Best of RAR: How a “Best Moments” List Can Help You Love Your Homeschool featuring Jon Acuff

I just think we've gotten dreaming backwards forever.

So like Stephen Covey wrote begin with the end in mind and people have interpreted that into

until I know the end, I can't begin. And we say to people, what's your big Harry Artacious goal?

Where do you see yourself in 20 years and you go, what? And for me, I've written, you know,

a bunch of books, self-help, motivational, business books. That question paralyzes me. The idea

that I have to guess the next 20 years, I didn't see what I'm doing right now 10 years ago.

Yeah, I couldn't have majored in this in college because it didn't exist.

Hello, hello, welcome to the Read-A-Loud Revival podcast. This is the show that helps you

make meaningful and lasting connections with your kids through books. I'm your host,

Sarah McKenzie. I'm the author of the Read-A-Loud family and teaching from rest and a collection of

picture books. And today I want to share an oldie but a goodie. This one was recorded a while back

with John Acuff. And in this episode, he helps us set some hopes for our homeschool year,

like how to achieve what we really hope for our homeschool, which is a really good thing to revisit

at this time of year in particular. He's got us creating a best moments list. This is the listener

favorite. I hope you enjoy the episode. I'll see you after the show.

Which activity would be easier for you? Describe the best life you could achieve over the next 20

years or describe the best things that have happened to you over the last 20 years. I already know

your answer to that question. And so does today's guest. And listen, the implications for how this

simple question can impact how much you love your homeschool are big. So let's get into it.

This summer, I read all it takes is a goal. The three-step plan to ditch regret and tap into your

massive potential by John Acuff. I loved it. There was one thing in particular that I read in this

book and thought, oh my goodness, this is so relevant to us at Read-A-Loud Revival. I wonder if I

could get John Acuff the author to come talk on the show with us about it. And it turns out I could.

He's here today. John is the New York Times best-selling author of seven books. He's an Inc.

magazine top 100 leadership speaker. He's also a husband and a father of two teenage girls whom

he just wrote a book with. We're going to talk about it. How teens win is a book about goals

by John and his daughters Ellie and McCray. So awesome. John, welcome to the Read-A-Loud Revival.

That was a great intro. I felt good about that entire intro. There's not a lot of pressure.

Not a lot of pressure in that intro. Not a lot of pressure at all. New York Times best-selling

author top leadership speaker. Well, he started, again, we joked about this off-camera. When the

intro is like, he won a poetry contest in the seventh grade. He shoots lasers right out of his

eyes. Ladies and gentlemen, you're like, oh my gosh. I got to throw a hot. I better be amazing.

I have a head of a B. So I'm thrilled to be here. Thank you for having me. I'm so glad you're here.

I want to paint a picture. John, I haven't told you this yet. But I was in Texas this last summer

speaking at a homeschooling conference near Austin. I had a book signing event like two hours north

and as I was driving, I was listening to your audiobook. All it takes is the goal. And first,

I just have to tell you, I listened to a lot of audiobooks and you can rock an audiobook. I feel

like. Oh, thank you. Usually authors just read it exactly how it is in the book. But I felt like

I was getting extra. So I loved it. Your conversational sidebars hearing your voice. Yeah, we tried to

put bonus stories in and the problem with me in audiobooks is I don't have the greatest weapon

which is a British accent. If I had a British accent, I would sell a hundred. You hear somebody

with a British accent, you add 80 IQ points. So they could read a grocery list. You're like,

is you hear the way said avocado? I don't have that. So I have to add lots of bonus content, lots of

sidebars, lots of and I wanted to be a conversation and I wanted to be fun. And so yeah, I really try

to make those almost like a performance versus here's just an audio version. It's funny that

you say that because I always tell moms that these conferences, the same thing like when I'm really

frustrated with my kids, I just switch into a British accent because you can say all kinds of things

to where your kids and they just think it's funny, even if you're insulting them. Yeah, that's great.

I'm sure this is not working in England. I don't know. Well, that's the thing. No one in England

hears an American accent and goes, oh my gosh, let's lean in. It only works one direction.

Now Australians get it too. South Africans get it too. I don't, again, I've never been

abroad and somebody go, save that word again in that amazing American accent. So we don't have

that that weapon at our disposal, but I think we make up for it. Totally true. Oh my gosh. Okay,

let's start with the quiz at the top of the show that I mentioned. And this comes right out of your

book, chapter one, you ask which activity is easier for you? Describe the best life you could achieve

over the next 20 years or describe the best things that have happened to you over the last 20

years. Talk to me about this. Why is this so hard for us to imagine what we want? I just think we've

gotten dreaming backwards forever. Like we've misinterpreted brilliant ideas. So like Stephen

Covey wrote begin with the end in mind and people have interpreted that into until I know the end,

I can't begin. I have to have and we say to people, what's your big Harry audacious goal?

