RAR #249: How a “Best Moments” List can Help You Love Your Homeschool featuring Jon Acuff

Sarah Mackenzie (00:05): 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. (00:38): Welcome to the Read Aloud Revival, this is the show that helps you make meaningful and lasting connections with your kids through books. I'm your host, Sarah MacKenzie. I'm a homeschooling mother of six, the author of Teaching from Rest, The Read Aloud Family, several award-winning picture books for kids. And I'm so excited about today's episode. This summer I read, All It Takes Is a Goal: The Three-Step Plan to Ditch Regret and Tap into Your Massive Potential, by Jon 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 Aloud Revival. I wonder if I could get Jon Acuff, the author, to come talk on the show with us about it, and it turns out I could, he's here today. (01:20): Jon is the New York Times Bestselling author of seven books. He's an Ink 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 Jon and his daughters, L.E and McRae. So awesome. Jon, welcome to the Read Aloud Revival. Jon Acuff (01:42): 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. Sarah Mackenzie (01:48): Not a lot of pressure at all. New York Times Bestselling author, top leadership speaker. Jon Acuff (01:52): We start with, again, we joked about this off camera. When the intro is like, you 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. Sarah Mackenzie (02:02): I got to bring it. Jon Acuff (02:04): That's a lot. I better be amazing, I better be. Sarah Mackenzie (02:07): That's right. Jon Acuff (02:07): So, I'm thrilled to be here. Thank you for having me. Sarah Mackenzie (02:09): I'm so glad you're here and I should tell our listeners on the podcast, if you are listening to this, this is a YouTube episode as well. So if you want to watch this interview, that's new for us here at Read Aloud Revival. So if you want to, you can head to our YouTube channel and watch this as well. (02:24): I want to paint a picture. Jon, 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 a Goal, and first I just have to tell you, I listen to a lot of audiobooks and you can rock an audiobook. I feel like- Jon Acuff (02:45): Oh, thank you. Sarah Mackenzie (02:46): 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, it's great. Jon Acuff (02:55): 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- Sarah Mackenzie (03:03): I mean, it's true. Jon Acuff (03:03): ... I would sell 100 times. You hear somebody with a British accent, you add 80 IQ points to it. They could read a grocery list, you're like- Sarah Mackenzie (03:11): It's true. Jon Acuff (03:11): ... Did you hear the way you said, avocado? I don't have that. So I have to add lots of bonus content, lots of sidebars, lots of... And I want it to be a conversation and I want it to be fun. And so yeah, I really try to make those almost like a performance versus, here's just an audio version. Sarah Mackenzie (03:27): It's funny that you say that because I always tell moms at these conferences the same thing. When I'm really frustrated with my kids, I just switch into a British accent because you can say all kinds of things to your kids. Jon Acuff (03:37): That's funny. Sarah Mackenzie (03:37): And they just think it's funny. Jon Acuff (03:37): That's great. Sarah Mackenzie (03:39): Even if you're insulting them. Jon Acuff (03:40): Yeah, that's great. Sarah Mackenzie (03:41): I'm sure this does not work in England. Jon Acuff (03:43): That's a really funny parenting hack, yeah. 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. Again, I've never been abroad and somebody would go, "Say that word again in that amazing American accent." So, we don't have that weapon at our disposal but I think we make up for it. Sarah Mackenzie (04:05): 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? Jon Acuff (04:29): I just think we've gotten dreaming backwards forever. 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, hairy, audacious goal? Where do you see yourself in 20 years?" And you go, "What?" And for me, I've written 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. (05:30): 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, it was a small little airport, and I said, "What 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... And the freedom for that and 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. Sarah Mackenzie (06:24): Well, so when you ask, "What are some of the best moments?" And I love how you give some examples. Let's 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 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, or the time my friend and I ate a nine pound lobster on Martha's Vineyard. Jon Acuff (06:52): That was amazing. Sarah Mackenzie (06:53): It was the size of the carry-on suitcase and had to be opened with the circular saw. Jon Acuff (06:56): Yeah, it was amazing. I would have that photo on my driver's license if the DMV weren't such jerks. It was one of... It was amazing, I still... And we rented mopeds that day too. Sarah Mackenzie (07:06): Amazing. Jon Acuff (07:06): And drove them around the island, it was all good. Yeah, so the key there is, I wanted to, I told people, "Fire the bouncer." It all counts. We get really wrapped up in what counts and 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. (07:37): 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 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 I can't put