be some pretty good advice.

Thank you, mom.

That is good.

That is so smart.

It's so smart.

And also, you know, the whole situation with gum.

If anybody ever offers you a piece of gum, you always take it just in case they're trying to tell you your breath stanks.

You taught me that.

I think it's really good advice.

I also want to say that the tic-tacs are better than gum because tic-tacs require a little bit of physical contact.

Like when somebody goes like this and puts their hand out, you have to kind of like put your hand on their hand, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap to get the tic-tacs out.

So my suggestion would be to carry gum and tic tacs.

Gum for the people with whom you do not want any physical contact, but you still want to be generous.

Tic tac for the flirty, flirty, flirty.

Really?

I don't know.

I just thought of it.

Okay, how about I don't know if that's right?

I can't wait till the next time someone offers me a dick tag.

Yeah.

Woo!

How about Russell?

Because Russell, man, I love this one.

Hello, this is Russell.

And the best advice I've ever gotten was from my therapist.

I was about nine months into therapy, and I realized that I needed to get out of the relationship that I was in.

So during the session, I was talking all about it.

And one of the things that I brought up was that I feel like I always have to walk around eggshells to avoid upsetting my ex.

And my therapist gave me the wonderful advice:

next time you feel like you have to walk around the eggshells, just step on the eggshell and see what happens.

And like clockwork, about five hours later, an opportunity arose for me to step on the eggshells, and I did, which led to a fight, which within a day led to the relationship ending.

So yeah, bye.

Russell, God bless you and keep you.

All right.

Excellent.

Step on the eggshells.

Whenever

someone makes you feel like you have to retreat or freeze or not say a certain thing or not do a certain thing or not be a certain way, or they will what?

You need to find out that what.

Yeah, totally.

It's really just expediting the inevitable.

It's like something's hiding under a blanket and you're circling to make sure that the blanket doesn't get moved.

No, no, no, no.

You need to move the blanket and find out what's under there, what's hiding,

unless it's like a threat of violence or something.

And then you just get the hell out because you don't want to find out what's under the blanket.

But what's under the blanket needs to be either revealed or known

one way or another.

So you don't spend your time.

Or the other person needs to

adjust their behavior.

You know, if a person has used to their whole lives navigating

with ensuring that other people walk in eggshells around them, then it either means that they can only live that way or that they will learn to live another way.

Right.

But they're certainly not going to learn to live another way if you're doing the same dance everyone has done before.

It's easier said than done.

Good job, Russell.

being willing to take that and go with it.

But that's excellent advice.

Yeah, it's choosing your own peace over the relationship at any costs.

Yeah, love it.

All right, Sarah.

My name is Sarah.

I've got two

boys, 11 and 9, and I was calling about the best advice I've ever received.

And I actually got it from my mom long before I had kids.

And I think it was advice she got when she was going through a messy divorce with my dad.

And I think it's impacted how I was raised and how I'm raising my own kids.

But anyway, the advice was the more people who love your kids, the better.

So, in her case, it was about my dad getting remarried and me having a bunch of stepmothers who,

you know, were not her favorite people, but were good to me and good to my brother, and that mattered to her.

And she could, you know, live with sending us there on the weekends because the more people who loved us, the better.

I don't have sort of the messy divorce, but I think about that a lot with my kids and their friends' parents or their teachers.

And I, I just, I think a world where people love your kids is a good one.

Sarah, that's such a good reminder.

All the time, people with blended families,

you know, love can get territorial.

And I think when you're someone's only mom, you're like, well, I'm all they've got.

So good luck comparing me because you got nothing else.

But when there's more than one, you're, you, you think, well, what, wait, what what is that person doing that I'm not doing?

Like, um, even, even us.

I mean,

Tish was about to go on stage recently and the concert promoter came out and said, it's time to go.

Who are you going to take?

Because there was only room for one person in the back.

And Tish looked at both of us and pointed directly at Abby.