Where do you see yourself in 20 years? And you go, what? And for me, I've written, you know,

a bunch of books, self-help motivational business books. That question paralyzes me. The idea that I

have to guess the next 20 years, I didn't see what I'm doing right now 10 years ago. I couldn't

have majored in this in college because it didn't exist social media. So we put this pressure on

ourselves to say, okay, where do you see yourself in 20 years? And I think it's nearly impossible.

And in my experience, it creates what I would call a vision wall between people and their goal.

So it's like this huge wall, you have to scale and you think it has to be perfect and it triggers

all these. Well, I have to have it just right. It stirs up perfectionism. And so I just

felt in my own life, I'm stuck. I don't know how to do that activity. What if instead I looked back?

And nobody looks that direction. We say things like, don't look back, you're not going that way.

And we lose all this knowledge, all this real textured of things that have lit us up. And so I

said, I wonder, and I was sitting in the airport. I was in Augusta, Georgia. I remember where I was.

There's a small little airport. And I said, if I just thought through the best moments I've had

and looked for clues as to what might be good in the future too. And so I just gave myself this

really open, easy assignment. And I just started to make a list. And that's what started in

the freedom for that. I taught it to hundreds of people before I put it in the book.

People, I would say, try 30 and people would end up doing 300. And it would just open up this

really rich conversation with yourself, with your past, and eventually with your future too. So

that's how it started. Well, so when you ask, like, what are some of the best moments? And I love

how you give some examples to see if I can pull up a few of them fast enough. Let's see. Okay,

so you have a couple examples that you gave were, you know, big ones, like my wedding day, the

birth of my two kids, when I paid off my student loans. And then there were little ones like

petting my neighbor's dog scout when I'm cooling down after a run. Yeah. Or the time my friend and I

ate a nine pound lobster on Martha's Vineyard, it was just like carry on suitcase and had to be open

with the circular saw. Yeah, it was amazing. I would have that photo on my driver's license if the

DMV weren't such jerks. Like, that was, it was one of, it was amazing. I still, like, and we rented

mopeds that day too and drove them around the like, it was all good. Yeah. So the key there is,

I wanted to, I told people fire the bouncer, like, it all counts. We get really wrapped up in what

counsel, what doesn't count, especially if you're a high performer. And if you're listening to

this podcast, congratulations, you're a high performer, because low performers don't voluntarily

listen to podcasts about being better parents. I tell people all the time, if you're even asking

the questions about how to be a better parent, you're already a better parent than you think.

Because the average parent isn't asking those questions. So I really wanted to give people the

permission to include everything, the big things, but also the small things, like seeing my youngest

daughter's headlights come back into the driveway, and we're sitting on the back porch, means she's

home safe. And it's this really small thing, but it's a, it's a meaningful thing to me. So I wanted

to have a chance for people to have really tiny things too, and not just go, well, I've never

hit the New York Times list. So that does it. I can't put, you know, I can't put writing a book on,

I saw an example that's at a bookstore. It's funny. Imagine a book signing. I was doing a book signing,

and a guy came up to me and the manager was helping me. And he said, I wrote a book too. And he

goes, but it's just self-published. And the bookstore manager stocked him and said, sir,

you're a real author. Like, don't say just self-published. You wrote a real book,

and he, his countenance changed. And so that was her opening up, like, no, no, no, that counts,

that counts. And so I wanted people to have the joy and the permission to write as many things

down as small as they were as insignificant as weird. If there's something you do that other

people think is weird, but it really lights you up, you're unique to that. Let's celebrate that.

Let's pay attention to that. I love this because what I noticed when I did this myself, because I

did it right away that night, I opened a note tap on my phone and was like, all right, let me just

start jotting down some of my best moments. And it actually over the next several days, I just

noticed myself noticing them. Like, the things that I think would have just skipped on by.

Yeah, it's wild. It turns on your eyes and your heart. So it's, I say, like, it's a short cut

to self-awareness. You get all these immediate benefits where it increases your gratitude, like,

crazy. Everybody says, be grateful, but there's not an activity. And you're like, I'll just yell

at myself until I'm grateful. And you go, no, this actually makes me grateful. But you're right,

you start noticing them in your past. And then what happens is you can't help but notice them in

your present. And then you can't help but go, I want more of that. Like, there's this progression

where you see it in the moment. And I say in the book, like, my definition of being present is

being nostalgic about a moment you're still in. And so like this morning, I didn't have to reflect

a week later. This morning, I took my daughter to coffee. She's going to college in two weeks. And

we went on a walk around our little town. And our friend's daughter just opened up a boutique.

