Fostering Connections: Navigating Modern Parenting with Danny Silk

Speaker 1: 0:05

Hey friends, welcome to the Uncommon Freedom Show. I'm Kevin.

Speaker 2: 0:08

And I'm Becca, and we're your hosts, here to help you reach your potential and maximize your impact in every area that matters. Let's get started.

Speaker 1: 0:18

Hey friends, coming up next on the next episode of the Uncommon Freedom Show is an interview with Danny Silk. Danny is the founder of Loving On Purpose, a ministry to families around the world, helping people protect, heal and strengthen their most vital connections. He's also the CEO of Danny Silk Consulting, which specializes in helping organizations establish a culture of honor. Coming up next, my interview with Danny. All right. Well, hey everyone, thank you so much for joining us on another episode of the Uncommon Freedom Show. I'm really excited to have a good friend, and especially a parenting mentor, with me, danny Silk. Danny, good evening, how are you?

Speaker 3: 0:57

Hey Kevin, hey buddy, Thanks for having me Absolutely.

Speaker 1: 1:01

It's a real treat to have you on. I started hearing about you from our mutual friends, doug and Tia, and then Becca listened to your or read your book Loving On Purpose and I finally actually read it myself over the summer and got a ton of value out of it. But you and I have met gosh. We met in person I think officially for the first time last October at Tia's book launch. Did we meet prior to that, or is that the first time officially?

Speaker 3: 1:31

I think I crossed paths with you a few times. We may have shook hands, but I think that was the first time we actually had a conversation.

Speaker 1: 1:38

I agree and all I know is that we have numerous mutual acquaintances or friends and everyone speaks incredibly high of you and Sherry and love you both. You're amazing people and I mean I have additional respect for you because, as I can see from your background, you're a fellow Corvette lover. Tell me about your Corvette.

Speaker 3: 2:03

Oh, it's a 2017 C706.

Speaker 2: 2:08

It's my daily too.

Speaker 3: 2:09

I mean, I actually yeah, I have a little mountain road here that I traveled to work that two of my favorite parts of the day.

Speaker 1: 2:19

Yep, I was telling my son because I picked him up from school today in my Corvette and I realized it's not practical for everyone to have one, either financially or just from a space standpoint. But I love driving my Corvettes and it just makes going anywhere, whether it's going to pick up, you know, groceries two miles away or going for a longer trip, it just makes driving fun. So if you have to do it, you might as well have fun doing it. Right, you know we're going to do it, Might as well have fun, yeah. And then those, those designs behind you. You're telling me those are actually local race tracks that you've driven on.

Speaker 2: 3:03

Local.

Speaker 3: 3:03

I have a little race team I'm a part of. We have four drivers. We have endurance races, so we do Saturday and Sunday daylight hours we race other teams and I tell Sherry, it's the most fun you can have with your clothes on.

Speaker 1: 3:19

You know what? I said something very similar to a friend over the weekend. I was talking to him about flying, because I'm working to get my pilot's license and driving fast on a track and flying an airplane or two of the best things, like you said, you can do with your clothes on. So really great, awesome, well, I'm excited. I asked you to review my book, my forthcoming book. By the time this podcast is published, it will be out. I just showed you the first hard copy that I've had the privilege of seeing. I know you've been through this process numerous times and that's making it hold in your first book.

Speaker 3: 3:56

Isn't that just awesome? It is.

Speaker 1: 3:58

It really is fun. I was telling Becca that as a guy I feel like it's as close as I can come to giving birth, yeah, so I'm sure you can relate to that. And then it you know we have a chapter in the book, or I have a chapter in the book called parent with purpose and you have an awesome book. It is called loving our kids on purpose and I didn't steal purpose from you. I guess it's what intentional people do, is they do things on purpose? So I would just love you know to let you share free flow kind of some of your parenting tips. I know that probably the thing that stuck out to me was most convicting for me as I got listened to your book was the importance of connection. So why don't we start there? Talk about connection, why it's important and how we can do a better job of that as parents with our kids.

Speaker 3: 4:58

Yeah Well, I, I, I created as primary, some people created as luxury. I think that the mistake that we make is early on especially, is we get it in our head that we think we can control these people because we can pick them up. You know we can pick them up, move them we can. You know we can overpower them. And that reinforces our past, because most of us were raised by people who felt responsible to control your children. Can we do control your child? Can we use a, control that child and like, okay, well, good luck here, you try. You know that that process of control gets into our belief system and then we behave as though we do have control not realizing that we are sowing seeds of disrespect and dishonor into our relationship.