And then they went backstage and got ready.

And good call.

Like the last person you want, if you're going to try to stay calm and steady and to a person who can't even Google, it's not going to be me.

And also, I did want to say

that

Craig has a new love

and her name is Jacqueline and we all love her.

The kids love her.

They're like, we love her.

And

I know, I know.

And

I do think that maybe it's a little easier to be in.

I think it's impressive with Sarah that her kids are young and she still feels this way.

It's so much easier to have older kids and welcome someone in for so many reasons, but it was harder for me when they were younger is all I'm saying.

I think it's hard.

And I also think she's absolutely right.

Yeah, because I think especially early on, I was really conscious of coming into the family and I was scared that there was going to be a little territorial situation.

From me?

Yeah.

Oh.

And Craig.

And one of the greatest gifts that you both gave me wasn't that.

Like you gave me complete, like carte blanche to be myself.

And I think what's been really special is that I've been able to actually show up for the kids in ways that are so different than the way you and Craig have ever showed up for them.

Children need multiple adults in their lives so that they can.

figure this thing out down here.

It's very confusing.

So

I can understand Sarah and having these little kids and wanting to have good people around them to help raise them.

I'm just so glad Tish has you.

It's the simplest thing, but the most impossible thing that I can imagine.

I'm thinking it right now and I'm like, oh my God, I'm just like imagining.

If you had within you

the

confidence and solidity of like, I

am the mother these kids need and I am everything I need to be.

Then the more people that love them, the better because you wouldn't be in the position to every time

they are like, oh, so-and-so braided my hair.

Oh, so-and-so got me the Xbox.

Oh, they're fun and they never yell at me.

You wouldn't be in the position to be like, but do you know what I do?

Do you know who's, you know, doing all the

hard stuff all the time?

And that's me and you should appreciate me.

But if you like had the confidence, then you could be like, that's nice.

Yeah, that's great.

That kind of confidence is just really hard to come by.

And I do think that most of us, when we get to that point, because we're not saying those things out loud, that's the best you can hope for.

Like you,

and it could be that I'm just not as involved as some people.

Maybe some people are really believing it.

Like really believing that they are the one that, but I think most of us, the best we can hope for is to still be insecure and override that internal voice.

And it's not okay, but it is okay.

I think this is happening where there's just two parents.

This kind of interaction is happening.

You know, sometimes you have like fun parent and sometimes you have strict parent.

And so there's this energy and this dynamic between the parents that if you could just step back and say, oh my God, my kids need so much of my spouse.

They need me.

And getting okay with that, I think that that would be really important for families.

Yep.

And thank God for you.

Truly, I'm just, I'm trying to imagine that scenario where the concert person comes out and it's me and Craig.

And Tish is trying to decide which one of us is going to be detail-oriented and calm and focused enough to get her through the backstage scenario.

And I think she might have just pointed to a stranger next to us and been like, can you come with me?

You for sure could do it.

I'm just standing back there giving her some like ideas.

But then, but you you know what I got to do when you think about it?

I got to be in the mosh pit.

Yeah.

Because you went back with her.

I got to be in that mosh pit with the, and by the way, it was a brandy concert.

So the mosh pit wasn't like moshy, whatever that is.

But I got to experience her.

And she said the moment that she looked down and saw me in the mosh pit was a great moment.

It's a great metaphor for modern parenting or allowing a bunch of different people into your kid's village that you trust because then there's somebody backstage.

There's somebody in the mosh pit.

There's somebody at home.

Craig was at home.

So Tish was sending videos.

She got to relive the whole thing again with him.

I will never get over you continuously and unrelentingly calling in front of brand new stage the mosh pit.

There was a five-year-old little girl I was dancing with.

It's not a mosh pit.

No.

People were like, hi, Glennon.

They were giving me rainbow flags.

I was waving a rainbow flag and a Love Wins thing.

I don't know.

It was the best mosh pit ever.