She's 20 and just opened a boutique called the Statement Society. And it was open. It was like

9 a.m. And we're the only people in there. And they were, it was their grand opening. We were

able to shop and support them. And my friend was there too. And I knew that moment was best in the

moment. I didn't need to wait a month to reflect and go, oh, that was a good moment. And that

amplifies the way I describe it is. It's like putting on, you know, when you see videos and people

put on color glasses and they could finally see colors for the first time. They've got color blind.

Yeah. And they all cry because they go, wait, trees are green. Like what? I didn't. Or when a baby

hears with cochlear implants for the first time as mother's voice. And like, if you don't cry when

you watch those videos, you are dead inside. So like, it just turns on your ability to really

appreciate it. And so for me, it just had so many practical instant benefits. Yeah. It's true.

Okay. So one of the things that I feel like happens all the time for homeschooling moms,

specifically, we'll ask these questions like, okay, what do I want for my homeschooling year?

What do I want my kids' education to look like? We're doing the same thing you talked about where

it's like, we're looking forward. You probably know this statistic. But there's some,

it's not a statistic, but this fact, I guess it's something like

ourselves more than a year in advance is like a different person. We, like, we're envisioning

a different person than we are. Yeah. So it's like, well, you can't really set a goal like a 10-year

goal because you're like, that's a fictional person. Well, it's also a fictional world. Nobody

would have included COVID in their prediction. Like if God help us if we still think we could

control everything. Like we just got a multi-year reminder. Like no one, and I remember the joke I

sometimes share with people is in late January of 2020, I opened up for Dolly Parton at the

Rhyme in Auditorium. Like it was the dream of all dreams. And she was amazing. She was every

bit of person that you wanted to be. And I drove home and I was like, this is only January.

The rest of the year is going to be amazing. And it was like the narrator was like it was not

to be amazing. Everyone on my speaking events got canceled. That's 80% of my business. Yeah.

Yeah. I wouldn't have five years ago. I didn't go. I could see year five, like a global pandemic.

I better pencil that in. So I think you should have long range vision. Definitely, definitely.

Sure. I'm not against that. I just want you to hold it fairly loosely.

This is perfect because it's the idea of like orienting yourself in the right direction.

Like if I'm on the West Coast and I want to go to the East Coast, I know I at least need to be

facing this way. I mean, not know all the roads, turns, stop signs, highways, I'm going to take.

Yeah. I love that. I've heard an author. I can't remember who it was. That's okay. But there

was like she was talking about how you don't really need to know all of what you're going to write.

You just need to you just need to write as far as your headlights because you could get from the

West Coast to the East Coast just on your headlights. Oh yeah. But you have to be going in the right

direction. So that long term vision is helpful. But for homeschooling moms, I think one of the things

that happens is we do one of two things. Either we go like, I don't know what I want my homeschool

year to look like. I'm just trying to survive. I'm trying to keep everybody fed and healthy and

to stalker practice on time. And I think we're supposed to do math. Like there's all these things

or we paint this picture that's completely impossible. And this happens maybe more often

than we'd care to admit where you know, we're scrolling Instagram and you see like the mom

who is doing like great amazing field trips, taking road schooling or something, taking her kids

all over the country and someone else who's reading these classics and another one who's growing

homestead. Like everyone has chickens, right? Yeah. And they're always cutting cucumbers into

shapes you've never heard of. Like I made octagon cucumbers today for my kids because they ate them.

And they ate them. They were so excited for cucumber day. And you're like, no, they weren't.

Why are you lying? Exactly. So then we are like, oh, I am never going to be able to fulfill this

kind of homeschool or whatever. As you were talking about the best moments list in your book,

I was like, this is what we should do. Just think like even just go back one year. You could go

back five though if you wanted because in here, you're saying, you know, best moments in the last

20 years. What are some of your best moments? I know for me, that's actually pretty easy. I can name

certain field trips. I thought we're fun, certain books that we read aloud, like a blanket fourth

that we did spelling under one day, things like that that are like kind of easy. Like when I get

going, when I start, like you said, you're thinking, okay, just do 10. Okay, can I do 20? Okay,

you could actually probably do 200. Like they actually start rolling in the second chapter. You

actually outline several questions that we can ask like prompts to help you think of your best

moments. I would love if we could walk through a few of these because I think they would be really

helpful to our listeners, watchers. Yeah, totally. Which prompt do you want to like give me a prompt

we'll break it down. Okay. Let's start with every time I see blank. I smile. Yeah. So that one's

fun because it's really open ended. It can be a person, a place, a thing. And so an example,

what's funny, the person I mentioned in the book is this guy, Rob Sintel. Every time I see him,

I smile and laugh and he's just so full of joy. And we all have friends like that in our life.

