How To Raise Boys To Be Men with Steve Watson

So what I do with my kids, I mean, I 100% believe it all starts with me. Like I have to be that that person because more than whatever I say they're gonna look at me and say, How do I react to people? How do I treat people? What am I trying to do? Like what kind of father Am I being what kind of husband Am I being? it it's a challenge for me because I'm, you know, I have my job, I have my side gig I have, you know, Father, you know, husbands about, like, trying to figure out, balancing all of those things, and trying to show them that I'm a hard worker, but also showing them that I want to spend time with them, you know, and be there, you know, showing them that I can be creative, be an entrepreneur, but you know that they're more important than any of these jobs that I have.

Welcome to authentic conversations. I'm your host, Ryan, James Miller. And I believe the way to freedom, fulfillment and success ultimately comes by living as the most authentic version of yourself. If you're ready to live the life you've dreamed of, you're in the right place. What up everybody, welcome

to another episode of authentic conversations. So what you are getting today, and what you will have seen at this point, is a bit of a shift in how I've shared the last few episodes of the podcast. Not that the format's changing at all. But definitely the types of conversations I'm having, you know, having, while we, I want to continue to be very real and very raw or authentic, about people in their lives, you know, many of the episodes we're turning into, and again, not that they were bad, because people have been giving positive feedback, and we've been learning from them. But you know, they were just turning into these seven steps to being a better or seven steps to overcoming. And again, those are important things, but I just wanted to do something different. And I wanted to align with this passion that I have to speak more specifically about manhood today, a word even that triggers a lot of people a topic that is being challenged from every facet of this world. And so I wanted to go right at it like I always do. And so because of that, took the LinkedIn started asking some people if they'd be interested in coming on the podcast, and one of the people that raised his hand was somebody that I've come to respect very, very highly. That's Steve Watson. He's the founder of trend breakers, you can learn more about him by going to LinkedIn, I'll make sure to pop his link in the show notes so you can reach out to him. But you know, he's created this community of finance people, human resources, professionals, and benefits advisors, and really trying to help them get a grasp on just the out of control health care costs that are that we're experiencing in America today. And I say we because we're all there. But that's not what we're going to talk about today. We're going to talk about the fact that Steve is a man, you're looking at him, you can see it already. I'm right here. He's there. He is a husband. He's a father to a lot of kids, which we're gonna dig into. And so with that, Steve, what up buddy, welcome, glad to have you.

I'm excited. It's fun. I love geeking out employee benefits but I mean you get into my family that's my my passion. Really. I mean, that's the passion that we all have most important to us that we don't talk enough about. So I'm excited about this.

Okay, so we're just gonna get right into so family, you have a lot of kids, right? How many? I have seven kids. Oh my gosh, and what are their age ranges?

So my oldest will be turning 17 here next next week and the genders it goes boy, boy, boy, boy, boy, boy girl, so I got a little Maryam. So at 17 all the way down to three. So she's just turned three here past December. So six boys and a little girl range from 17 to three.

That three year old child will imagine that kid for the rest of her life,

and you imagine, yeah, yes. And she she's those girly girls. You can ever ever get every princess dress ever. But she'll take your knees out because I mean, she's got six older brothers cliche. doesn't mess around.

I love that. Okay, so seven kids, how long have you been married?

I am we just did our 19th year anniversary celebrated in Charleston. So

if I had some really cool sound effects, we'd all be cheering right now. Yeah, that's amazing. I mean, it really really is, you know, when we think about just the sanctity of marriage, at least when I think about the sanctity of marriage. You know when we talk about marriage in general we just don't hear people that have been married that long right i mean it's it's getting harder and harder to

hear what's funny when you first get married you hear those people have been married like 20 years like wow, that's like so long are 10 plus years and yeah, it'll be 20 years next next year and it just keeps getting better like and honestly I mean is I mean good times, bad times all this stuff, but I I don't think people realize that the longer you've been married, the more depth that it has, and the more your relationship has and stuff like that, and people I think, miss out on, you know, spending that much time with one person.

