No don't go in there, Daddy's working.
You're listening to the only show in the galaxy for dad-prenuers who want to have it all. Each week you'll see how you can have harmony in the four pillars of purpose. Family, faith, fitness and finance.
Jonathan: Welcome back to another Daddy's Working podcast. All you daddies out there, love you and want to put this out there for you. #DaddysWorkingPodcast, we're on IG, we're on Facebook, LinkedIn, #DaddysWorkingPodcast. Feedback for the episodes, you want to make fun of us or you learned something totally interesting, tag us with the #DaddysWorkingPodcast. [0:01:06.4]
Alright, so my pitch for the day. Actually, it's one of the things, I'm always studying how we can get better, not just for us, not just for me and Cupcake, but for our clients over at the Podcast Factory and I'm always looking for new ways to help our clients make a greater impact, and one of the things that I've studied up on and I've seen this from Pat Flynn and I've seen it from other fellows is getting a little engagement, talking, because when you're behind the mike it's kind of lonely back here, and you got to look for ways for us, for you and me to communicate. I'm teaching a lesson and learning one all in one space in time here, but that's why I put the hashtag out there, #DaddysWorkingPodcast. See who's out there, talk to you, know that I'm not alone behind this mike here. [0:02:00.8]
Anyways, what I've got for you today is more super fun. Isn't it always super fun? But it's part two of the interview with Nick Nanton, and he's got more stories than you can shake a stick at. This guy is amazing, he's got parenting tips, and I love to just get different perspectives on how folks are growing them youngins out there, to see what works for us, and I really liked Nick's perspective on what he's doing and how he's helping his children to thrive really. In today's show the stupid obvious difference between super successful people and those average, ordinary people living lives of despair. A sneaky question to ask your clients that will make it easier to deliver something they love, how to have your kids happily doing homework every single night without your help. All that and a whole bunch more, let's dive into part two of the interview with Nick Nanton. [0:03:04.1]
Jonathan: So look this is something that came up and this I wanted to talk about a little bit because we are about family. So I thought Nick's amazing, how the hell do you make more Nicks, how do you raise your kids, what is it like with them growing up because we're trying to do some of the things he taught us, so I want to share with the listeners.
Nick: Well first of all, anyone who has kids knows this cruel joke of first of all you are going to have a child and you think because you are the only human being you've ever been your entire life, you just assume that another human being... Like you married somebody, you have a partner, so okay, it's at the very least going to be the mix, 50% them, 50% me. And you realize that, wait a second; this thing is its own human being, like that's not cool. They're supposed to be a miniature me or a miniature them or a miniature us. Then you sort of get a handle on it and you have another one. "Okay, I've done this, so the second one, no problem, I now understand that my children are different." and then you have a second one that is nothing like the first one. [0:04:02.8]
And then you're like, this is an even crueler joke, and then on we go, we'll have three, because I'm a quitter I stopped. I looked, they're all three completely different. They have elements, there's certain like relation like me, but as I try to raise them, first of all I try to, you know, we all have like things that we remember as really positive in our life, we have some trauma in our life that we remember, we all have certain things that, "I'm never going to do that my parents did, I'll never do that as a parent." and a funny thing is when you open your mouth and your parents come out, my dad definitely happened. I came to a point where I realized like I was somewhat like my mom, somewhat like my dad, but as a very different person, and we all, especially after I moved out of the house, like most people, we came to terms with that in a positive light. It's tough raising kids and them having their own mind. I got a 14 year old right now, and it's a totally different world, he's like his own little human being that thinks he's responsible for himself and doesn't realize how unresponsible he is. But he's be taught, like he's got to learn that. [0:05:00.7]
I just came to a point, I think a lot of us this is through my faith and to people at church and stuff who taught me a couple things I thought were really profound. Number one, discipline is not supposed to be because you want your child to do something a certain way particularly, the mindset of discipline should really should be, from my faith background, is that I need to be able to share with my child that, of course that I'm doing things because even though you don't like them they're good for you, but even more importantly, I want to teach you how to be obedient to someone who's above you, so that when it's your turn, when you are in charge of your family unit or you're no longer under my charge that you will still be willing to submit to God, and so that you will be willing to be obedient because we all look, we're human beings I have great discussions with friends about faith all the time, just they think I'm an idiot. "How would you possibly believe this guy just out of nowhere put here, rose from the dead?" all that stuff. I'm like, "You have faith in something, it's just something different." but the thing is that I understand your thought process. You know, they go like, "How could there be terrorism, how could there be cancer?" [0:06:03.2]
