#137 The hardest answer is the right answer

guest and great friend. You've been with me for twenty two years or something like that, and you've always been the guy that helped me dissect problems that I've had in my life. You've always been the one that give me sound advice. And so because of the format of this podcast giving other people advice, I want to be able to use your advice for others. Yeah, happy to be here and thankful for the invite. Back. Man, you've been on probably be a while fifteen episodes, Yeah, it's

been a while, though maybe more maybe twenty. Yeah, have you missed me? You've been doing an like how is it doing it solo versus with a guest solo, because sometimes you'll be by yourself and man, you'll be getting fired up, and I can tell you just want to look at somebody and be like you feel me. Yeah, it's it's easier to not have a schedule and just go I'm gonna knock out a podcast and hit record. Yeah, it's harder because I have to talk the whole time, right,

I don't get to breathe. Yeah, So if you have a question, email Grangersmith Podcast at gmail dot com, and that's where we're gonna read from today, out of order, not prompted, no notes in front of us. Bernie has no idea what's coming at him, and I don't either, So we're going to go into this right now. Subject line of this first one says still living with the in laws. Question comes from Rosy says, Hey, Grange, and my husband and I are coming up on our tenure innniversary,

yet we still live with his parents. We have three dogs excuse me, three kids, a service dog. We desperately want to move out of the house, but every time we mention a word or hint about moving, his parents panic. They tell us they will that if we leave, they will surely die. They say they can't live without us. Yet they are verbally abusive to myself and my husband. They yell at my kids every day. Don't get me wrong,

they mean well, they could be nice and sweet. Sometimes I just feel like the stress is eating us all. How can we deal with this and still honor them? Currently living in California praying to move to Texas. This comes from Rosie. Wow, there's a lot of people that are in California praying to move to Texas. I feel like there are. I was just in California and heard from a lot of them. Yeah. Wow, so ten years, I'm assuming that they've been with the in laws of

the entire time. Yeah, So, I think Rosie's Rosie's issue here is that we've said on this podcast a lot that you know, there's a principle to honor your your mother and father, but but there's there's there's counteracting principles in this situation of parents honoring the children of the man getting married and moving away from mom and dad. So there's there's some conflicting principles to talk about here.

How do you start this conversation with Rosie? Well, the first thing that sticks out to me with Rosie is that I believe and this podcast is always going to be tough. Love so love you, Rosie and and all you people that are writing in. I love that you trust us with something that is such a deep question for you and your family. And after I get that out of the way, I want to say that I feel like this this is falling more on your husband's shoulders,

this is yours. This is something your husband needs to man up. He got three kids. Yeah, he needs to man up. And I'm one hundred percent rosy for moving and and I think you could honor them and still move. And I think you could. You could say we love you guys. We were so grateful for the opportunity to stay here and to have this foundation at home, but we have to in order to really blossom our own family, we have to leave. We have to leave the nest,

and we want to come back and visit. If they were on hospice or something like with cancer, and it might be a little different. That doesn't sound like that's what's going on here. It sounds like they just have some parents that are that are needy. Yeah, yeah, I think the husband guy, Rosie's husband, like you said, needs

to man up. And it's so hard without you sitting next to us, and us be able to ask you questions like why is there another reason why you have been there other than the parents or the in laws trying to be controlling. I think that. I mean, if these are reasonable people, they're gonna understand. Oh yeah, of course you need your own space and you need to move out. It doesn't mean that they're abandoning, you know, the in laws. And maybe it's just a small step.

You know, Granger always talks about these things that you know, we're standing in front of the mountain and it's just too much. It's overwhelming to think about, you know, moving from California to Texas and really abandoned. Maybe you just move down the street. Hey, we're gon We're gonna start small. We're gonna move down the street. We're still gonna come over for a brunch on Sundays and the kids can come over and and then kind of maybe a slower process and just see how that is. Texas is a

long way. Yeah, that's a big step. Yep. Maybe that's part of the of the issue. And this falls on the husbands shoulders and Rosie. It's going to be a tough, tough situation. It's gonna be a tough conversation with your husband because you also want to honor him, but he needs to step up as the leader of the family and man up and say, my wife's not happy, my kids are being verbally abused. We're going to move out, and we're going to still going to come visit and

still be here for you. But but yeah, you're right, Rosie, your intuition here is right. Your question. I think everything is right. If there's verbal abuse going up, or abuse in any kind going on, you need to remove your kids and yourself from the situation. And regardless of being sensitive to the in laws or I understand you need to be delicate, but I mean, your husband and your kids are your first priority, so you need to get them to a safe place. Yep, yeah, sorry, Rosie. Tough spot.