I just have gone from world champion, Olympian, to roadie.

That's right.

My job is literally now to just carry Tish's Tisha's guitar.

Well, good.

I'm glad you got so strong for the effort.

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Let's hear from Christina.

Hi, my name is Christina.

The best advice I ever received is a quote that I still say to myself 10 times a day.

And it is, you never know what worse luck your bad luck saved you from.

I'll say it one more time.

You never know what worse luck your bad luck saved you from.

When I heard the quote, like immediately erased my road rage because I just assumed that everyone in front of me was saving me from some wreckage.

I just assumed now anything that happens to me that feels like it's not the best shit ever is happening to me to save me from something much worse.

Change my life.

That's good.

I don't think it's that wrong.

I don't

mean

even if it's only right 1% of the time, it's worth taking to the bank.

Yeah.

It's like when your plane gets delayed because there was some mechanical problem and everyone's so pissed.

It's kind of like, aren't you glad?

Like, I'm pissed too.

Listen, I have no logic when it comes to this, but it's that situation all the time.

Aren't we actually glad that somebody found the mechanical problem?

Nope, put us in the air, Larry.

God damn it.

You couldn't just let that go.

You had to get your gold star, Larry.

We could be in the air right now.

Good call.

Good call.

I love that.

In the Christian world, we used to call it

every rejection is God's protection.

The Christians love a cupulet.

No, this is what it's called.

If it rhymes, we believe it.

If you can make it rhyme,

we will understand that it's gospel.

I could do a whole episode of just shit that rhymes, so we believe it.

Oh, God.

All right.

What do you have to say, Meredith?

My name is Meredith, and I'm calling with the best piece of advice I ever got.

It was from my dad, who is normally a man of few words, but he had some good ones for me.

When I was in some angsty parenting, he said, You are not responsible for your children's greatest mistakes, nor are you responsible for their greatest achievements.

And I think about that a lot.

I can't tell you how much your pod means to me.

Thank you for everything that you do.

That's good.

I love this one very much.

Trying to detach myself from,

because I'm a competitor.

I like winning things.

And so like when our kids do things that are cool and amazing and what anyone would consider a great achievement, I have to actually be like, this is not yours, Abby.

Because I'm so competitive.

I want to be the best parent in the world.

And it has nothing to do with me.

I know.

Abby said this to me yesterday.

So we're at the table.

We were at a soccer tournament.

We're talking about handling things on the sidelines.

We're often talking about how best to handle things on the sidelines or before game or after game or what we say or don't say.

If you want to know what it looks like to not detach or to

believe that what your child does reflects on you, good or bad, just go to a sideline of any child's

sporting event because it is a case study in this.

And I said something to Abby about, like, well, you know, I think like a strong parenting move is to yada yada.

And she said, in all seriousness,

over

the salt shakers and sugar packets that she had just been using to try once again to show to me what off sides was on the table, she said, I don't want to be a strong parent.

I want to be the best parent in the world.

This one actually believes if she does the things right, someone's going to give her like FIFA World Player of the Year.

Someone is going to give her best parent in the world.

Sissy, how do you remind yourself

that

when they act right, it's not a reflection of you.

And when they act wrong, it's not a reflection of you.

Or is it?

Do you even believe that?

No, I think this has been the learning curve of the past two years for me.

Like with the diagnoses, there's like an identity piece of this that I feel like is huge for people.

So that's what the sidelines are are about.

That's what the my kids in honor role student bumper stickers are about.

It's like, I am either because I didn't have it for myself or because I did have it for myself and I built a lot of my own identity around it.

I need it to be reincarnated in this person or incarnated for the first time in this person.

Therefore, I will have it.

I have that because you have that.

And so I think that

both with the great things,

now I have that because you have that.

And then with the not so great things, with the like, I'm getting a lot of negative feedback at school.

I feel like you don't have a friend group that you're a part of.

I feel any of those things.

Now I have that because you have that.