Speaker 3: 5:58

And then one day, when the disconnection is sufficient and the kid really isn't afraid of your punishments anymore, we call that adolescence. The kid gives you a hey, I am not afraid of you anymore and there is nothing holding us together. And that is such a painful revelation for parents, where they find out that they've been sowing these seeds of disrespect into their relationship. And now boom it's harvest day.

Speaker 3: 6:34

Now they're going to get back what they've sown in all these power struggles and clashes. And this kid is out of control Now. They're just out of control because there is no hope of reeling them in. If we sow seeds of respect for the connection and teach the child the value of being connected to us, then when they do have a choice to bolt and rebel, they consider the effect of the connection and they manage themselves. So throughout their life I'm teaching them self-control, because nobody controls you. And then, when they're adolescents, they now understand they have the power of self-control and they use it to protect us.

Speaker 1: 7:21

That's good. So quick backtrack, give us a little. Tell me about your family a little bit, because you are a parent, which gives you credibility in this. Tell me a little bit about your family and your kids and grandkids.

Speaker 3: 7:36

I have three children. My oldest is Brittany. She is 38 now, and then I have two boys Levi is 34 this December and Taylor is 32 this December. So Ben and Britt, brittany, mary, the guy named Ben from Australia they have three kids and we all live together. So Sherry and I and those five people live together, have almost gone on nine years now and love it, just love it. And then my youngest son, taylor, is in Los Angeles in some Hollywood productions. He's not married yet. And my oldest son, levi, just recently moved back to Northern California where he grew up and is living with some of the relatives up there. He's not married yet Got it.

Speaker 1: 8:36

Got it. So you have three kids and three grandkids. Is that correct? Yeah, got it. All right. So you have this inaction, you've applied it, but I also know that you didn't start out this way. Could you kind of talk about your journey from initial parenting and maybe just flying by the seat of your pants or utilizing the things that were used with you as a child, to when you finally had this awakening to where the connection was so important, versus just trying to control your kids?

Speaker 3: 9:10

Yeah, well, sherry and I both, you know, we both got married one year after giving our life to Jesus. So, you know, the toolkit that we brought was our families. And our families are pretty busted up, like there's two parents, and, and my, my mom and dad, and then Sherry's stepfather who raised her since she was six. Those five people Represent 15 marriages. They've all been married three times. Oh, you know.

Speaker 3: 9:39

So this, this is the, the legacy that is coming into our family Busted, disconnected, drug infested, alcohol. You know, you name, you name all the, all the stuff. It's it's one generation behind us, you know, and so we're trying to figure out how to put the the axe to the root of the tree here and stop all that from crescendoing on our families. And Every time we reach in the toolbox, all we have are the same tools that they handed us. So we are in fact turning into our parents Because those are the tools that we have. So I I ended up Perceiving a. My education is in social work. I have MSW. We worked with juvenile offenders, we were working in foster homes and adoptive care families. I worked with Families in crisis for, you know, 15 years, and it was in that, that journey of how do I teach Christian foster parents how to parent these foster children that they can't spank? What's what tools? I got nothing. They got nothing. All you know it's just pulling belts off and chasing kids around with With wooden spoons.

Speaker 2: 11:14

I'm like no, we can't do that.

Speaker 3: 11:16

I know that's what you did, but we can't Spank someone else's child so that sent me on a journey where I learned about an outfit called love and logic out of golden Colorado Yep, and just Downloaded and really helped me combine the kingdom of heaven, which is really how does? How does my father parent me? Yeah, he's not in my face screaming at me, he's not taking me out to the woodshed, he's not spanking me, you know. He's not pushing me around the living room. What? What is the Lord Using to lead me? And it, and that's where I really discovered the, the depth and the power of a heart-to-heart connection is really how my father leads me, and that's the seed you know, that's the seed bed.

Speaker 3: 12:12

A bunch of the skills and tools that I picked up came from love and logic, and then teaching parenting seminars in schools and churches all over the place. And here we are 40 years later.

Speaker 1: 12:25

Awesome, talk about Kind of take us through maybe some of the other that the age, age ranges, of what connecting looks like. So let's talk about maybe the the preschool to kindergarten, first grade age range. How can we connect with our kids in that age group? What are some suggestions you have for us?