It's time to go, start small, It's time to go. Yeah, time to go. Okay. Next question, subject line says, my best friend is liking my exes post. Hey, grade, I'd like to remain anonymous. My best friend started liking my ex's Instagram post after we broke up, and even added her on Facebook post breakup. We had a healthy dialogue about that and how it was making me feel. So he respectfully stopped several months of pass now, and I

noticed he recently started doing it again. They weren't friends before we started dating, which makes me question his motives. Is this my own insecurity kicking in or do I have a reason to reevaluate whether I could trust this friend moving forward? How would you handle the situation? Thanks

for all you do anonymous social media. Anonymous, You're probably not gonna listen to me, but if you wanted to, you know, get a wild hair and say, you know, take advice of Granger's friend burns, delete your social media account, maybe get off your phone for a while. Guys, these devices, I don't believe that we were made as humans to be able to have access to as many options and people and relationships to manage and to sort through that

we do it is. I mean, there's so much depression and anxiety and struggle that it's causing because we're not made to do that. And so if you want to be bold and not have to deal with that, just get off of it. Maybe it's just for a time, Okay, let's not get crazy. I mean, I'm trying to convince Leslie to let me get a flip phone and get rid of my phone. But I understand that's extreme, So

maybe let's not go that far. Let's start with just maybe take a break from social media for a while, so that you get to be where your feed are, you get to be present and the only information in things you're having to deal with or what's in front of you right now. Maybe start there. Yeah, so what Bernie's doing here is anonymous. He's he's telling you in a way that you have to take responsibility for this. You're because that's why, because that's the only thing you

can control is your own responsibility to the situation. You can't control your ex, you can't control your friend, and but what you can control is not seeing it and not letting it affect you. So you take, first of all, take responsibility for yourself in this situation, because you're going to get better now now just dissecting the problem itself. She's an ex, right, you're not together, she's not your property,

And there's not really a rule that says that. So much time has gone by and your friend could never like an Instagram picture, and I don't think that has anything to do with trusting him moving forward, either yeah, yeah, I think she may be or he or she may be taking it personally when they don't need to. People are doing their own thing, and most of the time it has more to do with them than it does with you, and so I maybe wouldn't take it personally.

And let me say one more thing and then I promise ione to get off my social media digital information soapbox, because there's a lot I've noticed a lot of really young listeners to this podcast. A lot of people that ride in they're fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen years old. Right, So guys, just take a minute and just consider the

effects that your phone has on your life. Go into your settings and look at screen time and just look at the number of hours per day that you are looking at your phone, and then you can multiply that, I think times each hour you know that's in there average, it's like fifteen days per year. This is a scary experiment for you guys to do. When I did it, I was like, oh my goodness. But if you if you do that, you'll start to realize how dependent you are on that device. A lot of it can be

spent on social media. So just aware, maybe be aware and that there's people around you, and there's things around you that could use your focus and attention and maybe it'll end up helping you a So that's it. Yeah, let me piggyback one last thing on that we keep saying one last thing. If you say you need Facebook for work or there's a legitimate reason there is, there is this idea that you should always block your ex anyway,

just block her. Maybe you can't get off Facebook, maybe you need something you know, you need to do it for work, but you need to block her. Absolutely. You can't wake up in the morning and think what is she doing and look her up on Facebook and then see your friend like the post that is that's damaging your day, is damaging your mind, it's hurting your heart, it's it's prolonging the heartbreak. So when you break up with someone and and it's done, it sounds like this

is done in this story. You need to block her and if you need to tell her, hey, great, if you need to, if you need to shoot her attacks and say hey, I just need to tell you so

that you know this is not personal to you. This is this is not me hating you, but this is me working on myself and needing to be better because I'm heartsick, and in order for me to get better, I hope you understand that I'm going to block you, not for a hate reason, but just for the reason that I can't for my own sanity look at you every day on Facebook. Problem solved. Yeah, I think that's

your answer right there. As far as your friend, if he starts dating her, I mean, worst case he marries her, I mean that's gonna that could happen, but I don't think that's a trust issue. She's kind of free game, right. Yeah. I wonder how old these people are too. They didn't say today, No, okay, man, we're kind of We're kind of gonna go to something similar here. Next question says, hey, Gradeur, I'm Zach from Cincinnati. Have been struggling recently with my girlfriend.

