118： Connecting With Your Kids ｜ Jim Sheils
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Summary
In this episode, my guest Jim Shields joins us to talk about why we succeed in business but fail in the family, the entrepreneurial lie, how to create moments with your children, and how to finally connect with your kids.
Transcript
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If you are anything like me, connecting with your kids can be a real challenge. You know,
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it's important. You want to connect with them, but the grind of everyday life and providing for
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your family and wearing all the quote unquote hats that we as men are required to wear can
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come at a cost. Today, my guest, Jim Shields joins us to talk about why we succeed in business,
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but fail in the family, the entrepreneurial lie, how to create moments with your children,
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implementing what he calls rhythms into your life and how to finally connect with your kids.
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You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest, embrace your fears and boldly charge
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your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time you are not
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easily deterred, defeated, rugged, resilient, strong. This is your life. This is who you are.
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This is who you will become at the end of the day. And after all is said and done,
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you can call yourself a man. Guys, what is going on today? My name is Ryan
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Mickler and I am the host and the founder of the Order of Man podcast. Glad you are back with us
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again today or for the first time you're here today. You're listening to some of the best
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conversations the world of podcasting has to offer. My job is to ask successful men really good
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questions and get you the answers to those questions so you can improve on multiple fronts
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in your life. We've talked with guys like Jocko Willink, Lewis Howes, Tim Kennedy, Grant Cardone,
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Andy Frisella, so many more other powerful men, all of them with a message to share, which will help
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you become a better man. A couple of quick resources to know about as we get started today,
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as much as I like sharing with you digitally, there is nothing that I found that can replace
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face-to-face meetings, which is why we are hosting our very first regional Order of Man
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Meetup in Kansas City, which is going to be held on August 12th, 2017. I'm going to be there.
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Steven Mansfield, the author of Mansfield's book of Manly Men is going to be there.
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And we also have a copy of his book, Building Your Band of Brothers, available for the first 50 men
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to register for the event. So do that quickly and you can do that at orderofman.com slash event.
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Now, the other resource that I wanted to share with you is our exclusive brotherhood,
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The Iron Council. And speaking about building your band of brothers, this is a digital band
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of brothers, but it goes so much deeper than that. It goes so much further than that. I am seeing
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these guys forge some real bonds here. They're really holding each other accountable. They're
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doing big things in their lives. So if you want to learn more about what we're doing, you can do so
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at orderofman.com slash Iron Council. Man, I am so excited to share my conversation with my guest and
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friend, Mr. Jim Shields. I met Jim several months ago at a dad's retreat in Austin. I immediately
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resonated with his message about being a success on the business front. Yes, but failing behind or
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falling behind on the family front. This is something that I have done personally in the
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past. And I've worked really, really hard at avoiding the same pitfalls that I used to fall
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into of neglecting my kids and my wife. He wrote a book called The Family Board Meeting. And after the
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event, I immediately started to implement some of the strategies that he shared with my three
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oldest children. And I can tell you from experience that this man knows what he's talking about and
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he's going to help you get closer to your children, probably more so than you ever have. So enjoy this
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one, fellas. Take notes, execute on this stuff. It will change your relationship. Jim, how you doing?
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Thanks for joining me on the show. Hey Ryan, how's it going? Good to be here. Yeah, it's good. It's been
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what, a couple of months since we were able to connect in Austin. And man, I was so blown away
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with the message and everything that you're doing. I'm excited to have this conversation today.
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Yeah, me too. Ditto, ditto. It was good to kind of one-two punch you and I speaking together. I
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really enjoyed that. That's right. Yeah. Well, I want to talk with you about really connecting with
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family because I think it's easy for a lot of guys to really quantify the success that they're having
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within their business. But then when it comes to family, it seems to be a pretty difficult thing
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to do for a lot of guys. Can you explain maybe briefly why that is? Why do we have such a
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difficult time connecting at home versus in the office? Sure. I think that one of the biggest
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mistakes people make is certain principles we use in the office, either as an executive or a business
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owner, can actually translate at home if we apply them correctly and help our home life. But other
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things that we do at work and try to translate into home will actually sabotage our home life. And
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that's pretty much how family board meetings was created because we saw a lot of people that were
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successful in their business and not successful at home. And it doesn't have to be that way. So
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I think that they have to get clarity on certain principles that we follow at work can absolutely
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work at home. Other ones cannot. And I can give examples if that helps.
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Let's talk about the sabotage one first because I think sometimes it's best to illustrate what
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pitfalls to avoid. So what types of characteristics or skills, the things that you're talking about that
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apply to work that don't necessarily translate over to the family side of things?
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Absolutely. Ryan, the biggest killer, the biggest killer I've seen working with different families
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and spending time in the retreats and really digging deep to see why is there disconnection?
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The biggest one I've seen is the abuse of delegation. So let me explain that. Now, when you and I
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go to a top-notch entrepreneur event, and we want to learn the tactics and the skills of how to
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increase our business, how to better our business, one of the biggest things we're taught, correct me
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if I'm wrong, is delegation. You have to be able to delegate certain things because if you hold
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everything, you can't expand. You can't grow. What I found is a lot of very successful people
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that have gotten so good at the art of delegation at work, they've taken that same approach and
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principle at home. And that can be an absolute huge mistake because you cannot, you cannot, if you
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want to have a deep, meaningful relationship with your children, you cannot delegate quality time.