writing a book on." (08:05): I saw an example of this at a bookstore, it's funny you mention 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 stopped him and said, "Sir, you're a real author. Don't say just self-published. You wrote a real book." And his countenance changed. And so that was her opening up, 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. Sarah Mackenzie (08:46): I love this because what I noticed when I did this myself, because I did it right away. That night I opened a notes app 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. The things that I think would've just skipped on by. Jon Acuff (09:03): Yeah, it's wild, it turns on your eyes and your heart. So I say it's a shortcut to self-awareness. You get all these immediate benefits where it increases your gratitude like crazy. Everybody always 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. There's this progression where you see it in the moment, and I say in the book, my definition of being present is being nostalgic about a moment you're still in. And so this morning- Sarah Mackenzie (09:37): So good. Jon Acuff (09:38): ... 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, and it was like 9:00 AM and we were the only people in there. And it was their grand opening and 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... When you see videos and people put on colored glasses and they could finally see colors for the first time, they've been colorblind 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 its mother's voice, and if you don't cry when you watch those videos, you are dead inside. So it just turns on your ability to really appreciate it. And so for me, it just had so many practical instant benefits. Sarah Mackenzie (10:38): 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 kid's 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, it's not a statistic, but this fact, I guess. It's something like ourselves more than a year in advance is a different person. We're envisioning a different person than we are. So it's like, well, you can't really set a goal, a 10-year goal because you're like, that's a fictional person. Jon Acuff (11:12): Well, it's also a fictional world. Nobody would've included COVID in their prediction. Sarah Mackenzie (11:16): Exactly. Jon Acuff (11:17): Like God help us if we still think we could control everything. Sarah Mackenzie (11:21): That's right. Jon Acuff (11:22): We just got a multi-year reminder. No one in... I remember the joke I sometimes share with people is in late January of 2020, I opened up for Dolly Parton at the Ryman Auditorium. It was the dream of all dreams, and she was amazing. She was every bit a person that you wanted her to be. And I drove home and I was like, "This is only January, the rest of this year is going to be amazing." Sarah Mackenzie (11:42): Oh, gosh. Jon Acuff (11:43): And it was like the narrator was like, it was not to be amazing. Every one of my speaking events got canceled. That's 80% of my business. 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. Sarah Mackenzie (12:02): Sure. Jon Acuff (12:03): I'm not against that. I just want you to hold it fairly loosely. Sarah Mackenzie (12:06): This is perfect because it's the idea of orienting yourself in the right direction. If I'm on the west coast and I want to go the east coast, I know I at least need to be facing this way. I might not know all the roads, turns, stop signs, highways that I'm going to take. Jon Acuff (12:18): Potholes. Sarah Mackenzie (12:18): Yeah, I love that. I've heard an author, I can't remember who it was. That's okay, but she was talking about how you don't really need to know all of what you're going to write. 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. Jon Acuff (12:32): Oh, yeah, yeah. Sarah Mackenzie (12:32): 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 homeschooling year to look like. I'm just trying to survive. I'm trying to keep everybody fed and healthy and to soccer practice on time. And I think we're supposed to do math, 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 we're scrolling Instagram and you see the mom who is doing great, amazing field trips. 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 at Homestead. Everyone has chickens, right? Jon Acuff (13:12): Yeah, and they're always cutting cucumbers into shapes you've never heard of. Like, I made Octagon cucumbers today for my kids because it teaches them math. Sarah Mackenzie (13:21): And they ate them. Jon Acuff (13:22): And they ate them. They were so excited for cucumber day. And you're like, no, they weren't. Why are you lying? Sarah Mackenzie (13:27): Exactly. So then we were 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, even just go back one year. You could go back five though if you wanted, because in here you're saying 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 were fun, certain books that we read aloud, like a blanket fort that we did spelling under one day, things like that, that are kind of easy when I get going, when I start. Like you said, you're thinking, okay, just do 10. Okay, could I do 20? Okay, you could actually probably do 200. They actually start rolling. (14:10): 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 and watchers. Jon Acuff (14:23): Yeah, totally. Which prompt do you want to? Give me a prompt and we'll break it down. Sarah Mackenzie (14:27): Okay, let's start with, every time I see blank, I smile. Jon Acuff (14:33): 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 Santel. 