Hi, my name is AJ Hogue, the author of Effortless English.
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EffortlessEnglishClub.com Today I was searching for a topic to talk about for the podcast.
And I looked on my shelf and I saw this calendar I have.
It's this daily calendar of quotes. And they're like spiritual quotes, quotes on spiritual topics by Sri Prabhupada Bhakti Devanta.
And the one for yesterday and then the one for today and a couple others I really liked.
So I thought, oh, this is good. Maybe I'll just go through these quotes and read the quotes and just discuss my thoughts on those quotes.
I'm not any kind of spiritual master or anything like that.
I'm just a regular person, but I thought, hey, this is good.
But still, it's good to feed our minds with positive and virtuous thoughts and ideas.
Because when you get on social media... is what?
It's mostly unvirtuous thoughts and ideas, deceptions, propaganda, or just the same repetitive stupidity.
For example, for a few months I got onto Instagram.
I have an Instagram account. I don't use it very much.
Don't post much, but... I was getting on Instagram because I found this one therapist, kind of doctor, chiropractor, therapist.
Works a lot with kids that have, you know, various issues, developmental issues.
And so... They do a lot of cool exercises and therapies and things.
So I started following this guy's Instagram because, oh, this is great.
I'll try some of this with my son. And I have, and actually it's been fantastic.
Fantastic. Really super helpful. His name is, I should give him, I should give you his name.
Josh, Dr. Josh Madsen, I believe is his name.
If I'm remembering right. Josh, J-O-S-H, Madsen, M-A-D-S-E-N, I think.
And then he's got a partner, Lauren Limming, I think is his name.
But anyway, I follow Dr. Josh Madsen on Instagram.
And because I followed him for a while, Instagram, you know, their program, it's called the algorithm, the program.
It saw I was interested in that guy. And so it started showing me lots of posts from other people who do different kinds of therapy, you know, speech therapy, physical therapy, etc.
Exercise therapy for kids and or for adults too.
So for maybe a month, I don't know, maybe two months, something less than two months, I was getting a lot of cool suggestions that were relevant, right?
There were things I wanted to learn about that were interesting, and I was finding, oh, I found some cool stuff.
I found this group called Functional Patterns.
They're more into, like, exercise. They work with adults.
But they have worked with kids too, but they're all about, you know, what they call functional exercise or functional fitness, functional strength. actually got one of their courses and I've been doing some of their workouts a little bit.
And my low back has been kind of aching and in pain for many years now.
I don't know if it was jujitsu was making it worse.
Sometimes jujitsu definitely did make it worse because I feel worse after doing jujitsu.
But it may just have been other things too, like sitting too much. bad posture or other things.
I don't know. But since I started doing this functional patterns workout, I don't even do them very consistently.
But just doing them, you know, once, twice a week, and sometimes skipping weeks, my back pain's gone.
When I wake up, I don't have any lower back pain at all.
Zero. And I just do this one... Set of exercises, they call it the RG bar, the regen bar.
Regen means like regeneration, means to grow something again.
Kind of has a similar idea of healing, the regen bar.
So use this bar with these elastic bands.
Or you can use them with cables and weights.
Either one. I use the bands because they're super cheap.
And anyway, I've been doing that and man, low back pain gone.
It's amazing. It's cool. So shout out to those guys.
And I'm not even very... I have not been consistent or serious about it.
And yet, it's the only thing I've done differently and it has completely taken away my lower back pain.
And if I do find my lower back getting a little achy sometimes, I go do that workout again and then... in a day or two, usually the next day, back is feeling good again.
So, the point being, I was getting these cool suggestions on Instagram, and I'm like, oh, well, you know, this is what, this is like, you know, the positive potential of the internet and social media, supposedly, right?
That's what you want. That's kind of what they promise.
But here's the reality. After I did get a bunch of those interesting ones that were useful to me, Like, suddenly, they just kind of, they started showing me that kind of stuff less and less and less.
Maybe I wasn't clicking enough. I don't know.
Because, you know, after a while, of course, I started just seeing the similar things again and again.
And a lot of people on Instagram, on social media, copy other people.
So I started realizing, oh, well... You know, there's these few people I like, and then there's a ton of people who are copying them and making similar posts.
So I'll see like a post from one of these guys, let's say Functional Patterns, or Dr. Josh Madsen, and then, you know, a day later I see almost the exact post from some other person, some other person.
So it starts becoming repetitive. It's still a topic I was interested in, but, you know, the feed starts just filling up with copycats, right?
Because most people are. And they'll do this with any topic.
It's not just therapy or exercise. So I started getting tired of that.
So I would click on their little thing that said, not interested.
I just wanted to follow a couple of the people.
I figured out who I liked and who I thought was really doing interesting things.