She's very beautiful and I love her. She posts a lot of bikini pictures and videos on social media. I get worried and jealous that she's doing this for attention. Do you have any advice? Oh my gosh, but it's real, This is real. These are real problems today twenty twenty two. These are real problems, very real problems. So can I have a plug for strong father, Strong daughters. Go for it. If you haven't read that book and you're a dad out there of a daughter, please go read it. It

is incredible, Strong father, Strong Daughters. Because I think there who knows. We can't we can't assume the intentions of this girl. We can only take Did he say his name za Zach from Cincinnati? Okay? His I think he has a right to be kind of like feeling a little weird, right, yeah, I mean sure, I would probably feel weird, like sure, So I don't I don't know what to tell him. What do you say to her? I would say, there is I would say there's one

scenario where this works out. Two, there's two scenarios. One, she's a model and she's doing this because she's getting paid and that's her job. Two, she and I knew a girl like this at one point. She actually designed and made bikinis for a living, and she used other girls as to model the new the new line, the new summer line, and then she modeled a few times herself the new design. She literally knit them in her house and made these bikinis. Okay, those are your two reasons.

I don't think this is either one of those things. If she's I always am wary about anyone that's posting too many pictures with no friends in it. It's just them and there's no reason, there's nothing to promote behind it besides promoting their own ego. That's always a little weird to me. So like if I friend someone on Instagram, say someone say it's a radio personality, okay, or in a meet them and we become friends on Instagram and I look at their profile and it's every picture is

nothing but themselves. Everyone. There's no friends, our dogs, our parents or spouse. It's like, what's going on here? Yeah, yeah, that's weird. It's weird. So Zach, let's get practical. The practical step first is just talking to her. It sounds like he's young, he's pretty young. I'm guessing just say hey, I'll be totally honest. If you're gonna be very vulnerable, I'm gonna admit something that's embarrassing. But I'm a little

I'm a little weirded out. I'm a little a little jealous that you post these pictures for the world to see. And she's not gonna take that very well. Probably but then you're gonna find a lot out about your relationship at that point. If she's like, Hey, I want what's best for us in this relationship. If that's weird, I'm gonna stop doing it. You got a winner. Okay, that's a great, great answer, But I don't think she's gonna

say that. Yeah. Yeah, she's probably emotionally developing just like you. You know, they're in that kind of phase of like trying to figure out, you know, who they are and what they can trust and what they can't. And they either are looking putting things out there to see like what gets the attention the kind that they want. So I don't know, Man, she's going to get more likes if she's in a bikini then if she's in a

button up shirt, Yeah for sure. But maybe that's the question for for her from him is like, hey, is my attention not enough? Great? Is my the way that I love you and adore you and we'll do anything for you? Is that not enough? Because these photos it's kind of you saying like, hey, I need I need your attention and your millions of people. I need your attention and your affirmation, Like are my words not affirming enough?

And if not, then why Like it could be the start of a really deep, beautiful conversation or it could be the beginning of a break up. Yeah, but either way, I think you got to speak up, Zach. It's time. It's time, Zach bring it up to her. Let's hit another one. This says navigating parenthood and God. Hello. I'm the mom of three and I had a tough childhood. My mom was a huge Christian and shared custody of me and my sister with our biological dad. He was

and still is a non believer. He tried to convince me as a kid that God is not real. To give you an accurate picture of this, he had six six six tattooed on his neck. We no longer speak at all. Fast forward. I've worked through lots of anxiety around religion and have tried going to church, but I still struggle. I have three kids, ten, six and two. My ten year old recently had what I think was an anxiety attack. He asked me if life is real and how do we know that God is real? And

he was crying pretty hard. What advice would you give me and my husband to navigate through this with him? These are questions I still struggle with given my past trauma around religion. We go to church and we are believers, but it's still a very vulnerable subject in our house. Between my husband and me, we can almost discount the the dad talk, the six six six dad, So that was her dad, that was her dad, but he's not

in the picture anymore. So, so she was raised by her mom, shared custody with mom, who is a believer, yeah, and not believe her dad. Okay, But now her and her husband they're just wrestling with how to talk to through, how to know if God is real with their son

who is ten, ten six and two. Yeah, So I think the dad, kind of the grandpa is kind of irrelevant a little bit, right, But she's still it sounds like she's still Maybe she's just recognizing that she probably had doubts in her life as well through a broken marriage that she was raised in. So we're going to

talk about here, and this is it's great. This is great for Bernie and I because Bernie, you have a twelve, twelve, nine, twelve, nine and five and I have a ten and an eight and a newborn, so so we we know what ten is like. Bernie has had one and I have one now, and it's it's it is a critical This is critical is for parenting right now at this age. So how do we know how do we explain to a child that God is real? Well, it's going to really it's going to start with it's going to start

with parents honoring the Word of God through their lives. YEP. So for instance, when your your son has a baseball game tournament on Sunday morning at eight o'clock and you say, we're going to skip this turn ornament because we're going to church on Sunday morning, that's an example of living by the Word of God through your actions, so that he could see, oh, this is really important, Like this is a big deal. Going to church must be a really big deal to mom and dad and you, Mom, Julie,

