Looking for ways to connect closer to your kids and family? My guest will share some simple actionable steps you can start using today.

Michael Anderson is a public speaker and children's book author whose mission and purpose is helping fathers gain the strategies to transform their relationships, do their inner work, and show up more powerfully for their families.

To connect with Michael Anderson visit: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-anderson-44ba36ba/

To get Michael's book No More Mistakes from the Jungle Tales series visit:

https://www.amazon.com/Jungle-Tails-No-More-Mistakes/dp/B0D2BGH6YQ

Special thanks to InGenius Prep for sponsoring The Fatherhood Challenge. To learn more about InGenius Prep or to claim your free consultation, visit: https://ingeniusprep.com/get-a-free-consultation/?utm_campaign=2024+Podcast+Email+Marketing&utm_content=Fatherhood+Podcast&utm_medium=Fatherhood+Podcast&utm_source=Fatherhood+Podcast&utm_term=Fatherhood+Podcast

Special thanks to Zencastr for sponsoring The Fatherhood Challenge. Use my special link https://zen.ai/CWHIjopqUnnp9xKhbWqscGp-61ATMClwZ1R8J5rm824WHQIJesasjKDm-vGxYtYJ to save 30% off your first month of any Zencastr paid plan.

Transcription - Creating Stronger Bonds and Stronger Development

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Looking for ways to connect closer to your kids and family?

My guest will share simple actionable steps you can start using today,

and he will be with us in just a moment, so don't go anywhere.

Before we begin, I'd like to thank our proud sponsor of this episode

and the Fatherhood Challenge, Ingenious Prep.

Ingenious Prep is the world's premier admissions consulting firm,

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Ingenious Prep's student success lies within the fact

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whether it be test prep, tailored candidacy, building mentorship,

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Just click on the link in the episode description

to book a free strategy call with one of Ingenious Prep's college experts,

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that's ingeniousprep.com

and let them know you came from the Fatherhood Challenge.

Welcome to the Fatherhood Challenge!

A movement to awaken and inspire fathers everywhere,

to take great pride in their role,

and a challenge society to understand how important fathers are

to the stability and culture of their family's environment.

Now here's your host, Jonathan Guerrero.

Greetings everyone, thank you so much for joining me.

My guest is Michael Anderson.

Michael is a public speaker and a children's book author,

whose mission and purpose is helping fathers gain the strategies

to transform their relationships,

and do their inner work and also show up more powerfully for their families.

Michael, thank you so much for being on the Fatherhood Challenge.

Yeah, this is awesome, Jonathan. Thanks for having me on, man.

So Michael, what is your favorite dad joke?

(laughs)

Favorite dad joke?

Oh man, I'm trying to think of all the, you know,

I can't believe I say this joke because when my dad said it,

I just rolled my eyes every time.

But I am guilty of the classic when my kids say,

"Dad, I'm thirsty."

I'll say, "Well, nice to meet you, thirsty. I'm dad."

And they have never once found it funny.

(laughs)

They've never once found it funny,

but I do every time. I can't help myself.

(laughs)

I love it.

I really don't want to eat it.

I'm glad someone loves it because they love it.

(laughs)

Well, Michael, let's get right to it.

What is the story behind how and why you got into the work

of helping families connect and stay connected?

I kind of, you know, I kind of like I stumbled into this.

I was working in a different job, had a different career.

I kind of thought I was going to be doing that for the rest of my life.

My wife was going to school at the time.

I think we had just had our first child, I think,

just this baby, my wife was getting her undergrad in family studies.

And she was telling me about things she was learning about marriage,

about family, parenting, and I just started realizing that

the stuff she was saying was way more interesting than the stuff I was doing as a career.

And so I decided to go back to school and get and become a marriage and family therapist.

And as I started doing that, I started working with teenagers.

And I started having these experiences over and over again,

which I was talking with these teenagers and I kept having the thought,

"Man, if only we could get the parents to come in."

Because I more and more as I was getting to know these teenagers

and kind of briefly meeting their parents and getting to know their family dynamics,

I started realizing, and then I started learning more about trauma healing

and the effect that trauma has in the ways that we show up in our relationships,

in our families.

I just started realizing that, "Man, I'm with these teenagers for one hour a week,

but they are with their parents for hours and hours, days, every day.

And if we could help parents to do their own work and help them heal

and help them change the way they show up for their kids,

then this will be astronomically more effective than me trying to help these kids.

And so that got me really interested in parenting,

got me really interested in not only that,

but I started having kids and I started doing my own stuff,

my own work and do my own healing.