Yeah, yeah, you know, what's interesting for me is, and, you know, I could see you as somebody that would probably feel very similarly, you know, I just celebrated 20 years of marriage to my wife, and which is just a feat in and of itself for her. Definitely more so. But at the, at this point in my life, and I'm only 43, and I have a lot of great guy friends, but there is nobody that I would rather spend time with them my wife, you know, I, like I enjoy guys night out, or guys weekends, every once in a great while. But when I'm gone, I just miss my wife and want to get back to hanging out with her.

No, it's so true. And I think this is a difference between men and women. Like my wife definitely needs her girlfriend needs a break from the, you know, the kids running around, I would go off and do stuff. And like, my kids are like, well, who are your friends? I'm like, Mom, you know, like, Well, why don't you go off and do it. Like, if I if I'm gonna go leave on a weekend go somewhere, like, I want to go with my wife, I want to go spend the weekend with my wife, I want to go wherever, you know, and spend time with her. Because I'm the same way like that's, that's my best friend. That's who I want to be with. That's why we got married. It's been it's been a lifetime journey with.

And so night, teen years means that it's been all bliss, right? To get to this point.

Yeah, with seven kids all bliss.

So, so tell me about that just just for a minute is what what's it like to be married that long? Like, I mean, obviously, it's not all easy. We have, you know, different challenges that we run into on a daily yearly basis. And so what's it like for you to, you know, to think back on the last 19 years of marriage and getting to this point?

Yeah, when we joke around, like, we never, never could have imagined this this life. I mean, I think when you first get married, when you first come out of college and stuff, you think you're dreaming big, but it's really small, and what life has planned for you. You know, I never thought I'd go to Brazil, I live five years in Brazil with my wife and we have two of our kids were born in Brazil and never thought we'd move to Arizona and never thought we'd have seven kids. I was never part of part of the plan as well. And it's just now I you know, I'm in my early 40s as well and like looking forward, you know, like, I I still think I'm dreaming big, but it'll be fun to see what the next 20 years bring. You and I were just talking about authentic kind of stuff. I mean, this thing about having seven kids, I was one of our biggest, biggest challenges in our life. My You know, I'm, we're very strong in our faith as well, and a lot of prayer and a lot of stuff. And my wife had dreams of having a girl. But our very first one was born. And we had the name picked out Emily, we thought it was like girl, stuff like that I have this boy. And then you know, had a couple of boys and we're both from big families. I'm the oldest of six, my wife's oldest, a five, and we always thought like four or five kids, that's where we thought we would we would have. And then you know, the third boy comes and then the fourth boy comes and, you know, I mean, we're, we're part of the LDS faith. I mean, we're trying to max out like the Catholics and the Mormons is our job, you know, more kids than that. It was like the fifth boy comes in. And so she's still having these dreams about having this girl and having on it wasn't, it wasn't the people to ask like, are you just waiting for the girl? It wasn't so much about that. It was more of like, we felt God had called us to, like have this girl. And so like, you're questioning your faith of like, do we keep going, this is what God wants us to do, or not. And so then we have the fifth boy. And then the sixth boy, and you're like, Holy moly. That's just a lot of kids. Like, I mean, I love all my kids, I'm just saying that we were just, you know, and then you don't have the seventh one. And it's a little girl. And it's printed. I can't imagine life life without having my little girl at the end. But it's hard. I mean, this is a hard life to have that many kids and it's hard to, it's hard to have a 17 year old and a three year old at the same time, because the 17 wants to stay up until one o'clock in the morning. And the three year old wants to wake up at five o'clock in the morning. You know, dealing with teenagers and little kids and stuff like that. I mean, blast, I wouldn't change it. But it's hard. It really is a hard thing to do.

