Your #1 Job As A Parent, Respectful Disregard For Others, When College Isn’t Useful & More With Jon & Missy Butcher (Boundless Parenting Book Series).

My name is Ben Greenfield, and on this episode of the Ben Greenfield Life.

Podcast, at the end of the day, the most important thing to us is that our kids are happy and fulfilled. That's what matters to us. We don't care what the conduit is to get there. As a matter of fact, one of our most important parenting strategies is we provide our children with shelter and food on their plate into their adulthood. We don't want them to have to worry about putting a roof over their head and putting food on their plate. That's an easy thing to do. We provide that. And then here's the deal. Go out there and find out what you were put on this earth for. Figure out how you're going to create a path to happiness, balance, success and fulfillment.

Faith, family, fitness, health, performance, nutrition, longevity, ancestral living, biohacking, and a whole lot more. Welcome to the show.

You know, I don't think it's any secret that I am and have been for quite some time a fan of this anti aging strategy of using NAD to protect the cells and to enhance the health of the mitochondria.

There was a form of NAD that.

Was mentioned when I interviewed Tony Robbins called NAD3. We talked about it. I was intrigued about it. I didn't know anybody was actually making it. But that along with two other ingredients, one called spermidine and one called resveratrol, also came up in that interview and.

Are also kind of like the darlings.

Of the anti aging industry right now. Spermidine, resveratrol, and nad. Well, what we talked about in that podcast was how there's this very unique new form of NAD called NAD3. It's a licensed NAD ingredient, huge amount of bioavailability, and when combined with spermidine and resveratrol, this is like an unrivaled formula for anybody who wants to enhance aging using NAD and using a very unique bioabsorbable form of it. So this company called Biostack Labs formulated this stuff. It's called Nad regen. It's not Nad, it's Nad 3. So Nad regen is actually the only formula in the world to use NAD3, which is a licensed ingredient with human trials behind it. But they've combined that with a special form of spermidine along with resveratrol and niacinamide. So all these ingredients put together are like freaking food for the mitochondria and act as very unique, very effective cellular protectants to enhance anti aging and longevity. It's a pretty unrivaled formula Very unique blend. So again, it' NAD3, but then it's also got spermidine, resveratrol and niacinamide in it. And they're cutting us all a deal. Basically, two bottles of this stuff costs about $134. And what happens is if you order, they're going to give you another free bottle. So that extra free bottles were $67. Pretty good deal. Go to BioStackLabs.com Ben BioStackLabs.com Ben I do about five days on, two days.

Off any week where I might happen.

To get like some kind catch or NAD iv. I don't take extra nad, but man, for an oral formula, this one's pretty unrivaled in the industry.

Brand new.

You can get your hands on it now. So. Biostacklabs.com.

Ben all right, let's talk ketosis.

When your body churns out ketones, it is a state of metabolic efficiency, mental clarity, improved athletic performance, better metabolic health. The reason for that is that ketones are 28% more efficient at generating energy than sugar alone. That means you can do more with less. And ketones are usually made when your body's pushed to the limits, when it's deprived of carbs, when it's fasted, when it's had a whole, whole bunch of fat, coconut oil and butter and all the things. But you can also, using the magic of science, shift yourself very rapidly into a state of ketosis that you normally have to fast for days to get into by supplementing with liquid ketones. You can usually drink ketones to do this. And there's one form of ketone brain fuel called ketone iq, fittingly enough, and it is literally, quite literally brain fuel. None of the insulin spikes or caffeine jitters or mid afternoon energy crashes you get from most energy drinks. You just fuel with ketone iq. One serving of this stuff and it shifts you into the state of ketosis that you want again without being fasted or restricting carbohydrates. So it's almost like you have your cake and eat it too. Or if you're already into ketosis and you want to put the icing on the cake and get even deeper into ketosis, this stuff works fantastically for that too. It's made by HVMN. They created this stuff through a $6 million contract from the US Department of Defense, deep partnerships with some of the top researchers in the ketone industry. And it's a cutting edge drink and you get 20% off. Here's how go to hvmn.com and use code BENG20. That gets you 20% off any purchase of Ketone IQ. That's an exclusive offer for my listeners only. Hvmn.com BENG it's called Ketone IQ by HVMN.

A lot of people ask me what CBD I use. There's like a billion different CBDs out there. Kind of like keto things, CBD things.

Those are probably the two off the.

