In this episode of Valuetainment, host Patrick Bedevi interviews his own father. Patrick talks about his relationship with his father, how he grew up in Iran, and how he dealt with growing up in a military family.
00:04:40.000There is no way in the world I am who I am today without my mom.
00:04:43.880Because my mom instilled the ability to read people.
00:04:49.280You know, I watch body language with how my mom was constantly with her worries and concerns and how my dad was and how the relationships were.
00:05:30.660That was the whole idea about, hey, my mom and my dad.
00:05:33.080Because my mom was more influential on us leaving Iran.
00:05:36.940If it wasn't up to my mom, we would probably be in Iran longer.
00:05:40.460My mom's like, we got to get out of here because he's going to serve.
00:05:42.700So his purpose was to get us out where, and then what I'm going to do with my life, where my purpose, what my kids is, they have access to more resources.
00:05:52.820So it's about what they do with those resources and those contacts.
00:05:56.220They have a bigger upside than their daddy.
00:05:58.740You know, they have a bigger start than their daddy.
00:06:00.660But the friendship side, the relationship side, the leadership side, the expectation side, a lot of that's going to be similar.
00:06:07.160Since you have a daughter, I know you got two boys and you got a daughter, do you treat all your kids the same?
00:06:25.040But she's got a different connection with me.
00:06:27.360You know, when her and I go to, when I put her down and she wants to get close and, you know, I'm hugging her and, you know, we're spending that quality time together.
00:06:36.920It's a complete different feeling than my boys.
00:06:38.480So my daughter, I treat her in a completely different way, but I will tell you this.
00:06:54.180I don't know what's going to happen with her, but she's either going to be an attorney or she's going to get what she wants because she's got a very, very, very strong personality at a young age.
00:07:04.180But it's a complete different relationship I have with her than the boys.
00:07:06.980If there's one thing you do talk about, I don't know what it was, in one of the interviews you said something about reading people.
00:07:12.320You spent a lot of time talking about reading people.
00:07:14.640Do you think that's something that can be taught?
00:07:17.040I think anybody can learn how to be better in something.
00:07:21.120But there are certain things, no matter how much time you put into getting better at it, somebody else can get great at it.
00:07:27.420You know, I can learn how to hit a baseball and get pretty good at it.
00:07:31.540But I am never going to be able to get as good at hitting a baseball than like Ted Williams because he's had the 20-20 vision and, you know, the way he would see things and everything would slow down.
00:07:41.220You can't do nothing about that, right?
00:07:43.080There are certain things I can do to get as good as somebody else's but never great.
00:07:47.540Reading people, a part of it has got to be the life you've lived because the more friction of a life you've lived where there's more controversy, more heated issues, more things you saw, more fights, you know, more challenges right in front of your eyes as a kid coming up.
00:08:03.240But all of that is memory that's being stored here and it stays, right?
00:08:08.080And when it stays here, later on in your life, when you see somebody that's behaving in a certain way, you say, oh, this reminds me of 28 years ago when that took place in very similar habits and it's very similar attitude and language.
00:08:20.600If that's the case, the next move he should make should be this.
00:08:23.380Oh, my God, that's exactly what he did.
00:10:36.320You know, I got 18 years with these guys that they're going to be with me.
00:10:38.880After 18 years, they're going to live on for their life.
00:10:41.140It is selfish of me to want to have them around me 24-7 and not teach them the habits that my dad taught me to be a good citizen, right?
00:10:49.860What is a good habit to learn to be a good citizen?
00:10:52.800A good habit to learn to be a good citizen is to be independent, is to lead, is to respect, is to improve, is to love, is to have courage, wisdom, tolerance, understanding.
00:11:01.580And I get bullied and not bully people.
00:12:02.380I think they're going to go back and think about how their daddy was when they were younger to reflect on those memories and those habits and hopefully apply those things into their lives one day.
00:12:30.100I just liked it a lot and I enjoyed it.
00:12:33.220If I could do it every day, it was that hunt, that excitement of somebody new, you know, the 18-year-old kid when a girl says there's no way in the world and you wanted to see if you can figure out a way to get her to like you or be interested in you.
00:12:48.260You know, what's the strategy you need to use to go about it?
00:12:50.660I was in that part, that phase for a good six, seven years.
00:13:16.640It may work one out of ten and then you get better.
00:13:18.780It's two out of ten and three out of ten, but it's never going to be ten out of ten.
00:13:22.000The idea is to make your strategies better.
00:13:25.160And as long as you're making your strategies better, whether it's with, you know, women, partying, business, money, finance, it doesn't matter.
00:13:32.180Everything's about improving your strategies.
00:13:34.800So that's the philosophy that I applied in every aspect of my life.
00:13:39.420We got a lot of single people on Viettainment.
00:13:41.120Is there any strategies you want to share with the rest of us that work for you?