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It just doesn't work. But what people do is they feel, okay, delegate at work. It's, you know,
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almost like the bowling pins are being thrown at you and you just throw them back out, throw them back
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out. But at home, I've seen guys delegate themselves so far out of the family life that they're almost
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non-existent there. So there has to be a balance, a kind of a gut check of what are you actually
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delegating at home? Certain things you want to be involved in. And I've actually sat with people
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and said, well, hold on, let's do a delegation list. What have you delegated? And we'll pick two
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or three things off. I'm saying, why are you delegating that to their grandfather? Why are you
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delegating that to their babysitter? Don't you want to be a part of that? Don't you want to see that?
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And it's like this aha, like, man, what happened? And it's never really ill intention or ill will
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that's been, we've just taken this skill at the office and brought it home, but we've abused it
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where it actually causes disconnection. So the art of delegation at work can be an absolute charm.
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The art of delegation at home can be an absolute sin. I've watched it to the point where it's,
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it's dangerous. It really is. If I understand correctly, maybe just to reframe this, I think
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what I'm hearing anyways, is that men who are successful in business tend to understand how to
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leverage themselves very well to multiply their efforts. Except for at home, your wife and your
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children just aren't going to resonate with you trying to multiply or leverage your, your abilities
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or your presence, right? Exactly. I mean, I'm not saying you can't have certain help with, you know,
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I do date night every Tuesday night, Ryan, with, with my wife and we have a babysitter. That's great
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leverage. But what I've seen is people get so busy at work. Okay. To, to keep doing, to grow the
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business bigger and better. They delegate everything at home. Okay. They're taking care
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of. We have a babysitter. We have a nanny. We have grandparents. We have, and I can't make it to the
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soccer game, but my wife will be there. It's an abuse of the principal. And what happens is all of a
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sudden they feel disconnected. They feel like their kids are strangers, especially when the teen years
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come and they're going, why? I, you know, I kept things in order. I did such a good thing, but
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their presence was not there. And what I've learned is kids don't understand that you want to build a
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big business. That's not what they're asking for. They're asking for you. So you want to be able to
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delegate certain things at home and at the office to spend quality time with your wife and kids. At
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least that's what I've seen. And sometimes we just don't even realize that we delegated ourselves out
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of the relationships. It's crazy when you really think about it. It sounds like, and you talk about
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this in the book, but it sounds like that entrepreneurial lie that you mentioned in the book. Would you mind
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covering the entrepreneurial lies so people can really understand or wrap their heads around what
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that even is? Sure. Yeah. The entrepreneurial lie, which it's happened to so many people, including
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myself, is that you're building this business for your family and you're going to be absent for the
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next months, years, whatever, and they will understand and it'll, you'll be able to gain them
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back. That's a lie. That is a myth. That is sacred ground that you can't get back. And there has to be
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some grounding in that pursuit of growth, in that pursuit of ambition. Because if you don't,
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you're going to keep telling yourself that lie. Let me give you a real straight example. Teenagers
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get hooked on drugs and alcohol. They go to the best clinic in the country. It costs 80 grand to go to.
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Parents have to show up for one day. They're sitting in that room and it gets down to what's been
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missing. Why did they turn this? And usually it's lack of connection at home. That's been,
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it's so many times. And what the busy entrepreneur who's making a lot of money will say, well,
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I have to keep working this much because I was able to, how else would we be able to afford this
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rehab? So it goes back to the chicken or the egg. And when you really step back, you go, holy shit.
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I mean, I got to really look at this. So the entrepreneurial lie says they will understand
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someday. And from what I've seen, they usually will not both kids and your spouse.
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How do you reconcile this? Because here, here to play devil's advocate a little bit,
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there is an importance obviously on men bringing home income, right? Providing for the family
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financially. And so to be able to reconcile me having to go provide financially versus me being
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present and providing emotional and mental and love and all the guidance and support that we need to do
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on that end. How do we strike this balance? If there is even a balance, balance is a very tricky
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word because look, you and I have both started businesses, Ryan. It is hard work. It is not
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the glorified things that are usually in certain testimonials out there. It's a lot of hard work.
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It's a lot of setbacks, a lot of unknowns. So that's going to take some dedication. I mean,
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you are in the trenches. You're absolutely in the trenches. And that does require, you know,
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the old saying, a rocket uses 80% of its power in liftoff. First few minutes of liftoff to get it
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off the ground. That's kind of like starting a business. So I understand. I've been there with
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a few different businesses. But what I've found, which I wish I knew 17 years ago when I started
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my first one, what can help save us from losing what's most important to us is rhythms. And you
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and I talked about that a lot in Austin. We did. What I found is the power of rhythms,
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which I will explain can be like sanity pillars for you. They can, they can be an absolute grounding
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mechanism in those most important relationships. And once you identify them, they're not that hard
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to keep up with. And they can, there are 10 times, a hundred times multiplier for, for strengthening
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relationships while you're doing that crazy stuff at the office. So you're talking about being more
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efficient with less time. I know that's a really cold way of explaining it, but I am. Am I
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understanding that correctly? Yeah. Well, let me explain what rhythms are. So a mentor of mine
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who actually uses the family board meeting strategy, that's how we actually got to meet.