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. (14:51): So I was able to go, oh man, Charlie, Charlie always makes me feel encouraged, and all of a sudden you write down your 10 cheerleaders. And then I said, "Every time I crest the hill in Monteagle." So I live outside of Nashville in a 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 is terrible. And then you get to this ridge called Monteagle, 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 for Monteagle, I'm like, okay, I did it. (15:30): And it can be an item. It can be your favorite pair of walking shoes, because you know 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 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's one of my favorite worship songs and it fires me up, or every time I see this Bible verse. So that one's really, 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. Sarah Mackenzie (16:10): Well, it 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 in the perfect shapes, I smile." But we're actually looking at our real life. So what it's doing is it's making you see the things that you're already doing. Jon Acuff (16:26): 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, I want to 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, "The average parent does zero goals. The average parent doesn't know where their kid is right now. You're already doing better than you think." Sarah Mackenzie (16:54): That's right. Jon Acuff (16:55): 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, and the perfect homeschooling mom. The key you have to remember is, this is new. The type of comparison we have access to is new. We don't give ourselves credit for that. My mom, 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 ourselves credit for like, that's a new, difficult challenge we haven't adapted to yet. 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. They weren't doing video. (17:47): When I was being raised as a kid, if somebody went on a vacation and said, "Come over and watch our slideshow and a Kodak reel," you'd be like, "No, thank you. That sounds terrible." And then now that's what we do. If a friend of mine, if one of my mom's friends in 1988 was like, "We went on to Disney World and I made a 60 second video about that. I'd like to show you that a lot." You'd be like, "That's gross." Sarah Mackenzie (18:11): That's weird. Jon Acuff (18:12): "What? No, that's weird. No, I don't need to see the highlights of your vacation. Why?" Sarah Mackenzie (18:17): Why did you make that? Yeah. Jon Acuff (18:18): And now we just do that. Sarah Mackenzie (18:20): That's it. Jon Acuff (18:22): And I do it too. I do it with other authors. It's so tempting, and it's tempting because it's really well done. It's not accidental. That's the other thing I sometimes say is, Netflix doesn't want you to raise good kids. They don't care about that. Sarah Mackenzie (18:37): That's right. Jon Acuff (18:37): Netflix doesn't want you to get in shape. 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 I think if you can focus on your own life, because people say, "Stay in your lane, you look on your side of the fence." And my big thing is like, well, what's a tactical, practical way to do that? And this is one of them. Sarah Mackenzie (18:58): 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 a mom is in, but if I had a free hour today, I'd spend it, blank. I say it's tricky because my husband and I have six kids, they're now all older, but when they were 12, 10, 8, we had a 1-year-old and twin newborns. So I would've easily said, sleeping, obviously. Right? Jon Acuff (19:22): Yeah, yeah. That was an easy answer. Sarah Mackenzie (19:23): Yeah, but today in my life now, yeah, I would change that. Jon Acuff (19:27): 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, especially young moms, will say, "Hey, I'm blowing my goals. I'm not doing great on my goals." And I go, "Well, tell me about your life?" And they go, "I got a four-year-old, a two-year-old and twin, six month olds." And I go, "You're raising humans. You're in charge of humans. That's a wild goal." 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 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. (20:08): What I found with some of these things is, it's like having a reunion. You end up having a reunion with something, some part of you that you forgot you loved 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 that? I forgot how much I used to love puzzles even for 10 minutes. That was, it turned my brain off. What? Why did I?" Because 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 knit..." you didn't, it just kind of life got busy and chipped away and chipped away and chipped away. And so a lot of times in the list you find something that you go, oh, this used to light me up. Why did I put it down? I'm going to pick it back up again. Sarah Mackenzie (20:50): Yeah. And then another way you could think about this question too, that I was thinking specifically for homeschoolers, because usually I think with 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- Jon Acuff (21:03): And by the way, that's a good thing. So let me just pause on that for a second. Sarah Mackenzie (21:06): Yep, please do. Jon Acuff (21:06): That's a wonderful thing. And I, like one of the soundtracks I use. I wrote a 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..." That would be the worst, that would actually be the real problem. Sarah Mackenzie (21:51): That'd be a tragedy, really, yeah. Jon Acuff (21:53): [inaudible 00:21:53]. I don't want anything for the future of my kids. I finished caring about ideas for the future of my kids. That's not going to be our problem. So I want you to see that as a gift, not a curse, that you have more you want to do. And I think you always will, I think you always will, and I think that's a feature, not a problem. Sarah Mackenzie (22:14): So good. Okay, I love this. And then we can actually, so then if it's not, it's a feature and not a problem, we can go, okay, well first, second, while I'm making this best moments 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? 