I don't know, I really don't know, but here's the deal, I do understand that from my point of view and faith, if I want to be God in every step of every day, I want to be in control everything, I wouldn't be, "This one's going to be super smart, this one's going to be super attractive. He's not going to like that girl." or whatever. Or, "This friend's not going to get sick, this friend, oh I really think that work to start at 9:30 tomorrow and that the banks should open at 7:15 because I want to go to the bank at 7:15." We want to be God, we want to be in charge and we want to have totally arbitrary rules based on our feelings, emotions. If anyone would admit that, I think faith would become a lot easier to understand, because God is impossible understand because we want to be Him and we want to make all if the rules instead of letting Him do it, and we don't understand the bigger picture. He's either not really there or is He evil or whatever. So it's just as I realize some of these things, I started realizing my goal is actually to nurture my child and give them the room to become the person, the best version of themselves that God created them to be, because they are not going to be me. [0:07:07.7]
And in a similar fashion I learned a long time ago, a lot of people, I think we talked about this at lunch, that a lot of people block their day in 15 minute increments and stuff, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it, but for me, I like plan three or four things and I have plenty of time in between when I can, because I don't know if I plan my day is not going to be nearly as cool as if I just sit back and get a few things that are important to me, I think are important, out of the way because it allows my brain to move forward and feel productive, mine's like do what he does. If I try to over-manage my schedule or who I would meet with, who I wouldn't meet with, who I'll take a phone call, who I wouldn't take a phone call with. I mean you got to try to make the best decisions you can. If someone emails you and they're like, "You need to give me an hour of your time because you don't understand..." No, I'm not even going to respond, I'm just going to delete that. But if anyone ever emails me and is like, "Hey..." I came and spoke to my university class and someone said, "When ...." My answer any time will you come speak to a class or a podcast is always yes, just scheduling, because I don't know what’s going to happen. It can mean nothing, or it could be something awesome, but I'm not God, I don't know, so why don't, I don't know, so why don't I just take the journey, because it's never really hurt me before. [0:08:14.3]
I've taken that model to try with my kids, however it's way easier to talk about in a podcast than to actually do it. Just because there's so much involved and you want them to be successful in school, but you want them to be well balanced, but you want them to play sports and other activities, you want... And so it's hard, I just think to me, again, ego wise, I think I have to just constantly try to check myself and say is this what I want or is this is this what I want for them or is this the best for them and realizing that they are who they are. I know a lot of people are very intentional about certain things, "Yeah, I really want my kids to do this by the age of this, by the age of that. I also..." It could be very good for them, it's just not my strength, my skill set, so I just try to thing through an intelligent way and with my wife and with my kids, and sometimes I ask my parents, "Hey, what'd you do when this?" [0:09:10.1]
Whatever, but people around me who are smart just try to think things through and just try to let them. My goal at the end of day needs to be, I think everyone says this but it's hard to do, I just try to keep reminders of my goals to help them be the best version of themselves they can be, and that is not Nick Jr, like that's not what's for them. I would never have guessed I'd be in the career I'm in, making films around the world, I'm having a blast but it definitely would be for everybody, and so why would I try, I don't know if any of them have any interest in it, any interest in certain pieces. I don't have to go anywhere I don't want to between 9 and 6 every day or I don't have to go to lunch in a cafeteria, or like they like the freedom part, but there are certain things that you would make other people go nuts. So I got to remember that, and then, you know, just try to help them develop, to give Dan Sullivan credit, their unique abilities. I think surrender. Seems a good term. [0:10:03.9]
Jonathan: One of my favorite things that we talked about and that it goes against everything everywhere, normal society, and it's one thing that Rachel I talked about with, or Cupcake and I talk about with our son, is where you said you had the idea of yeah, there are certain things that you have to do, there's no question. Some things have to be done and that's that. You have a school project, you have an assignment, you have a paper due, it has to be done, but does it have to be done on their terms, or can you do it on your terms? Like that open-minded thinking everybody would shun that, and to me I'm like how do we live by that, so we can get the end result but it doesn't have to be how someone else told us to get it.