And the posts were still useful and gave me ideas to do with my son or with myself.
And then the others, I just said, not interested, not interested.
Well, after doing that, now my feed is just full of nonsense and garbage.
Garbage. Absolute garbage. Just gradually, it just reverts to garbage.
And so it's just a bunch of, you know, so-called influencers doing fake posts.
You know, they set up these, it's obviously they're rehearsed, meaning they're planned.
They plan their posts. Just make some video that's supposed to be funny or shocking or something.
It's all mindless garbage. So more and more I'd get on there, on Instagram, hoping, oh, maybe I'll get a cool idea, something to try.
Instead, I'm just scrolling through garbage, garbage, garbage.
Some of it meant to, a lot of it meant to shock you, right?
Make you upset. Or just, you know, supposed to be funny, but just stupid. tons of just garbage and nonsense.
Finally, I was like, you know what? Enough.
I can learn what I want directly from the people I like.
I just go to their websites. That's, you know, I got the functional patterns course.
Why do I need to be on Instagram? I can just have their course.
I learn all I want from their courses. They have other courses.
And the same with Dr. Josh. You know, I just...
We actually joined one of their programs.
They have some online courses. I joined those courses, took the courses.
So I didn't need their Instagram. I realized I was repeating a lot of stuff from their course.
And I don't want to be exposed to all that negative garbage.
Same thing with X. I got an X because supposedly Elon Musk was bringing back... freedom of speech, and okay, maybe it's a little more free now than it used to be.
I mean, it's better than when the other guy was running it.
But, again, you know, I would try to follow, first of all, you know, there was a bunch of political stuff.
You know, all the political stuff is the same, which is meant to get you upset and outraged and ahhh! you know, or scare you or whatever.
So I just kept saying, you know, trying to block and mute, block and mute every political person, including Donald Trump, anything from the government, anything from the main media.
But man, it doesn't matter how much I block, they always show me somebody else with the same kind of stuff.
I cannot get rid of that junk from my Twitter.
Because I was hoping that in the Twitter, you know, when they do the, there's the two feeds, Twitter X, you can just look at the feed that just shows only the people you're following.
And, you know, I would do that. And that was fine.
But sometimes I would want to go to the other one with suggestions because I was hoping that they, to find some interesting people.
Like, especially, I'm quite interested, again, in this area of therapy and health and things like that.
And I did find some interesting people, but again...
It's just garbage and negativity, garbage and negativity.
And it starts to overwhelm anything that's positive on social media.
There's like 80% of garbage and negativity and deception and propaganda and all that.
And then maybe 20%, maybe, I don't know, maybe 10% or 5% actually that's positive and useful.
So I'd find that every time I'd get on social media, you know, hoping to look up something about health, fitness or something like that.
Instead, I'd be getting shown this stuff and it started getting me kind of agitated and put me into kind of like a bad mood.
And I was also thinking, oh, you try to use social media, you know, for the business.
And I, and that's when I finally just like, I'm sick of it.
I'm sick, sick, sick of this garbage. So now if I'm on the internet, I just try to, if there's someone I like, like a writer or a blog, I just go directly to their website only and read what they have written or if they have a video, watch whatever video they made.
And I avoid social media. I don't want to have random stuff being popped up and shown to me because these algorithms, these plans, these programs are designed to feed us propaganda, make us angry, and or scared, and or just distracted, and make us, you know, stupid, fill us with a bunch of mindless, stupid stuff.
So this is why, in this age, it's number one, it's important to just Get rid of social media is my advice.
When you're an adult, you'll do what you want, but I'll tell you, your life will improve.
In fact, I just saw some study somewhere, somebody wrote about, you know, a study.
I don't know if I trust studies. But anyway, it's something you can just test yourself and find the same result.
Take a two-week break from the internet and you'll feel happier and more relaxed.
Less stressed. For sure. It's been my, you know, it doesn't even take two weeks.
You can take a three-day break and, I mean, maybe you've done this on vacation or like maybe your phone breaks or something and you're just kind of forced to be off the internet and suddenly, oh, you find that after a few days you're just more relaxed and happy.
So that's one side of it is to, you know, just cut out at least social media.
I'm not saying the entire internet because you can find some very useful things.
I mean, effortless English is on the internet.
It's online. There's lots of stuff. There's people I read that are on the internet, but it's the social media, Facebook, Instagram, X, whatever.
They've got people, whole teams of people trying to figure out how to feed you lies, deception, and propaganda.
It doesn't matter who you follow, they're going to start trying to show you other stuff too.
And of course, they're also recording and gathering information on you and what you do.
So, That's step one. Try to weed out the negative, all those negative thoughts, beliefs, information.
Negative meaning lies, negative meaning things designed to make you angry, upset, fearful, powerless, distracted, sinful.
