Choose Your Race

Can you believe we are almost five whole months in to the year 2011?

It’s been almost five months since we talked about those darned “New Year’s Resolutions” and all the changes to put into our lives as a result of the calendar changing over.

So how are you doing with that?

Have you achieved that goal, have you accomplished that resolution?

Are you looking for something new and exciting to try – a “Mid Year’s Resolution?” Or are you just annoyed that I am even asking the question?

If you are celebrating a success – if you lost the weight, or gave up the cigarettes, or wrote the book, or spent more time with your family, or changed your career, or got the degree, or whatever it is you accomplished; AWESOME!!!! Good for you! Congratulations!!!

If you are annoyed with me for writing about it, or with yourself for not doing it, what do you want to do about it?

There are quite a few tools sitting around my website to help you out with that – and a few more will be available once the website is updated in a few weeks.

But, until then, try this:

Make a decision to change something

Utilize SMALL, incremental steps

Add in some accountability from others

Achieve success.

The equation is that simple. How will you put it in to practice?

As for me, as I write this, I am wrapping up all the hard work and training needed to run a long race. Once you receive this, I will be recovering from that long run, and planning the next outlandish goal for the year.

What about you?

What’s your race this year?

It's Time to Man Up!

This article could also be called, “What Do You Mean You’re Leaving Me With the Kids?!” Thanks to my wife for inspiring this article by leaving on Friday, and taking the weekend away. Happy (day after) Mother’s Day to her and all the mom’s out there. Thank you for everything you do.


Alright guys, it’s time to step up and man up.

Too many of us our relinquishing our responsibility as “men”, “fathers”, and “husbands” in exchange for video games, beer, hunting, sports, or any other extracurricular activities.

Too many of us are using “Work” as an excuse to avoid being at home, to avoid taking responsibility for our families.

Things need to change; we have to start doing better. Those who are working hard to do the right thing are having a hard time carrying the weight of those who aren’t. It’s making everyone look bad.

This is the game of your life; and only your marriage, your children, your livelihood, and your future weigh in the balance. It’s time to step up and get involved in all these aspects of your life. If you don’t, something else will fill the void you leave in the life of your kids, or in your marriage, or in your future.

I’ve shared a great website here before that covers a myriad of manly topics – www.TheArtofManliness.com has covered date night, top books for men, shaving techniques, workouts, dress codes, and a ton of other topics over the past few months. It has a considerable cache of great manly info, I encourage you to check it out. In this article, I am going to talk about the manly art of…… Spending Time with The Kids!!!!!

If you are spending enough time with them, and those who have an outside few and important opinion (mom) agree, great! Keep it up. If you are not, and you’re not sure what to do, here are a few tips. If you are not sure what “enough” is, I will tell you what I do. I aim for at least an hour every weekday – homework time, coaching time, play time – whatever I can work in to our busy schedules. Then the goal is for us to spend most of the weekend together doing something fun and character building (for them AND me), because that’s what families do more weekends than not. That’s what we signed up for when we had kids.

Teach them something. Every time the oil in the cars gets changed, my daughters help. I’m pretty sure they could change it themselves at this young age. Cleaning the house is a team effort, so it gets done quicker and they learn how to take care of things. Same for cleaning their room – although not as easy to be as active in that part of teaching – we do try to make it a team effort in order to teach. Let’s face it, not many eight year-olds know what it means to “clean up” unless they are taught and it is role modeled for them. Life is full of teaching opportunities. You don’t have to look very hard.

Show them your favorite hobby. Hard work deserves its reward. I’m a huge fan of doing anything outdoors. I appreciate the opportunities to go camping or hiking with friends – we all need time away. But it’s just as much fun to take the family camping, or to take my girls hiking. We just picked up a new GPS unit so that we can do more geocaching together. Whatever your hobby share it with your kids. If you don’t have any hobbies, develop or redevelop some. Check out the fun of geocaching at www.geocaching.com , or you can take a look at the app on your smartphone. Magellan has put out a new series of very basic starter units that you can pick up for a reasonable price. Nothing says “manly” like mixing tech and the outdoors, using our billion dollar satellite system to find piece of Tupperware in the woods.