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? But then we can go like, oh, is there a way that since I know this would go on 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 maybe once this year, could we, whatever it is, fill in the blank. Jon Acuff (22:59): Yeah, can we add? Well, if you're not doing it at all, one is infinitely more. So the pressure is you can't go, I love this, I'm going to do it every week. What I find with people who are goal-focused and your audience is definitely goal-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, they'll go, "I write on Tuesdays, I just always write on Tuesdays." And I'll go, "How many times have you done it?" They'll 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, and that's a lot of pressure. (23:34): What if we said like you said, could 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? Now it's a chore, now it's additional task, now the joy is already left of 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. (23:56): One of the soundtracks I say is, "Some beats none. Some beats none," because for a perfectionist, a perfectionist would rather get a zero than a C minus. So an example would be, I meet perfectionists that'll say, "Jon, 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, "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, one of our parenting soundtracks is some beats none, some beats none. Sarah Mackenzie (24:27): So good. Jon Acuff (24:27): That little stuff adds up. Sarah Mackenzie (24:29): Well, okay, so one of my twins, 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." Jon Acuff (24:40): Oh, that's good. Sarah Mackenzie (24:41): 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 do, we could study birds. And I'm looking at my schedule and I'm like, oh wait, we already have science at co-op. 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. It's like we make it exactly like you said, we take it to 100 so fast. Jon Acuff (25:11): Yeah, and then you're like, I'll get a vest with a lot of pockets and I'll become a birder. Sarah Mackenzie (25:15): Yeah, exactly. Jon Acuff (25:16): I'm a professional birder now, and we'll follow whooping cranes as they migrate. And you're like, wait, or we could go on Saturday to a lake that we know has birds. Sarah Mackenzie (25:27): Exactly. Jon Acuff (25:28): And spend an hour looking at birds and go, yeah, that's scratched the itch because the kid might go, "That's enough birds," or he might go- Sarah Mackenzie (25:35): That's it, that's all I wanted. Jon Acuff (25:35): "I want more. I want to double down, mom. I want twice as many birds next week," and you go, "Okay, oh, a little skin in the game, let's go." Yeah, but 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 a little bit counts, a little bit. (25:55): 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? I would never just do that amount and put it on Strava." And I was like, "Yeah, but it adds up over... All I had time for was 1.2, and if I do 51.2 mile runs over the year, it's 50 extra miles." I ran two miles today and I didn't beat myself up when I got in and be like, I can't believe you only did two. I was like, cool. That was a little bit extra, some beats none, some beats none, Sarah Mackenzie (26:25): Some beats none, so good. Okay, so you mentioned here 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 book or if I heard you on your podcast, which I'll put a link to your podcast. Jon Acuff (26:39): Oh, thanks. Sarah Mackenzie (26:39): What is the name of your podcast? Jon Acuff (26:41): All It Takes Is a Goal. Sarah Mackenzie (26:42): All It Takes Is... Wow, I can't believe I didn't remember that. Jon Acuff (26:44): Yeah, right there. I put it on the front of the book. It's pretty, yeah. Sarah Mackenzie (26:46): I subscribed to it, so I just listened to it. Jon Acuff (26:48): Totally. Sarah Mackenzie (26:48): I haven't looked it up. Okay, so you might've said it there, but you were talking about auditioning goals or trying them out. Jon Acuff (26:55): Oh, yeah. Sarah Mackenzie (26:55): Can you talk to me a little about this? Jon Acuff (26:56): 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 what happens is people, especially around January, December, January's are really goal-focused. They go, this is my New Year's resolution. You go, you haven't done that for a week. You're making a year commitment, that's bonkers. So that gets back to that freedom. I quit a ton of goals because I'll try a bunch of easy goals. And an easy goal, 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. 