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We did some real estate deals together. And what I liked about him, Ryan, he's, he's extremely wealthy,
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which honestly doesn't impress me that much anymore because extreme wealth I've seen and I've seen
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misery right around it. But what I liked is he is extremely wealthy, runs five publicly traded
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companies. He has five children and he's home for dinner six nights a week. Wow. And he said,
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thank you for the board meeting strategy because now I understand the importance of one-on-one
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time. Let me talk to you about the power of rhythms. And I had said to him, Rick, how do you,
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how do you do this? How are you keeping this up? I'm not handling anywhere close to what you're
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handling. He said, you have to rhythmize your life around your core values. So let me give you an
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example, Ryan. You and I, I know from our, we both love our wives dearly, dearly. They're very
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important to us. So that is a core value for me, my loving marriage. What I've said as a rhythm,
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like I mentioned before, every Tuesday night is date night. That is date night. We are, our babysitter
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is here. We have date night. The phone is off for a few hours. We planned something fun. Last night,
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we walked the streets of St. Augustine, went to one of our favorite restaurants. We had a great time.
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And that is every week. I don't even have to think about it because I am a, what Colby scores would
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say, a quick start or, or very fire red. My organization skills aren't the best. And most
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entrepreneurs are like that. They're very creative, very driven. When, when you have rhythms so set
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like that, where I have date night, Tuesday night, Friday night, I have pizza Friday and game night
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with my boys. Sundays, we have family meeting quarterly. I have a family board meeting with each of my
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children. There's certain rhythms I've set in my life. And I like the word rhythm. Like I told you,
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like a habit habits. I mean, you and I can have a bad habit of yelling public, a bad habit of picking
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our nose, a bad habit, a bad drinking habit, whatever. Habit. I don't, it is kind of a forced
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word rhythm. I'm a music guy has a musical element. It's got some, some soul, some harmony. And when you
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set these rhythms around what matters most to you, what's most important to you, your core values,
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and you don't have to think about it. It's like, Oh, Tuesday night, date night, Friday night,
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pizza night, game night, Sunday, it becomes so ingrained and you don't miss. It doesn't all of a
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sudden that six weeks have gone by and been going, Holy shit. I haven't gone out. Yeah. Yeah. I haven't
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gone out my, with my wife in six weeks. So anyway, that's the power of rhythms. If you set them very
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clearly and you don't have to think about them and it's just almost automatic in your schedule. And,
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you know, usually there's daily ones, weekly ones, monthly ones, quarterly ones. Again,
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it sounds, Oh, that sounds like a lot. It's really not. And what I said to Rick was, okay,
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Rick, that's going to take away freedom. I like freedom. I like creativity. It's like
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this will not take away freedom. It will expand it. It'll give you more because it's around your
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deepest core values. And these things will continue to deepen you and strengthen you and bring more
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enjoyment and consistency, which is a really hard one for certain entrepreneurs like myself.
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I don't know if you follow Jocko Willink at all, but his phrase is discipline equals freedom. And I
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think this is exactly what you're talking about right here, creating these rhythms, which is the
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discipline of accomplishing the things that you've identified as being important so that you can free
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up your time and have the freedom to do other things that are meaningful to you as well.
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Exactly. Exactly. I agree. And I'm, I'm a big fan of Jocko. And the one I actually had on my
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bulletin board forever was if you want to be tougher, be tougher. It was such a straight one.
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And the same thing with the discipline one. Yeah. You just, what you have to do is just
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set your line, draw that line in the sand and say, I don't care if things are hectic at the office
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on Tuesday night, Thursday night, whatever it is that this is a non-negotiable meeting with my wife.
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Because when communication and connection stops and consistency, all sorts of problems can start to
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arise. And we don't want that. So you just pick your line and stay with it. And it feels so good,
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Ryan, after a few weeks, after a few months. And when you look back and when I feel most out of
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control, when the rhythms start to fade, Oh yeah, well we won't do game night tonight. Let's not have
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family meet. You feel out of control. You feel ungrounded so that once you've done them and then
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stop a little bit, you'll want to go back to them that I can promise you.
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I bet. Yeah. I bet you can feel that. It sounds like, and correct me if I'm wrong, that this
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finding these rhythms is really just a process of experimentation because I hear a lot of guys will
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say, Ryan, what's your, what's your perfect morning routine? Or what's the conversation you
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have with your wife on Monday night? Cause these are some of the rhythms that, that I implement in
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my life and the reality. And from my perspective, it's like, here, I can give you an example of what
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I use, but you have to find what works for you. Absolutely. 1000% Ryan. Ryan is Ryan. Jim is Jim.
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Whoever's listening is whoever is listening. It has to suit you. You don't have to do the exact
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thing, especially your morning routine might really irritate me and vice versa, you know,
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but, but what we're talking about is the outline of a morning routine. Let it suit you. I've started
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to actually go to the gym very first thing in the morning before I meditate. Uh, because I think I'm,
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I can become such a, a fast minded person and people would say, Oh, well that's not what you're
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supposed to do in this book or that book. I don't give a shit. That's, what's making me feel the
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best. So I, I think that's a very powerful point, Ryan. They have to scope it to themselves. And yeah,
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you might say, I tried that, that rhythm. It didn't really suit me, but this one did.