Speaker 3: 12:50

Well, I I think that the kids.

Speaker 3: 12:53

Kids connect pretty easily with their parents when they're little because you know you supply every need they have. So really, what you're trying there is you're trying to not destroy the connection by. You know you're going to begin to teach your toddler to think and to problem solve and to Control themselves, which is not what most people are thinking about. Most people are trying to Trying to get a toddler to do exactly what they told them to do. Which is what makes this such a war is I'm trying to control a tornado who doesn't control themselves, so there's lots of fun To be with that's.

Speaker 3: 13:40

You know that's probably the the main Skill development or tool that you'll be using with a preschool age child is you want to be fun or do you want to go to your room? Do you want to go to your room with your feet touching the ground or not touching the ground? You can come out when you're fine. Take your time Now. That Exercise parents will do for years, but it's a self-control exercise. I'm teaching my toddler to be fun Instead of whatever they're doing. So you want to be fun or do you want to do what you're doing in your room? You want to do what you're doing in that chair and pretty soon you'll watch a child, you'll, you'll, you'll say right to this little Four-year-old, you know, be fun, and you go to your room and they'll go Fine, oh we fine, that is self-control practice, right there.

Speaker 1: 14:45

So instead of threatening the child like you, better cut it out and put a smile on your face right now. It's recognizing. I can't force even a five-year-old to put a smile on their face, right, and so I'm saying especially, exactly, exactly, so it's recognizing. Hey, you have the right to have a bad attitude. You just don't get to do it around everyone else. So if you want to be with everyone else, you're welcome to you, got to be fun, and if you need some more time to have a bad attitude, we're just gonna have you do it in your room or a chair or anything like that. That's essentially what you're talking about, right?

Speaker 3: 15:21

Exactly, cuz, cuz. Sometimes I just need to go to my room. Yeah, sometimes you're just having such a hard time, I just need to get away like I am.

Speaker 2: 15:30

I am no fun.

Speaker 3: 15:31

You guys do not want me in this room right now. I'm going for a walk. I, you know, I'm going for a drive. I'm gonna go take a nap. I am Overwhelmed. I need Time to control myself. Well, certainly a preschooler is gonna need the same.

Speaker 2: 15:47

Hey friends, here's a quick reminder that if you're finding value in this show, would you do us a favor and subscribe, share with someone you think would benefit and give us a five-star rating. We make nothing from this show and invest a lot of time and money producing it. All we ask is that you help us get our message to more people.

Speaker 1: 16:02

Let's move on now to, you know, maybe, that middle to late elementary school, to maybe even early middle school. What does connecting look like? How do we, you kind of shift our parenting as kids grow up from the early elementary ages?

Speaker 3: 16:19

This is when, probably, the developmental task has a lot to do with teaching them to clean up their mess. So you know, when a child is irresponsible or disrespectful, take your pick. There's a disconnect and I tell them you know that's no fun and what are you going to do? So what are you going to do now is they're prompt to pick wisdom, you know to pick responsibility, to pick respect, and they say clean up my mess, right. And so it's no longer just about self-control, it's now about addressing what happened in the relationship.

Speaker 3: 17:08

So the child lied to me, the child punched his sister, the child doesn't want to do their homework or doesn't want to help with the chore. So I say things like lots of choices, lots of choices, lots of choices. But when a child lies to you, you don't ask them if they lied to you. You say I don't believe you. And they say so. How do you think that feels? Do you think I feel respected or disrespected? When you lied to me, I didn't ask you if you lied to me. I told you I don't believe you. So I'm just going to move along like I'm not. You know, I wasn't there. I don't have a. I talk on it. I don't have the video, so I have to actually kind of go with my gut, like yeah you're lying to me.

Speaker 3: 18:01

So I don't believe you. It's true, I don't believe you. And now, what are you going to do? Okay, have a seat. As soon as you come up with the solution, let me know. Now the child's in a chair and I continue doing what I was doing, and they wait. I'm going to clear my mess. Okay, great, and that's the goal. The goal now is to begin to for the child to take responsibility for the way their behavior affects our relationship, and I taught them to control themselves, and now I teach them to take responsibility for their mistakes, because life's full of them, and it's not about winning a court case. It's not about blaming somebody else. It's about taking responsibility for yourself, and so much of those years is about cleaning up your messes when you make a mistake.