this is your name. You're saying, we go to church and we're believers. But it's but you struggle with religion, so it's important for them to see that you're not struggling with it. Yeah, that was the first thing that I was thinking, is your kids understanding that we're all kind of wrestling. I have talks with Boston all the time of like, man, do this parenting thing is hard. Like, I love you so much and I want this for you, but I also want to let you make your decisions

and your good choices and bad choices. But I feel like the best ministry that I have to my kids, like you said, is the way that I relate my life to the Word of God. So they don't just see Sunday morning we go to church, but they see the way that we stop and we talk to the homeless person on the corner, and that we have these bags in our car already made it so we can so we can help them and do something. The way that the music that we listen to is, you know,

it's glorifying to God. There's there's all of these things that are pouring out of a genuine heart posture that wants to glorify God with my life. That I think that that even though I may fumble through the actual words of you know, telling them about the story of the Gospel, maybe it's not eloquent and maybe it's kind of fumbled around, But the way we live our lives out of that love that we have, I think that's the best way we communicate it. Yeah, Paul says, and

his epistles. He'll say that the evidence of God is all around us. We're left without excuse, and that's in creation itself. That means sometimes you take a vacation with your kids to the Grand Canyon and you walk out to the edge of the Grand Canyon and you tell your kids as you're looking at it and everyone's in awe of it, you say, isn't God incredible? Look at this? Look at this place? Isn't God incredible? And your six year old and your two year old are hearing that,

they're left without an excuse to go. This wasn't an accident. This was by design. You step out in your front yard when a big storm comes in in June and the clouds roll in and the big thunderheads and all the colors and the lightning, and you look up and you go, God is incredible. Look at this. God is incredible. And they're going to look at you and go, yeah, I see that. I see it now. And it also

happens through your own struggles, because we struggle. Believers will struggle, and you through your struggle you say, I'm I'm mommy, why are you crying? I'm just I'm so sad, but I know through my tears and through my sadness, I know that that God has a plan, that God has a purpose, and so I trust God has a purpose even though I'm crying and I'm hurting, and this is very hard we lost grandma or whatever. But you relate

to your kids. You speak out loud that we lost grandma and I'm so sad, but I know that I'm trusting. I'm trusting the purpose of God in this, and they're soaking that in they're absorbing that from mom. Yeah, I think that's great. I would suggest to Julie, and Granger says this on this podcast all the time, which I think is awesome and honestly has impacted me in my

spiritual walk in my life. Is you, Julie personally, just dig into the Word every morning if you possibly can, because out of that, you're gonna know what to say, You're gonna know what to do. It's just going to be natural that your kids are gonna be like, wow, there is My mom just gives credit to God for all things. So that's where they're going to place their trust. Is like, no, well God made this and God did this.

Not well, I worked hard and I got this job or this house is like, oh no, man, God is so good. So yeah, I would just dig into the word and start there. And when you do that, Julie, for instance, for me, I read the Bible every morning, and I've purposely made my place where I read in our living room where the kids wake up and have to walk past me, so that every morning they see

the Dad is living for this word. It's a lifeline because although I mess up and I struggle and I stumble through life, I'm going back to be renew dude. Every morning. I'm going back to the source because I need it. Because literally my life depends on those words. And I want my kids the first thing in the morning to see Dad is going back to be refueled

this morning. Yesterday he struggled through something, anything, but he's being He's being renewed today because he has to, not because he wants to, or because it's an it's a hobby or a habit, but because his life depends on it. And I want them to get older and get into their twenties and look back on being young and be like, I remember, Dad, what do you remember about your dad?

I remember he got up every morning before we were up and he was in there reading the Bible with his eyes wide open, like he had to read it. I want them to think that, and then I want them to do it. Yeah, let's take a break, beer back. All right, we're just going down the list. Reading these questions got my secret weapon guest Bernie cal go with us. And this next one says, dear granger, I recently went

through a two year relationship. I thought the girl was the right one for me, and she tried manipulating me into coming back into a relationship with her, and I told her that it was not going to work out because I was depressed for two weeks after she broke up with me. But my mom told me that I'm better off without a relationship, especially when that's going to break my heart. I told her I'd rather stay single

for a couple of years. I've even made plans to move out to Oregon, where I live, to move out to Cheatham County, Tennessee and start a new life. Looking for some relationship advice in any tips. I'm getting closer to God and starting a new life in a new town. I'm nervous to go, but I'm also looking forward to this. I'm twenty five years old. Okay, so there's a lot of questions in there, relocation, closer to God, relationships. Yeah, and if y'all have a question, email Grangersmith Podcast at