Coach them. This is right in line with teaching them, but requires a bit more focus and research on our part. Are they in a sport you don’t know much about? Learn it. Do they play your favorite sport? Step up and coach the team – I know most kids leagues are always looking for qualified coaches. Whether you were an Olympic athlete in the sport, or just found out about it, you are qualified to coach because you are a Dad. There are plenty of resources available online or at your library to learn the sport and how to coach it. If you are not able to dedicate the time to a full season of coaching, take the time every weekend to support the team by working with your child in the yard – throw the ball, shoot some hoops, kick the soccer ball, hit the puck around – do something. Be active. Be a part of their interests.

Do something THEY like to do. This is not always easy, but one of the most “manly” things you can do. I can’t tell you how many times of tried to play Polly Pockets or Barbie or My Loving Family. It’s more fun when the gigantic Barbie comes to raid the Polly Pocket village, but that doesn’t always work for my girls. What does work is letting them take the lead, I just get to be a witness to their play, and they like that. We have been able to find some common ground with Legos. Whatever it is your child likes to do, try to be a part of it. It can be rewarding for your, but immensely rewarding for them.

Give her some away time. All of these suggestions have been aimed at this point – Mom needs time away. It doesn’t have to be two weeks in Hawaii, although that might be nice, but it could just be a few hours with you and the kids out of the house, or just letting her get out for a cup of coffee with friends, or even get away for the weekend. Just as we need, and deserve, our evenings or weekends with the guys; mom needs that too. Just as much, you need time with the kids – it’s not always easy, but neither is parenting. The point is that you do it. Start putting the time in, you will get better at it, and it will get easier as you go.

Hopefully you did something nice for mom yesterday. Now, what are you going to do with the kids this week, and next weekend, and the week after that, and during the summer? It’s not just one day. Being a dad is a full time job. It’s more than a full time job. So get to work.

What You MUST Know to Get Through the Month

By now, if you’ve been reading this website fairly regularly, you know I’m a pretty big fan of the Psychology Today magazine. They put out some fairly interesting articles and ideas, even if it IS pop culture psychology – that is to say it’s not ALL firmly research based, although quite a bit of it is. In a way, it challenges you to be a critical consumer of the research they offer. Meaning you (and I) have to think about whether a “1-person case study” is cause enough to overhaul our lifestyle and behavior when a previous decade’s worth of research may indicate the contrary. That idea of being a “critical consumer” of “research” is pretty important in our times of being bombarded with “new and improved” facts, opinions, and research.


I thought might provide for you a quick take on some of the more enlighten bits I read from this month’s issue to see what you might think about using in your life:

There was a fairly graphically entertaining article on optimists and pessimists titled “Optimism, Optimized”. In it, we are told that thinking about, planning for, and expecting “ the worst” is often helpful in educational situations in order to motivate us to study and to not feel too disappointed when our studies don’t pay off. On the other hand, expecting “the best” can often be helpful in the areas of family, romance, and career, as setting high expectations in those areas can lead to self-fulfilling behavior.

I’m a big proponent of working towards being medication free in most mental health situations; but I do recognize the need for the use of psychotropic medication from time to time. There are a few new developments in this area and the treatment of anxiety. Most anti-anxiety medications today treat the issue in a manner that causes most people prolonged periods of sleepiness or just plain unconsciousness. Research is promising for a medication that will help with anxiety based issues like post-traumatic stress disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and specific phobias that doesn’t leave the patient unconscious. This would prove extremely helpful in helping those struggling with anxiety, and it’s many forms, to be successful in treatment.

Boost your brain with your i-device or smartphone. Here are three cool memory-based games to help stretch your brain. I picked up Memory Matrix for my phone, and I believe it has helped me achieve near-genius levels of intelligence, as well as boosted my self-esteem. You can check out Lumina and Touch Attack for other ‘handy’ memory improvers.

The article Mood Makeup was pretty interesting, even from a male point of view. Although it highlighted three different products, I’m not one to comment on ‘bronzer’ or ‘foaming moisturizer’. Apparently the aforementioned smartphone brain booster has not given me the intelligence to understand such thing. However, the Firmenich’s Smiley Perfume piqued my curiosity. You should know that smell is the strongest sense linked to memory – if for no other reason because your nose and brain are close together and linked pretty tightly. A particular smell from a pleasant time can trigger pleasant thoughts and feelings. This product goes quite a bit deeper into the nasal cavity and incorporates theobromine and phenylethylamine (the same ‘happy chemicals’ found in cocoa beans). So, if you’re feeling down, give it a try.