And I saw him this morning. It's his daughter who opened up the Statement Society. So I was able to

go, oh man, Charlie, Charlie always makes me feel encouraged. And I, you know, all of a sudden,

you write down your 10 cheerleaders. And then I said, you know, every time I crest the hill

on in Mon Eagle. So I live in outside of Nashville in town called Franklin. And when you drive

from Atlanta back to Nashville, you battle your way through Atlanta, which hates you. Atlanta

hates you so much. And then you battle your way through Chattanooga and the highway there's

terrible. And then you get to this ridge called Mon Eagle. And when you're on the other side,

it flattens out and it's home free to Nashville. So every time I just see the sign from Mon Eagle,

I'm like, okay, I did it. And so and it can be an item. It can be your favorite pair of walking

shoes because you know those those things represent progress and just seeing them makes you go.

Or it can be a necklace your husband gave you on your 10th anniversary. And it lights you up

that you're like, we did that. And again, that's one of those things that that turns on your eyes

because you'll start to see them and start to go, man, every time I see this song pop up on my

playlist, it you know, it's one of my favorite worship songs that it fires me up or every time I see

this Bible verse. So that one's real, I wanted to start with one that was really easy and gave you

lots of avenues. And again, reinforced it all counts, it all counts, it all counts. Well, also,

it's making you so one of the things I noticed about this is it's not like no one says every time

I see the mom cutting cucumbers into perfect shapes. I smile. But we are like we're actually looking

at our real life. Like so what it's doing is it's making you see the things that you're already

doing. Yeah, not somebody else's. Yeah, it's giving you that's the thing. I would say one of the

things I repeat the most for people is you're doing better than you think. You're doing better

than you think. And again, people in our circle, people who are like, I want to improve my

parenting or improve my life, whatever are often doing better than they think because they'll say,

I'm doing these seven goals. And I don't think they're working and you go, you're the average

parent does zero goals. Like the average parent doesn't know where their kid is right now. Like,

what are you you're already doing better than you think? And again, it shows you your life,

not somebody else's. Here's what I'd say about that. So we've touched on Instagram a few times

in the perfect homeschooling mom. The key you have to remember is this is new. Like the type of

comparison we have access to is new. We don't give ourselves credit for that. My mom and when she

was raising me in the 1980s could only compare her motherhood to three other moms on our cul-de-sac.

That's it. She didn't have access to what a mom was doing in Houston, Texas or a mom in

Spokane, Washington. But now you have access to every mom who's alive in 30 seconds. And we haven't

given ourself credit for like, that's a new difficult challenge. We haven't adapted to yet.

Yeah. And so I think sometimes we have to pause and go, oh, that's right. That's right. My mom

didn't struggle with this because she had moms at church, but she didn't have 10 million moms

at church. Like they weren't doing video. If you like, when I was being raised as a kid,

if somebody went on a vacation and said, come over and watch our slideshow and like a Kodak real,

you'd be like, no, thank you. That sounds terrible. And then now that's what we do. If a friend of mine,

like, if one of my mom's friends in 1988 was like, we went to Disney World and I made like a 60 second

video about that. I'd like to show you that a lot. You'd be like, that's gross. That's weird.

What? No, that's weird. Like, no, like, I don't need to see the highlights of your making. Why did you

make that? Yeah. And now we just do that. And I do it too. Like I do with other authors. Like,

it's so tempting. And it's tempting because it's really well done. Like it's not accident. Like,

that's the other thing I sometimes say is like Netflix doesn't want you to raise good kids.

They don't care about that. Like Netflix doesn't want you to get in shape. Like,

Instagram doesn't want you to have a happy marriage. That's not their goal. Their goal is turning

your attention into money. And so like, I think if you can focus on your own life because people say

like, stay in your lane. Like, look at you look on your side of the fence. And my big thing is like,

well, let's, what's a tactical practical way to do that? And this is one of them. Yeah. This is

one of them. I smile whenever I see I love it. Okay. Here's another one. This one might be tricky

depending on what season mom is in. But if I had a three hour today, I'd spend it blank.

I say it's tricky because I have six kids. They're now all older. But when they were 12, 10,

eight, we had a one year old and twin newborns. So I would have easily said sleeping like

obviously. Yeah. That was an easy answer. Yeah. It depends on the season. You're right. And I

think that's such a great word for it because I'll have moms, socially young moms will say,

hey, I'm blowing my goals. I'm not doing great. Oh, my goals. And go, well, tell me about your

life. I got a four year old, a two year old and twin six month old. And I go, you're raising

humans. Like you're in charge of humans, right? Like that's a wild goal. Like we don't count that

sometimes as a goal. It's like, oh, you should just be good at being in charge of humans. And you're

like, oh, my gosh, this is, this is challenging. This is hard. So I think season is a great word.

