The Daily Dad

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Show Them It’s Not Too Late Jan 01, 2024

Show notes

We talked recently about what Dr. Becky Kennedy always tells parents: it’s never too late.

We’ve talked about Nell Painter’s mother, who became an author late in life (and Nell Painter herself, who went back and was Old in Art School) We’ve talked about Bruce Springsteen’s father finally telling Bruce what he needed to hear. We’ve talked about other parents who got their act together late.

We should be inspired by these examples. We should be inspired to be this example for our kids. We should show them, it’s never too late. It’s never too late to lose weight, to change, to find a new career, to quit a longtime vice, to try something new, to invest in yourself, to repair or apologize or make amends.

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Ryan and Sam Holiday on The Importance Of Routine Dec 30, 2023

Show notes

On this weekend episode of the Daily Dad, Ryan talks with his wife Samantha on finding common ground and learning to empathize after they had kids, the value of to do lists, pros and cons from the pandemic & the importance of routine.
If you want to spend time with more dedicated Stoics, if you want to join a culture full of people rising together, we invite you to join the 2024 Daily Stoic New Year New You Challenge. We did the first New Year New You Challenge in 2018, and year after year, we’ve realized more and more that one of the core benefits of the challenge is the community dynamic. Change and improvement comes fastest through culture, results through accountability, and wisdom through exposure to new people and new ideas.
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Why Are You Trying To Make This Go Away? Dec 29, 2023

Show notes

We’ve said this before, but one of the things we need to constantly remind ourselves of as parents is that our kids are just being kids. If we’re being honest, what’s closer to an accurate description of a kid: those behaviors listed above or being a perfectly quiet, perfectly obedient, perfectly well mannered and well behaved? You know that kids do these things, you know that it’s normal, you know that it’s largely harmless, you know that they have very little control over it, that it’s all part of a process of learning and growing and figuring things out.
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Reform is Necessary, Despair is Criminal Dec 28, 2023

Show notes

You weren’t the parent you wanted to be in 2023. You weren’t the person you wanted to be in 2023. Almost no one was. Anyone who thinks or says they were is lying…and for most of us, this truth goes back further than a calendar year.

None of us are perfect. We all screwed up. We all back-slid. We all picked up bad habits. And as a parent, that means our kids picked up those bad habits too. Because, as we’ve said before, behavior is the language of children.
For those ready for reformation, as we mentioned last week, we created the 2024 New Year New You Challenge. It’s a set of 21 actionable challenges—presented one per day—built around the best, most timeless wisdom in Stoic philosophy. Our goal is to help you and your family make 2024 your best year yet.

Participants of the New Year New You Challenge receive:

✓ 21 Custom Challenges Delivered Daily (Over 30,000 words of all-new original content)
✓ Three live Q&A sessions
✓ Printable 21-Day Calendar With custom daily illustrations to track progress
✓ Access to a Private Community Platform

These aren’t pie-in-the-sky, theoretical discussions but clear, immediate exercises and methods you can begin right now to spark the reinvention you’ve been trying for. We’ll tell you what to do, how to do it, and why it works. And when adversity inevitably comes around, you’ll be ready.

The 2024 New Year New Your Challenge officially begins on Monday, January 1st. Stop delaying. Head over to dailystoic.com/challenge and sign up NOW! Let’s go.

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The Debt Is Paid Forward Dec 27, 2023

Show notes

We do so much for our kids. We drive them around. We provide for them. We entertain them. And of course, there are parents who do even more. Parents who packed up and moved across the world for a better life for their kids. Parents who gave their lives for their kids.

How much do children understand these sacrifices? How much do they appreciate it? Not fully, that’s for sure. But that’s OK—because it’s not theirs to understand, it’s not theirs to appreciate. As we’ve said before, we owe our kids everything. We’re the ones that brought them into this world. They don’t owe us anything except to be themselves.
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[Good Inside] It’s Never Too Late Dec 26, 2023

Show notes

Every parent wishes they could have done some things differently. Maybe you wish you were around more when they were a toddler. Maybe you wish you were more patient when they were a teenager. Maybe you wish you said I love you more.