Of course, for every positive piece of psychology, there’s got to be a little bit of negative – the interview with Simon Critchely, a philosopher in the field of death, may make you run out to buy Firmenich’s secret happy potion… The crux of the article is that contemporary society has put such a negative spin on death that we work hard to avoid it, and therefore struggle to cope with it. Coping with death, embracing it’s inevitability, and recognizing our own mortality are keys to a happier life. What do you think? True or just plain morbid?

The final article I thought would be helpful – The Fab Fourteen – a helpful list of the top 11 foods you should be trying to eat more of. Yes, the article is called Fab Fourteen, but even after reading it three times, I could only find 11; unless you break out all the nuts listed, and then there is 15… What you should be eating more of and why:

Barley – knocks out bad cholesterol

Quinoa – quinoa is a great alternative to rice and has all 9 essential amino acids; even though it has a funny name, it is gaining in popularity and can be found in most grocery stores

Buckwheat – huge in the antioxidants race

Rye – protects against gall stones and is great for fighting hunger

Nuts – almonds, walnuts, pistachios, pecans, and hazelnuts – have “good fat” in them, and protect against cardiovascular problems AND cognitive decline

Black raspberries – lots of fiber and lots of great chemicals that help your brain deal with stress more effectively

Blueberries – more great chemicals that protect against cognitive decline, including Alzheimer’s

Broccoli – mom was right… this is a great detoxifier and just plain good for you

Pomegranates – similar to the positive effects of blueberries, but much more difficult to harvest… have you ever tried to get the fruit out of one of these? It takes quite a bit of work, but is well worth it

Tomatoes – one of the few foods who nutrient value is INCREASED by cooking and processing; great for blood pressure and fighting bad cholesterol

Next time you are grocery shopping, grab more of these, and less of the boxes and bags of processed foods, and you will be well on your way to a healthier you.

What Are You Putting In Your Head?

Who are you when it all starts to fall apart? When the stress of work, marriage, parenting, or life in general starts to get to you, what kind of person do you become? When you feel like you can’t do it anymore, but you know you have to, what resources do you have to draw from?


It is at these times that truly test us that we find out who we truly are. It’s at these times that the choices we have made throughout our lives push us to succeed, or allow us to fail. At these times it is what we have been putting in our heads that comes back out in our actions and attitudes.

When you are faced with a new or difficult task, does your head fill with thoughts of “I can’t do this”, “I’m not good enough”, or “why me”? Or do you rise to the occasion and fill yourself with ideas like “it will be tough, but I can do it”, and “this will stretch me and make me stronger”?

When faced with adversity in life, do you turn to unhealthy coping skills like overeating and drinking alcohol; or do you look at the adversity as an opportunity, and seek out ways to conquer it?

Do you seek out chances to learn and expand yourself through travel, experience, education, reading, and socializing; or do you spend your time in front of the computer following friends Mafias and Farms, or surfing for the newest gossip on the latest celebrity to self-destruct?

When you have time for leisure, do you spend your days in front of the tv watching the latest adult cartoons, catching the entire 6-8 hours of the Cubs double-header, or playing 12-14 hours of video games; or do relax with the Discovery Channel and History Channel, or try to engage in some kind of physical activity to improve your health?

The choices we make, from the most major life decisions to what eat and how we relax shape and craft our lives. The choices we make, what we put in our heads, BECOMES our life, and creates our existence.

I don’t have it all figured out yet. I can easily lose myself in a mind-numbing tv show, or shoot-‘em-up video game for an hour or two. But I’m learning. The first time I woke up from a Facebook induced coma and realized an hour had disappeared, I knew it was time to make some changes. I started making different choices.

The great thing is, you can to. If your unhappy or frustrated with where things are going in life; sometimes, it can really be as easy as making some different choices. First start with the little ones, like what you are putting in your head, from there the bigger choices get a little bit easier.