And then step two, the other side of it, is what we're going to do today, which is to every day, every day, every day, consciously, by choice, look for and find and feed yourself positive information, truth, beauty, and goodness, sources of truth, beauty, and goodness.
But this doesn't have to be media. Nature is a source of beauty and goodness.
So just getting out in nature can do a whole lot.
And leave your phone behind. Leave your phone behind at home and then just get out in a park, on a trail, by the ocean, wherever you live.
Nature. That will feed your spirit, will feed your soul for sure.
Goodness and positivity. And then the other thing is you can, of course, read things which are true and beautiful and good, which inspire you to positive thoughts, higher thoughts, good thoughts, virtuous thoughts.
And you can do this with reading or through video or podcast, audios, whatever it is.
But just try to fill up your mind with good and positive thoughts. thoughts, information.
That's why I bought this little calendar from Prabhupada, or from Prabhupada's quotes.
Just because each day, and sometimes, you know, I don't know, I think these come from, most of these come from letters he wrote to people, because he wrote tons of letters to people. when he was alive, until they'll take a little piece from a letter he wrote.
And sometimes, like, I don't know, the people who made this calendar, I'm like, well, why did you choose that?
It's... But other times, there's some really nice things in there.
But they're always good and positive. So the first one.
He's writing a letter to somebody. So see, people, his students, his... the people who were his students all around the world would write him asking him questions.
And he would write back to them with his answers.
And so it's great because we have this record of his writings on all kinds of really everyday topics a lot of times, which is this one.
So someone wrote him, I don't know exactly what they wrote, but it's clear from his answer that someone wrote him and I think they were maybe saying, I'm struggling, I'm having trouble because I'm trying to be a good follower, to pray every day, to chant, to perform my religious duties and but that I'm busy with children.
And many times my children, they demand a lot of attention and time, and sometimes I struggle to do, maybe to chant as much or to pray as much as I would like to.
So Prabhupada wrote him back and said, your child or your children are more important than these duties.
If you cannot spend time with your child, then stop doing these things.
He says, these children are given to us by Krishna, by God.
We must be very careful to protect them.
Do not think of them as ordinary children.
They are children of God and we are very fortunate to be given them and to take care of them.
That is a very great responsibility. Do not neglect it or be confused.
So this is really nice. This is wonderful.
Because, you know, it's especially with maybe like a religious topic or duties, you know, we could make a lot of people, you know, they focus on You know, they want to be good.
It doesn't matter if it's religion or, you know, I don't know, doing non-profit work or giving, you know, focusing on charities or, you know, it's kind of very, many times people will do these things but then neglect their own children, their own families that are right there And they're home.
You know, it's like someone who gives lots of money to homeless people and they're so focused on the homeless problem.
Or, oh my God, they're so focused on climate change.
Or, oh my God, they're so focused on some, the people suffering from some war in a faraway country.
And they talk about it and post about it and, you know, try to appear to be, you know, such a, oh, I'm such a caring, compassionate person. good person because I care about all these things.
But then with their own children and their own family, they treat badly.
They ignore them. They don't give them enough time.
They're not patient with them. They don't give their own families, the people right there around them, a lot of love and compassion.
So I love Prabhupada's answer because he's saying, of course, you can do both.
You don't have to completely stop doing, for example, praying.
You can still pray, but maybe if you, you know, some of his students were super serious.
Maybe they're trying to pray two, three, four hours a day.
And, okay, you know, if you have to, maybe, you know, maybe you miss a day or maybe, you know, 10 minutes is all you've got.
Or you do it in the evening when your kids go to bed.
So I love that he says this, that, you know, how you should think of your children.
And this is another, like a bigger point.
Which is that we should think of our children as these are children of God.
They're given to us as a sacred duty. And there's nothing higher than that.
They are completely dependent on you and your spouse, your wife or husband.
And the influence you have over your children is the greatest influence you will ever have with any human being.
There's no one else, no other human being in the world that you can influence more than your own children.
There's no other person in the world you can help more than your own children.
There's no greater or higher duty in life than that of a parent.
And it is indeed, this is exactly how I try to think of my children, that instead of thinking of children as ours, these are my kids, and to focus on only material things, Things like discipline with your kids.
I want my kids to be disciplined. I want them to be well behaved.
Or performance. I want my kids to have good grades and to make good money and have great jobs when they grow up.
These are not the most important things.
These are not your most important duties as a parent.
And indeed, these kids are not ours in the sense we don't possess them.
Yes, they're ours, but they're ours, they're given to us.
You know, they're our sacred duties. I think that's a great way to think of your children.
That your children are these beautiful souls given to you by God and it is your sacred duty Your sacred duty.
Sacred means holy or spiritual or religious.
Duty is something you must do. It's your sacred duty to raise them in the most loving and wise way possible.