But I wanted to try to get people to go, you're right. If I had 30 minutes or I had 60 minutes or

even 10 minutes, I would love to read or I would love to walk. What I found with some of these

things is it's like having a reunion. Like you end up having a reunion with something,

some part of you that you forgot you loved. Yeah. And it reminds you. And so a lot of people when

they do the list go, why did I stop doing that? Or why did I quit? I forgot how much I like,

I used to love puzzles, even for 10 minutes. Like that was it. Turn my brain off. Yeah. What?

Why did that? Because you never, there wasn't a day where you said, I'm stopping puzzles. I will

never do a puzzle again. Or I quit knitting. I hate knitting. Like you didn't, it just kind of

life got busy and chipped away and chipped away and chipped away. And so at a lot of times in the

list, you find something that you go, oh, I used to, this used to light me up. Why did I put it down?

I'm going to pick it back up again. Yeah. And then another way you could think about this

question to it, I was thinking specifically for homeschoolers. For most of us homeschooling moms,

there's more things we want to do with our kids than time to do it in. So we're always having to

like, by the way, that's a good thing. So let me just, let me pause on that for a second. That's a

wonderful thing. And I like one of the soundtracks I use, a root of book called Soundtracks about

mindset is my imagination is bigger than my calendar. My imagination is bigger than my calendar. So

the calendar is seven days. It's been the same 365 days for centuries. My imagination is massive

and boundless. And so I want to release the pressure of any mom who listens to this and goes,

I have more to do than I have time to do. You should because you're really creative and you have

a huge imagination. And I would never want you as a mom to come to me and say, I have no ideas

for my kids. I'm out of desires for my kids. I'm out of ideas for my, you'll, that would be the

work. That would actually be the real problem. Like, I don't want anything for the future of my

kids. Like I finished, I finished caring about like ideas for the future of my kids. That's not

going to be a problem. So I want you to see that as a gift, not a curse that you have more you

want to do. Like, and I think you always will. Like I think you always will. And I think that's a

feature, not a problem. So good. Okay, I love this. And then we can actually, so then if it's not

if it's a feature and not a problem, we can go, okay, well, first second, while making this best

moment list, if I had a spare hour in my homeschool that I could do anything with my kids specifically

in homeschooling, what would I do? You know, it might be reading aloud. It might be taking them on

cool field trips. It might be science experiments. I guess some people like those. It could be all kinds

of different things, right? And but then we can go like, Oh, is there a way that since I know this

is would call my best moments list or these were some of my favorite memories from homeschooling

before when we were able to squeeze them in? Can we make that a bigger part of what we're doing? Or

at least not even a bigger part, but just can we make sure it has a spot at all? It doesn't have to

be every week, but like maybe once this year, could we, whatever it is. Yeah, can we add? Well,

if you're not doing it at all, one is infinitely more. So the pro like the pressure is you can't go,

I love this. I'm going to do it every week. Like what I find with people who are goal focused and

your audience is definitely go focused is they sometimes go like the book says from nothing to

everything. And that's a ton of pressure. So they try something. And I meet people all the time

that'll go, I write on Tuesdays. I just always write on Tuesdays and go, how many times you've

done it? They go, once I did it this Tuesday. So from here on out, I write on Tuesdays and I go,

that feels like you're going to go from once to 52 weeks. That's a lot of pressure. Like, yeah,

what if we said, like you said, can we do it one more time? Don't add the word perfect to any of

these prompts. If I had an hour, how would I pick the perfect thing to do? Like, oh, now it's,

now it's a chore. Now it's additional task. Now the joy is already left for the room. It's like,

no, here's five things I would do. And I'm going to pick one and I'm going to do it. One of the

soundtracks I say is some beats none. Some beats none because for perfectionists and perfectionists

will rather get a zero than a C minus. So an example of the, I meet perfectionists that'll say,

John, my goal is to run three miles today. I only have time for two. So I'm not going to do any.

And I'll go, you know, two is infinitely more than none. But perfectionists, it's all or nothing.

And so if you can say, no, it's going to be 15 minutes and 15 minutes. Some beats none.

Some beats none. So that's a soundtrack. We say in our family, like one of our parenting

soundtracks is some beats none. Some beats none. That little stuff adds up. Well, okay. So one of my

twins, they're now, the twins are now 11. And I asked them just recently, how would you finish

this sentence? I'm curious. I wish we had more time to blank together. Oh, that's good. Yeah. Okay.

So without skipping a beat, one of my twins said, look at birds. So my first thought was like,

oh, we could do a bird unit. We could like do. We could study birds. And I'm like looking at my

schedule and I'm like, oh, wait, we already have science at co-op. I don't, where am I going to

fill this in? And it occurred to me or on Saturday, we could just go look at the birds in the woods

by our house. Yeah. Yeah. It's like we make it exactly like you said, we take it to a hundred

so fast. Yeah. Yeah. And then you're like, I'll get a vest with a lot of pockets. And I'll,

you know, like, I'll become a birder. I'm a professional birder now. And like, we'll follow

whooping cranes as they migrate. You know, like, wait, yeah, we could, yeah, we could go on Saturday,

like to a lake that we know has birds. Exactly. And our looking at birds and go, yeah,

that's grassy itch because the kid might go, that's enough birds. That's all I want it. I want

to travel down mom. I want twice as many birds next week and go, okay, oh, a little skin in the game.