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And once they pick it and are true to themselves on it, I think they're going to see a lot of results
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and you don't have to set, Oh man, I got to set 15 rhythms into my life. Set one or two and see the
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results in a few weeks. See if your wife is talking to you a little more kindly feel if she
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feels like you're more available. See if your kids are, are bringing up stuff to you that they
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usually wouldn't have by spending some quality one-on-one time, which we can talk about for
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the board meeting strategy, but just like you said, experiment. And I think usually the results
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are really good. Why do we stop doing these things? Because I noticed even in my business,
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I'll pick a strategy or a rhythm or whatever it may be. I'll start implementing it. I'll see some
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immediate results. Maybe my, my kids connect with me a little bit better. Maybe we have some of those
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conversations that we've never had in the past. And then all of a sudden I look back and I'm like,
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Oh yeah, we haven't done that for six months or for a year. And that was actually working. And yet
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here I am stopping the very actions and the things that are helping me improve. You know, I think it
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goes back to what you said with Jocko. We try to outsmart discipline. We, we, we really do. We try to
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outsmart discipline and feel, Oh yeah, we don't need to do that anymore. Or this is working,
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but, but let me figure something out. And then when it's gone, we feel like a pillar has been
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pulled out of our life. So it really is. Again, most of us for the entrepreneurs out there,
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if you look at, again, I'm a big fan of Colby. I've done it with all of the people in my life,
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my family, I am quick start. So I'm naturally inclined to quick start different things. And
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especially in business, you can, something could be going really well, really well, just cranking out,
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cranking out. You're enjoying it. It's, it's getting great group turns, doing good results
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for lots of people. And you can say, no, let's change. And that's probably the worst thing you
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can do. Right. But we, we, a mentor of mine, Ryan used to say, look, certain things when it comes to
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business and your personal life should almost be, be boring with the scheduling of it. You know,
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if you want excitement, go jump out of an airplane. And it's not meaning that the, the rhythms at home
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are boring at work are, but if, if you start to just complicate things to complicate things or don't
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have the consistency, all those things that you were working for, the results you wanted by setting
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rhythms go away. You want a deeper, more meaningful relationship with your family, period. End of
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story. That's what almost every person I interview says in those words, you got to keep rhythms and
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you have to fight that urge to say, it's almost like an alcoholic who says, well, why did I quit
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drinking? You know, I shouldn't have quit drinking. I'm not, you know, let me, I can have a few beers and
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we know where that goes. Uh, it's, I think it's the same thing with rhythms that really suit us,
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really develop our relationship. We try to outsmart discipline. We try to outsmart results
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and push too hard, too big, too fast and say, oh, we don't need any more. We're good.
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And it's just a natural reaction. Yeah. This almost reminds me of Top Gun. Of course,
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most of the guys, every guy that's, that's listening to this podcast should know that movie,
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but it's like an ice man where he's just like so disciplined and so committed to it that you get
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bored and you make a mistake and that's where he capitalizes. And this is the level of
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discipline. I think you're talking about here to some degree, maybe, but let me ask you about
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time because I think based on what you're talking about, and let's just assume that a guy is listening
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to this and he says, okay, I understand that I need to implement some of these rhythms, not only my
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business, but my family particularly. And I think a lot of guys will look at it and say to themselves
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something along the lines of, you know, I've just got to put my, my time in, right? I've got to,
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I've got to put in the dues or whatever it may be. And we look at this as just time versus
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quality time. Can you make that distinction for me? Because this is something you talk about at
00:20:44.840
length. Yeah. So there is a huge difference between time and quality time, huge. I mean,
00:20:51.600
exponential. And what I've seen is there's a lot of people that spend passing time with their
00:20:57.460
families, but not actual quality time. Quality time takes a certain amount of depth, a certain
00:21:02.440
amount of preparation, a certain type of environment. And a lot of people will skip over that. And what I've,
00:21:10.220
what I found, Ryan, from sitting with, with different groups of families, sitting in support
00:21:14.860
groups of young kids who were, you know, heavy narcotics or alcohol, there is no substitute for
00:21:20.540
quality time. None, not money, not fancy private schools, no app, there's no substitute. So you have
00:21:27.840
to set the stage for connection and quality time does that. And it does not occur. True quality time
00:21:33.280
does not happen at the breakfast table. When everyone's running in six different directions,
00:21:38.520
someone's trying to text someone on this and no one's listening that, and you're running three
00:21:43.660
different ways out the door. That's not how it works. So I got really clear for my own family is we have
00:21:50.880
to spend time together and it has to be under certain environments and terms. And we have to spend one
00:21:56.980
on one time because if you separate the parts, you can strengthen the whole. That's super important
00:22:01.660
for any family to, to have, especially you as the man, you as the father, you should spend one-on-one
00:22:09.520
time with each member of your family. It is an absolute game changer for strengthening the unit as a
00:22:15.080
whole. So that now you're getting into the actual strategy component of the family board meeting. Why
00:22:21.380
don't, as we go down this, this whole, why don't we talk a little bit about what the board meeting even
00:22:26.840
is and the premise behind creating something like this for your family?
00:22:31.220
Sure. Now, did I give you a good enough difference between time and quality time though,
00:22:34.700
Ryan? I want to make sure I answered your question. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think as we continue
00:22:38.180
to talk about these parts, these three parts that you've identified, I think it's going to explain
00:22:42.500
it even further. Awesome. So the family board meeting strategy was born about seven years ago.