It's your sacred responsibility And it's a joyous and happy duty.
Not all duties are... Nowadays, people don't like this word.
You don't see this word used very often.
Duty. People hate the idea that they have to do something.
They're required to do something. They think, I just do whatever I want.
So a lot of people think that all duties are negative.
But they're not. Because children are also a sacred blessing that will give you probably the greatest meaning and purpose of your life.
Other than God, there's nothing higher. Certainly nothing material.
No company, no job, no career, no outside mission can ever bring you the same level of meaning and purpose as your own children.
So many parents, so I'm talking about the United States now, because it's not as true some other places, I think.
But in the United States, in America, so, so, so many parents have, I think unknowingly, I don't think they consciously think about it, I think it's subconscious, kind of below their thinking.
They don't even realize it sometimes, but they have a very materialistic idea of parenthood, of being a parent and what they should do as parents and what their duties are as a parent.
And I'm talking now about people who actually do love and care about their children and and want to be good parents, okay?
Of course, there are bad parents out there who neglect their children and... or even worse, you know, harm their children, abuse their children.
I'm not talking about them. That's obviously, you know, bad and evil and demonic, and that's not what I'm talking about.
So I'm talking about people who want to be good parents, but they have a very... unsacred, unspiritual, not spiritual view of parenthood and what it is.
And these parents, and I see them all around me here, they're obsessed with the material.
And they are obsessed with things and performance.
And this is their focus as parents. This comes out many ways.
Number one, there's a huge emphasis on discipline.
Discipline, discipline, discipline. And you can read a lot of parenting books in English where they focus so much on discipline.
And before I had kids, you know, I was reading a lot of parenting books.
And, you know, for a while I was convinced by these.
You know, discipline is super important.
They have disciplined kids, you know, basically obedient kids.
So you have these clear, strict rules, and they follow them, and they listen to you, and they don't... Very orderly and all that.
It sounds good, and they'll give not good reasons for it.
They'll say, oh, children really crave that kind of structure and all that.
And of course, some of this is required, of course.
Yes, chaos is not great for kids, especially small kids.
So they do like some routine and predictability.
It makes them feel safe, of course. But it's the focus on discipline as like the most important thing.
And I've seen this in my own family, my extended family, I mean, with relatives where they had that parenting approach.
And so, like, they tolerate no disobedience at all.
And worse, they see disobedience from their child, and the child doesn't do what they tell them to do, they see that as defiance, they see that as the kid being bad, being rebellious.
And on the outside, sometimes, they may look like a perfect family.
You see them in a restaurant. All the kids are sitting perfectly still and they're very polite and all that.
That's all good things. But then, you look a little deeper and what's missing is love and connection.
There's a great... Writer called Gabor Maté.
I'm maybe mispronouncing his name. Gabor Maté.
I believe he's Brazilian. I may be wrong about that.
Definitely South America. South American.
I think Brazilian. Gabor Maté. He writes a lot about trauma.
About people who experience trauma. Meaning terrible, painful things that happen to them in life.
And especially... that happened to them in their childhood or when they're young.
And he teaches about how to heal from that.
Very good guy. He's doing very good work.
And he talks about and writes about, you know, this obsession with discipline, discipline, discipline.
And his point is, which I agree with, and now that I am actually a father and have kids, is that connection is way more important than discipline.
He's 100% right. Connection, in other words, the connection, the love.
What does he mean by connection? It means the love and the trust and the affection, the closeness and the honesty between parents and their children, children and their parents.
That is number one. That's what you really should be focusing on.
And these are spiritual values. And this is, you know, comes back to what Prabhupada is saying.
This is a spiritual mindset that your children are your sacred duties given to you by God and that creating that and teaching them that and giving them that tremendous love and trust and kindness and patience and acceptance is number one.
He also makes the point, and this is what I've found now, I've found that Because I just, you know, I realize most of my kids came and they're so sweet and beautiful.
And maybe a blessing too from my son because he had so many health problems.
I was in the hospital. You know, I just have such, I worried like crazy about him.
But I just felt such compassion for him.
And I know he had already been through so much and suffered so much.
You know, just all the hospitals and the surgeries.
I just found myself, I didn't care about the discipline anymore.
Like it became, I won't say zero, because we have a little, but I realized all these ideas I had after reading those books, I just threw them out.
I'm like, forget that. Love, trust. I'm just going to be loving and give him as, and give my daughter too, as much closeness and love and affection.
And when they're babies, you know, I just focused on being with them every moment I could and giving them lots and lots of time, you know, holding them.
I would carry them. I wouldn't use a stroller until they became too big and I couldn't carry them anymore.
I carried them. I had those baby carriers, right?
And I would carry both of them. I had a baby carrier on the front where I'd carry one.
