We all have some version of this memory: We didn’t feel well. We fell awkwardly on our wrist. We hit our head. We told our parents, but they didn’t believe us …they told us we’d be fine. They told us we’d feel better soon. Then a few days later it turned out that we had scarlet fever or shingles. Our wrist was broken. We’d sustained a concussion. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Nov 02, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1186
Aristotle wrote his famous Nicomachean Ethics for his son, Nicomachus. Seneca was given a philosophy teacher by his father. Cato too, was given the philosophical education his parents felt the promising boy deserved. Marcus Aurelius tried to give Commodus a group of philosophical advisors, and we can imagine that one of his great disappointments in life was that his philosophy and his example didn’t seem to rub off on his son. Stoicism 101 ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Foll...
Nov 01, 2023•5 min•Ep. 1185
Being a parent is terrifying. Joan Didion’s famous line, as we talked about recently, is that once you have kids you are never not afraid . We are hostages to fortunes now, always worried that something could or will happen to our kids. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 31, 2023•5 min•Ep. 1184
You are not perfect. Nobody would argue that–least of all your kids. But are you better? Better than you were when they were younger? Better than you were a couple years ago? Better than yesterday? ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 30, 2023•3 min•Ep. 1183
On this weekend episode of the Daily Dad, Ryan talks with his wife Samantha on the unexpected things in life we can’t prepare for, the anticipation of things often being worse and solving the problem first. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 28, 2023•15 min•Ep. 1182
Your kids are going to make bad decisions. They are going to do things you disagree with. They may well grow up into someone you don’t understand. That means calming down . It means trying to see their perspective. It means giving them space. It means asking questions and withholding opinion. It means offering help. It means providing resources. It means acceptance. It means unconditional love. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook ,...
Oct 27, 2023•2 min•Ep. 1181
It’s a noisy world out there… and most of us add to the din. We chatter on social media. We chatter on the phone. We chatter over email. Even as parents, we tend to do a lot of talking. There are all the things we tell our kids. The things we remind them about. The lessons we try to teach them. The books we read to them . ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 26, 2023•3 min•Ep. 1180
Maybe someday, you’ll get there. It’ll probably be too late –your teenager will be grown up, the phase will be over, things will have calmed down. You know these things you seem to have strong opinions about…the tone of your kid’s voice. Whether the music they listen to is any good. How they want to style their hair. What they want to major in. Who they marry. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 25, 2023•3 min•Ep. 1179
It happens so often that you hardly even notice it anymore. Your kids said they weren’t hungry and now of course they are. You told them to go to the bathroom before you left (they ignored you), and now they want you to pull the car over so they can pee. You knew they’d like this movie, you knew they’d have fun, you knew that other kid was trouble. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 24, 2023•3 min•Ep. 1178
Here’s a test of your own childhood: Imagine you’re sitting on the couch watching TV. You’re in the kitchen making a snack. You and a friend are hanging out upstairs. And then you hear the garage door going up. Or you hear keys in the front door. The car pulling into the driveway. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 23, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1177
On this weekend episode of the Daily Dad, Ryan talks with his wife Samantha on starting with the idea that your kids are good inside, what truly is our role in helping our children instead of whats wrong, and more parenting tips from Dr. Becky Kennedy and her book Good Inside: A Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want to Be ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 21, 2023•25 min•Ep. 1176
Family is wonderful. None of us would be here, the writer Aaron Thier once put it, if people hadn’t taken care of us when we were small. Somebody birthed us, raised us, drove us to school, kept us safe. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 20, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1175
We had this idea of what we wanted , needed our lives to be. How much money we wanted to make and through what career path. We wanted a new house. We wanted to go on trips. We wanted to live somewhere exciting and interesting. We wanted to do cool stuff, we demanded a lot out of life. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 19, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1174
Yeah, some people won’t get it. Yeah, some people think it’s weak. But you? You know it isn’t. Which is why you make no secret about your other life–about your kids, about what being a good parent demands of you, how it competes for your time (and interest) at work. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 18, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1173
“This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/dailydad and get on your way to being your best self.” There was that moment after they were born that you found yourself looking forward to when they could crawl. It will be so fun, you thought…right up until they started crawling away and getting themselves into dangerous situations. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 17, 2023•3 min•Ep. 1172
We all want better for our kids. We want them to have a better life than we had. We want them to have better parents than we had. That’s why we’re trying so hard. That’s why we wrestle with our demons–going to therapy, reading books, putting in the work. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 16, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1171