Nick: Absolutely. For instance, my whole thing with my kinds is like, "Hey, are you doing it to the best of your ability within the constraints you have?" but the funny thing is, many times the teaches says, "Hey, I need you to write me a paper on X, Y, Z topic, on the third president of the United States." [0:11:02.2]
Okay, great. And so many times I don't know that I'm doing it all the time effectively, but I'll try and talk to one of my kids. My oldest son seems to really, I'm sure like a lot of kids, seems to really like video, editing videos on his iPhone, stuff like that. By the way, I make films, but I'm a terrible editor, so it's not like he got it from me, it's not my thing. So if he's being miserable with the paper, let's say I hope I have the foresight to say, "Hey, what's the purpose of the project? Do you know the purpose of the project?" And by the way, it can frustrate the teacher, but I'm trying to understand the purpose of the project, because what I want to do is, you know, I really want... I'm having this fictional conversation right now because I don't know that I've ever done it this way, but I have no problem doing it. We both want him to learn, my older son or any of my kids to learn. Like is there some sort of state guideline you have to meet? Okay, so we've got to take that into account. I do understand it's probably difficult to let 37 ducklings do 37 different things, I get that. [0:12:02.6]
But within reason, but even if he has to turn in a certain assignment that everyone has to do, how many inspire him with his skills and things he likes to do to actually learn something useful, and if we have to, we can do the painful part of making it in a format that the teacher needs it in. But again, just how can we capture their imagination to not... Or even sometimes you just ask them, they thought it was a limitation, like us, that wasn't even really a limitation, "No, I never said you had to do it that way." Something like that'd be awesome, instead of writing a three-page paper you made a 5 minute video, because the classroom actually learned something from it. I think it's just asking questions of how can we make this more fun and more interesting. My rule in life in general for the most part, there are some that you have to do. I don't really love lifting heavy things, I couldn't say I love my feet pounding the pavement for four to five miles three, four times a week. I've learned to embrace it, I listen to audio books, podcasts while I do it, but there's certain things you got to do. You can't wake up and drink whiskey from 9 AM, even though you might really like it at 9 PM. [0:13:05.9]
Just certain things you have to do. But why don't we ask a question within the realm of healthy things in life, how could I do this in a way that would allow me to utilize my strengths and maybe I could utilize the strengths of others around me to make it even better, because as we all know, life is not a series of one man shows, it's just not. So I tried to help them just see that and see that, "Did you ask the teacher if you can do this way?" "No." "Well what makes you think you can?" "She showed us examples form last year everyone did this." "You're still not answering my question." And so you start them to get them to think there, like, "Hey..."I remember this one time, school had pretty bad service, pretty funny. I was in like, I don't know, 7th grade typing at the time or whatever, and the teacher, not my favorite. And so I would ravel rouse every now and then, but just like talking or laughing with my friends or whatever. So I got assigned at the time to write 300 times or whatever, "I will not talk in class." and so I did what any kid would do, I asked her if I could do it on my computer, and she said, "No." [0:14:07.6]
I was like, "No, you just want me to learn to type right." So I convinced her to let me do it on my computer, and so I just copied and pasted it 100 times. I did the assignment, she didn't say that the goal of the assignment was for me to sit there for two hours and write it over and over again, that probably was her goal, but she never made that very clear, so her goal, stated goal was to deliver it written how many hundred times, so I did. Just trying to think about... And again, it comes from sort of not having certain resources as kid. There's a reason why so many people were ADHD, dyslexic, people have a lot of challenges to become entrepreneurs because you learn pretty early in life that you're never going to be able to make it the way everyone else is telling you. So you learn at some point in your life that there is another way, at some point you get fed up with whatever everyone else's other way is, and you go, "I've done enough of the things that they told me how to do at a certain way, but I couldn't and it worked out just fine, so why don't I just try that in some other areas in my life?" and that ends up usually becoming entrepreneurship from my experience. [0:15:09.6]
Jonathan: Yeah. I like the other part that you focused on there, and I think this is what separates successful people from people living plain, ordinary lives, and it was focus on the result. That's what matters. If there's a result that we have to get, sure, let's get there, I might not take your way, you might not take mine, but at the end of day if we're getting results, whether it's for ourselves, for our clients, for our children, isn't that all that matters, is just get the end result?