Usually my son, because he was smaller. And then I had a baby carrier backpack usually my daughter would go in, sometimes they would trade, and I would carry them both, one baby on the front and one on the back, and I'd go for long walks, and I'd take them to, I'd go shopping with them, I just took them everywhere.
And I tried, I waited as long as possible until we got a stroller, because I didn't, because the stroller, they don't get that close connection, right, where you're holding them and they're touching you.
So even though I had twins and it was hard, you know, I just chose, I decided to think of it, well, this is a good workout for me.
The heavier and bigger they get, it's a better workout.
And I'm so glad I did it. And then eventually I had to start doing the stroller.
But I still will pick them up. If they ask me, you know, to hold them or to carry them, I still do it.
You know, I'll give them a piggyback ride.
You know, I hold them on my back, hold them on my shoulders. hold them on the front, whatever, as long as I can.
Now, you know, they're getting heavy, so now, eventually my arm, I can't take it anymore.
But I'll do it as long as I can possibly physically do it, and as long as they like it and want it.
Because it's about that love and connection and affection.
And, you know, one of the things I believe is Gabor Mate teaches, and others too, that I can't remember names now, I've read so many, like I said, I read so many parenting books, but I agree with Gabor Mate and others that if your love and connection and your relationship with your children is close and full of love and trust, and connection and safety.
Discipline is not that difficult. Because they want to please you, I promise you.
And if you have that, if they feel loved, and they feel that strong love and connection and trust, you have a great relationship with them.
It's not so hard. We just say, hey, you know, when they do things that we don't want them to do, which they will, which they do many times, frequently, just say, hey, don't do that, you know, and give them a reason.
And you know what? They don't argue. They don't say anything back to us.
You know, sometimes they'll have tantrums, right, when they scream and cry and they're upset because they don't get what they want.
But Some parents view that as some kind of attack on the parents or they're going against their discipline and they have these negative ideas.
Look, it's just they're overwhelmed emotionally and they just can't handle it.
That's all. So never view your child, I don't know, rule-breaking or so-called bad behavior, never view that as some kind of attack on you Or, oh, they're not disciplined because they didn't do it.
From a group called the Sunrise Program, another great group, they teach this concept called red light, green light.
And it has helped me tremendously as a parent.
Especially a parent with young kids. But, you know, truthfully, this is also true for adults.
And what they teach is this. They teach the same thing, that the relationship is most important, not discipline.
It's better, instead of trying to discipline your child, it's better to focus on communicating to them how much you love them and care about them.
Do that first, and then you can focus on discipline later.
And so they have a concept called red light, green light.
What does it mean? So they talk about how your child is either in a red light state mindset, emotionally, or in a green light emotional state.
State just means how they're feeling, right?
So if they're in a red light, it means they're being overwhelmed by some kind of negative emotion.
Maybe they're angry, maybe they're frustrated, maybe they're tired.
They might just be hungry, they might be sleepy, upset about something, who knows?
Sometimes it's obvious and you know why, and sometimes you have no idea, but it's clear that they're, you know, they're overwhelmed emotionally.
In that moment, in any moment when they're in that red light state, Do not discipline.
Don't try to teach them anything. Don't try to teach them about what's good behavior and what's bad behavior.
Don't punish them. Because in that state, when they're overwhelmed with emotion, they're not capable.
They just cannot control themselves in that moment.
And they can't learn anything in that moment.
So what they need is just your love and understanding and compassion and affection.
So that might look like, you know, if they're just throwing a tantrum or they're just being, you know, really angry.
You know, if you can, like sometimes I'll go up to one of my kids and I'll try to give him a hug and I'll just say, I love you, I love you, I know you're upset, I love you.
And, you know, sometimes that works like magic.
It's amazing. I'll do that and I'll just keep kind of giving them like a gentle hug.
I love you. I love you. Kind of just whispering it in their ear.
It's okay. I love you. And like they'll calm down so fast.
And then I can talk to them and we'll get to that because that's green light.
Of course, life's not always perfect and sometimes if that doesn't work, they push me away. right they don't want physical contact they don't want any physical affection and so you can still be compassionate and loving it's just that okay then maybe you just have to give them some space and you just say okay you're upset now I see that and you just let them do what they're going to do now if they're doing something destructive or dangerous they're trying to hit you or somebody else they're trying to destroy something okay then maybe you have to go over there and physically stop them but not hit them and not grab them roughly or anything like that you just do the minimum whatever you need to do so that they don't hurt anyone including themselves and they don't destroy anything and then you just wait it out you just and man sometimes this takes a long time some kids and my kids can certainly do this sometimes they can have a tantrum like that and it can go for 30 minutes it can go for an hour Luckily, it's gotten shorter now as they've gotten older.