00:22:48.060
As you know, Ryan, but probably not all your crew knows. I fell in love with my wife instantly, 29th
00:22:55.280
birthday chance meeting. We were like peas and carrots right away. And when I fell in love with
00:23:01.060
her, I also had the chance to fall in love with two beautiful little boys. She was divorced with full
00:23:06.800
custody of both these little boys and we hit it off famously right away. And I've gone on since to
00:23:13.180
adopt them at their, at their request. Now we had, we had some trust issues though, in the beginning
00:23:18.860
and I wanted to get to know them. I was running big real estate business. We had come out of the
00:23:23.580
meltdown at this time and we're doing pretty well, but still had some stitches on the arms and I wanted
00:23:29.080
to make sure I connected with them. So with some advice of some of my mentors and that, I just,
00:23:33.680
I came up with this strategy that I thought, wait a minute, why can't I apply some of the principles
00:23:38.340
that work to home? Why can't I treat these boys with the same attention and respect that I do my
00:23:44.200
biggest clients, key team members and investors? So what I started to do and set up with them was
00:23:49.340
saying, look, I remember it was our first Christmas together. That was one of the presents. I said,
00:23:53.500
we're going to start having a board meeting every 90 days. And the board meeting strategy looks like
00:23:57.720
this, Ryan. I know that you know it and practice it now. Every 90 days, I will have a quote unquote
00:24:02.100
board meeting with each one of my kids. And it's a minimum of four hours uninterrupted. And there's
00:24:08.220
only three principles, three principles, one-on-one without electronics and a fun activity of their
00:24:15.240
choice with time for focus reflection at the end, which is just communication. And those three
00:24:21.360
principles together, just to give you how important this strategy is to me, my oldest son had trust
00:24:29.540
issues in the beginning and it was things that happened before I was around. When I came into his life,
00:24:35.580
he was close to failing the third grade and doing terrible in school. He had just been put on the
00:24:41.680
spectrum. I don't like that word, but for autism. And, and then he suffered every night from night
00:24:48.320
terrors. And if you don't know what those are, you're very lucky because it's when your child wakes
00:24:52.540
up in a half conscious state and it can take hours to get them back to sleep. Now, these are pretty
00:24:57.720
serious things. I knew that these could be changed. I knew the power of quality time as the fun uncle.
00:25:04.240
I was already teaching other entrepreneur families about this. And now it's my turn as a dad.
00:25:08.600
And the breakthroughs we had on each one of these board meetings every 90 days, Ryan, within one
00:25:13.800
year, he went from failing to getting the most improved student in the third grade at the end
00:25:19.320
of the year. And he was absolutely beaming when he got his award. He was taken off the spectrum
00:25:24.760
for autism. They admitted it was a mistake. I knew it wasn't autism. It was stress of things that
00:25:30.280
happened. Stress can do crazy things. They took him off the spectrum. And then third,
00:25:36.340
his night terrors were gone completely. Now I used to talk about that story for the first few years
00:25:41.480
on stage, Ryan, I cried like a baby in front of a thousand people because it meant so much to me.
00:25:46.380
And it shows the power of quality time. We did these results without therapy and without medication.
00:25:51.920
That's not what he needed. What he needed was true quality time that built trust and a deeper
00:25:56.620
relationship and an understanding. And that's exactly what happened. And they were fun. We were
00:26:02.160
speaking the language of kids. They were picking the fun activity of their choice. And each of the
00:26:06.320
each of those three principles builds off the other. And we had some people a lot smarter than me help
00:26:11.520
perfect this. And that's what it came down to was those three principles. And they build off each
00:26:16.640
other. If you want me to go into each one a little bit, I can, because they really are. Gosh,
00:26:21.180
the three of them together is just such a game changer for the relationship you have with your kids.
00:26:25.340
Yeah. I do want to break these down further. I want to start with one-on-one time. And the reason
00:26:29.180
I want to start with this one is because I know the guys listening are probably already seeing a
00:26:33.560
challenge with this. I have four kids. One-on-one is, is even more difficult just because we have so
00:26:39.880
many children and I have the business and I have this and I have that. And it becomes a challenge.
00:26:45.140
Is that a critical component? And do you see success in, for lack of a better term,
00:26:50.560
lumping these together with multiple children? No. One-on-one is non-negotiable. So like you,
00:26:57.460
Ryan, I'm an absolute lunatic. I have four kids now. So we're in the same boat. The power of one-on-one,
00:27:05.200
again, you've got to separate the parts to strengthen the whole. One-on-one time takes away
00:27:10.100
all sibling rivalry, all attention of maybe they lean on your wife a little more because you're not
00:27:15.580
around as much or your husband, whichever. And the one-on-one time is like putting the magnifying
00:27:21.900
glass on that relationship in a good way. Okay. You and I, let's say we're having an issue with
00:27:28.080
our wife and we're going to go to a couple's weekend to try to really work on our relationship.
00:27:33.560
We're not bringing the kids. We love our kids. It just, it's not appropriate. The same thing here.
00:27:38.840
When, when, when you start, when I started to interview entrepreneurs, when we were really fine
00:27:42.240
tuning this about six years ago, it was amazing to see how, how random it was that people actually
00:27:47.940
had one-on-one time with their kids. There was always a spouse. There was always a sibling.