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 no, let me try a different one. (27:41): 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, gulping painfully, just trying to. She was like, "What are you doing? Who's making you do this?" And I was like, "Got to get this water down." And 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. Add a little bit more. (28:10): So I'll give you an example of this, so a friend of mine, we were talking and I was like, "What's your goal this year?" He's like, "I want to do 100 sales calls a week." I was like, "All right, that's a lot." I was like, "How many do you do a week right now?" And he goes, "Five." I was like, "So you're going to 20X it?" I was like, okay, fair enough. I was like, I get it, aggressive. I said, "How many hours a week would it take for you to do that goal?" And he said, "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 is like, "None. Free time? I'm very busy." And I said, "There's your problem." (28:40): 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 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 started. And so I'd much rather you go, I know that in this season, I got 20 free minutes every day. Is it 20? And you go, so when I have those 20, I'm going to savor them, I'm going to use them, and here's the little goal I'm going to plug into them. (29:16): And I'm going to audition things and then again, I'm going to grow it over time. We say that with our kids all the time. When there's a passion they're into, your birding thing. Maybe this kid turns it, that becomes a huge passion and they go to college for it someday. 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. Sarah Mackenzie (29:42): Totally. Jon Acuff (29:42): 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 you up for lessons," and we suffocate this. And then the kid is like, "I just said I liked art because I had drawn that day and it was kind of fun. I don't want to ray for Christmas. 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. Sarah Mackenzie (30:07): As home scorers, 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 are you in science?" Jon Acuff (30:15): Yeah, for three months. Sarah Mackenzie (30:16): And yeah, and they're like, "You just ruined Harry Potter. What the heck?" Jon Acuff (30:19): Yeah, I'd like Harry Potter to feel like work. You're like, oh. Sarah Mackenzie (30:21): Yeah, exactly. [inaudible 00:30:23]. Jon Acuff (30:23): I want you to know how long the wand is and what the properties of Hermione's hair, yeah. Sarah Mackenzie (30:28): Exactly, oh my gosh. The auditioning goal is exactly the example we were just talking about with the birding, is instead of saying 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 he might be like, "That's it," or he might go, "Can we do that again?" Jon Acuff (30:44): Well, and then he doesn't feel the pressure of living up to what's now your expectation. Sarah Mackenzie (30:48): Totally. Jon Acuff (30:48): So if you go, I made it a whole thing, he feels like, oh, mom's really into this. I kind of have to pretend I am too. Sarah Mackenzie (30:54): Yeah, exactly. Jon Acuff (30:55): Versus, 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 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 that's what I mean by progressing your goals, because most people only have two versions. It's nothing or everything, and there's no room in between. And I think if you can give yourself some steps, it's easier. Sarah Mackenzie (31:36): 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 could listen to the audiobook. I loved the audiobook. I also got myself a hard copy, so I'd have the prompts. Jon Acuff (31:53): Love it, babies need shoes, babies need shoes. Sarah Mackenzie (31:56): I love it. Jon Acuff (31:56): Let's go. That dress I bought my daughter today was expensive, so thank you, at the boutique. Sarah Mackenzie (32:02): 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 Jon said, you don't need to make it from zero to 100. Audition something, just try it, see how it fits. Jon Acuff (32:21): Build a home school you enjoy. Don't look up a year into it and realize, I hate this school we're a part of and we created it. This has... 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. Sarah Mackenzie (32:54): So true. Jon Acuff (32:55): 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? Sarah Mackenzie (33:04): Without having to overhaul things or make a goal from zero to 100. Jon Acuff (33:06): Oh gosh. Sarah Mackenzie (33:07): Just little tiny bits at a time. Jon Acuff (33:08): Yeah. Sarah Mackenzie (33:08): I don't want to forget to ask you about your new book because 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. Jon Acuff (33:23): 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 me 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." In 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 you in half a year." So, and then we just started to see broken soundtracks in teenagers. (33:52): 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 on 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 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. (34:16): But I knew if I wrote the book, it would sound like an adult trying to sound young. It would be like, "Hello, fellow youths. I wear Michael Jordan's too. Don't crease the J's. I got so much Riz. I'm a Rizzly bear." I knew it would sound so terrible. 