gmail dot com. I have a couple requests. One, keep it about a phone length long. That's a perfect length to read. If it gets longer than a phone length, then it's harder to read on the podcast. My second request is make sure you it's it's better if you put periods in commas. I'm shocked with the questions that don't. It's like a long question and there's not a single period in the whole question. Is that like a phone that's like a texting thing? I guess. So, I mean

just everything's so casual these days. We have you know, abbreviate words tots magoats or tots sobs or whatever it is. And I'm definitely man getting old, like really fast, because I'm looking at like some of the younger cultural things and I'm just like, oh, back in my day, we did like sorry guys, old man moment. So he did

he say anonymous? No? So this is Wade. This comes from Wade, and so Wade just going through like Bernie said a lot of different things here, But I think you're right for not going back to this girl that you went through this relationship with. You broke your heart, she manipulated you. Good for you, man, that you're making a step that a lot of people have troubled doing, and you're you're recognizing that, Hey, I was really hurt after this breakup, and I'm going to get out of it.

I'm not going to go back into it. In fact, I'm not going to go into any relationship right now until I feel confident in myself and confident as a single person. So good for you, man. Sometimes in doing that is an exercise of doing that, you have to move out of your hometown. Yeah, you're doing that. Yeah, So what's the question here? He's just looking over and looking from the future. Yeah, for some advice, I think

there's three words for old Wade. Mama knows best. With what Mama said, she said, you don't need to go back with her. I think that opens the door. You're twenty five, you're still young. Move I actually moved. You moved to Tennessee younger than that, younger than that. So we moved Tennessee to Georgia. Back to Tennessee. Back to Texas, go move, experience a different culture. Man, You're going to a different environment, make new friends. Like you said, you're

working on yourself. You're trying to become closer to God. And there's no way or no better way to be closer to God than stepping out in faith and saying, okay God. If this is if Cheatham, Tennessee, is that right, Cheatam County. Cheatham County, Tennessee is where you're calling me to go. And I don't know anybody, I don't have a job. I'm going to go because you're calling me. Dude, You're going to be closer to God through that. For sure. You're listening to two guys that did this when we're

in our low twenties. Both of us moved many states away to Tennessee. Actually, and I didn't know a single soul. You didn't either, and we just completely started new. So part of your question is getting closer to God, Well, that's getting plugged in right away. To a church in Cheatham County. I would go, and you might have to go to a couple. You might just sit through a couple of Sunday services to feel where it feels like

that's your personality and these are your people. And when you do get plugged in, get involved, go serve with them. If they have like a serve Saturday or something where they're going to go into the community and cut limbs with the chainsaw. Sign up, go do it. Yeah, go for it, Wade. You may go to a party and meet a buddy who plays the guitar and then y'all song swap all night, and then twenty two years later

do a podcast with them. That's our story. It could happen, but that will happen to you, Wade, do it all right. Next question says Dating Advice. Hey, I'm Garrett. I'm twenty one years old and I'm a custodian and I met a para teacher at work I really like and I think she likes me too. I'm pretty I have a pretty severe stutter, and she's always kind to me and gives me compliments, and I give her compliments too. But I have never found the courage to ask her out.

I can only carry out a normal conversation, but when I'm about to ask her, I study a stutter pretty much the whole conversation. What would you recommend I do? Vulnerable, the vulnerable. That's where this that's where this is. Daniel, Who are Garrett? Your email says, Daniel Garrett, you are. That stutter is part of you, right, that is you in a sense, it's what makes you you. So if she didn't like the stutter, she didn't like you. So she might as well know right from the very beginning.

You come in and you say, and I've said this kind of thing before on this podcast, and so I want to say it's difficult to do this, but you just say, my name is Garrett. I think you're beautiful and I really like you, and I would love to grab a coffee with you sometime. Oh, by the way, you hear that stutter. I stutter when I'm nervous around pretty girls. And so I'm sorry that I can't I can't talk completely clearly because I stutter a little bit.

And I hope you're okay with that. But I'm just trying to tell you that I would love to have a cup of coffee with you. Yeah. I think that's great. I think being your true self because if you try to hide it, yeah, it's eventually going to come out down the road. And wouldn't you just rather know from the jump. Man, this girl likes me for me, all of me, the stutters and all the stuff, like she knows me from the jump And it sounds like this

is a it goes away whenever he gets more comfortable. Yeah, so after you go to coffee and you guys talk for a while, maybe it's not as big of a deal for her because you're comfortable around here and you don't stutter as much around there. It will still be a thing in the future for him, always, right, right, Yeah, So what did you say about Jordan Peterson earlier? Something about you? If you what is it you said about If you're lying, If you don't if you have something

to say, right and you stay quiet, you're lying. Yeah, So hiding the stutter from her, trying to hide it is essentially lying to her at the beginning. It's tough to understand that, but it's the truth because you trying to be your best and not stutter is a form of a lie instead of just telling her straight up, I would love to have coffee with you. And then you stutter and you say sorry. Do you hear that?