Nick: Absolutely agree. Some of the lesson is in the hard way to get the result, but some is learning to never do that again or do this way. For sure, it's never going to typically be easiest at first, but yeah, I think a big thing most people don't ask the question of is one of the Dan Sullivan question, we quoted Dan a lot, which is great, we sort of met through his network. So if we're saying, I almost fell out of my chair, this must be pretty good. If we were having a beer or ice water or whatever it is three years from now celebrating whatever it is that we're going to celebrate three years now and we were celebrating how well this project we had done was, what would have had to happen for us to have the best celebration possible and have an awesome... [0:16:19.1]
So when I do that on my clients, it's such an amazing thing because you get, all of a sudden you cut very quickly to the core of what it is they're really after, and so it's like, "Well yeah, I can deliver that." Now, there's options for how we deliver it, because most people come to me for a film project or book project or whatever else, and because it's not what they do all day every day, which is fair, which is the reason why I go to a doctor, he does all day every day, they think that they need to do it this way, and I've learned to ask that question like, "What's the actual outcome that you want?" and when we get to the outcome, then, "Let me give you the different options, let's pick the one making that would make you the most excited." I have clients all the time say, "I have this budget to work with you this year. I loved the project from last year, I'm going to spend this much. How should I spend it?" [0:17:00.9]
I'm like, "Well, the great news is, number one, I've built enough trust with you that you're telling me how much money it is and you asked me how to spend it. That's good. And the reason why you do that is because I've done it all, I've done all these things that I tell you you should do. So I can't change my answer that I do think at some point you should do all of them, but I would tell you to start with what makes you most excited, because if you do something you're not excited about it's never going to work, and whatever you're most excited about next, so even just in a PR project, if you're excited about it, you're going to talk about it all the time and it's going to have more success for you because you're talking about it because you're excited about it. Let's go that way." So I just try to find what is the outcome you want, let me present some options, and whichever one you light up at, that's probably the one you should do, because it makes you excited, and obviously we know when you're excited and dedicated and motivated by something, you have a lot better outcome than if you're apathetic about it. When I used to not use ghostwriters for my writing I was a decent writer, but man it was like pulling teeth. So I would be down to the deadline and that would just be painful, and I just realized, "Wait a minute, there are people who do this. I can just talk to them, which is a skill I have, and they can do it, and so that would be great." and it made my life so much easier and I became so much more prolific. [0:18:12.7]
One of the things that, it's a really stupid lesson, but I think it will make a lot of sense to people, when I started doing interviews with people, at first I wasn't doing any pre-planning because I'm not a pre-planner, so I didn't want to have to read eight books and write an outline, so I would just sort of wing it, because I could usually get away, like I can wing it, I can be fine, but then I realized, "Wait a minute, there's people who, like is what they do." so before I started doing interviews I started having someone spend weeks reading all their stuff, reading their blogs, watching stuff. What I did for them, depending on the format of what I'm going to do, but in most cases I'm doing an interview, it's going to come out to be like an hour long to 90 minute finished piece, like a portrait interview piece, like on my show on an Amazon called In Case You Didn't Know, and so I literally will have my writer write an article that's all about the person, an interesting parts of their life and I'll read that. [0:19:02.4]
Now I just read the article two or three times, and then they give me what's called a bead sheet, which is the article broken down in questions with basically the most likely responses, because that's what the article was, what the response would be. I don't dread it at all. The night before I do an interview I read the article and I make sure the questions are in line, and I'll read the article again the next morning, and now I have a very short term, very good look at their life and I know that some the moments and the critical pieces, and then I do the interview, and of course, and they are delighted about something that I had no idea about and whether they're taking our tangent we go there, but I'm not unprepared, I just outsourced the preparation that I never would have done before, and I have way better interviews, but it was just a simple thing of realizing where is that friction, who can help because there are people who... And the people who do it, it's so funny, they like thank me for for paying them to do it, they're like, "I never thought anyone would ever just pay me to write and read, and like this is my favorite thing ever." I'm so glad, I'm so glad it's your favorite thing, because it's my least favorite thing ever. [0:20:04.1]
Jonathan: Too good, too good. So let's talk a little bit about some of them, the movie projects you're working on. I mean you said you're going to Iraq. What are you working on?