Yeah. So, I mean, were there any significant hurdles that you guys have faced in your marriage along the way? I mean, was there any like, you know, big moments of challenge or struggle that you recall as being just one of those things that I mean, almost stumped. Yep.

My wife and I've always had like a really good relationship between the two of us. And so I don't think we've luckily not had like a big challenge between the two of us. It's, again, a big part of our faith is that when we get married, we get married for eternity. And so we really believe that these marriages go beyond just this life, and which is a big deal. And so when you're when you're talking about getting married, it's not even like getting married. Just like the next 4050 years, you're talking about, like, ever, kind of kind of stuff. And so part of the going into that with that mentality, I think helps live through, like the small things and the big things. But as far as like big hurdles, I mean, moving to Brazil is a big challenge, like living in different countries and a different culture and dealing with that, you know, I think the biggest ones was like, do we have more kids and, you know, do we follow this kind of stuff and challenging because it you know, my fourth child, and my wife was pregnant, our fourth she ended up and ended up in the hospital going with an ambulance there. And I remember following in the car, this ambulance, and just like, that's my whole world, it's in the ambulance right there. And just, you know, being the dad and the father being like, I'm done. Like, I can't do this. I can't do life without her. I can't do that. And so I was tough.

Yeah. So I guess that kind of leads into my thought so you know, as I think about being a man today, there is this, at least I feel a significant tension. So we not too long ago came out of this era of toxic masculinity, where you know, guys were over flexing themselves. And with that, you know, we saw like, you know, the height of, you know, maybe abuse kind of, you know, came to the forefront and society and then we saw this pendulum kind of swing almost into a complete other direction. And this isn't always going to make more fans of, or for me, but you know, then we we started to swing into this very weak, weak sense of masculinity. The answer to toxic masculinity was

it's a joke, right? You watch any movie about dads, it's all about the funny guy that can't do anything that doesn't know how to do anything. It's just like, yeah,

yeah. Or, you know, they're, they're, you know, they don't need to be strong. They're just, they're just passive. And so how do you view and especially, I mean, your seven boys. So like, how do you personally view masculinity and leadership as a man in your home and with your boys? Like, how do you come to see that today? Yeah, I

remember like, on your post, like one of the things you talked about being kind of like, why conservative male kind of kind of stuff. Like, you can't use that anymore, right? You can't even like say that until you get you get hammered. And okay, okay. So it's like one thing about me, like, I can deal with my own stuff, but I have six boys that I'm trying to raise that gift, guess what, they can choose the race, they can choose their gender, the game shoes, they're I mean, they're they're conservative stuff. And I'm trying to help them feel valued. And I think that's as human beings, that's what we all want. And unfortunately, I think that's what's happened to a lot of minorities, a lot of female stuff. They just weren't valued for so long. And I think a society we're doing better at doing that. We want to bring everybody up to feel valued, but I think we're pushing men down and saying, Well, you can't feel value can't do that stuff. That's not all we want, right? And so sometimes when I go out there and say, I want to feel valued, I want to feel like I'm doing this stuff. I want my boys to feel that stuff. I can't say that. Now, unfortunately, on social media, I can go out there and do that in a very public way because I just get slammed out there. And even you think about your clubs in high school, like you can't have a male club you can't have a conservative club. You can't have a heterosexual club you can't have you put those three together and you're like this racist kind of whatever out there but they need a place you know, and I want to teach them and

how do you how do you educate them? I mean, especially like, your older boys, I mean, 17 that's a junior man. And so you know, how are you bringing him up to define that in himself? And at the same time, I would just expect this of you knowing what I know of you to be respectful of those that think differently.