That's the stutter? When I get nervous right out there you're just being totally truthful and you're being yourself, and if she doesn't love that instantly about you, then she's the wrong girl. Absolutely. There's nothing more attractive I think for a woman or for a man, is somebody who is completely confident in their skin who God made them to be, with a sense of humility for sure, not like an arrogant confidence, but somebody who understands. Man, this is who I am, who God made me to be.

I'm confident and secure in that, and I'm offering that to the world. I got nothing to lose here, nothing to hide. So next question says, how to find a girl that shares your values in faith? Hey, Grandeer, my name is Brendan. I'm twenty years old. I'm a Christian from Florida. I don't find the party in drinking seem very fun, and dating apps seem to be very hit or miss. How would you suggest I try to meet someone.

I'm working full time and going to college and trying to make a good life for myself, but it seems like other people my age only care about partying. My friends and family have always told me I'm a good person, but lately I've been doubting that myself. What am I doing wrong? Thanks Brendan. Trying to find somebody with your values, you just have to narrow the scope of where you're looking. You can't you can't go to Chick fil A and

you're trying to get a stake. It's like, I really want to filat Mignon and they're like, well, that's not on the menu. Here. You came to the wrong place. You came a Chick fil A. You're wanting fla Mignon. You're looking in the wrong place. So you're looking for a girl and you want her to have the same values as you. You've got to change restaurants and you know the restaurant, you know the places you like to

hang out. Yeah, that's good. I think you've said this on this podcast before, but I think it's worth repeating because it I think it is important in what he's going through. I would honestly recommend taking your eyes off of this girl that you want to date. You're twenty years old, you're young, and there's a whole world in front of you. You're a believer, So if you don't say I'm a Christian, my answer is probably a little

bit different. But if you have a Christian worldview, focus every bit of your energy on Jesus and chasing after him God every morning. Like Granger says, be in the word God, what do you want for my life? What do you want? Where is it? Where is it? And as you're walking in that, I feel like He's going to put some passion. I feel like early on for both of us it was music and man, that what a blessing that He gave us this vision. And girls

along the way that wanted a date. I was like, no, man, God has called me to do this and to spread this message in this way, and I am doing that. And it wasn't until I looked to my left and right, like you say, and saw somebody that was doing that same thing as much as me, and then we kind of started hanging out, and then we hung out a little more. And so that would be my recommendation, and is switch the focus focus on Jesus and just pursue His will for your life as hard as you possibly can.

And don't I think we tend to put a timeline on well, I have to like find the girl and get married in between this time. If I'm gonna have kids at this time, and I'm going to die at this time. We're working it back and saying, well, man, twenty to twenty five, I gotta find who I'm going to spend the rest of my life with. Just throw that out the window. That's just that's our culture. And

I don't think that that's true. I think that you just focus on him and in his time and his perfect will, that person's going to come along and you're going to know it. Yeah that. Jonathan piccluda pastor and author in Waco, Texas. He wrote a book called Outdated. Highly recommend this book for you, Brendan Outdated, you get the audiobook, get the physical copy. But he says something

very similar to what Bernie just said. He says, chase after Christ, live your life as though God is number one and glorifying Him is number one in your life. And as you're on that path, as you're walking that path, the first time you find a girl that is doing the same thing that there's honoring God and loving God and putting him first, ask her out on a date. It's really that simple. Like it's that simple. And if it doesn't happen this year or next year or ten years,

that's okay, but when you do ask her for coffee? Yeah, Because if you get to the end of your life and that person has never come, would you rather look back and say, man, I spent the last thirty years looking for this person never found, or I spent the last thirty years chasing Jesus and I'm ready to go home. Yeah. Yeah. We could find plenty of questions on this podcast of bad relationships, like it's probably the next one on the queue.

It's a bad relationship and here you are without a relationship. You're better off? Man? Yeah, okay, ont said another one now here It is parents going through divorce subject fine, Hey Grangeer. First off, First off, absolutely love your music and your podcast. My name is Emily. I go to Texas A and M Whoop. My parents are recently going through the divorce process. My dad has gone about it entirely the wrong way and is losing everyone because of it.