Let's go. Like, yeah, it's, but I think, I think that's just human nature to want to go to the

extreme. But the older I get, the more I'm able to be flexible, and maybe even generous with

myself as far as like a little bit counts, like a little bit, like, you know, I have a buddy who

teased me. I ran 1.2 miles and posted it on Strava. And he was like, dude, 1.2 miles. What?

I would never just do that amount and put it on Strava. And I was like, yeah, but it adds up over,

like, all I had time for was 1.2. And if I do 51.2 mile runs over the year, it's 50 extra miles.

Like, yeah, I ran two miles today. And I wasn't, I didn't beat myself up when I got in. I can't

believe you only did two. I was like, cool. I was a little bit extra. Some beats none. Like,

some beats none. Some beats none. So good. Okay. So you mentioned here, like, you're basically talking

about easy goals, which is something that you talk about in your book. And I would love to talk

about those a little bit. I don't know if you said this in your broker. If I heard you on your

podcast, which I'll put a link to your podcast in what is the name of your podcast? All it takes

is a goal. All it takes. Well, I can't believe I didn't put it on the front of the book. It's

pretty. I subscribe to it. So I just listen to it. I don't have to look it up. Okay. So you might

have said it there, but you were talking about auditioning goals or like trying them out.

You talked to me a little about this. Yeah. So don't marry the goal. Don't marry a new goal.

That'd be like speed dating and getting married at the same night. So like, what happens is people,

especially around January, December, January is a really goal focus. They go, this is my new year's

resolution. You go, you haven't done that for a week. You're, you're making a year commitment.

Like, that's bonkers. So that gets back to that freedom. Like, I quit a ton of goals because

I'll try a bunch of easy goals and an easy goals. There's a couple frameworks. It's like,

you can try it in less than seven days. It doesn't cost any money. It doesn't take a lot of time.

But so I'll try a bunch of goals and go, yeah, that was not for me. Like, I tried it and it didn't

work for me. And so let me try a different one, not as because I failed it, but like, no,

let me try a different one. Like, my wife teased me about that. I was trying to drink a gallon of

water a day and she saw me one day in the kitchen, like, go up and like, painfully, like just trying to,

she was like, what are you doing? Who's making you do this? And I was like, gotta get this water

down. She was like, you look miserable. And I was like, I am. And she was like, it's your goal.

Change it. And I was like, so I can do that. So I really like helping people kind of audition them,

test them, and then grow them. Like, add a little bit more. So I'll give you an example of this.

A friend of mine, we were talking. And I was like, what's your goal this year? He's like,

I want to do a hundred sales calls a week. I was like, all right, that's a lot. I was like,

how many do you do a call a week right now? And he goes, five. He's like, you're going to 20

exit. I was like, okay, fair enough. I was like, get it impressive. I said, how many hours a week

would it take for you to do that goal? And he said, uh, about 25 hours a week. And I was like,

how many hours of free time do you have in your week right now? And he's like, not free time. I'm

very busy. And I said, there's your problem. Like, I say, dreaming runs on optimism,

planning runs on realism. And people have a hard time making that transition. And so I just want

to say like, if you're a busy mom and at the beginning of a planning unit at the beginning of a

year, you come up with things like 10 things you want to do, put a rough estimate of the time

they'll take and then see if your schedule allows them. Because otherwise you have failed before

you start it. And so I'd much rather you go, I know that in this season, I got 20 free minutes

every day. That's it. 20. And you go, so when I have those 20, I'm going to save for them.

I'm going to use them. And here's the little goal I'm going to plug into them. And I'm going to

audition things. And then again, I'm going to grow it over time. Like we say that with our kids

all the time, like when there's a passion, they're into your birding thing. Maybe this kid turns it,

like, that becomes a huge passion. Like, and they go to college for it something. Maybe it's just

a passing fancy because kids like to try a ton of stuff. The problem with parenting, in my opinion,

is sometimes we suffocate kids passions because we're so excited they have one. So a kid goes,

I like art. And we go, you're an artist, every birthday present, you're getting crayons and markers,

we're signing up for lessons. And like we suffocate this. And then the kid is like, I just said I like

art because I had drawn that day. And it was kind of fun. Like I didn't, I don't want to pray for

Christmas. Like I don't want to have to. And so I think that's the dance we do as parents is that

we can nurture it. We can throw fuel on it, but we can't suffocate it.