00:27:51.720
There was always a best friend. And what I've found is a lot of the noise just goes away. And when
00:27:57.420
you're focused one-on-one quality time, deeper connection, this is probably the most simple,
00:28:04.340
but the most profound when people say, wow, I didn't realize the difference it would make because
00:28:08.700
no one wants to have the next Jam Brady, right? And Marsha, Marsha, Marsha. And, and that can kind
00:28:13.960
of happen even if you're not doing that. That's how, but when you, when you distribute equal quality
00:28:19.400
time one-on-one, I'm telling you that separating the parts of strength in the whole does wonders for
00:28:27.660
Men, we are knee deep in the conversation we're having in our exclusive brotherhood,
00:28:31.780
the iron council this month about being the protectors that we as men are called to be
00:28:36.460
each and every month. We identify a new topic that we as men want to address. We do a deep dive into
00:28:43.080
that topic. We complete assignments, participate in challenges, and otherwise do the work required to
00:28:49.320
excel in our lives. But we also focus on what we call our battle plan, which is a 90 day system
00:28:55.340
for planning out your life, tracking your progress, accomplishing big things with regards to your
00:29:01.220
health and your wealth, your relationships, your personal goals. So if you're looking for the tools to
00:29:06.380
help you up your game, or if you think you might just need a good kick in the pants from a band of
00:29:11.340
brothers who have your back, the iron council is where you need to be. You can learn more about
00:29:16.140
what we're up to and reserve your spot at the table at order of man.com. Now let's get back to
00:29:21.380
that conversation with Jim. Let's move on to the second component of this, which is no electronics.
00:29:27.500
And this is almost impossible. It seems like with this tapped in as we are to technology and
00:29:32.800
electronics, talk to me about this. I was real lucky years ago, and a person that helped me
00:29:37.880
perfect this strategy and simplify it was Dr. Ned Hollowell. He's the leading expert in ADD,
00:29:44.280
ADHD in the nation, was with Harvard Medical School for 15 years. I was at a private event with him,
00:29:49.280
saw him speak, he saw me speak. And he's the one who introduced me to screen sucking. And screen
00:29:57.160
sucking is just a basic way where we stay on electronics longer than we even desire to,
00:30:01.440
and we're not even sure why. And we don't even recognize how long we're on those things,
00:30:05.220
right? I know time gets away from me when I'm on Facebook. Exactly. Exactly. And me too. So what
00:30:12.260
he talked about was the important of, you know, you got to disconnect to reconnect. And again,
00:30:18.640
it's so rare now, Ryan, so rare that someone will be one-on-one for four hours, eight hours overnight
00:30:25.560
without their phone on. And let me tell you what happens. First of all, you and I are busy guys.
00:30:30.240
So if we tried to do this one-on-one, first of all, man, that is the starting point. That's going
00:30:34.860
to do some really good things. But if the whole time you're one-on-one, you're getting this text
00:30:39.380
that, you know, one of them pisses you off. Oh, let me listen to this email real quick. Let me take
00:30:43.740
this quick call. You think you're actually spending quality time with them, but you're not. You're
00:30:48.260
immediately saying this call is more important than you. This text is more important than you. This email
00:30:53.200
is more important than you. This post is more important than you. On my board meetings, my phone is on
00:30:58.180
airplane mode because I want to take a picture to commemorate the moment every 90 days. Now I've
00:31:02.340
been doing these for almost seven years. So my goal is every 90 days we're having this, this adventure
00:31:08.580
together, this, this deepening moment. And I'm taking a picture to commemorate. So the time they
00:31:12.960
leave when they're 19 years old, they're going to have this catalog of all of our pillars of moments
00:31:17.240
together. So that's my only, that's my only electronics. But what I found is if they're on their
00:31:23.420
phone texting and playing this game and there's really no connection, there's not, there's, there's a
00:31:30.540
complete separation. And what I found again is when the electronics go off, the noise goes away. Again,
00:31:37.780
we're trying to put the magnifying glass on the relationship in a positive way. And that's what taking
00:31:43.820
electronics out of the equation can be. And it sets an example, especially for, for the busy working men
00:31:49.620
out there, Ryan, that the relationship with your son or daughter is more important than that phone
00:31:55.740
call, that text, that email. And it might not come out verbally in that clear of a way, but believe me,
00:32:01.900
that message does penetrate, especially the more you start to do these consistently every 90 days.
00:32:07.760
I mean, there's also, I mean, obviously there's benefit to having a no electronics policy with your
00:32:13.860
children in this case, but I mean, the benefits to yourself are huge too. I know when I go to the
00:32:18.600
mountain, for example, and we don't even have service, so I don't even bother bringing a computer
00:32:22.100
or my cell phone or whatever it may be. I know that inability to connect digitally just recharges
00:32:28.240
me, rejuvenates me. And like you said, it allows me to reconnect with my family or nature or my
00:32:33.580
spirituality side. Such a cool experience. Yeah. And there, there is, you will see it. Anyone out there
00:32:39.940
that's going to do their first one, there will be an absolute feeling of pride that you turn that thing
00:32:46.560
off and your business didn't blow up. No one really needs to talk to you. There is an absolute
00:32:50.860
feeling of pride to say, I turned this sucker off and I gave my son his full attention that he was
00:32:57.320
due and it felt good as hell. Let's move to this third component because this, this is interesting
00:33:02.140
and this can be taken a couple of different ways. In fact, you distinguish the two because when you
00:33:05.920
talk about fun activity, that doesn't mean fun activity for you. It means fun activity for your
00:33:10.180
children. Talk to me about this. Yeah. So fun activity with focus reflection is basically the
00:33:14.860
shortest definition I could come up with Ryan for experiential education. Now you and I have
00:33:19.340
talked about education and about learning about how we got to upgrade better learning for our kids
00:33:23.840
and better education. So this is something I'm super passionate about. And one clear thing I've seen
00:33:28.300
education, experiential education, best on the planet gets the best results, but it's harder to put
00:33:34.040
together and take the time to do so. But we are now using the power of one of the most powerful forms of
00:33:41.060
of education on earth, experiential education to deepen the relationship with our kids.