But that's red light. And so forget trying to do any teaching or discipline when they're like that.
And you know what? It's the same as adults.
If you have like an adult in front of you who's yelling and screaming and crazy with anger, are you going to be able to have like a rational... reasonable discussion with them about what's going on?
Not usually. It's probably not going to work until they calm down.
And that brings us to the green light. The green light is when a person is in kind of a normal state, an emotional state.
You know, they're calm. They're not upset about anything.
They can hear, you know, they can just chat with you and have a normal conversation.
They can... and listen and understand what you're saying.
Those are the moments where you teach discipline.
Although discipline, I don't like the word discipline.
You just teach them about virtue and how we act and about social, how to act better socially.
So once your child is calm again, they're feeling loved, however long that takes, everything's calm.
In fact, maybe even just the next day. You don't even have to do it right away.
You can sit down with them and say, okay, look, sometimes I have to say no, and when I say no, screaming and yelling, it doesn't help, you know.
Or you talk about, you know, we don't hit each other, okay?
So I'm not going to let you hit me. I'm not going to let you hit your brother, okay?
Okay? But you talk to them and discuss these things when they're in that green light state.
So your first thing is just, okay, got to wait out the red light.
Sometimes you just got to wait. And you just try your teaching.
I prefer the word coaching, not discipline.
You're not trying to discipline them like they're in the army.
They're not soldiers. They're kids. You're teaching them.
You're coaching them, not disciplining them.
It's no big deal. That's how they learn.
So you coach them, but you wait to do your coaching when they're in the green light state only.
And you know, you might have to wait a long time.
One of the benefits you'll find of having this mindset that your children are a sacred duty that love and connection and the relationship is number one, not discipline.
You don't even need discipline. You're just coaching.
You're teaching. You're not disciplining them.
You're not creating soldiers. You're raising human beings.
One of the benefits of this and the challenge is it's going to challenge you.
And if you're serious about this and this belief... and this mindset and this approach, unless you're a perfect human being or just a super wonderfully disciplined, patient, loving, virtuous person yourself, you're going to find yourself being challenged and you will find that your weaknesses and your vices will be exposed by your kids.
My kids have exposed my impatience. They have exposed, they have shown me how easily I get frustrated.
So I'm telling you this ideal of, you know, red light, green light, and just let them, you know, don't try to discipline and just be calm while they're in the red light.
Okay, but the reality is, after a kid's screaming for 20 minutes... you, I know me, like, it starts to break me, like, I just can't take it after a while, I'm just like, ah, and then I start my, finding myself getting into a red light, I start getting frustrated, like, ah, enough, enough, please stop, you know, or they're trying to hit me in the face, because they're upset, it's, uh,
Certainly in the past, especially in the past, I'm better now.
But, you know, it would be hard. I'd be like, I'd start getting angry.
They pick up a toy and smack me in the face with it when they're two years old.
I know they don't really understand. They're not trying to really hurt me.
They're just in that red light, overwhelmed state.
But, you know, I would find my anger coming up.
I'd find myself getting into red lights.
And then I'd start yelling, enough, enough, enough.
Stop doing that! Do not hit me! You know?
And then afterwards I always felt terrible because I realized this isn't about my child.
They were just overwhelmed. They're not trying to hurt me.
This is me. My weakness is being exposed.
And then I find myself as part of this sacred duty realizing I've got to become a better person.
Whether it's by prayer, meditation, discipline, all these things, you start working on yourself, trying to be more patient, trying to be more understanding, having a more spiritual mindset, even in those difficult times as a parent.
And in this way, when you have the mindset that your children are your sacred duty, you will be led, you will be taught to become a better person.
So while you're doing your best to raise them to be good people and virtuous people, loving people, they'll teach you to be more virtuous and more loving and more caring.
And that's the beauty of it, when you have that mindset.
You know, I see that the people who have the discipline mindset or the other mindset I see that's super common here, usually people do both here, the so-called good parents, is they focus so much on the material performance.
They are obsessed with their children's grades in school, their test scores, where they're going to go to college, and what job they're going to end up with, and of course how much money they're going to be making.
Obviously This is important at a certain level because, yeah, you don't want your kids to starve to death.
You don't want them to become homeless. You don't want them to be in a miserable job they hate.
All those things. Absolutely. But it's not number one.
And see, what happens is, I see, is that these parents, they're so focused and obsessed with this that, again, they damage their relationship with their child.
They become unloving. They become kind of harsh and criticizing and always putting pressure on their kids and creating tons of stress for their kids about grades and studying and discipline and later money.
And little by little, little by little, year by year, that relationship, that love and that trust and that closeness with their child gets less and less.
And then, so common here, I can't tell you how many parents I meet who complain here about how when their child gets into high school age, teenage years, that suddenly the relationship is bad.