He recently blocked my number. I've nothing but hear him out. It's hard because he's my dad, but he's turning into someone I don't know. My mom and dad have always been close and she deserves none of this. I love her with my whole heart and it pains me to watch her hurt me. My mom, brother and sister have all become so close due to this. I'm not sure how to handle it. Thank you, As always in gigam, Emily,

thank you tough question. Let me point out something that you might not have noticed through this, but your very last thing you said is me, my mom, my brother, and sister have all become so close due to this. That's a blessing. Yeah, sometimes we have to look for the blessing. They go, wow, it took this terrible situation, but now I'm really close with my siblings like I've

never have been before. Yeah, I'm glad you said that because I think a lot of times it's years after that we look back, because I think about the relationship I had with my brother and sister, everything that we've been through in our life lives that has made us really stronger, and I'm looking back on it thinking, oh, man, what a blessing that was. But now, hearing Granger in the moment, maybe you can have that just awareness of

what's happening in real time. Right now, it's tough. I'm still a little bit confused as to why Dad has what happened that would one make them divorce and two make him block his daughter and his family. He's handling it wrong. She said that it's a tough thing for a daughter. I think you've talked about this before, for a child to have to navigate a parent acting emotionally immature or yeah, out of line. I know the right answer, and it's the hardest one. The hardest answer is the

right one here. What do you do about Dad? You forgive him and you love him. You can't change his actions, but you could change the way you were act to him. And so what do you do forgive him? What do you do tomorrow? Forgive him again? It doesn't mean you condone his actions. It doesn't mean you accept his actions. It doesn't mean you pull him into Thanksgiving and you make him sit back at the table. It means none of that. It just means in your heart you say, Dad,

I love you and I forgive you. This situation crushes me and Mom doesn't deserve it, and you should never block your daughter's number. But I still forgive you because I love you, because you're my dad. Have you heard that line kindness leads to repentance? Yeah? I hate that because it's so true. But it goes against everything in the moment that I want to do. It's like, no, I want you to see how you messed up, and I want to tell you and then I want you

to apologize and repent of what you've done. Right, But kindness really leads to repentance. People hearts are not going to get there by you kind of condemning them. So I think what you're saying grace and forgiveness and patience and kindness, it's going to be really, really tough and a burden that as being a college student with your dad, you shouldn't really have to bear. But this is the lot that God has given you, and you get a chance to respond to it the best that you possibly can.

So I would agree with you, Gris, That's how I'd handle it. And love your mom. You know she needs you right now, She needs you more than she ever has needed you, and so be there for her. Love her. If she needs a she needs you to run at the convenience store and grab a diet coke, go do it. Serve her, serve her and be there for her. Just to listen. You don't always have to give advice, but just just listen, be there, for her. And when she asked, what you're going to do about your dad and she

wants to work you up, say I'm going to forgive them? What? No, he's an ee, but I forgive him, mom, Because essentially we're all evil. And like you said, it can be really easy for people to associate forgiveness with condoning. Yes, and that's not We got to separate those two things. That's not biblical at all. Try to stay away from the circles that are going to want to gang up and just talk gossip. What do you hate about Dad? I'll tell you what I hate about Dad? And another thing,

what do you hate about dad? We all hate Dad. Let's gid him. Yeah, just avoid that, walk out of the room if that starts happening, and just or just tell people, hey, I still love him, He's still Dad. What Yes? I do? I do? And and I hope, I hope that one day if and when I mess up, you forgive me because you know what God has So try to live that of not it's not easy, Emily, it's not easy, But that's the posture I would take with this. And it's not quick. Just so you know

it's it's going to be a while. Next question, subject line says mentally exhausted. I've been mentally exhausted and feel drained when going to sleep and waking up. My life feels good. I'm working every day, I go to school. I don't have a relationship, but I have plenty of friends. Why am I so exhausted physically and mentally? Matthew? This

is a great question for Bernie. I don't even know what he's gonna say, But if I was feeling this mentally and physically exhausted, you would say time for the wilderness. Wouldn't you speak into Matthew about your wilderness talk? Yeah? I think Matthew, without knowing you and without knowing all the circumstances of your life, it sounds like he said he has a good life. Yeah. I think that we live in just a different culture now, where there's so

much stimulation and we're having a so information. I feel like I could stop my life right now and spend the rest of it thinking through and processing everything that I've experienced up to now. Unfortunately that's not going to happen, like I'm still going to be consuming more experiences and information to process. I think if you can develop a habit, and this is really hard. It's hard for me. It's a discipline that we just have to keep getting better at.

But stillness and solitude, be alone with your thoughts. I think practicing mental exercises for me. I do it every morning, and I do it with the motivation of God. I want my heart, soul, mind, and strength to glorify you to its fullest capability. And so in the same way that I'm eating healthy foods and I'm exercising my body, and I'm reading your word and I'm filling up with you every morning, I'm doing the same thing from my mind.