Art credit: Luke B. Dunscombe

Avoid the Deep Dark Depths

If you were in the depths of a major depressive episode; no energy to get out bed, no desire to seek pleasure, feeling sad, lethargic, down, and depressed every waking moment, possibly feeling like you didn’t want to go on, what would you do?


I hope you have the support in place around for someone to say, “we need to get you some help”. I hope you have the resources to find and acquire the help you need. Better yet, I hope you never get to that point.

Sadly, a lot of people do. Stress becomes anxiety, anxiety trends towards depression, and eventually a person can get so low that it takes considerable measures to come out of it, or it leads to more difficult mental health issues.

This is a simple list of activities to engage in to help prevent mental illness. You may be amazed at their simplicity. I hope you are. I hope you read these and say, “I do these EVERY day!” Engage in these more days than not each week, and you will be on your way to maintaining wellness.

Eat healthy. Drink Healthy. There’s a reason we are told to eat our fruits and vegetables. It makes you healthy. The more the better. The more colors your can fit into a meal, the better. Limit your intake of processed foods. If you can’t produce the ingredients, why put it in your body? Those chemicals alter the chemicals in your brain and lead to altered moods. Too much sugar, caffeine, or alcohol can do the same thing. Instead soda or coffee, try tea or water. Lots of water. At least 2 liters (about 8 8oz glasses) each day to flush out your system, help you feel full, provide the hydration you need, and because it’s better for you than a Monster.

Sleep. Not too much, not too little. Generally 7-9 hours is good every night. The important factor many people miss out on is not to alter your sleep schedule too much. If you go to bed by 10pm get up at 5am every morning, don’t stay up until 1am and sleep until 9am on the weekends. Research indicates that you shouldn’t alter your sleep schedule more than +/- 1 hour from your “norm”. Doing so is about the same as subjecting yourself to a bad case of jetlag; it alters brain chemistry and leaves your brain reeling from the change.

Exercise. 20-30 minutes each day. Get out and walk. If you are good at walking, go for a run. If you can’t do either, ride a bike. If you can’t do that, lift weights. There are more ways to exercise available to than there ever have been. You can enjoy a health club membership or use a dvd at home. You can work out with expensive equipment, or go for a walk in your bare feet. Whatever you choose to do, do it consistently for 20-30 minutes every day. You will maintain and improve your physical health; and that will have a myriad of positive effects on your mental health.

Socialize. Not just online, but with people you care about and who care about you. We are hardwired to be social creatures; not indulging in that evolutionary mandate leaves us feeling isolated and alone. Giving time to be with friends and family helps to build connections and increase the presence of the “feel good” neurotransmitters in our brains.

Spiritualize. Commune with a higher power, pray to God, read from Buddha, or meditate in nature. Recognizing we are not omnipotent and admitting our flaws as humans can have a positive humbling effect. Seeking guidance in a belief system greater than our individual knowledge can offer perspective. Connecting with the religion (a system of expression spirituality) of our childhood links us to past generations. All of these can be positive factors in promoting wellness and overall emotional health.

Manage stress. There are two ways to deal with stress; avoid, deny, remove, or change the stressor; or learn to cope with it in a more effective manner. If you are feeling excess stress, identify the stressor (work for many – but even that can be more specific), and determine if you can change it or cope with it better.

Manage your moods. Moods come and go for a variety of reasons, many of which may be outside our control. What is within our control is how long we allow a negative mood to stay and fester, and at what point we choose to engage in behavior to bring about a more positive mood. If you find yourself spiraling into a negative mood that you can’t come out of, enlist the help of others (see Socialize). If they can’t help, consult with a professional.

Manage your thoughts. Much like moods, thoughts come from out of nowhere – quirky firing of neurons brought upon by something we saw out of the corner of our eye can yield the strangest of first thoughts, or impulses. Again, something we are not always consciously in control of – but just like moods, we are in control of what our next thought is, and how we choose to act on that thought.

Manage your money. While we’re talking about managing factors in life – mismanaged finances can be the greatest source of individual stress and relational discord. It’s ironic and somewhat funny how many quotes and commentaries you can find throughout history, from the ancient Greeks to the current Session of Congress and everywhere in between; how poor financial management can lead to emotional turmoil. Take care of your money, and you will be taking care of your health.