The child no longer trusts their parent, no longer respects them, There's no closeness, they don't communicate, you know.
They ask their kid, what'd you do in school today?
Nothing. The kids give little short, or the teens give short, one word answers.
It's tragic. I mean, what did the kids learn?
They learned that, you know, family is an unhappy, stressful place.
And then guess what? Then they kind of hesitate.
Maybe they don't want to have kids themselves because they think that that's what it's supposed to be like.
And it's not. This is what happens when you put the material first and ignore them spiritual.
Because in the end, you know what? If your kid doesn't end up being rich, who cares?
It's more important that they're good and virtuous and happy and loving and that they learn that first of all from their relationship with you.
You're their first relationship in life during the most influential and important years from baby until they are adults.
You can always learn to make money. And you know what?
A whole lot of people, a lot of people have gotten quite rich who never did well in school.
Robert Kiyosaki, the rich dad, poor dad guy, he wrote a whole book about that.
About how the students who get C's, you know, just those kind of average students that don't do that great.
They don't do terribly, but they don't do great.
They're not straight A's, you know. So many of those guys become entrepreneurs, start their own businesses, and make money, and they have... They become rich, even, doing things that maybe aren't sexy or cool.
Maybe they're not starting a tech startup, but they might have a landscaping business where they make really good money.
Or any other kind of business, where maybe they do real estate, or... countless ways people can make money.
It's okay. Teach your kids about money and all that.
Read the rich dad, poor dad books with them.
But don't make it the focus of your family and certainly not your focus as a parent.
I think just always keeping this highest mindset.
And you can ask yourself every day. I do.
Every night. Every night after the kids go to bed, you know, I review my day and I ask myself this question, how did I perform my sacred duty?
Did I perform my sacred duty to my children?
And when I didn't, when I did things that I look back and I feel bad about, it's like a shot, like a punch in the gut.
Like, ah, I lost my patience with my daughter today and I yelled at her.
And I always feel bad about it because it never helps anything.
It doesn't do anything. It's just me. It's my lack of emotional control.
It's my own weakness. Wrath is one of the seven deadly sins.
And because I have been doing this now for years, every night asking myself and reviewing my day and how did I do? as a father, but with the mindset of sacred duty.
So measuring myself by spiritual standard.
Not material. I don't ask, were the kids disciplined today?
I ask, you know, how did I do? And the focus is on that love, connection, trust, affection.
Because of this, I have gotten better. I'm better.
And even though I make mistakes. Good Lord, do I make mistakes.
And I struggle. Like I said, I'm easily frustrated.
I'm kind of got into the habit of, you know, easily kind of just, you know, I'll cuss and say bad words.
I do all that kind of stuff. I'm not perfect at all.
But because I have this focus and because it's something I focus on every day, because I have this standard and I review this every night, I am better and in general, I have a really close and loving connection with my children and they're very affectionate.
Like I said, they still, they love for me to pick them up and hold them and my daughter will just, you know, we'll have great conversations.
She's only six, but sometimes I'll take her to the store with me, just her and I, and she will just talk the whole time, you know, And I know this is important because I know that as they get older and eventually reach those teenage years, there can be big challenges, right?
They're going to eventually grow up. They'll start to have their own ideas.
They'll start to have ideas that are different than mine.
We'll have disagreements, all these things that happen in life.
And it'll be too late if I try to work on myself then.
It'll be too late if the relationship's already... you know, damaged, if I've already lost trust, if there's not that strong love and affection.
So I view this too as not only, of course there's right now, I love, love and adore them, but I also look around at parents, so many parents who have such terrible relationships with their kids who are even 13, 14 years old or certainly older.
And I constantly ask myself, How to prevent that.
How to make sure that we're just as close when they're 17, 16, 15, 14 as we are now.
And that means making relationship number one.
It means making love and trust. Also honesty.
I don't lie to my kids. I don't always tell them all the ugly truth of life. yet, they're not ready, but I don't lie to them.
So, this all comes from the main belief, the main mindset that Sri Prabhupada wrote about in this letter, which is viewing my children as a blessing from God and as my parenting as a sacred duty.
And then indeed, whatever I do as a parent is a way of serving God, is a way of showing my gratitude.
And when you have that kind of big master... than all these other things, focusing on love and connection first, and lots of other things will follow.
But that's the most important, is what Sri Prabhupada was teaching this person he wrote a letter to.
So I encourage you, if you're a parent, if you want to become a parent, Or even as a grandparent.
Maybe you're already, you know, you're already a parent.
Your kids have grown up. And, you know, hopefully you're happy with how everything worked out and you have a good relationship.
But whatever, even if you made a lot of mistakes, guess what?
You can still, you may get a second chance as a grandparent to have this same mindset.