00:33:46.040
And what experiential education is, is put your students in direct inspiring experiences and save
00:33:51.920
time at the end for focus reflections, which is just time to communicate and open up conversations
00:33:57.240
about deeper values and core levels of importance. So we are using experiential education in a fun way to
00:34:04.120
deepen the relationship with our kids. Now it is, as you said, a fun activity of their choice, not yours,
00:34:11.180
because sometimes with good intention or sometimes not with bravado, we say, this is what you're going
00:34:17.080
to do and we're going to bond. Sure. So let's say you and I, or you and your son, Ryan, he has a board
00:34:22.260
meeting come up and you love antique car shows and he's got no interest. So you drag them along to an
00:34:27.260
antique car show one-on-one, turn off the phones. And at the end of the day, say, isn't it great? We bonded
00:34:32.200
son. No, I mean, we want, we want to give them the ownership and you want to see something cool
00:34:37.700
about creativity, getting clear on what are they passionate about? What are they really interested
00:34:41.500
in? You let them create that day and you say, activity of your choice. You plan the day, man, they get
00:34:47.720
into it. We could do this. We could do, can we do that? Well, let me think. I want to do this. So that's how
00:34:54.240
it works. You let them, the ownership, the buy-in is letting them plan the day because we can guess
00:35:01.160
what they might want to do or guess, or not even just say, well, this is what we want to do. Come
00:35:05.880
and you'll like it or not. We don't want to do that. You let them pick it. And now we've got one-on-one
00:35:12.580
time. We have no phones on and we're plugging into the most powerful form of education on the planet
00:35:17.300
to strengthen the relationship with our kids and do it in a fun way. I mean, I can tell you personally,
00:35:21.980
I had a great experience with my oldest son using this, something that he decided would be
00:35:27.900
important or fun to him. He wants to be a quote unquote animal, a cowboy animal doctor.
00:35:33.540
So one day I had, I have got a friend who's a veterinarian here in town. And one day I called
00:35:38.280
him up. I said, Hey, can I bring my son in just to go through some procedures or whatever it is you
00:35:42.980
do? And he says, yeah, have him come in for a couple hours. So me and my son went in and we
00:35:47.300
watched a, watched a dog having some teeth extracted. We watched one of the most hilarious
00:35:52.600
things I've ever seen, which is trying to feed a cat, a pill. That was really interesting.
00:35:57.980
We went through some other things as well, but this experiential education is so, so important.
00:36:04.160
And my son just walked out of there with so much energy and enthusiasm and engagement and excitement
00:36:10.420
for life because we experienced that together in an environment that wasn't, Hey, let's study this
00:36:17.420
Exactly. You hit it spot on because what's important to your son might not be important
00:36:24.220
to one of your other sons, but people are, oh, parents are always saying, dads are always saying,
00:36:29.340
geez, I wish I knew what my kid was, you know, had interest in or passionate about so I could support
00:36:33.480
him better. When you let, you give them the space like this to plan the day, these come, these are
00:36:38.560
going to well up. It's going to become clear. They might be interested in certain sports, certain
00:36:42.560
things. I have an animal guru in our house too. So we, you know, we went to the dolphin rescue.
00:36:46.820
We've done all sorts of things like that, you know, and he has interest, maybe marine biology,
00:36:52.160
some sort of ocean thing. Again, our job as parents is, I think the best educator we can be,
00:36:58.020
find out what they're passionate about, dump gasoline on it and set it on fire, you know,
00:37:02.240
or as the Montessori approach says, follow the child. We're giving them that lead here.
00:37:07.940
Let me ask you this, Ryan, instead of you going to that vet and seeing the cat pill and the teeth
00:37:12.760
being taken out, you would just drop your son off and come and pick them up in a few hours.
00:37:17.280
Do you think the experience would have been in the same? Do you think he would have been able to
00:37:20.500
share the passion and excitement of what had just happened the last four hours? Or would he maybe
00:37:24.140
get in the car and go, yeah, it was pretty cool. Yeah. Talk for a few minutes and be done.
00:37:27.500
That's what would happen is I'd say, how, how'd the experience go? And just like you said, yeah,
00:37:30.900
it was cool. We did this and this, and I wouldn't have the same level of energy. And he would see that
00:37:34.840
and think that it wasn't important to me, something that was important to him. So I imagine it would
00:37:38.560
take a lot away from the experience. Exactly. Exactly. So it's, it is, it is that clear. If
00:37:44.440
you let them create the day and then go through the experience together and at the end, so again,
00:37:50.980
experiential education is direct inspiring experiences and then spending time at the end
00:37:54.680
with focused reflection, which just means communication at the end. The first question
00:37:59.140
of experiential education is what was your favorite part of the activity or the day? And why?