And so I just really started to just gain this love for parents who wanted to heal

and wanted to show up better for their kids, I mean.

And so that just kind of launched me down this path and I've loved it, man.

It's been so, so rewarding.

In your mission statement, there is a mention of doing inner work.

What does that mean and what's involved?

Why is it so important and what was your own journey with that?

Yeah, no, this is the idea of inner work.

It's like that phrase that gets thrown around a lot and pops ecology.

Like, yeah, do your own inner work.

You gotta do it.

For me, what I, as I learn more again,

as I learn more about trauma healing and learn more about parenting,

I learned more as I worked with clients and as I became a parent,

I just, I was learning that, you know, about 90% of parenting is not about learning new skills.

Like, it's not about learning new parenting skills.

It's actually about getting really curious about the things that are happening inside of us

that block us from genuinely connecting with our children.

Like, when our kid throws a tantrum,

what is happening inside of us that is keeping us from connecting with our child in that moment?

Being more, more, mostly open and available.

You know, for me, or a personal example to your question,

I noticed that when my son, so I've got two sons and one little girl,

and when my son's cry,

I would, I used to be very cold towards them.

I would just be really harsh, you know, just kind of like the whole,

like don't cry, like come on, be tough, you know,

take a deep breath, you find your fine.

And I started realizing that when my kids would cry,

what was happening inside of me was this own insecurity was getting triggered inside of me,

this own fear that I was weak, that I wasn't strong enough.

And when I saw my kids cry, it was activating that inside of me.

And so as I got curious about that, and then I was also activating these fears,

like, oh, I don't want to raise a weak kid or whatever.

And I realized like 90% of me showing up better for my kids in those moments

is all about me doing my own stuff, like me healing those fears,

me working through those beliefs, me learning how to most regulate.

And I just believe that whether it's that scenario or,

and honestly, any scenario, any scenario in which you're not able to show up in a more connected, open way

for your child, it's just a sign that there's inner work,

there's inner healing that has to happen inside of you first.

That's absolutely powerful.

And I think a lot of dads can relate to that.

I was talking with another guest and we were discussing how sometimes dads can get really uncomfortable

when their kids cry, especially if it's a dad with a daughter.

I mean, we get uncomfortable when our wives cry, maybe not all of us,

but most of us get really uncomfortable with those scenarios.

So I love the fact that you touched on to why in a lot of cases that might be.

And then how we can get past that.

There's an inspiring photo of you reading with your kids.

And I absolutely love that photo.

In fact, I loved it so much that I wanted to make it the episode cover art,

so guests can actually see it too.

Because for me personally, just looking at that photo is inspiring.

Why should dads be reading to their kids?

How has it impacted their development and your bond with them?

Yeah, man.

Okay, just a lot of different avenues here.

We could take this, there's so many benefits.

So for one thing, we live in such an overstimulated world.

I mean, the world is moving so fast that honestly, I could say,

reading books with kids is so good for their development

and helping them slow down and learn and boost the creativity, which is all true.

And that's all a very valid reason you should read your kids.

But what I found is doing stuff like that is actually so good for me.

It's so good for me to just slow down and be present with my child.

And it can be really hard to find time to do that.

And today's, you know, busyness.

Everyone wears busyness like a badge of honor.

And I'm so good to just rush my kids to beds that I can finally relax and rest

or continue some work that I didn't finish or whatever.

And I'm guilty of that.

And I've noticed that the times when I just am willing to be present and slow down my kids,

like, yes, it is so good for them.

But honestly, and as selfish as this might sound, it is so good for me

to just be able to take in what it feels like to be with my children.

What it feels like to just be around their innocence, what it feels like to just be

around their curiosity and their wonder and their goofiness.

It's like healing for me, man.

And not only that, but it just is and now to just like talk about like on the child's side,

like it is just so good for their kids, for kids to have that slow,

really connected time with their parent, obviously.

And so I don't want to minimize that at all.

But just from a maybe a more different perspective here and again,

as selfish as it might sound, like I think I need it, man, more than anything.

There's something about that time slowing down.

And there's something about reading.

It's almost as if there's there's two worlds as your world.

And there's the world of your child or your children.

And at that moment that you're reading those two worlds become one world.

Ah, it's cool.

I love that.

And you're in that same world together in that same space.

Yeah.

And the sense is as if they feel like all of your attention is on them through that activity.

Yeah.

And John and dude, that's that's awesome.

I love that.

What came to mind is he said that is, you know, often, you know,

my kids are want to do something and I have to say, you know,

hey, I would love to, but I actually have to finish this work right now,

which is about like we have to work.

