Seeing the World Through My Son’s Eyes with Lake Dawson

Hello and welcome back to Raising Men. On this show, you know, we talk a lot about strategies and statistics and paradigms. We talk to experts, and it's all about raising boys into good men. But as fathers, if we're honest, we spend a lot of time talking at our kids and not nearly as much time just listening to them. So in honor of Father's Day coming up, I have invited A very special guest into the studio for a quick low pressure check-in.

He's one of the biggest reasons I started the podcast in the first place. And he's my son, Lake. Lake is here with us today. Lake, thanks for hanging out with me on the microphone. Welcome to the show, buddy. Hi, y'all. How about you say hi to the audience over there? Hi, y'all. Who are you? uh And you, and you, and you, and you. All right.

Okay, so I promise not to grill you today, but I am really interested in understanding what the world looks like from your shoes. Okay. So uh on this show I talk to adults all the time about how we want to raise boys to be strong and kind and full of integrity, to be good men. But sometimes adults overthink things. We overcomplicate things a lot. So then when you look at your friends and your coaches, when you look at the people that you look up to, what does a truly good guy look like to you?

Uh he play video games, he kind to me, he give me Marshmallows, okay. And candy and uh he let me go over to But and he played the same games with me on Roblox and he played with me on Otter Gain Till. Okay. All right, now you and your friends are growing up in a world where phones and tablets and video games and social media and YouTube are everywhere, right? It is a non-stop wave.

of noise. And I know that we talk a lot about what you know how much of your tablet you can use and whether you're allowed to use YouTube and all those things. And we have rules and boundaries about screen time and I know that those rules can be a little bit annoying. So when we actually put the screens completely away and turn off the technology, how does that feel to you? It it depends on what we're going to do. If we're gonna go like to the park with Josh. Yeah. Good. That's good.

What kinds of things do we do that make you happy to be off your tablet? Like when we go play when we go to the park together, or if we go to basketball practice? Donuts when we get donuts. What what is your favorite thing to do when we're completely offline? playing Nerf Gunt with Joshi and all my other friends. in the neighborhood, yeah. And and you, because you're trying to be the target. Yeah, I'm I'm a very big target. I'm pretty easy to shoot, aren't I?

Yeah, and when you go turdy, you uh it's blow the whim. I don't know what that means. Okay. So one of the things that I like to talk about

Is what I call this two brain theory. We have two brains in our we have two brains in our head. There's one brain that is just very reactive, and I call that the Conan the Barbarian brain. It's very it's you know, it's the kind of brain that gets mad, and it's the kind of brain that makes loud noises and all that stuff. But there's another brain, there's a thinking brain. So the other one's the psycho one? It's the it's what I call the Sherlock Holmes brain.

And I know those those characters don't mean anything to you, but Sherlock Holmes is a very, very smart person. And Conan the Barry Bryan is a very physical person. So when you're having a really frustrating day ah at school or in sports or with your sister, what is the best thing that I can do is your dad to help you take a breath and pause and handle it with your. Sherlock brain instead of letting your anger get the best of you. Eat donut. You want to eat donuts?

I feel like maybe you are just trying to angle for some donuts. Which I respect. I really love donuts myself. Donuts I got back. Remember when you were younger? Remember when you were kind of having a tough time at school? And you know, and sometimes it was so tough getting ready in the morning and we would kind of be at each other's throats. Before had the checklist. And we would take a walk. When I was six? when you were five. We would uh we would take a walk around the block. Remember?

Remember we'd get in a fight. If we got in a fight before right before you went to school, we would take a walk around the block and we'd be late to school. Just we'd be taking a walk until you were nice and calm. What do you think about that? Thinking back on it. let me ask you one more question and then I will let you go do a little bit of show and tell with the audience. How's that sound? Okay. Okay. So this one's gonna be a tough one. And I don't know. I don't like tough. I I know.

It's but but we'll we'll just just we'll just think about it. Take your time if you need to. But what is the single

Biggest lesson or rule or tradition or thing we do in our home that make you feel ready to go out and succeed and face the day and uh and just rule the plan. Getting a new uh Okay. I love your ingenuity here. So this is me. This is my gun. I run out to the park and boo. Dude. I am very, very impressed with the way that you are just single-handedly, really, really singularly focused on leveraging this opportunity to explain what it is that you want to go buy or you want me to buy for you.

Very impressive. Very impressive. Okay. Like, I just want to tell you. That I really, really appreciate you taking the time with me today and I love you very much. And you are the inspiration for me to do this whole project. And I think about you every day. And I think about you every time I get on the microphone and talk to all my friends about what it takes to raise a really strong and powerful man. And I hope that I hope that we will have as close and a wonderful a relationship as we do.

I'm a mini YouTuber. You are a mini YouTuber. Okay. We're gonna take a pause real fast and I'll let you run down and you go get what it is that you wanna show to the audience. Ready?

All right. Now I talk a lot on this show about how impressed I am with you late. Um and one of the things that impresses me to no end is how smart you are. And I gotta tell you, I feel a little bit manipulated. man, he's very impressive. I I have told them about your your fractions and division prowess. Um He's very impressive at math. But I tell you a hundred wait, wait, wait. Oh what is a hundred times What is a hundred times ten thousand? Uh-huh. You tell me. One million! Nice, nicely done.

Okay. But I also want to tell you how impressed I am that you have used this entire session to manipulate me. And just so for those of you who are listening, um this is what Lake decided that he wanted to go down and get. And that is a box. Of donuts. Now we had told him earlier in the day that he was not allowed to eat any more donuts. And but he knew that if he was sweet and he grabbed the donuts and we talked, then I would allow him to eat one right here on camera.

Let's go, pick out a donut, pick out a donut, and let and and you can have one right now.

There it is. Show it to everybody that Okay, take a big old bite. Hey man. Hey listen. Seriously for one moment. The best part of my life is being your dad. Thanks for being such a great kid, okay? And thank you for watching and listening to this show. Please share it with your friends. And just remember, happy Father's Day. And you are a great parent.