00:38:04.680
That seems because people are like focused reflection. Holy cow. Is he a psychologist?
00:38:09.620
Like far from not, not even close by that. Right. But people say that sounds, how am I
00:38:14.380
going to get them to open up? Start with that one question. Start with that one question and talk
00:38:18.440
about the day. See, see what's brought up. And I can give you some other tips of how to really make
00:38:24.120
this the most enjoyable and most effective as well. But that's the starting point to just start
00:38:29.260
talking at the end. What'd you like? How was that? And you, and they're able to ask you the same and
00:38:34.380
it's pretty amazing where the conversation can lead to. Yeah. I love it. Well, unfortunately,
00:38:38.980
we're going to have to skip the tips today because we are bumping up against time, but
00:38:42.960
no worries. No worries. If I could, if I could say one thing though, Ryan, absolutely board meetings
00:38:47.920
like these are not meant for times of lecture to tell your child how they can improve. Don't do it.
00:38:54.540
That's my own. That's my one tip real quick. Don't prepare 50 lectures to go on this. You will
00:38:58.760
absolutely kill the connection. So no lectures. You got problems. You want them to improve on that.
00:39:03.660
It's not supposed to come up on the board meeting. I just had to say that for the best result. Sorry
00:39:07.480
about that. No, no, it's great. I understand how important that can be just in my own experience.
00:39:11.660
And, and I've made the mistake of lecturing and it doesn't go well. And it's not the fault of the
00:39:16.560
board meeting. It's my fault for incorporating a lecture into something that is not supposed to be
00:39:20.800
an opportunity for you to get on your soapbox. Absolutely. Me too, brother. These tips are important
00:39:27.240
guys. Look, the book and the outline and the family board meeting is a very simple read. It's a very
00:39:32.120
simple process. It's not always easy because we're trying to change the trajectory of where we are,
00:39:37.500
but I promise I know personally in my life, these have impacted me. So Jim, I got to tell you,
00:39:42.560
I appreciate you sharing this stuff. I want to ask you a couple of questions as we wind down. The first
00:39:46.760
one is what does it mean to be a man? Oh, wow. That's an intense question for having to think about it
00:39:53.780
for 30 minutes. I think to be a man is, is to live my purpose without regards to fear. And I think
00:40:02.220
I have to, as a father, a man, I need to provide and protect. And again, going back to set that
00:40:10.080
example. And the best way I can set the example is to be true to myself and follow my purpose without
00:40:15.900
fear getting in the way. That's what a man means to me doing that, setting that example and being able
00:40:22.020
to provide and protect for my family and for my friends as well. Provide true friendship to
00:40:27.640
provide true support. That's what being a man means. Powerful. And I, and I agree with that.
00:40:33.480
And I define myself as that, as that as well. So powerful stuff. Jim, how do we connect with you?
00:40:38.220
Somebody's listening to this. They say, Hey, I got to, I got to implement this stuff with my family.
00:40:41.180
How do we connect? How do we learn more about the work that you're doing? Yeah. If you want to learn
00:40:45.000
more about what we're doing, you're welcome to get in touch with me at Jim at board meetings.com.
00:40:50.080
Uh, also if you go to www dot family board meetings.com, uh, we do parent child retreats
00:40:56.440
for entrepreneurs and their kids. Our next one's in Utah. Uh, and we're also starting to do some more,
00:41:01.160
uh, consulting and private work with different people that need it. So if you want to go to
00:41:05.840
family board meetings.com can find us there and also a private Facebook page that if you just reach
00:41:10.900
out to me, Jim Shields, I'll be able to get you into the group as well. Right on. We will link all of
00:41:15.740
that up. So the guys can check that out, Jim. I got to tell you, I appreciate you. My family,
00:41:19.420
although they don't know you appreciates you as well, because some of the things that you have
00:41:23.360
taught me I've implemented and it's made a major difference in our lives. So I appreciate you,
00:41:28.420
brother. I really do. No, I did. Oh, you've been a huge person for me standing up to fear. A couple
00:41:33.320
of things you said just really resonated. So thank you. There it is guys. My conversation with Jim
00:41:39.660
Shields to the dads listening in. I hope you got a ton of value from that one to the other men listening
00:41:44.360
in who may not be fathers quite yet. Start this stuff from the beginning. I wish that I would
00:41:51.220
have done so. And again, pick up a copy of Jim's book, the family board meeting. It's a quick read.
00:41:56.120
It's jam packed with tools and tips for connecting with your kids. You can head to order a man.com
00:42:02.060
slash one one eight as an episode 118 for the link to that book and everything else that we discussed
00:42:08.460
today. Also, I'll make mention of our exclusive brotherhood. Again, the iron council. I don't want to
00:42:13.200
beat a dead horse here, but I found that surrounding myself with the right people has paid huge dividends
00:42:18.480
in my life and you are going to find the right men inside the iron council. Go to order of man.com
00:42:24.240
slash iron council to learn more gentlemen. I will look forward to talking with you on Friday for our
00:42:29.500
Friday field notes, but until then take action and become the man you are meant to be. Thank you for
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listening to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man
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you were meant to be. We invite you to join the order at order of man.com.