Welcome to this episode of, I don't know Jack about parenting, where today I'm going to talk about even if you don't know Jack, I have a solution on how you can figure it out. Check it out on this episode of, I don't know Jack.

Hey, welcome back to. I don't know Jack about parenting where today I'm going to actually talk about that fear of listening. I don't really know what I'm doing in this thing we call parenting and I have the perfect solution for you and I'm going to tell you that anybody could use this solution who is listening to this podcast. If you're catching it on youtube, if you, wherever you're listening to this, you have access to this beautiful little tool. It's called Google. Uh, I often kid, I, I don't talk about this much on the podcast, but by profession I am a life coach. I help people figure out what it is they want to accomplish, like what's their life purpose. And then we talk about setting goals and reverse engineering that. And oftentimes when I do that and people start moving in a direction, they, they start saying, well, coach, how do I do this? Or what is that?

There's a lot of facebook groups 

And I often, whatever their question is, if I don't know the immediate answer, I Google it. I find an article that somebody else who already has that expertise has written or I find a resource online through google that will help provide an answer to get them moving in that direction. If I don't already know the answer myself or have a resource myself. And in this world of parenting, there are a lot of great forums. There's a lot of facebook groups out there. As a matter of fact, I'm in a number of dads groups and it always amazes me that people who come into these groups are looking for advice. They're looking for people who are going through the same exact thing that they're going through, but they will ask advice to perfect strangers who just happened to be going through a same similar scenario but don't necessarily have the expertise. 

Right? Hey, what do I do about x, Y, Z, and I often see medical questions being brought up in these forums and I think to myself, you have a pediatrician. You have access to other hotlines where there are professionals who could answer these questions, but oftentimes these people feel comfortable enough to ask a perfect stranger in a Facebook group how to care for their child in a medical situation. Which blows my mind. Now in that aspect, when it comes to the medical thing, I would say that Google will scare the bejesus out of you, but in everyday things. The example I'm going to use is currently, right now I have a 16 month old little boy and a seven year old and every time he hits a new month milestone or a new birthday, you know, it seems like every month is a birthday. 

He starting to be able to listen

It's like, oh, he's 16 months today. Oh, he's 17 months today until there too. Those are kind of the milestones, but I can google what developmental skills should I be looking for or honing into what, what, what can I be teaching my 16 month old that he can grasp at this point and I read the article and they're like, he may start being a little resilient or a little, a little booger, for lack of a better term, a, and he's getting a little bit, a little bit of independence. He starting to be able to listen and do what we asked him to do. I gave him a wrapper this morning that my seven year old left in his playroom and I said, can you put this in the garbage? He grabs it. He looks at it. He waddles over the garbage. He puts it in the garbage, but I also want to give him something to do. They also said that if he's not doing it already or she's not doing it already, they're really going to start to be able to pronunciate a lot of words.

So when I read that, I made sure I started doing the repeat after me, which is one of the chapters in my book. Repeat after me a really made a conscious effort to say, Hey, can you say hi? Hi. Can you say ball ball? Can you say? And then I'll say something crazy like hamburger, and he just looks at me and he's like, and I've noticed he could shake his head no, but I said, do you like when it's time to eat? And I started shaking my head like this to see if he could get those muscles. And it was kind of a no, he's trying. Nobody taught him that yet. But he learned this really quick. Right? Uh, so what I'm trying to say is we have the world at our fingertips. We used to have two in my day and I'm sure some of you as listeners, uh, you know, who are maybe older, like myself.

I just want to acknowledge you

I used to have to go to a library and when did you have to go to the library? When the library was open and you had to go out of your way to do so you had to borrow a book or you had to go to a bookstore and purchased a book. But right now we have the world at our fingertips. So if you're listening to this, I just want to acknowledge you because you found this probably through Google or obviously the Internet. You went to Itunes, you went to Podbean, you went to spotify, you went to Angkor. Wherever you went, you went through that contraption. Typically a phone these days or an ipad or maybe a desktop or a laptop and you, you're looking for a resource. So I encourage you before you go to mom, dad, sister, cousin, whatever, there are a lot of people who have been through it and done it right.

They've done it well enough to think that, hey, maybe I have something to offer here. I know that's the case for me. My Boys, and I know every parent may think this, but my boys are absolutely phenomenal kids. Oh, it's so exciting to watch them grow up, go through their stages, but it's also amazing to be able to pour into them in a, in a positive, uplifting way. And I wasn't always that guy. I became this guy for my kids because I want it to be a better dad. I wanted to be a better and in order to be a good dad or a great dad, I had to become a better person myself. I can't just compartmentalize, like be an awesome dad. I mean, I also have to be, uh, an awesome boss to myself. I need to be an awesome husband. Uh, and, and do I fall short of that many times? Absolutely.

If you have questions

I did it by getting what I thought was some good advice from some people. Got some training. I became a coach myself. I learned to help people, but before I did all that, before I can help others, I needed to be able to help myself. So I encourage you to figure out how to help yourself. Moms, dads, whomever is listening to this in a really good way to start is to google it. Google it. If you have questions, ask Google. Although yesterday I'll admit I was looking for an answer to something and Google had no answer for me. It was a little odd and maybe I'll talk about that in the next podcast, but Google is an absolutely phenomenal resource. So then you then, you know, obviously I looked up the 16 month old, how can I empower impact? What are the developmental skills of a 16 year old, a 16 month old?

And I said, well listen, I, I don't always do this, but I'm googling this for him. I can't forget about my seven year old. And I said, what are some great activities to do with seven year olds? And I googled and one article came up and it says 101 things to do with seven year olds and I, and I look at the sheet and as I'm going through it as a proud dad, probably did 90 of them already, not this year because it's January at the time of this recording, but I've done almost every single one of them. Um, but it doesn't mean I can't do it again. And again. And again, this isn't a one off. These are one off things. These are things that we continually do, but exciting to know that I'm on the right track based on what other people think are some really good things to put together 101 things you can do with your seven year old.

That's the stage I'm in

That means that they really put some thought into that and if and if they put thought into it, conscious thought enough to write it down and I've done them, it makes me feel like I'm on the right track. So just google it. If you have a 16 year old right down his fallen off the wagon and given you a hard time, Google it. If you have an infant right now and you're having any question, google it and don't just go for the medical questions. Like I said, 16 months. Where's this defendant? Developmental skills? Google it. What words are easiest for kids to say to practice first? Google it. That's the stage I'm in right now. Seven year old's favorite sports, most popular sports. My son's a little athlete. Google it. And lastly, you know, I encourage you to google those things, but it just popped in my brain for some reason, a water. One of the favorite things my son enjoyed doing. We put them in a chess club.

Know what?

Where should he be in a chess club? Google it because we're thinking about putting me in chess club again because it was something he really excelled that it's fantastic for the brain.

So

I don't know Jack about parenting. And I know I don't know Jack about parenting. So what do I do as one of my number one resources? I Google it. If you don't want to Google it or you do want to Google it, let me tell you one last thing. Go Grab my book. It's free and it's here in the outro.