Yeah, yeah. And I am that way that's funny and you're the same exactly and I saw some people like hammering you, I'm like, Do you even know him? I'm like for the love clothes and I go off on people and it's like, it's like when you know people so what I do with my kids I mean, I 100% believe it all starts with me like I have to be that that person because more than whatever I say they're gonna look at me and say how do I react to people? How do I treat people? What am I trying to do? Like what kind of father Am I being what kind of husband Am I being it it's a challenge for me because I'm you know, I have my job I have my side gig I have, you know, Father, you know, husbands about, like, trying to figure out balancing all of those things and trying to show them that I'm a hard worker, but also showing them that I want to spend time with them, you know, and be there you know, showing them that I can be creative, be an entrepreneur, but you know that they're more important than any of these jobs that I have. And so as much as I can't I just try them, share their struggles with them and say, Look, it's hard like this is what I'm trying to do and what do you guys think? I'm trying to listen to them and try and, and I'm not perfect at all. I mean, this is a journey that I'm trying to draw on I, I learned my one son, he was got into a conversation with my wife and I was saying, look, I just want to spend more time with dad, like, I just need dad. And that hurt, you know, this 14 year old, it's having a hard time and I want to do that. So we came together and decided we're gonna go play pickleball so we wake up at 530 in the morning, because he loves pickleball and we go play pickleball ever every morning, and I'm not in the shape to play pickleball I'd rather sleep in and do stuff, but it's what he loves to do, and it's turning into be like our thing. So every morning pickleball and

you know what I love about that so much Steve is so when I think about a man, a couple of the defining characteristics are protector and provider. And I think the old school idea of provision was, in some sense, monetary, right, I'm gonna put a roof over your head, I'm gonna put food in your mouth, I'm gonna you know, clothes on your back, which are all very wise things to want to provide for your family. But one thing that I started to become really fascinated by was this idea that to provide is also to make available and I think that's one aspect particularly that men and fathers in homes or even husbands to their wives have often overlooked. You know, I mean, there was a season of my life when I was spending so much time trying to provide the practical for my family that I was ignoring my family. And so I love that you you, you're making yourself available in a way that is so much about provision. It's just it's one of

them. Here are some really good books, there's a book called love and respect. I've loved that book. I mean, if you if you haven't read that book between like learning between males and females and stuff like that, and it comes from a Bible scripture and talk about how it commands women to love their husbands and for women or men to love their wives and wives to respect their husbands. And he was just fascinating. Like, why is the difference? Like why why shouldn't it be love each other and do stuff and so diving into that that piece and how we speak different stuff, and you'll have to go read that book and do it, but what, it's helped me with my wife, but it's helped me with my boys as well. And my wife's got to the point of saying, look, these like 1415 1617 year old boys, like, I can love them, but I can't teach them respect. I can't teach them to be a man, I can't teach them these kinds of stuff. Like it's your turn now dad, like it's on you. And I'm feeling that weight now. It's like the older they get the more that's like, you know, when they're really young moms like they're all the time and keeping them alive and stuff. Like Now it's my turn. Like it's, I'm feeling it.

Yeah, now that's good. So how, so for you, your own kind of personal you know, in your head moments and, and time So what? What is tapping into your own emotions look like? Because again, I feel like that's another area that it's definitely rarely talked about unless it's talked about in attachment to anger. But so how do you handle emotion for yourself? And then again, I mean, obviously that's translating into you know how you're parenting kids.

Yeah, and it's actually been something I've been thinking a lot about over the last probably a year year and a half and there's a there's a really good book out there called like, no more Mr. Nice Guy, or the nice guy syndrome or something. And I, I really fall into this where I just sacrifice everything for my everybody else, right, it's all about waking up early money, time, energy, kind of like this martyr complex. And what I've found is that, you know, while it's service is such a good thing to like, give you got to make sure that you're actually giving it and not turning it into like this martyr thing of like, I'm going to give it to you. And I wish that I had that time and kind of resent resentment behind it as well. And so like tapping into your own emotions, like what is important to me, like, what do I want to do, and finding that passion within myself and then pairing that with what my kids want to do? Like I, you know, I'm actually starting to really enjoy pickleball it's actually turning into like a little passion of mine and something that's fun for me that I want to go do as well. But I think mostly, emotions is tough, because I've actually been a pretty even keel person most of my life and so I don't get super passionate, super sad and super stuff like that. But as I feel like I missed out on part of my life, too, because I'm not feeling some of those. Even the good ones, like extreme happiness and extreme joy and extreme stuff.