On this weekend episode of the Daily Dad, Ryan talks to Steven Rinella about the sense of wonder, respect & adventure for nature, spending time with family, and his new book catch a crayfish, count the stars: fun projects, skills, and adventures for outdoor kids . ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 14, 2023•24 min•Ep. 1170
There is so much we want to teach our kids —so much that fathers are expected to teach their kids. How to ride a bike. How to swim. How to throw a punch. How to tie a tie. How to read . How to get up the guts to talk to someone. All of this is important, of course. All of this must be done. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 13, 2023•3 min•Ep. 1169
The last book you read was Goodnight Moon . The last series you binged was Harry Potter . You know more about the latest scandal at your daughter’s high school than the 2024 primary candidates. You’ve spent so much time in the sun at soccer games and baseball practice that you might be fried inside. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 12, 2023•3 min•Ep. 1168
The two boys who look just like you. The daughter who lights up when you pick her up from school. The teenager who wears your old band t-shirts. The mischievous prankster who makes you roll your head back in laughter. The nerd who plays video games with you. The foodie who loves to cook with you. The kid going off to college . The one sitting behind the store counter of their first job. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 11, 2023•2 min•Ep. 1167
“She’s not good at hearing people,” the musician Mikel Jollett writes of his mother in his haunting memoir Hollywood Park . “If we tell her we’re hungry, she’ll say, ‘No you’re not. You ate earlier.’ If one of us says ‘I’m sad,’ she tells us that it’s not true, that we’re happy now because we’re with her.” ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 10, 2023•3 min•Ep. 1166
When they’re grouchy, when they’re glass-eyed, when they’re stuck, when they’re making choices that don’t quite make sense …there could be many reasons why your kids are acting this way. They could be tired, as we’ve said before . They’re almost certainly hungry– as we said , that’s at the root of most problems. They could be depressed, they could be going through something and just not understand what it is. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagr...
Oct 09, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1165
“This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/dailydad and get on your way to being your best self.” On this weekend episode of the Daily Dad, Ryan talks with comedian Christina Pazsitzky on balancing work and life, and raising kids while being a good parent. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 07, 2023•11 min•Ep. 1164
You knew it that day in the hospital. You felt it the first time they threw their arms around you. You are reminded of it every time they do something decent and kind and good. You were given something very special. You have been entrusted with something very special. A bundle of genes and circumstances that will never exist ever again in history, that’s never ever existed before–something, someone totally unique and wonderful. Someone with gifts, someone with something to offer, someone who nee...
Oct 06, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1163
When your teenager sits you down to come clean to you about something…When you’re on vacation and wondering whether you should try to squeeze one more thing in…When your adult kid decides to get divorced…When you’re frustrated and resentful about something with your spouse and decide to have a talk, there is something you should keep in mind. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 05, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1162
“This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/dailydad and get on your way to being your best self.” It’s fitting that one of the most important things you can do as a parent requires you to think about something that’s very nearly impossible for a parent to consider. It comes to us from Marcus Aurelius by way of Epictetus. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 04, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1161
If you want to spend more time with your kids, as we said recently, the important thing is that you don’t drive them away . Yet that’s what so many of us do, isn’t it? Because we worry, because we care, because we can’t quite strike the right balance, our efforts end up backfiring. Think of John O’Connor’s mom whose smothering tendencies drove her son to move from California to Arizona just to get some distance. There’s no way she wanted that to happen, but she made it happen all the same. Think...
Oct 03, 2023•4 min•Ep. 1160
Imagine you’ve come to the end. You’re leaving this world, leaving your kids behind. Or worse, more unthinkably, your kids are leaving you. They’re off to college. They’re moving across the country. Time or distance or conflict separates you. They’ve been in an accident. You’ve both lived to ripe old ages, but they go first. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Oct 02, 2023•3 min•Ep. 1159
On this weekend episode of the Daily Dad, Ryan talks with his wife Samantha on stepping outside of our own upbringing and challenging the conversation more as parents when it comes to the freedom of our children. ✉️ Sign up for the Daily Dad email: DailyDad.com 📱 Follow Daily Dad: Twitter , Instagram , Facebook , YouTube...
Sep 30, 2023•15 min•Ep. 1158
This change we’ve made, this decision to become dads—it has uprooted everything. It’s like we were hit, suddenly, with a crossfire hurricane. The house is a mess. The schedule is grueling. There is never enough sleep , never enough time in the day. Even the cool, quiet dark is pierced by the shriek of a man who has stepped on a pile of Legos… and the shriek is coming from your mouth. Yet to be good at our jobs, to be good at this fatherhood thing, we need stillness . We need time to reflect. We ...
Sep 29, 2023•3 min•Ep. 1157