Nick: I'm on a project with a foundation that has, I don't know how much they want me to say about it, but I'll tell you some. I would tell you everything, I never asked them how much they want me to talk about this. But basically a foundation has rescued thousands and thousands and thousands of people from ISIS in Middle East and religious minorities, and so we're going over there and telling some of the stories and showing some of the problem over there. I mean a lot of people thought ISIS was dead or is like dying, and they are sort of rebuilding for resurgence. Not only that, they're really trying to just smite out certain religious minorities in different parts of Middle East. So we're going to go try to sort of share that story, because it's not a story that's being told a lot, but when you look at Kurdistan and north of Iraq, it's the biblical city of Nineveh, whether or not you believe the supernatural part of the Bible, but if you just go through the historical context of it, I don't think anyone would say wiping out all of history in an area and building it over again from scratch is a wonderful idea. [0:21:10.4]
So there's just not of people paying attention to that stuff, because there's so much else going on the world, and this organization's chosen to focus on it. As I found in anything I've done, when you focus on the human aspect anything becomes fascinating. There are women and children and people being kidnapped and trafficked and all sorts of things by ISIS, and just at the beginning one guy just decided he wanted some different. He thought, "Man, maybe I could do something." and now tens of thousands of rescued, relocated people later, he's making a huge difference along with his team in the lives of people who wouldn't have an opportunity. So I'm telling that story now. I've done a few movies on human trafficking, one Haiti, Operation Toussaint is what it's called, it's on Amazon, and the other one we did in Colombia called Triple Take, which is three raids that happened at the same time, as far as we know is the largest sex trafficking slave rescue in history. [0:22:05.1]
And I'm doing a project right now Folds of Honor, a documentary. It's a military support organization founded by an amazing guy Major Dan Rooney, he's only guy in the world who is a fighter pilot and a pro golfer, and they have given 120 million dollars in scholarships to the families of fallen soldiers. I mean if you were to meet any soldier on the front line and say, "Hey, if something happens to you, what do you want me to do?" To a number, every single one of them would say, "Take care of my family." and so they're doing it from the bottom up, which is awesome. We've got a bunch of other crazy stuff in the works too, but it's been awesome. Just because for me, just getting to interact with people who are doing different things and curious about different things, it reminds me how many good people there are out there, it's just really fun to tell their stories.
Jonathan: I like that attitude that you have too, it's more of the world is a good place, even though you're showing all this bad stuff, you seem to have that attitude that people are good, the world is a good place, we're doing good work, and I admire that very much about you and I hope to learn more of that, because I'm a bit of a grumpy person myself. [0:23:05.0]
Nick: No, you're not, no, you're not.
Jonathan: One of the things I wanted to just highlight here quickly, as we come to the close here is that you've done a lot of work, I said it in the beginning kind of, kind of jokingly, freed slaves, but you've also done documentaries where some of that stuff is going on here, and when I say "here", I don't even just mean the U.S., I mean here in Orlando, and that is un-freaking-believable. When you told us that we were like, "No, no, no." I mean you're doing good work out there saving people everywhere, and I appreciate you for that, brother.