Speaker 1: 18:56

How do parents deal with a child that they feel like they're constantly having to address the same issues? For example, you know they're leaving stuff out, not cleaning up after themselves, and I granted, and the scope of things that parents have to deal with, that's not the most important, but it can also be a nuisance especially like for us, for kids, when you know if only one kid left things out on a regular basis it would be one thing, but when you're dealing with multiple kids, you know it has this compounding effect. How do we keep the connection and address the fact that, son, I am really growing tired of having to remind you to clean up after yourself all the time. Any suggestions for any parent who might have to deal with anything like that?

Speaker 3: 19:46

Sure, yeah, yeah. Well, you know you're right and the scope of things, that's not a big deal. But if you're bringing the hassle level down to that, well done. That would be the time when I just offer a choice, say, hey, you want to pick up your stuff, or do you want me to pick up your stuff for you?

Speaker 2: 20:08

Because if I pick, up your stuff for you it ends up in.

Speaker 3: 20:14

We'll call it the redemption bag, yep. And if you'd like to get your stuff back, come find me on Saturday, because I got some stuff you could do to get your stuff back, yep. And if you don't, come find me now, I know the junk that we have in our house.

Speaker 1: 20:34

Got it, so you're not making a big deal about it. You're just you're communicating with them like, hey, you got two options. You can take care of her, I can take care of it, or, I imagine, I can pay your brother or your sister to take care of it, or you can pay your brother or sister. I'm going to have them do it and I'm not going to pay them. You're going to end up being the one to pay them, right?

Speaker 3: 20:56

Yeah, yeah, it would be like, if you know if I don't want to iron my shirts. I have a choice. I can take them to dry cleaner. I can wear wrinkly shirts. You know, I have two choices. Everybody has two choices, pretty much about anything, yeah, so I get really good at choices with my all my kids actually, but especially that that post toddler all the way through to, you know, early adolescence, lots of choices.

Speaker 1: 21:37

Okay, got it, and let's move on to teens. So obviously, if teens sloppy teens was the worst that we had to worry about, that would be wonderful. But through the course of history granted, through the course of history it really wasn't until the last 100 years or so that kids were living with their parents and not being in the dependent like they are today. I mean, a teenager is kind of a 100 year old phenomenon really. So I think that creates a lot of the problems that we actually have in modern society. But let's face it, kids live with their parents, so they're at least typically 18 and many times beyond that, and the things that parents have to worry about, the battles that parents and kids fight, are a lot more than just leaving things out. We got cell phones, we have curfews, we have music, we have media, we have sex, drugs, you know all kinds of stuff. How do we bring connection into these much more serious and consequential topics?

Speaker 3: 22:42

Yeah, this is, this is when we just double down on the connection. You know, this is, this is really all I have. You know, I've done I've done a good job of training my child in what's important to us, what's important in life, what's important to God. You know, we we've done a good job of showing them and training them. Now we're really a coach, we're now a coach and we are in intimate relationship Outside of my spouse.

Speaker 3: 23:18

I don't have anybody that gets in my heart the way you do, so your choices affect me right here, primarily, and so, yikes, ouch, ug, whoa. Yay, that'd be my. You know my five ouch, that hurts. Yikes, you're scaring me. Whoa, I feel powerless when you do that. Ug, I feel really sad. Yay, I love it when you do that.

Speaker 3: 23:49

I would just learn how to quickly engage my kid's heart and and attention to our relationship with speaking the truth and love, and I would let them know and experience me. Instead of acting like I'm bulletproof, like I'm made of Kevlar, like you can't hurt me, you know, instead of putting up this really tough, bulletproof front, I would let them, I would stand in the light and say ouch, and let them feel the weight of hurting me. Yikes, let them know I'm scared. The more you talk, the more scared I get. Ug, you've told me twice before that you're going to protect me and you haven't. That's so sad to me. I feel so sad. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hey, when you get that upset that fast, I feel powerless to have a conversation. Maybe we could talk later, or do you want to try again?

Speaker 1: 25:03

That's good, that's good. How about addressing the relationship, the connection piece, versus implementing consequences Like where? How does a parent, especially of a teenager, of an adolescent, figure out? You know what they should be doing from a consequence standpoint.