Obviously, like, I don't, I think it's very okay for parents to have to like say no to their kids sometimes, you know.

But, but I think it's also like just an illustration of, you know, I live in my world,

my kids live in their world and sometimes I have to keep those separated.

But what a cool opportunity just to finally let those two worlds blend through imagination and stories.

Like, I love that.

John, that's so cool.

There are two guests I've had on the program.

One is Claire Stead and the other one is Deborah McNeilis.

And I've always referenced them both because they talk heavily about brain development in babies and newborns.

And so many times, dads may feel like, especially in the newborn stage, like, you know, well, you know,

I, what role do I have?

I'm not very important, you know, that it's the mother that breast feeds and does all of this nurturing stuff.

And, and so, you know, I'm not so important now.

So, you know, my time to engage will be when they become a teenager.

It's time for me to really kick in then and, and prepare them for adulthood or when it's time for them to drive.

That's when I'll kick in and, and do my thing.

Yeah.

But research is showing that dads are essential.

This is not an optional thing.

They're essential for max development in those early years.

When, when they're a baby and one of those critical components to brain development is reading to babies,

babies will still react to that.

So, I saw a picture of that of, of a dad reading to his baby and the eyes of his baby are just wide and drawn to what's happening in that experience.

And there's clearly some kind of a bond going on.

And you know there's some development going on in the brain that this data is causing to happen because of that that one on one time.

So, from what I've learned, it's, it's never too early to start reading to your children.

So cool.

Yeah.

I, you know, that's been one of my favorite things.

So, I've got a, I've got a one year old little girl.

And that's been something I've been trying to do more of is reading to her.

And I've just experienced those benefits.

Like seeing her engage and interact and learn and you can just tell that, yeah, you can tell that something is happening inside their brain.

And I really do just to your point, you know, that, that it's really common for, for men to say, like, you know, during those really early periods of like, yeah, like, I don't, my role,

my role will be when they're toddlers, when they're a little older and they can play.

But I honestly think that's, that's a self limiting belief, you know, I, I think that's just a story our brains tell us.

And it's not true.

Our kids need us from the, from day one.

And, and we need them from day one.

I think that's something that's so important for fathers and for myself to understand is like, yes, our kids need it, but like, we need this.

We need this bond with our children, even at such at the earliest stages is healing for us.

So just love what you're saying, man.

One of the earliest memories I can remember of bonding with both of my sons was before they were born and we were coming up with a birth plan.

One of the things that I was very adamant about was being there to catch both of my sons.

This was something that to me was not negotiable.

Yeah.

Was not up for debate.

This was going to happen and this is one thing I really put my fist down.

Yeah.

I mean, if there was a real dire merge at medical emergency or something like that, this was going to be happening.

Yeah.

And there was not a doctor or a nurse that was going to be telling me, no.

I insisted.

In fact, I'll just say I demanded that the very first thing I wanted my son to feel when he came into the world is the hands of his dad on him.

Yeah.

Bring in him in ushering him in.

That was to be his first contact with with the physical world.

So cool.

And that happened.

And that is one of the most unforgettable moments of my life.

Wow.

And I caught him.

There were no gloves and I really don't care what people's opinions are about that about the fact that I had no gloves.

I don't really care.

Yeah.

He felt my bare hands on his bare skin for the first time and I pulled him up to me.

And he scanned around as I was had him right up to my chest and he was scanning around.

And then his eyes made his way right up to my eyes and we locked.

Yeah.

He knew exactly who he was looking for.

And that that look when he locks that I found you.

Yeah.

And we just stared and stared and stared.

I'm not sure when when I'm not sure who blinked first or when it just felt like a long time.

Yeah.

And there was a slight smile.

There was this recognition.

It was I can't even that's the best I can describe it beyond that.

You just have to have that experience for yourself.

But there was a lot of communication going on.

That was nonverbal.

Yeah.

And that moment.

So the effects of that moment are still felt to this day.

I can tell you that man.

They're that so powerful.

I am our first was born at a hospital and and we didn't really know much about.

We were just kind of we're just a young couple just flying in very undereducated with childbirth.

And then our next two were both home births with midwives and.

And my second and my third I was able to deliver and similar same same thing first first to touch

them and.

And man, you're right.

It's so you can't describe it unless you've done it.

It's beautiful.

It's a powerful experience.

Absolutely.

So Michael, what are some of your favorite tips that you're willing to share with us on how to what helped you connect with your family?

And how dads listening now conform that same connection.

So a couple things one.

It's really important to understand how just how important physical touch is.