And was that similar in your own upbringing, like were you brought up to just be very even keel or was

it so that's one of the things I was kind of reading through that. So I was the oldest of six kids. My dad had two jobs that are like his day job and he had a farm so I grew up on a sheep farm as well. So he was gone all the time. And so it was like mom with me and like, you know, five younger siblings and it was just pretty stressed there. And so I never wanted to add more stress to my family. And so I'd always like kind of be very interrupted. And then take care of my own stuff never like put my challenges on the my family because I didn't want to add more to it. But, you know, we learn a lot of our bad habits from from kids and how we're taught and how we're raised and stuff. And I feel like I, I miss out on a little bit of life, because I'm not willing to kind of open up myself and kind of talk about those things. It's always about the other person because I'm in my head trying to serve them. But then they're like, Well, what about you? Like, how can I help you? How can I get connected with you? And so I'm learning that now in my 40 years of trying to open up more and it's, you know, I've taught myself for 40 years how to do it this way. So some of the things I don't even know the answers to.

so interesting that you say that my parents divorced when I was six. And on one hand, I had to step up and be the man of the house right away, right away, like my mom was remarried a few times. And some guys were good for moments other guys were never good at all. And so I was consistently you know, the kid I was mowing the lawn, I was driving, you know, my mom got breast cancer when I was young, and at 14 I was driving my mom around because we didn't have anybody else to do that. And, you know, I kind of stepped into that role. And so I became independent and then when you coupled my personality, which was very boisterously outgoing and everyone was like you're the leader, you're the leader. And so I never I never learned how to accept any of that and then as I grew up one of the other things I realized was was that my dad had very high expectations of me and so like him leaving coupled with that expectation really pushed me to then want to always prove everybody that I could do everything right I was enough I was worthy enough and so those things coming together created this monster of sorts which you know, I I never wanted help from anybody I was way too prideful and I mean that was just internally destroying to me and brought me to the literal just like brink of disaster because I was I was just it was too much about me and I couldn't let anybody into that like that's a hard thing to deal with.

And then you're talking about me going back to where we started out with like marriage and love and stuff like that can you truly give all of your not giving all right and we're like, you know, it's like I can serve and help as much as I can. But if I'm not willing to let them serve and let them help me and let them feel my emotions love us stuff like that like it's like I'm always doing a disservice to them I'm not letting them all the way into me so

that's really good. Yeah, I mean, yeah, what I've done quite I've done quite a bit of marriage counseling for other people in the past young couples that are getting married and I always tell them you know, one of the lies you you're told is that marriage is 5050 I said marriage is 100 100 if you are not going 100% all into everything on a day in and day out basis you know, you're always going to come up short and you still are anyway but you're always going to come up short in some degree or another I mean, it's really about giving all of yourself over to another person and people just don't get that Okay, so two other things that I'm kind of interested in hearing from from you as we slowly begin to wind down so the first one is fear. So again, you are a husband to your wife, you are a father to seven kids, you are involved in multiple business ventures like there has to be some fear built into all that you're doing so what as you think about all of your life out there like what is that fear that you you feel like you're most challenged to deal with? Or do you have one that you're most challenged to deal with? Um

I don't know how much of the surface it is but providing for my family is a big one I mean I got to put food on the table like we we eat a lot of food and we we spend a lot of gas a lot and a lot of stuff I have a college come up and stuff like that and so the idea of having some company have the ability to fire me it's just does not resonate well with me at all that I can just just and so that's partly why I've always had these side things and I like multiple streams and stuff from a providing protection for my family source of income has been a big thing for me. I don't want to have somebody have that type of control over me and so if one thing goes that I'll be able to have other other sources fears other fears You know, I think we talked about my one son just recently but them not knowing how much I love them and how much I care for them. So I'm like balancing trying to provide as much for them, but I don't want to miss these years with them at the same time. Like I don't want them to come 10 years from now and be like wow, you know, wish we would have spent some more time together or Thumbs up. So it's like those two balancing is probably what I'm most worried about.