Speaker 2: 25:31

Well, you know it really depends.

Speaker 3: 25:33

I mean, a pregnancy is a consequence that we're just going to live through. You know, you like Taylor, when he was 16, he didn't come home, you know. So I was sick. You know that's how I found out he didn't come home is he had a curfew? We were in bed already and I was, you know, worshiping at the porcelain throne and you know I noticed he's passed his curfew. I text him. I said, hey, dude, you know, I don't know if you noticed, but you're not here, and I didn't hear anything. And then I woke up, you know, on a bathroom floor, about three AM, and I said Am I calling the police or are you about home Crickets?

Speaker 3: 26:18

I sherry waves in the morning and I says Taylor in his room. She said no, I said he didn't come home last night. So you know she is now in panic mode because this is the first time he's any of our kids have ever done that Like it seems like every one of your kids introduces something to freak you out that the other ones didn't, and this was Taylor's.

Speaker 3: 26:39

This Taylor's contribution our youngest was didn't come home, so she's, you know, trying to figure out where he is. And about eight AM he walks in the door and I met him at the door. I said I'm glad you're, I'm glad you're alive, keys phone. He's like oh, he's all upset. He's like you know, I can't believe it was us. I didn't. I had nothing, I had nothing to say. Off, he goes, and he was. I fell asleep on my cousin's couch and they my phone died, and there's no electricity on that side of town. I don't know what he was trying to do.

Speaker 2: 27:16

Yeah, it's just like dude.

Speaker 3: 27:18

So, mr, I slept at all night at my cousin's house, slept until two in the afternoon, right and. And then he comes out of his room in his underwear, going to the bathroom, looking at us like a prisoner of war you know, and I'm like I got nothing. I got no conversation with this boy. That's not the guy I want to talk to. And then about 430, the phone rings. It's one of his friends. It was back when the phone was on the wall in the house.

Speaker 3: 27:48

It was one of the. I said, yeah, he's here, taylor. So Taylor comes to, taylor goes oh, that's tonight, oh, I forgot. So his buddy just reminded him that there's a halo video game tournament and they have matching shirts and everything. So now Taylor comes out and he's gonna. You know he's now. He's like okay, dad, hey, I'm really sorry. I just wanted to say sorry, I just wanted to clean my mess. You know, I'm like okay, well, sorry for what? Well, sorry, then come home.

Speaker 2: 28:16

I'm sorry, you know sorry that you guys were worried I come. Why does that matter?

Speaker 3: 28:20

So, I don't know, I mean I thought you want to be me to be here, so why would it matter if I wanted you to be here and you didn't come home? I don't know what you're doing right now?

Speaker 2: 28:34

What are you doing?

Speaker 3: 28:34

I'm trying to clean up my mess. You're making this impossible. You're doing that thing you do with everybody else. You ask him all these questions Jedi mind tricks. Yeah, I said. I said well, can I, can I ask you some questions? He goes, yeah, I said how did mom?

Speaker 3: 28:53

and I fall so far down your consideration list when you think of how you're going to take care of things, like it seems like you took care of 20 things before you even thought about how your decisions would affect us. That felt so disrespectful and so powerless and so scary to not have you come home and you didn't even consider us until number 20. I feel I have no value when it comes to how you sort through your relationships. And he said that's how you feel.

Speaker 3: 29:38

He said yeah, because you don't think you're important to me so well, that was not my experience last night and he says I'm sorry, I had no idea that's how you felt that will never happen again. I said okay, that's all I needed to say. I just need to know that that's never going to happen again. He said well, I'm sorry, please forgive me. So I do forgive you, son, thank you.

Speaker 2: 30:22

Hmm, I said do you want these keys in this?

Speaker 3: 30:26

phone, he goes yeah. Now is it, that was it, that was the whole interaction, and that's repentance and that's what I need. I don't need your sorry, I need repentance and I believed it and I was right. It never happened again. Now a bunch of other stuff happened, but not that one. That one didn't happen again, and that's what I need from him. I need him to adjust, to protect my heart.

Speaker 3: 30:59

And that's really how the Lord leads us. A lot of us, you know a lot of a lot of parents right there are saying well, when do we get to punish him? Like, well, I took his keys in his phone the second I saw him. That's just a freedom and a privilege that you've abused and until you repent, you can't handle this. You're going to hurt me with this. So if he hadn't have handled it that way, I would have still had his keys in his phone for however long it took for him to take responsibility, clean up his mess, control himself, honor our connection.