And so if there's any fathers listening, you know, especially if you've got sons, but but regardless, right?

Like I would just encourage dads to engage in physical touch with their kids.

Like hugging, kissing, wrestling, holding them, just be be silly with them.

We play play rough games with your boys like wrestle with them.

Like my you know, kid, especially especially boys and this isn't thankfully is not the case for every every boy, but there is way too often.

Boys grow up emotionally starved and and absolutely starved a physical touch.

There's kind of this, there's societal messages and themes around, you know, boys just have to kind of be tough and and emotions make them weak and they just kind of have to suppress and and a dad to hug or kiss their boys would be weird or are some things like that.

But what we don't, but those are all just kind of societal like lies, right?

When the truth is is, you know, to for a child to be held by their parent, you know, you I loved how you said you brought your son when he was born just right there, skin to skin.

Like to hold your child like it releases like cascades of neurochemical processes that are so good.

And healing to be like held by your parent to be like kissed by them to physical touch like their releases powerful chemicals like oxytocin and dorphins.

To help you bond like oxytocin is is the bonding. It's called it's nicknamed the cuddle hormone. It's the it's the bonding hormone that gets released when there's physical touch.

And as a dad, you have such a powerful opportunity to bond with your kids through play through wrestling being crazy with them grabbing them squeezing them, you know, just like having fun with them.

It's how that's how kids bond. In fact, man, I wish I had the research in front of you, but there's research out there that shows that dads and their children bond more through play.

To that type of aggressive kind of wrestling running around playing then they do, but by just like snuggling and cuddling.

And so if you're a dad listening to this, my my tip would be come home and just and just be with your kids physically just and enjoy that and helps them bond helps them feel secure to you.

And if they don't feel secure, we're wired to bond, we're wired to attach. And so if we're not getting that bond and that attachment through those means, then kids will learn unhelpful ways of receiving that same type of bond, right?

I mean, kid, I mean, through even through pornography, through substances like whatever, there are artificial ways to get those same that same chemical experience.

And so if it'll get through you, they'll get through somewhere else and and so just take advantage of that now. That's that's probably one of the biggest things I would I would want to tell dads.

Let's change directions a little bit and this might be a loaded question, but here it goes.

What happens when dads have passed trauma from being abused as a child, for example, what does the path to healing look like? And how do they become and stay present for their families in the midst of that?

It's interesting. People want to sometimes people want to like avoid talking about trauma because they think it makes them weak to acknowledge that there's trauma or makes them feel broken or ashamed, makes them feel helpless.

I actually filled the exact opposite.

And healing trauma is just one of the most beautiful things in the world. Like to and so I would encourage, you know, I believe so deeply that the way to heal trauma is to actually learn how to love the parts of ourselves that are carrying that trauma.

Part so when we go through abuse as a child of any nature, it affects our psyche and it affects different parts of us that kind of carry on that pain.

These are often very young parts of us that carry on that pain.

And, you know, we could be a 35 year old man, but yet something happens that just reminds our brain of past trauma when we were seven and all of a sudden that that part of us that is seven neurologically carrying on that trauma that gets online that gets turned online.

And that's why we have big reactive feelings in we've and maybe reactive behaviors and we're like, man, I'm a 35 year old man. Why am I acting like I'm seven? Well, it's because there is a very young part of you that's still carrying trauma that has been processed.

And so what's beautiful, I think, about trauma healing is we usually spend so much for our lives trying to ignore or suppress our trauma.

But if we're actually willing to get curious and I think curiosity is the most powerful word in the English language for actually starting to curious about what's happened to us in the way it's affecting us now.

And then, we start to get a lot of curiosity breeds compassion because once we get curious about that seven year old that's carrying that trauma, we start to realize that it's not as fault.

He didn't deserve to have that happen to him. And he's actually a really cool kid.

And we start to have compassion on them. And now, all of a sudden, a part that a part of us that we used to ignore and suppress now we have compassion for.

And we just want to hold, we just want to hug that part of ourselves. We just want to tell that seven year old kid that he's actually really cool.

And he's not to find he's not weak, he's not broken, he's good enough. And that we love him and that we care for him.

And now, this part of us that we spent so many years of our lives ignoring and suppressing, now not only are we curious towards them, but we're compassionate.

And now not only are we compassionate towards them, but we just love them. And love is at the heart of trauma healing, like connecting with these parts of ourselves and loving them.

That's that's how we heal. That's how we can finally move on and unburden the trauma that we're hanging on to.