As homeschoolers, we take it even a step further. I think because our kids will be like,

I loved Harry Potter. And we're like, we're going to do a Harry Potter unit study. And now we're

in sign. And you're like, yeah, and they're like, you just ruined Harry Potter. What the heck?

Yeah. I like the Harry Potter to feel like work. Yeah. Exactly. I want you to know how long

them wand is and what the properties of Hermione's hair. Exactly. Oh my gosh. The audition goal is

exactly the example you just, we were just talking about with the birding is like, instead of saying,

like, we're going to do a whole birding thing. I'll be like, okay, let's just go look at birds

on Saturday morning. And then you said, you know, he might be like, that's it. Or Michael,

like, can we do that again? Well, and then he doesn't feel the pressure of living up to what's

now your expectation. Totally. So if you go, yeah, made it a whole thing, he feels like, oh,

mom's really into this. I kind of have to pretend I am too. Yeah. Exactly. Like as a homeschool

mom, I guarantee you could come up with four steps of progression where you're like, the first

one is on a Saturday morning, very light. We go to a farmer's market and we look at plants. They

mentioned they like plants. So we're going to go do a walk around in a farmer's market to look at

the type of plants that are sold or type of food that's sold in our area. Oh, that's interesting.

I didn't know that we had farms like that. And then you go to the second level if that goes well

is we read one book about it. We just read a book. It's not a unit yet. And then the third level

is this. And then like, that's what I mean by like progressing your goals. Because most people only

have two versions. It's nothing or everything. And then there's no room in between. And I think if

you can give yourself some steps, it's easier. Yeah. So good. So good. Okay. You guys, we have only

touched a tiny bit. We talked about parts of the first two chapters. I think I only gave you a

highlight of three of these questions to make your own best moments list. But there are 10 in here.

So you can listen to the audiobook. I loved the audiobook. I also got myself a hard copy. So I'd

have. Love it. Babies need shoes. Babies need shoes. I love it. That dress I bought my daughter

today was expensive. So thank you. Yeah, you're welcome. Because I bought the book in all the

different formats. It's possible. I also have it on my Kindle, frankly. But then you can look at

the prompts and help yourself make a best moments list, which I think will help you decide what's

worth your time in the coming year. And then also, like John said, don't you don't need to make it

from zero to 100 like audition something. Just try it. See how it fits. Build a home school.

You enjoy. Don't look up a year into it and realize, I hate this school we're part of. And we

created it. You know, like this has like, if you right now, my wife says this to me all the time,

she's like, you have a really hard boss. And it's you. And it's her way of going, oh, you're

right. Why am I doing these things? I guarantee you can build a homeschooling program that you look

up and go, man, this is so difficult and so stressful. And our family is fighting. And it's just

the worst. And you're like, who's in charge of it? Oh, wait, I'm the principal in this situation.

So how do I along the way make sure that I'm building the thing that fits our family, that fits

our season, that fits our hearts, that fits where we're trying to go without having to overhaul

things or make a hundred a goal from zero to 100, just a little tiny bits of the time. I don't

want to forget to ask you about your new book, because when I, I mean, I love the whole book,

but I especially love the best moments chapter. And then I think that's kind of the basis maybe

of the book you wrote with your daughters, but I won't put those words in your mouth. You

tell me about it. Yeah. So a funny thing happened when my book on mindset soundtracks came out,

parents came out of the woodwork and said, hey, do you have a version for teenagers? And that

had never happened. And so a lot of parents came to and said, my teen is struggling with their

mindset. If I could help them with their mindset, it would change the arc of their life. And Nashville,

as an example, it's a four to six month wait for teen counseling. So when a teenager finally

is brave enough to say, hey, I need to talk to somebody they go, great, we'll see in half a year.

Yeah. So, and then we just started to see broken soundtracks and teenagers. So we were at a swim

meet and this girl got out of the pool and said to her mom, I'm the slow swimmer in the team,

I'll never get better. And my wife and I looked at each other and said, oh, those are just broken

soundtracks. She can change that. And I would just say as a parent, if you're, if you hear

absolutes, it's usually a broken soundtrack. So I'll never get better at geometry. I'm the only

one who doesn't have the new iPhone. Everyone went to the party, but me, those are often signs of

broken soundtracks. And you can change those. But I knew if I wrote the book, it would sound like

an adult trying to sound young. Like it would be like, hello, fellow youths. Like I wear, I wear