People are looking at me and reflecting me in a way because of you, either good or bad.

And I think that it's

that

has been some of the most liberating work that I've done is to try to be like,

it's quite not a reflection of me.

Totally.

The all-star is not a reflection of me.

The

acting a certain way that I wouldn't choose to act is not also a reflection of me.

This is an entire person working out their own shit,

starting on a path that they will continue, God willing, for the next hundred years to continue to work out.

Yep.

And it's actually very simple, but it's one of the hardest things and the most simple things.

It's like, I get to be a participant

and have a certain kind of partnership where I get to bear witness.

And if you are willing, get to

be in conversation with

you about

hold your bags.

Hold your bags.

Hold your bags.

Hold your trash.

Hold your trash four times a a day.

Find your shit because you're not willing to look for it.

But other than that, I'm just like in a really special relationship of witness to this and get to try to reflect you back to you where I can.

But you're going to be here.

You're going to be.

It's really hard.

I struggle with this one, I think, the most because of the way that I was raised.

I was raised in an environment where

everything that I did, it was made very clear to me, was a reflection of my parents' parenting.

Yeah.

That's how they made me feel, both good and bad.

And so that's like in my DNA, in my bones.

And so I have to remember that these children are not me.

And I'm like that competitor.

And I get stuck sometimes.

And I'm calling this thing parenting, this need for them to be ambitious and to be great and all of that.

I'm like, but that's my defense mechanism for not actually calling it what it is.

And it's just like ego.

It's just like all ego.

All ego.

Yeah.

And I get, I get mixed up with it sometimes.

And we have this conversation a lot because I still have work to do.

Well, and I think it's such a macro issue.

It's so huge.

People are either dealing with this actively or they're not dealing with it.

Everyone's doing it.

Yes.

That's right.

And I think it's sometimes easier for the parents whose kids are

currently performing in a

quote unquote like successful way.

Right.

Because it doesn't put these little gifts of discomfort on your door on a regular basis for you to be analyzing.

I think the people whose kids are quote unquote successful maybe cannot realize that they're doing this for a really long time.

That's right.

Until they do.

You know,

yesterday I got a call about something that happened at camp.

Okay.

And then I had to go deal with that.

In these little moments, I

used to not think about it until after the fact.

But now in the moment, I'm like, I'm deeply uncomfortable.

I'm mad.

And then I have to say,

what am I most uncomfortable about?

What am I most mad about?

And

eight and a half times out of ten what I am most uncomfortable about and what I am most mad about is being a

person

who just had to get a call that this happened

is being a

person who other people are now viewing as the kind of person who they have to make a call about to this it is not eight and a half times out of 10

the

substance of the thing that I'm getting a call about.

And if this were actually about parenting instead of about my own identity,

then

I wouldn't be

upset and uncomfortable because I would be looking at the substance of this thing and saying, okay, this is what your job as a parent is now.

Your job as a parent is to help this person navigate this difficult situation they found themselves in and to adapt to it so that they can better navigate it next time.

And that substance

is just what the actual parenting is.

Yes.

And all the discomfort and all the angst and all the embarrassment is not about that.

It's about me not ever thinking that I would be the kind of person who would get calls about this and me wanting to be like, well, I'll tell you what, I'll tell you what's going to happen.

They are going to straighten up and fly right.

Yeah.

Because that's the kind of person I am.

Or your social standing because of that.

Yeah.

Your social standing because of that.

On the flip side of that, which

I'm sure we'll get calls about this, but I'm going to say it as a former teacher.

The flip side of that is why are you going to put that bumper sticker on your car about your kid being in the honor roll?

If it were really about your kid and your, your happiness with their commitment or whatever, I don't know, then why isn't it on the refrigerator?

Or why isn't it on in a conversation?

Your child is in the car looking forward and that bumper sticker is on the outside of your car only for the people behind you

to note.

Like

my parents had

seven college stickers on the back window of our van.