In her amazing book Good Inside: A Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want to Be, Dr. Becky Kennedy writes that that’s what she hears all the time:

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This Is a Gift To Give Yourself (And Your Family) Dec 25, 2023

Show notes

Today we wanted to run our favorite entry from The Daily Dad: 366 Meditations on Parenting, Love, and Raising Great Kids, a helpful reminder on this day of celebration.

When you were younger, for Christmas, all you wanted was presents.

Now that you’re older, now that you have kids, all you want is presence. All you want is for your kids to be present over the holidays.
Our New Year New You Challenge is all-new content, guided by thousands of responses and reactions to our previous challenges, courses, videos, and emails. It’s a whole new challenge based on painstaking research and timeless science, for an all-new, life changing experience.
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Ryan and Sam Holiday on Recognizing The Most Important Thing Dec 23, 2023

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“This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/dailydad and get on your way to being your best self.”
On this weekend episode of the Daily Dad, Ryan talks with his wife Samantha on the emotional neglect that comes with using kids for social media, the culture of Christmas being stressful, not letting work or expectations become the main thing along with self awareness and communication.
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You Must Give Them This Gift Dec 22, 2023

Show notes

Theodore Roosevelt lived an incredible life. He was an author. A naturalist. A rancher. A police chief. A cowboy. A hunter. A governor. A soldier. A president. An explorer. A philanthropist. And that’s probably not even close to an exhaustive list. His life was full of activity. It was full of adventure. It was marked by triumph and adversity to overcome.

It’s worth telling your kids the story of Theodore Roosevelt to inspire them for the same reason that Theodore Roosevelt’s parents made sure he knew about the fascinating and inspiring lives of history. As one biographer observed, “the story of Theodore Roosevelt is the story of a small boy who read about great men and decided he wanted to be like them.”
So we’ll leave you today by putting a challenge in front of you. For the last four years, we have been doing what we call the Daily Stoic New Year New You Challenge—a set of 21 actionable challenges, presented one per day, built around the best, most timeless wisdom in Stoic philosophy. These aren’t pie-in-the-sky, theoretical discussions but clear, immediate exercises and methods you can begin right now to spark the reinvention you’ve been trying for. We’ll tell you what to do, how to do it, and why it works.

From these challenges, you will:

✓ Learn to stop procrastinating and avoiding the change you truly desire

✓ Build new habits that form a strong foundation for change

✓ Abandon the harmful habits that are dragging you down

✓ Strengthen your character, becoming a more virtuous version of yourself

And above all: You will find out just how much you are capable of.

Every morning, the email arrives in your inbox, and it presents you with a choice. You can do the harder thing, you can do the challenge. Or you can follow the drift of least resistance—you can open the email and leave it at that. Or worse…you can ignore this call right now and not sign up at all. Which way will you go?

The 2024 New Year New You Challenge officially begins on Monday, January 1st. Stop delaying. Head over to dailystoic.com/challenge and sign up NOW! Let’s go.

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You’re Made Not Born Dec 21, 2023

Show notes

There is a beautiful passage in The Velveteen Rabbit where the young rabbit asks one of the seasoned old toys in the playroom whether ‘becoming real’—the process of being changed by the love of a child—is something that has to do with how a toy is made. Is it about having certain parts, he asked? Does it require a certain makeup?

"Real isn't how you are made," says the toy horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

So yes, it’s a choice, but an unusual type of choice. It’s the decision, as we’ve talked about, to accept this process. To open yourself up to it. To let it change you.

We choose to have kids, and they choose to give us their love, to really love us. We play with them, we connect with them, we open ourselves to them and they to us. And then this process changes, transforms both of us in the most wonderful and magical of ways.

For those ready to accept the process, to open yourself up to it, we created the 2024 New Year New You Challenge. It’s a set of 21 actionable challenges—presented one per day—built around the best, most timeless wisdom in Stoic philosophy. Our goal is to help you and your family make 2024 your best year yet.
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