Go do something. Stretch your brain and your body. Get up from the computer and do something different. If you sit around all day, go for a walk. If you spend most evenings watching tv, read a book. If you spend your day in a cubicle, get outside in nature. If you haven’t seen something truly amazing in a while, go see the ocean, an art museum, go up to the observation deck of a skyscraper, write a book, or go volunteer in a pediatric cancer treatment center. Expand your horizons, do different things, try new things, and you will maintain the flexibility of your brain and hold on to more of your fluid intelligence longer into your years. Besides, it’s fun.

How to Turn Your Child into a Scholarship Athlete

I took my oldest daughter to the annual Father-Daughter Dance a few weeks ago. As always, it’s a wonderful and bittersweet event. Sweet, of course, in seeing her run around with her friends and timidly try to dance; bitter in that each year is a kind of marking point for her getting older and growing up. It’s a reminder to always enjoy the time I do have with her.


Par for the course, as the girls danced and gave us dads an occasional break, the soccer coach dads soon got together to discuss talent, strategy, and future prospects. Yeah, we take it pretty seriously. Once gentleman, who wasn’t “in” the group, sat and listened intently, his eyes growing bigger and brighter as we discussed and exaggerated about the skills of the more talented girls.

Eventually, as the hoopla died down, he asked; “how do I turn my daughter (3rd grade) into a scholarship athlete?

It was question I wasn’t used to answering, so I bumbled through a few ideas. And then I stewed on why I felt like such an idiot trying to answer that question. Then it came to me:

YOU CAN’T! You cannot turn your child into a scholarship athlete! It’s a combination of genetics, skills, coaching, luck, and fate that take a child from the local basketball court to the Final Four and on to the NBA. You cannot create a scholarship/professional swimmer like the good Dr. Frankenstein working in your backyard swimming pool.

I think the proliferation of the Tiger Woods story, and the stories, of most of our high-paid athletes has convinced us that all we need to do is spend all day, every day, working with our child on their sport, and they will grow up to support us with their million-dollar contract and endorsements.

It’s not going to happen like that. You can work with your son or daughter all you want, but they may not grow up to earn untold riches. But you sure can mess up their childhood and your relationship with them.

Here a few tips to help improve your relationship with your child through sports, while embracing the POSSIBILITY that they might just be the next Mia Hamm, Tiger Woods, Venus Williams, or Peyton Manning.

Don’t over-schedule them! Give them a break – kids have to play! Whether it is with Barbie Dolls at a young age, or electronics as they grow, kids need time to play; especially early on. It’s simply not fair to them to have them involved in something every night of the week, all year long, with games and travel on the weekend. We are creating small ninja-gymnast-ice skaters with the volume of activities some children are scheduled for each week; judo, karate, tai kwon do, gymnastics, hockey, baseball, soccer. And that’s just one child’s schedule!

One activity per season is generally a good rule. It will help give them the time they need to develop, and won’t stress you out and drive you crazy tying to get them from place to place.

Build their love of the game – whatever it is. If you can’t take the time to coach your child, then spend some time with them in the evenings or on the weekends playing and working with them on their basic skills. Throw the football around, go bowling, kick the soccer ball, play tennis – whatever is they are interested in. If you show more of an interest in their playing, and less about them winning, they will come to love the fun aspect of the game, and will work harder to become better.

Show up. Be the supportive parent, not the loud angry parent at games. Be present to help your kids before and after practice, but step back to let the coaches do their jobs. When it comes to came time, be supportive of your child, that’s it. There is no need to scream at other peoples kids, the refs, the coaches, etc. Think about the message you are sending your child with your behavior at their events.

Get them the 10,000 hours. Malcolm Gladwell wrote an amazing book – one of my favorites, Outliers – on what makes people successful. The most obvious fact that came out of his research was the Rule of 10,000 hours. Whether it was the Beatles, Bill Gates, or Mozart, they all had run into a fortunate opportunity in their lives to acquire 10,000 hours of practice in their area of expertise. From there, they became the best at what they do.

You can set up the situation, somewhat, for your child to accrue 10,000 hours of practice, but each one of these master’s in their area ran across an amazing amount of luck that granted them this time. You can do a little, but you can’t do it all – don’t force your child to spent 10,000 hours this year in front of a piano.