Speaker 1: 31:43

That's good, that's good. I think as parents we tend to run towards a consequence or punishment, and it's easy, when you hear a scenario like that, to think, oh man, you're letting him off the hook easy Right, like you're letting them get away with it. But when what you're saying is when you have that heart connection and you obviously you know some kids are really good at fibbing and others aren't as good at it or others just maybe don't do it, but when you actually believe that the repentance has happened because repentance means basically doing a 180, you're going away from it, then that is. You know unless there's some type of natural consequence that automatically happens that the doling out of a punishment isn't necessarily beneficial.

Speaker 3: 32:44

Yeah, it's no nothing I can add to that. Gets what I wanted. I got what I wanted. Yeah, you know but, let's say, it happens again. Okay, now this is I got a credit card when I was 18, I racked it up. I didn't pay it off. I have a ding on my credit. Now I want to buy a car. I go back to the bank. They check my credit. What do they? What happens? Oh, buddy, that's your second offense right, you get away with that first one.

Speaker 3: 33:19

But you, we knew you'd be back and I know he's coming back and if he comes back with a. I'm sorry, dad, I love you on. That will never happen again. I will say to him buddy, I don't believe you. That's what you said last time. Now he's got a credibility problem. Now we're gonna amount credit and how credit works right. And and that's the paramount if, if you need something from me that is built on trust, you've got to have credibility, and if you lose that, you got the worst problem in the world, friend.

Speaker 3: 33:59

Yeah, yeah so so he'll be crawling out of that hole for a while because I'm, you know, I, I, I'm hard to convince you and I gave you grace and mercy on that first round, yeah, but this second one, oh, buddy, lord, lord, didn't I perform great miracles and do wonderful things? Yeah, I never knew you, bro, like whoa.

Speaker 2: 34:34

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3: 34:35

Bam, it's right there. So what's he gonna do the second time? I'm not really sure, but I'll let you know when I feel it.

Speaker 1: 34:43

Yeah, okay, that's really good. Do you have any advice for us and other parents? You said your oldest is now 32. Is that right? Did I get that right? 32?, 30?, great, he's 38. I'm sorry, your youngest is a youngest is 32. Yeah, 32. Youngest is 32. So I'm doing some math. He was 18 14 years ago, which means 2009. When did the iPhone come out? Shortly before that, right? So flip phones were common when you were raising your kids. Smartphones really didn't exist Then did they, no, but I do.

Speaker 3: 35:32

Yeah, and they yeah, so Delaney had a phone, got herself in a world of trouble with that phone and Addie's got a phone now and she, she, she took notes.

Speaker 1: 35:45

Yeah, do you have. Do you have any advice for us parents raising kids in this digital age where there's I mean there's just so much Dowsize, I mean you know there's. There's definitely some pros and my opinion that there's more cons for kids to have phones and there are pros, whether it's, you know, just the unintentional, easy access to pornography. I mean, you know, even you can look up a kid's YouTube video and you know the next video in the queue could be something totally inappropriate and so it's not even intentional. Do you have any advice for us parents and how to manage that and keep the connection with our kids?

Speaker 1: 36:34

Oh just being about rules like you can't have this or you can, type of thing.

Speaker 3: 36:41

Yeah, it just so depends on the kid, right? Because some kids are like just born for danger and adventure and interword angel sphere to tread, and other kids are just so afraid of being in trouble that they just self governed strictly. So I mean, they got this. This is a continuum of who am I talking to right now and I would just be honest with them as much as possible and say things like yikes, you know I have your phone because of that last exchange we had when I asked to see it and you freaked out Okay, people who have nothing to hide, don't act like you have. Act. Hmm, so I have your phone because you're scaring me. What?

Speaker 2: 37:34

are you going?

Speaker 3: 37:35

to do and I, as often as I can, I'm going to make my child's problem their problem, not my problem to convince them of. So if you have a child with a phone and they're scaring you, you have their phone. If you have a child with a phone, who's you know, hiding it or clearing their history or what you like, okay, I'm scared. I'm scared I can't prove anything, but I'm scared. So I have, I have a phone, I have two phones now.