And you know what? It's never too late. Even if you are grown and you're grown old and your kids are grown and adults, if there's some bad feelings there from the past, from their childhood, then you know what?
It's still not too late. You can still try to heal and repair that relationship with your child or children.
And you can still adopt and still have, change your mindset to this mindset.
You know, it might even involve apologizing to them.
I apologize to my kids, and they're six, because if I lose my temper and I yell at them, and then later I'm like, ah, that's just me being frustrated, I'll go back to them, and I'll say, I'm sorry I yelled at you.
I'm very sorry. I was wrong. Please forgive me.
They're six, so I'll say, Daddy was very grumpy, and I'm sorry.
And they're always giving me a hug and they're fine.
In fact, it means something to them. You might think, oh, they're too little to understand.
No, they do. They can understand a lot of details, but when I go and tell them I was wrong and I'm sorry that I acted like that, it helps.
It helps. you know, and it's good for them to see that, oh, see, it's not just, because they know, as kids, you know, they lose control of their emotions, and they probably, maybe they feel bad afterwards, they don't understand, so I think it helps them to see that, oh, adults do this too, and, but you can still, you apologize if you, if you're wrong, and it's,
And you can try to make the other person feel better.
Of course, it's better if you don't do it.
It's better if you don't do it at all. But if you make mistakes with your kids, whatever they might be, maybe you pressured them too much about grades and things.
Maybe, I don't know, whatever. You lost your temper.
Don't have too much pride. You can apologize to your children.
You can apologize even if they're three years old.
I'm so sorry, you know, daddy was... Daddy was grumpy.
Daddy was wrong. I'm sorry I yelled. I'm very sorry.
Please forgive me. And then, you know, try to give him a hug and a kiss.
And you can do that with your, you know, 30-year-old child, too.
If they're grown up, you can say, you know, you should.
You should. And you can see the beauty of this, the spiritual beauty of this.
I certainly see it. The more I try to help my children be this kind of father, the better I become.
So good luck to you in this. If you had a bad childhood, let's say, you know, this is a message to young people who maybe say, I don't want kids.
Why do people say that? I mean, what leads a person to say, oh, I don't want kids?
It can be propaganda and a lot of programming and stuff, but a lot of times it's just because they look back on their childhood and their family life And it just wasn't particularly loving or great.
They're like, I don't think I want that.
Maybe there's a lot of arguing. Like I used to say, I don't want kids.
I don't want kids. And some of it was just selfishness.
Some of it was understanding I was not ready to be a dad.
Some of it was I wanted to go see the world and travel and do things because I was very restless.
And some of it was looking back and my parents eventually divorced when I was Not until I was in university, but before that, they would just argue.
I just remember arguing, arguing. I used to just think that was normal, that, oh, parents argue.
And I would sometimes see my grandparents arguing when we would visit them.
Like, it was just normal, you know, yelling and arguing all the time about just all kinds of stuff.
I thought, oh, that's just normal. But I didn't like it.
I hated it. I still hate it. So I think, you know, maybe unconsciously I also thought of that and how unhappy that made me as a kid and I just, I didn't want that.
So I messaged to you if you're young and maybe you didn't have a great experience in your family or maybe your parents were fine but maybe it just wasn't really loving.
Maybe you felt a lot of pressure. Maybe they were all constantly pressuring you and stressing you about grades and test scores and things, or who knows, maybe they argued all the time like my parents did.
But it doesn't have to be that way. You can be a different parent.
And you can use any bad experiences you had as a negative role model, meaning, ah, this was bad and painful, so I'm going to avoid it.
I'll never do that. So for example, my wife and I almost never argue one of the things I love about my wife and about our relationship too is this we don't yell and scream at each other you know there have been a few high stress moments where we have argued and but they're very rare very unusual afterwards we're always oh so sorry and then but So my kids, you know, they're in a home where there's not yelling and screaming all the time.
In fact, almost never, especially for them to see it or hear it.
Very rare. So it can be different. When you have this mindset, you know, family and marriage and children can be beautiful and wonderful and give you the most happiness and a tremendous sense of purpose and meaning and love and goodness in your life.
Especially when you view it as a spiritual process, a spiritual gift, a spiritual duty.
So lots of love to you. Hope you enjoyed today's topic.
And I guess a final mention, check out Gabor Mate.
You can probably find him on YouTube. I know people, he's been on some podcasts.
And he's got a nice book called, what is it called?
Keep a Hold of Your Children, I think it's called.
Keep a Hold of Your Children. Keep a Hold of Your Children. by Gabor Mate, M-A-T-E.
And my own website. Join my Power English course.
Get my VIP program. Go to EffortlessEnglishClub.com EffortlessEnglishClub.com Lots of love to you.
I will see you next time. Bye for now.