And but it starts with curiosity because sometimes self love is a big ask for for fathers for men. And so we start just by can we are willing to start getting curious. And hopefully that makes sense. I mean, healing trauma that we could do multiple episodes on that.

But hopefully that's that makes sense as far as just a brief answer to that question.

It does. It does make a lot of sense. You've written a book called No More Mistakes. Tell me about this book and how dad's listening can get their copy.

Yeah, so yeah, it's a children's book. It's the first of hopefully many of the children's book series that I'm working on the second one's getting published in September.

But I wanted to write a book that was not only for children, but also for parents. Again, you know, I was working with teenagers and I was like, man, we could help parents get in the room and do their own stuff. I'd be great.

And then, you know, even better, if we could help parents do their own work and heal, you know, when kids are younger, right? Instead of when they're 15 and 16 about really the house, like we help parents heal when their kids are, you know, one, two, three years old.

And so I want to write a book that was fun for a kid to read, but it also had lessons that both a kid and a parent could just kind of talk about together and parents could read and realize, oh man, like I want to apply that into my life.

And so this first book, so the book series is called Jungle Tales. So it follows, you know, a group of jungle animals that kind of live in this community altogether and each book, they do something together that kind of teaches a mental health principle.

And this first one is called No More Mistakes. And so the main two characters of this series is this Rocky is this right on him, Rocky. And then this monkey named Mani.

And Rocky loves to play basketball. It's actually called Coco Ball, but it's like basketball with a coconut and he's taking shots and he keeps missing and he realizes that he's embarrassed.

He's making mistakes and messing up. And he starts like avoiding all things that could lead to mistakes because he thinks mistakes are bad.

And it's the story of just him learning through his friends through experiences that actually mistakes are not only bad, not only good.

It takes your good and they help you to improve. And they're actually a critical part of self improvement. And so that's that's the first book.

Each book will dive into a mental health principle kind of like that. And it's available on Amazon right now.

And I can Jonathan, you're up for it. I can get you the link that you can put the show notes to go and check it out.

Yes, absolutely. I would appreciate that. How can dads find you or learn more about what you're doing?

Yeah, so right now the best way to get a hold of me is to LinkedIn. I post there pretty regularly.

It's the platform that I'm most active on. The only downfall is that my name is Michael Anderson. And so there's probably about a thousand Michael Anderson's just in a 50 mile radius of me.

My parents blessed me with a very boring name. So but again, if you're okay, the Jonathan, I can send you my link to my LinkedIn profile on my in the show notes.

And you can connect me there. You can absolutely DM me reach out and talk with me. I'm a I swear I'm a nice guy. So don't don't hesitate to reach out.

Just to make it easier if you go to the fatherhood challenge.com. That's the fatherhood challenge.com. If you go to this episode, look right below the episode description.

I'll have all of the links that Michael just mentioned. I'll have that in the show notes, including the link to his LinkedIn profile so you can connect with them there.

So Michael, as we close, what is your challenge to dads listening now? My challenge again, this is going back to what we talked about earlier is I would encourage every dad to embrace the word curiosity.

Again, our brains kind of natural instinct is to judge what we do judge the thoughts that come up in our mind judge the emotions we feel judge our behaviors lots of shame lots of criticism.

A lot of like, why can't I just be better.

But I want to challenge I would just those challenge out there to dads to take some time today, the next day, maybe go a week and just commit to being super curious with what's happening inside of you.

And just interact with your kids and interact at work interact with your partner if you have one and just get really curious about what's happening in your life that's that's bringing on thoughts, emotions, behavioral patterns, things like that that you're wishing you could change.

And just commit to being curious just like check that out be curious with yourself and see if you can start to kind of get curious about why you do what you do rather than shaming it and judging it.

And as you do that, just ask yourself why do you start getting to know these different parts of you with curiosity maybe even a little bit of self compassion.

Just see if new insights come and see if it makes it easier for you to change when you embrace curiosity rather than being self-critical for yourself.

That'd be a challenge I'd give to dads.

Michael, thank you so much for that wisdom. I sure appreciate it. It's been absolutely an honor having you on the Fatherhood Challenge.

Thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us.

Yeah, John, thank you so much. Thank you for what you're doing. I think fathers, we need more communities like this.

And so I just appreciate you creating a space for fathers to be able to work on themselves and continue to heal and improve. So thank you for having me on.

Thank you for listening to this episode of the Fatherhood Challenge. If you would like to contact us, listen to other episodes, find any resource mentioned in this program or find out more information about the Fatherhood Challenge.

Please visit thefatherhoodchallenge.com. That's thefatherhoodchallenge.com.

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