Nick: Thanks brother, I appreciate that. We made the two movies in Haiti and Colombia, I never, I mean, focused on human trafficking, it's not a pleasant thing to think about, but as I learned about what was happening and through conversations with organization Operation Underground Railroad, few conversations with Tim Ballard, the founder when we're shooting or whatever, I was learning about all these things that are happening in America, and people would watch the movies or learn and man, most of whom would say, "That's just as heartbreaking that's happening there." and I realize that no one really knew it's happening right here. [0:24:12.0]
So we are now making a film, we haven't even specially announced it yet, so there you go, we can do it right here. Over the course of next year we'll be making that film, called It's Happening Right Here, and it's all about human trafficking in America. We're going to cover Canada, we're going to cover some of the pipeline how a lot of young girls get smuggled in from Mexico through the U.S. and then just regular in every city in the country and almost every neighborhood it's happening. A lot of times the ways you think you would happen and a ton of them the ways you wouldn't, just through blackmail of pictures or videos or whatever, and there's just such a spectrum of it. I really just want to turn it into a project where people like me who have kids, who I don't know how to talk about this stuff to my kids, they're trafficking kids right now, and of course Facebook and Instagram, but things like Fortnite, even Roblox, anywhere they gather, these people who are professionals are grooming children and trying to trick them into doing things that they don't realize what's happening, because they're being tricked by professionals. It's happening. [0:25:11.8]
So I really want to bring light to the fact that it is happening right here, and what can we do to prevent it, what does that look like, and that's a tough thing. What can you do to recognize it, which I know a lot of people weren't even looking before, so if I can just start that. And then what can we do to just be able to open the conversation with our kids. I think a lot about the fact that in like 80's or whenever it was, like, "Don't talk to strangers." One of the guys, I believe, who, I've heard this story several times, and he sort of championed that, that whole movement, sort of now says, "Man, I wish I hadn't said that way, because like a lot a lot of people would help you if you needed help." So there's good things of like don't go with a random man who's trying to give you a lollipop in a mall if you can't find your mom, that's a different game. But what would it be like if instead we focused on the right things? [0:26:02.4]
So what I want to focus on is, it's not like the risk of every, the probability of any person at any time being trafficked is, I don't know, but it can't be that high, but why don't we just, just the same as we tell our kids, you probably shouldn't hop in the back of an ice cream truck, even if the music sounds good and they're promising ice cream, probably not a good idea. Sexual abuse is a really, I talk to kids about sex, and it opens so many Pandora's boxes at age appropriate levels and everything else, so I'm just digging into that, trying to figure out what's the best film that I can make that would help with those things. And as you can, tell there's a lot going on in my mind. I don't even know what that's going to look like, but I figure trying is better than not. So that's what we're doing over the course of next year.
Jonathan: Brother, this has been a pleasure. It's NickNanton.com to get more from Nick. Man, anything you want to say? This has been amazing and I could keep going, except I have another interview bug. Anything else as we're wrapping up here, brother? [0:27:01.6]
Nick: Man, no, thanks for having me on, it's a pleasure. Hopefully I didn't ramble around too many things, that's the way my mind thinks. If anyone wants to see more, we have a ton of stuff on all the major platforms, my sweetheart of the moment would be helpful to me, I have a show that Larry King is executive producing called In Case You didn't Know with Nick Nanton, it's on Amazon, there's two episodes so far, we need reviews, and of course, the more reviews we get, the more it drives up viewership on Amazon, serving up to other people. So I'd be honored if you watch anything, I'd be really honored if you watched that, I'd be super honored if you watched that and left a review. That'd be super helpful to me and I appreciate people like you sharing, so other people might find out about the stuff we're doing, and that's how the world works, so I appreciate you.
Jonathan: So it's In Case You Didn't Know on Amazon, we'll make sure to link to it in the show notes and put it out in the emails as well, brother. Thank you so, so much.
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