Allow them to say “No”. Your child should have the final say in whether or not they want to participate in a given activity. Don’t force it – this is a sure way to break down your relationship with them. If they want to take a season off from soccer, let them. If they are done with softball and not interested in playing ever again, that’s fine. Do not put the pressure on your children of living your sports life vicariously through them – there are plenty of adult leagues if you want to play. But let your child decide what activities best fit their personality.

Good luck. It’s not an easy job – parenting. I don’t recommend you complicate it further by putting excess pressure on yourself or your child.

The Charlie Sheen Guide to Parenting

You may have missed the rants and public implosion of the Charlie Sheen empire a few weeks ago - but surely you haven't missed your opportunity to catch him live on his My Violent Torpedo of Truth / Defeat is Not an Option Tour this past weekend in Detroit and Chicago, or coming soon to a venue near you, have you?!




Although I am not sure what "ol' Chuck" will be talking about on tour", I have boiled down a few of his more recent ideas for your use in your parenting endeavors. I was pleased to see some parents already using these concepts on the fields of our local youth soccer program over this past weekend.



"DUH Winning!" - winning isn't just important, it is everything. It is the only thing. Win at all costs. Win not matter who the opponent is. If you are winning work harder to win some more. Sportsmanship is for 'normal people, people who aren't special'. They should have just left her in the game and let her keep scoring!



I guess for you 'normal people', teaching your children not to brag about winning, and to be a good sport is one of those things you do. I guess if you don't want to live the Charlie Sheen prescribed "rock-n-roll lifestyle", you could teach your children about it. It's a difficult boundary - you want to teach your child to work hard, have fun, and succeed; but that succeeding 'too much' is not good sportsmanship. Running up the score in real life is not favorably received.



Example - there was a young lady this weekend who scored 7 soccer goals; that's about twice as many goals as there usually are in an entire game. Even when the coach pulled her back, or had her on the sideline, the team still went on to score around 20 goals. You could tell the coach was struggling with trying to encourage his team to work hard, but he also didn't want to embarrass the other team. It's at a young age that lessons like this can be taught. Having a discussion with a 6-year old about sportsmanship can go a long way to developing a well adjusted 16-year old. How do you teach your children to be good sports? What do you say to encourage them to work hard?



Charlie would say you just don't have the "Adonis DNA" to stomach winning.



It's all about your kids "waking up one day and realizing how cool dad is!" In the book of Charlie, being cool is the rule, especially when it comes to kids. That means buying them everything they want, never saying "No", being their best friend, saying what you want when you want to them, and "you know, signing all the checks on the front" so they don't have to earn money but just have it. Do these things, and you will raise children with "tiger blood in their veins".



For the rest of you parents out there, setting boundaries, encouraging your children to earn money and possessions, and saying "No" to their sometimes irrational or egocentric requests (the ones that are pretty typical of child and adolescent development, apparently you just want to raise "normal" kids.



Finally, if you want to raise kids like Charlie Sheen, you should probably have them watch plenty of Charlie Sheen and that means at least a daily dose of that show he is on, right? While you are at it, they should probably be watching whatever else they want along those lines, too. Television today has plenty of great messages to share with your children, you don't need to monitor what they watch - they should probably have their own tv with cable or satellite access in their bedroom by around age 5. That way, they can learn all the valuable lessons of that Charlie Sheen show, and find out about the wonderful world of marketing and advertising that is available through television.



For you who don't want to be an "F-18 deploying ordnance to the ground", you might want to monitor what your kids watch, and certainly not allow them to watch that show. Find out what kinds of messages your kids are receiving from their television viewing habits. Know what the kids are watching when you're not with them, and ask them about what they watch. For every show on tv that has a Charlie Sheen message, there are other shows that offer educational and entertaining information - see The Discovery Channel or The History Channel to find out more. Also, take the television out of your kids room - watch tv as a family and discuss what you view.



Those are just a few of Charlie's tips - you can find out more on his tv show, or continue to feast on the media feeding frenzy that is his life. I am sure you can find a few hours each day of internet and news coverage. If, on the other hand, you don't agree with his tips - if you don't have Adonis DNA and tiger blood - maybe you could just turn off the tv and go for a walk with your family.