Michael Jordan's too. I don't crease the J's like, I got so much rhythm or risley bear. Like I knew

it would sound so terrible. Yeah. So I asked my two teenage daughters to help me with it. And that

led to the second book, too, where we said, okay, all these parents are like, if I could get my

kid motivated, if I could find something they care about, if I could get them invested in their

own future, how do we do that? And so we did a teen version of all it takes as a goal. Because it's

like anything else, it's compound interest. Like imagine if you as a 16 year old could have started

to work on some of these things, how that compounds over like, I'd much rather give a kid some tools

versus repair them as a 42 year old that's had a job. They hate it for 20 years. Yeah. And does

know how they got there. So that's what how teams when became was my daughters and I sat down and

said, okay, if we were going to help teenagers really achieve their goals in a realistic way,

in a way that's in their language that builds them up and pushes back against so much cultural

conversation right now. Like for instance, there's a broken soundtrack that people in their 20s

are dealing with which everybody keeps telling them you'll never own a house. You'll never own a

house. You'll never own a house. And wow, is that a broken soundtrack? Because they they

eventually believe it. And they don't even try to do the things that would lead to owning a house.

They just accept my generation will know it'll be impossible for my generation to own a house. Yeah.

And we're working very hard in our house with our kids ago. No, like you won't be able to go to

Europe at 26, but you shouldn't be in Europe. Like don't do your honeymoon solo at 26. Like that's

a lot of money. Like what if we so there's all these conversations that's open in our own house,

but that's what how teams win was how do we help teenagers have goal setting and goal achieving

that shapes the rest of their life. So good. Okay, as you're talking about broken soundtracks and our

teens, everybody who's listening, tell me in the comments if you want me to have John back to talk

about soundtracks and how we can help our kids improve their soundtracks and our own soundtracks

in our mind to improve our mindset. That book's been a wild conversation for me and I really

it's been a lot of fun helping parents with it, helping teenagers with it. It's being taught in

schools right now, which is great. My hope is in the future like 30 years ago, we didn't give kids

any financial advice. We'd go, Hey, here's a credit card. Try not to buy a jet ski and then they

wreck their lives. And now there's personal finance lessons for teenagers. My hope is that there's

mindset classes eventually for teenagers on, Hey, here's how to think about yourself. Here's how

to think about challenges. Here's how here's how your thoughts turn into your actions and your

actions turn into your results. So let's be deliberate about the words we say. And it's funny. My

daughter, my oldest daughter, Ellie uses soundtracks all the time. She texted us. She went and studied

in London first semester, her sophomore year of college and she said, we came up with some new

soundtracks. One that I'm telling everybody is tired beats regretful. Tired beats regretful

because some of the students were staying home in London watching Netflix instead of going out

and seeing going on a tour of the city or going and she was like, no, no, no, like, I'd rather be

tired than regretful. Like this is like, I'd rather be tired than regretful. And and so it's fun

to see teenagers get it immediately. Yeah. And they'll start to call you out as a parent on your

soundtracks too, which is super fun too. Yeah. Oh, that's so good. Okay. I'm going to put John's

books in the show notes for this episode. All it takes is a goal. His new one, how teens win

soundtracks. All my favorites. John, thank you so much for coming on the show. This has been

way fun. I love doing it. I appreciate you supporting the work. That means a lot to me.

I just love the way that John reframes things for us. You know, you're doing better than you think

is such a good word for homeschooling moms, right? It's so easy to fall into comparison. But when we

remember that our imaginations are good and they're built, they're created for good and that the

little things we do add up and they make a difference, it can be really encouraging. So I hope you

enjoyed this episode. Now let's go listen to the kids and find out the books that they are loving

lately. I love the New Zealand and my name is Alisha Kapornas and I'm three years old.

And what book do you like? I like people. People by Janet now and Albert. What do you like about the book?

I like the mom watching when does. The mom watching when does anything else?

And the baby got a doubt to go to sleep and it's caught.

What's your name? Lily. Lily. And how old are you?

Two. Two. And where do you live?

Missouri. And what's your favorite book?

Most ways with ducklings. Make way for ducklings. Why do you like this book?

Because I like this house and I like to play with some little ducks in a peach.

I like to play eating peanuts. You like the big ducks and the little ducks and the ducks eating peanuts?

Yeah. Yeah, that's good.

What's your name?

Mia. Mia? How old are you?

I'm three. No, you're two. I'm two. Yeah, where do you live, Mia?

I'm a washer. Yeah, washer. What's your favorite book?

Sam I am. Sam I am? Why do you like that book?

Just I have a brush left.

What is your name? Lily. How old are you? Three.

Where are you from?

What's uh, where?

What is your favorite book, Lily?

Curious George. Why do you like Curious George?

Because it has a lot of pictures in it.

You have drawings and it's on the pictures.

What do you like about the monkey Curious George?

Because he flies a hot air balloon and the man with the yellow hat doesn't like it.

Wonderful. Thank you so much, kids. I hope you enjoyed this episode.

I'll be back in two weeks with another episode.

So in the meantime, I think you know what to do.

Go make meaningful and lasting connections with your kids.

Their books.