Okay, that's, that's phenomenal that you said that because I mean, that really is the final question that I wanted to ask practically, how are you balancing the desire to love, sacrifice care for and serve your family, while continuing to maintain some level of success? Whatever that is to you. So what are what are some of the practical steps that you take to do that? Or do you have them

the one that I always try and do that I'm still have a lot to learn about is go all in when you're doing whatever. So we're doing a podcast right now. It's like, be all in on the podcast and not worried about some of the other things that are there. And when I'm playing pickleball, with my son go all in at that moment or go on stuff like that. So that's, that's been helpful. And it makes a little bit more meaningful relationships when I'm with them and doing that stuff. So not just half on the phone and half on this and half brain over there, and whatever. So you just, even if your body's there, you're still missing out on on that. And then trying to get really efficient, and no, what I'm what I'm good at, and what I'm not good at. And so I'm really good at, like hiring people on my side hustles to do specific things that that's not what, you know, editing a podcast is not what I should be doing with my life, right? I mean, that's, but no, but I really enjoyed doing the conversations, enjoying the conversations. So spend my time doing that and let other people do do other things. And it's, it's easy to kind of get caught up with like, well, how much money is I can save this money and stuff like that. But there's the time aspect of just do what you do really well at go all in on it and let other people that. Do those things, do it for you. So I dig

that I love that idea of being 100% all into what you're doing. I mean, I know it's something that I fall victim to a lot. And then I Yeah, well, I mean, obviously, you have far more responsibility. But I think to then, really backing that up with knowing what you're good at what you enjoy, and offloading the things that either you're not good at or don't want to do. And I think that's very practical. I want to say simple wisdom, no, it's a very difficult thing to do. It's very, very practical, simple wisdom, if more of us would adopt it, because it would free us up to do more of the things that we like to do, which is going to allow us to be more present with the people that we love, more present to do the things that we enjoy and more present to be more successful in the businesses that we're all either

like all aspects is like home life What can I offload other people to do you know, even in my day job, you know, like saying like, this is what I do really well with that we need to hire somebody else to do that, or my side hustles stuff like that, like it's got to be all aspects of your life like trying to do what you do well and let other people do it.

That's good. Well, that that's the good one big practical takeaway. I said I didn't want seven steps, but one was a good one. Alright, man, well, I mean, I appreciate you being willing to share you're actually the first one I don't know where this is gonna come out and oh, shame. But this is the first episode that we're recording in this vein. So I'm interested to hear how your experience and feedback is going to lean into you know what, what, you know, many other guys are going to share but super valuable and super helpful. So thank you, thank you for being willing, well, first,

very, very welcome. Unfortunately, it can be very lonely being this dad and this husband and I think we just need each other and to be able to like talk with each other and do stuff. So I really appreciate you know, to come on and share, share my story and look forward to other ones.

Awesome. Alright guys, well, that wraps up another episode of the podcast. As always, make sure to reach out to and connect with the guests, Steve Watson. You can find him on LinkedIn. I'll put his link in the show notes. So you can do that. If you have any feedback for me thoughts, questions, concerns, fact if you were pissed off about something that I said reach out to me if you were mad about something that Steve sell you and reach out to me to

just put it all on me, I'll

take it all on. Other than that, as I always say, regardless of what I'm talking about, be you be happy, be authentic

peace. Thank you for joining me on this episode of authentic conversations. If you are ready to live the life you've dreamed of. I'm here to help. Head to Ryan James miller.com slash podcast to begin your journey. And if this episode impacted you in any way, pay it forward by sharing it with someone you know. I'm Ryan James Miller, and I'll see you next time on authentic conversation.