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?" (34:47): And so we did a teen version of All It Takes Is a Goal, because it's like anything else, it's compound interest. Imagine if you as a 16-year-old could have started to work on some of these things, how that compounds over. I'd much rather give a kid some tools versus repair them as a 42-year-old that's had a job they hated for 20 years and doesn't know how they got there. So that's what How Teens Win 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." 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." Sarah Mackenzie (35:36): Wow, yeah. Jon Acuff (35:37): And wow, is that a broken soundtrack, because 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 never, it'll be impossible for my generation to own a house. And we're working very hard in our house with our kids to go, "No, you won't be able to go to Europe at 26, but you shouldn't be in Europe. Don't do your honeymoon solo at 26. That's a lot of money. What if we..." So there's all these conversations that's open in our own house, but that's How Teens Win was, how do we help teenagers have goal setting and goal achieving that shapes the rest of their life? Sarah Mackenzie (36:13): So good. Okay, as you're talking about broken soundtracks in our teens, everybody who's listening, go over to YouTube, go to the channel, go to this episode. Tell me in the comments if you want me to have Jon 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 because I'd love to have you back to talk specifically about soundtracks. Jon Acuff (36:34): It's been a fun conversation. 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. Sarah Mackenzie (36:45): So cool. Jon Acuff (36:45): 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'd 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 your thoughts turn into your actions and your actions turn into your results. So, let's be deliberate about the words we say. (37:12): And it's funny, my daughter, my oldest daughter, LE, 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 going on a tour of the city or going... And she was like, "No, no, no. I'd rather be tired than regretful." Sarah Mackenzie (37:40): That's good. Jon Acuff (37:40): This is like, I'd rather be tired than regretful. And so it's fun to see teenagers get it immediately and they'll start to call you out as a parent on your soundtracks too, which is super fun too. Sarah Mackenzie (37:50): Yeah. Oh, that's so good. Okay, I'm going to put Jon'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. Jon, thank you so much for coming on the show, this has been way fun. Jon Acuff (38:03): I love doing it. I appreciate you, it's important, the work. That means a lot to me. Sarah Mackenzie (38:09): Okay, now let's go hear from kids about the books they're loving lately. Emma (38:17): My name is Emma. I'm eight years old and I'm live in Texas. My favorite book series is The Keeper of the Lost Cities by Shannon Messenger, because of how Sophie doesn't fit in and then she finds a new home. Finn (38:34): Hi, my name is Finn and I'm eight years old and I'm presenting on a book called The Hardy Boys. And it's about two teenagers that solve mysteries, and I'm really into it. Daniel (38:52): Hi, my name is Daniel. I live in Texas, I'm 10 years old. My favorite book series right now is The Unwanteds by Lisa McMann. I like it because it has magic in it and its fantasy, and that's my favorite genre. Speaker 8 (39:12): What is your name? Speaker 4 (39:14): Donason. Speaker 8 (39:15): And how old are you? Speaker 4 (39:16): Three. Speaker 8 (39:18): And where do you live? Speaker 4 (39:21): Virginia. Speaker 8 (39:22): And what is your favorite book to read? Speaker 4 (39:24): The Plane Pals. Daniel (39:27): Plane pals. And why do you like Plane Pals? Speaker 4 (39:30): Because them fly. Speaker 7 (39:34): What's your name? Samuel Hicks (39:35): Samuel Hicks. Speaker 7 (39:36): How old are you, Samuel? Samuel Hicks (39:39): Four. Speaker 7 (39:40): You're not four, you're three. Where do you live? Samuel Hicks (39:45): In Texas [inaudible 00:39:47]. Speaker 7 (39:46): In Texas. What's your favorite book right now? Samuel Hicks (39:49): Construction Site. Speaker 7 (39:51): Good Night, Good Night, Construction Site? Samuel Hicks (39:53): Yeah. Speaker 7 (39:53): Why do you like that book so much? Samuel Hicks (39:55): I love it so much. Speaker 7 (39:57): What's your favorite truck in it? Samuel Hicks (39:58): Dump truck. Speaker 7 (40:00): Dump truck. All right. Say thank you. Bye. Samuel Hicks (40:02): Thank you. Bye. Emmy (40:05): Hi, my name's Emmy. I'm nine years old. I live in Minnesota and my favorite book is Sophie Mouse because they go on a lot of adventures. Eddie (40:15): Hi, my name is Eddie and I'm four years old. And my favorite book's The Buffalo Fluffalo, because he is a snarly and warly and Gruffalo. Sarah Mackenzie (40:32): Thank you, thank you, kids. I always love hearing about the books that you love. (40:36): Show notes for this episode are at readaloudrevival.com/259. I'll include links to several of Jon's books. I'm a huge fan of his writing, his podcast, we'll put that in there too. And if you'd like me to have him back to talk about soundtracks, tell me in the YouTube comments and that way I'll know there's enough of us that want to hear it and I'll have him back and we'll talk about it. (40:58): I'll be back here in a couple of weeks, but in the meantime, you know what to do. Go make meaningful and lasting connections with your kids through books.