Speaker 3: 38:21

Now I have two phones both of my phones I carry, I should say, both my phones I carry, and you let me know when you figured out what you're going to do to manage this level of freedom Because, honey, you've taught me, you are not ready for this much freedom.

Speaker 1: 38:42

That's good. That's good. Awesome, danny, any other top? Well, actually, talk about the benefits, because I know, reading from reading your book, that you didn't start out your parenting journey understanding the importance of connection. If you made a shift, you know, mid course. Talk about the benefits, because I know you have a very close relationship with your kids now. Can you talk about what are the benefits of having this focus on connection and how does it pay off in the long run?

Speaker 3: 39:18

Well, I mean obviously Brittany, my oldest, she's, she's my success plan for this ministry that we built loving on purpose. You know she and her husband are. She wrote a book called imperfect parenting, which is her, you know, rendition of loving your kids on purpose. She's not teaching and training and conferences and, and you know, flying around the world and that's they're doing the next gen and and then to watch them as parents.

Speaker 3: 39:51

probably the greatest delight that I have in life is watching my daughter do a better job than I did as a parent. You know, it's just the meow man. It is so rewarding, I mean it's.

Speaker 3: 40:12

it's the best you know I have what one of my sons is the my, my political antithesis you know, he has the opposite worldview of pretty much everything in life than I do, and yet he edits the videos for our podcast, he works with my media team and he is still connected to us. He comes up, stays, stay at the house. He's the best uncle in the world he is, he's just a kick and we're very connected because that is the emphasis. So agreement is not what holds us together. We have vast disagreements and in today's climate with adult children, that's what's blowing up families is. We have to, you have to show me me before I can love you, and that's not happening. And so fear is ruling so many family cultures because we didn't emphasize the love that chases away the fear that comes through connection.

Speaker 1: 41:27

That's so good. That's awesome. Well, danny, I really appreciate your time. I know that many people have gotten a lot of value out of your book. I certainly did and I'm going to go back. It's one of those. It's really I think it's one of the few parenting books that people need. If they just kind of kept it on replay, probably reread or re listened every year, because you know you forget stuff and you fall into old habits. You fall into the habits of your parents and things like that and there's. You know, if we just applied some of the top notch stuff that we have access to, we'd be much better off. So I really appreciate your time and real quick. Can you just talk about your ministry, because I know you'll talk about what Loving on Purpose does and if people want more information or to tap into the resources and the help that you offer, talk about what you guys do and how they can get more information.

Speaker 3: 42:22

Yeah, Loving on Purposecom. We just refreshed our whole website, so go check it out. It has all really the the the core offers that we present there. We have something called the Life Academy. That is just videos. It's like 100 plus videos of all this stuff. It's culture of honors, Loving our kids. It's unpunishable, it's keep your love on. It's all the books that I've written in courses that are really designed for small groups. And then we also have Kylo University, which is the 16 week relationship course that teaches us to connect our connection with God, our connection with our own heart and our connections with other people, and that's just changed the lives left and right. And then we have that with family coaching. So a lot of people want a conversation about what to do with my child right now. Family coaches will that have all been trained in what we do. We'll get on there and help you work through any of your marriage parenting, personal situations or challenges that you might need encouragement.

Speaker 1: 43:38

And is the family coaching? Is that something that's done virtually, or they have to be local. How does that work?

Speaker 3: 43:45

Yeah, it's all done online.

Speaker 1: 43:47

Even the entire university is done online, got it Awesome, awesome Well, danny, thank you so much for your time, appreciate your friendship, appreciate your mentorship. I know Becca and I have reached out to you and Sherry on numerous occasions to get your advice on different scenarios that we've encountered as parents and there's definitely no perfect parent. But our goal is to, you know, be better than our parents were, not to dig on our parents and, and hopefully our kids will be even better parents than us. I know right now, I know my kids are convinced they will be better parents than us, but time will tell. So it's great, it's great to have you and thank you so much for this conversation, my friend.

Speaker 3: 44:30

Thanks, I really appreciate being with you All right.

Speaker 1: 44:33

God bless. Thanks for listening to the uncommon freedom show. We believe freedom isn't man's invention. It was created by God. If you are enjoying the show, please give us a five star review on the platform we're listening to us on, then subscribe and share with friends and family that you think will enjoy the show. You can connect with us at back and kevcom for more resources to learn biblical principles, essential disciplines and the winning habits that help once average people lead the life they want instead of accepting the life they were given.