I want to be able to focus in every moment on your word and what you're willing is calling me to. So I'm gonna I'm going to have some mental exercises that help me. These distractions come in and I just I mentally push them away and then I can come back to focus. When you walk through the wilderness, I think what happens is you give yourself the space to really sort through a lot of these thoughts that keep making you mentally exhausted. So I would give yourself some space.

Journal Granger always talks about journaling, just getting those things when you read them, you can either dismiss them as I don't I don't know why I keep thinking about that, but you won't do that until you actually see it, or you can understand that. Man, there's maybe there's something here that I need to really just sit with and process. There's there's a deeper issue here as to why I

keep coming back here. If you're mentally exhausted, one, you have to think about what you're putting in your body. That's the food that you're eating, that drinks that you're drinking, but also what are you looking at, what are you watching? I talked about the you know, the phones earlier, of spending so much time looking at your phones. All of those things matter. What is going in and if you're

overloading the system, it's just going to be exhausted. So give yourself some space, consider what it is that you're putting in, and then maybe redesign how your mental life could look moving forward. That's great. I would ask this question if this was me. I'd ask this to Bernie because he thinks through this kind of stuff. And I think you mentioned some great things like food, your food, you feel drained when you're going to sleep, and waking up.

There's a good book called Everything Starts with Food, and yeah, there's a way of looking at there's certain things that you're putting in your body that you don't even know that could be deffecting you. And it doesn't necessarily have to be chocolate or sugar. It could be it could be beans, or bread or tomatoes. It could be something simple. As you kind of dissect what you're putting in your body, you realize, yeah, I don't react good with bread. Could

just be you. And then I would say, you know, get some kind of workout routine. You get some kind of workout routine going whatever suit you. I don't care if it's jogging or walking, or strength training or treadmill or yoga, I don't I don't care. Find something that fits your personality and stick with it three to seven days a week. Do it and you'll sleep better. You'll sleep better, and then when you sleep better, you wake up better. And then the mental thing, it sounds like

you're gonna need an electronic sabbath. Make it make a day. This is gonna happen when you're you come to the point of emailing me saying you're mentally exhausted, you're gonna say, Okay. On on Sundays, I'm gonna I'm gonna stayway from elect tronics completely. I'm gonna avoid screens and electronics and and I'll probably do some kind of camping trip where I go out by myself. I'm gonna go in the woods and I'm gonna camp in a tent with no electronics,

and I'm just gonna make a fire. I'm gonna cook some hot dogs on the fire, and I'm just gonna stare at the fire and listen to the wind and codies, and man, I think I want to go. You're making as I don't know. Man, these are this is how you could And then if you come back and you feel a little bit better, then you go, oh that worked. I'm gonna do it again in two weeks, and and

then practically every day every single day. Man. iPhone has gotten pretty good with designing the phone where you could set it up where like mine, mine turns off it like eight point thirty. It goes into it shuts down all the apps I don't need, and it puts it on silent and or do not disturb, and then it doesn't kick on till like eight am the next morning, and then it allows me to use those apps again. So and I don't sleep with my phone. I think

that's important too. When I take a shower, start winding down, my phone goes to the charger and I don't see it again until the next morning. And if I do need to see it again, those apps are shut down. So iPhone and I'm sure Android does too, but they've set up a lot of really cool things to say, Hey, this is the time of day when I'm going to use it, and this is the time of day I'm not falling asleep on the pillow. Staring at your phone is I think one of the worst things you could

do for your mental health. Yep, because you used to go unconscious, and even if you've got to check a post or something, you go unconscious by looking at all that you just go down this rabbit hole and then before you know it, you're exhausted and you're still staring at the phone. So go put it in another room and set it up where you can't touch it after a certain time at night. I think that's going to help a lot all those things. Yeah, I mean, you think about if you what happens if your diet is

just sugar, alcohol, caffeine. Yeah, well, I mean it's a terrible diet, my guitar player. Yeah, nobody's going to recommend that diet. But yet there's things mentally that we feed ourselves that are the equivalent. But we haven't yet yet because I think there's studies that are happening now that are going to be eye opening associated screen time and the things that we're actually looking at with the mental exhaustion that he's talking about right now. So man, that's

all we got today. Thank you for coming. Bro awesome. Yeah, time flies when you're having fun. Man. Thank you guys for listening. See you next Monday. Thanks for joining me on the Grangersmith Podcast. I appreciate all of you. Guys. You could help me out by rating this podcast on iTunes. If you're on YouTube, subscribe to this channel, hit that little like button and notification spell so that you never miss anytime I upload a video. If you have a question for me that you would like me to answer,

email Grangersmith Podcast at gmail dot com. Ye