I'm not judging, but I'm just saying parenting is hard and it is a communal thing.

And there are so many things to value in a child.

One of them is school achievement.

P.S.

That particular part of a child is freaking celebrated enough.

Yeah, exactly.

Like promise not that we're not putting enough emphasis on the honor rolls, the schooling.

If your kid's on the honor roll, trust me.

I've been in education for a long time.

They are getting celebrated enough.

They have the assembly.

They have the, they don't need a bumper sticker.

And the parents whose kids are struggling in that area and are not being seen for all the other million brilliant things they have don't need that shit in their face at a stoplight.

I've been very conscious of it because I can, I can get into the pride way of this.

Be proud, be proud, but just in your heart.

No, no, no.

But when our kids do something great, the language I use with them, I really try not to use that word because that implies that their success has something to do with it.

Exactly.

And so I really try to say, I'm so happy for you.

That was so fun to watch you do that.

That was so fun for me.

Cause like as soon as I say proud or that it's like a joint achievement at that point.

That's exactly right.

And so I'm very particular about that word.

And sometimes I say, I'm so proud on purpose.

And I know I don't say that very often, but I just, I feel so proud.

I'm using it.

I'm doing it.

I'm using my one thing for the year.

When you finally gave in and said, I'm proud.

I remember this so well because it was two weeks ago.

When Tish got back from camping, she made it through camping.

Like she said, it's my child.

She made it through camping.

And then she explained to Abby that there was a time in the morning where they, they were with a group and they had to decide who was going to carry all the stuff, the pots, the pans, the whatever.

And she always chose one of the heavy things because she wanted to be the kind of person who chose, who made the

burden lighter for everyone else instead of choosing the light thing really fast.

That's when Abby said, I'm proud.

Oh, well, I mean, Abby, come on.

Right.

I was like,

can you make that rhyme?

Because I feel like that was biblical.

I was like, oh my God, Tish, that's, that's my girl.

That is, that,

so proud of you.

Yeah.

That is.

I'd be proud of that too.

I would, I would have said that for sure.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I just want to say that the other thing is when you say I'm proud to a kid or anyone,

well, I'm like a glass is half empty person, but so all the kid is thinking is next time I don't do this shit, they're going to be unproud.

If pride is something I earn.

So if I won the race and my parents proud, then I know for sure the next time I don't win the race, they won't be proud.

And I'm like overly obsessed with words, but I do think like

it looks like you're so happy.

It's so awesome that you're so happy.

I'm so happy for you.

Yeah.

You know, and so then when they're sad because they lost, it's like, oh, you're so sad.

I'm so sad for you.

But there's not this like earning thing.

I know.

Emma scored this goal the other day and Craig and I are like bro-hugging on the sidelines, like, yeah, like, that's awesome.

I mean, it was a sick goal.

And, like, afterwards, I told Emma, I was like, Your dad and I, we were bro-hugging on the sidelines, like, we had anything to do with it.

We're just like living vicariously through you, sister.

So good.

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I would like, if possible, to end with Erica, who I believe in the first episode, which you should go back and listen to Tuesday's episode where we just talked about the best advice that we'd ever received, three of us, and I said that I didn't think that there was any advice that I could stand by 100% of the time.

I would like to retract that because I think what we're about to hear from Erica is advice that is always, always good forever.

Let's hear from Erica.

Hi, my name is Erica.

The best advice I ever got was from my mother, who's a very religious person, but when I was about 12 years old, she got up her courage and she told me that masturbating was okay.

And that is by far the best advice I've ever gotten.

Thanks.

So, for you Christians out there, I'm going to say it this way.

God is good.

God is great.

It is good to masturbate.

Write it down, put it in the sermon on Sunday.

It rhymes, so we can trust it.

Oh, my God.

Pod squad, we love you.

I think we should do a best advice episode every year or month or whatever the hell we do.

This is super helpful.

All of you go forth

and masturbate.

We'll see you next week.

Bye.

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