Top of my head that are the most saturated words used in the industry and they're a dime a dozen. I go after what I consider to be the purest, best, most powerful, most well acting full spectrum CBD that exists. The guy who makes this stuff has been on my podcast three times for good reason. Adam Wengauer makes this Element Health cbd. So Element Health cbd. I take one dropper full occasionally. If I'm on a plane and I just got totally knocked myself out, I'll go as high as three dropper voles. Their maximum strength 60ml bottle has a whopping 4800mg of full spectrum CBD. It's insanely powerful stuff. Honestly, it just works. It doesn't get you high like THC does, but this CBD is the most relaxing. I mean you can, as Adam and I discussed in the podcast I did with him, just use a few drops as a pretty potent nootropic and to kind of stabilize you if you've had a pick me up an energy drink. But oh my gosh, a few dropper fulls of this stuff, you're even for someone who's pretty sensitive, even just one. I do that with the kion sleep and a little bit of melatonin and that's like my sleep stack. It works amazingly. It's kind of like I've cracked the code on sleep with that stack and that CBD is definitely a part of it. There's so many benefits of CBD for anxiety, for stress, even as Adam talks about, for fertility, for inflammation, for pain from old injuries. Here's how you get 15% off of any of the Element Health CBD products. Go to elementhealthsupply.com BEN and use code BEN15. That gets you 15% off. Elementhealthsupply.com BEN, and use code BEN15.

They'll get you 15% off. So enjoy. Well, I'm very, very pleased because the episode that you're about to hear is part of the boundless parenting series in which I'm interviewing a host of amazing parents who have produced absolutely amazing children and who have often very unique or outside the box parenting approaches and an emphasis on family and legacy that I think you'll benefit tremendously from, whether you have children or you want to have children or you have children in your life or you know someone with children who might benefit from this interview. I think it's going to be really, really insightful for you. My guests today are John and Missy Butcher. And I've known John and Missy for several years. My wife and I spent a lot of time with them when we were actually in, of all places, Estonia. In Tallinn, Estonia, where we went through one of most transformational life reinvention and life purposes processes, if that's a word that we've ever embarked on. It was called Lifebook. And Lifebook was designed by John and Missy. It's basically a book that weaves together all of your values and your characteristics that you hold dear and your purpose statement and your dreams and your goals and your vision, and they help you create this fantastic book. It's like a vision board on steroids. And so my wife and I joined John and Missy and got to know them through that process. I've gotten to know them over the years, and they're just very, very special people. John was once dubbed by Chicago magazine as the guy with the most perfect life. He's a serial entrepreneur. He's the creator of Lifebook. You might be familiar with the precious moments of figurines and art. And John is the mastermind behind those and his wife, Missy, and he have not only created this extraordinary system that helps thousands of people, it transforms their lives from ordinary to living masterpieces, but they're also into a lot of concepts that you and I hold dear. Anti aging and experiencing long lasting love and redefining education and building an ideal living environment, and of course, parenting. And so today we're of course, here to talk about parenting. I have created a host of questions that every parent featured within my book has the option to pick and choose an answer. And John and Missy were kind enough to go through and choose the questions that I proposed to them. And they honed it down to a few questions that I think you're really going to benefit from. So this is going to be like a Q and A episode. And I won't reveal where John and Missy are right now. They live in a very special place. You guys allowed to say where you live, or is that a total secret?

We'll talk about the island chain, but not the Specific island they live in Hawaii.

And so they're also in a very beautiful locale in Hawaii. And so I think we should just jump right in. John and Missy, what do you think?

Yeah, absolutely. Ben, thanks for that lovely conversation.

Mary spent time with you.

Yeah. I miss you guys. It's been a couple years since we've had a chance to connect, but we'll make it happen. I might have a hunting trip with my sons at some point this year down to the islands and maybe I'll try to connect with you. The first thing, of course, is proving the fact that you've actually figured out how to make children, how to make little human beings. And so I'm going to assume that you guys have children. I know that you have children, but what I'd like you to do is describe to me your family, like how many kids you have and how old they are and what they're up to. This is like your bragging moment for your kids and why you're proud of them.

Awesome.

Nice.

Okay, you want me to go, sweetie?

Yeah, go ahead.

Okay. So we have four kids. Ben, Jess and her husband Pat are our oldest. And how old are they, babe? 34.

35 ish. 35 and 38 I think they are now.

Yeah. And they have two kids.

Jesse is our daughter and yeah, Pat's our son in law. Yep.

So we have two grandkids with them.

Jordan. Yeah, give me a go.

And then Jordan and Ashley have two kids. Jordan's like 30ish. We don't know.

Maybe I should be doing this. Seriously.

See, this is insightful though, because I've always wondered, well, how long does a parent actually remember how old their children are? And maybe it's kind of like many older individuals, they seem to forget how old they themselves are. It sounds to me like maybe one. Maybe your very first piece of advice for parents is you eventually forget how old your kids are.

Yeah, just deal with it.

Once you get over 50, it's like you get. You just can't remember. So we got Jessie, she's in her late mid-30s. Jordan is in early 30s. Then we have Jade, she's 21. And Justin is 17. And our two oldest kids are both married. And they each have two kids. We have four kids and four grandkids.

Okay.

Yeah. So let me, let me tell you what's special about these kids and what we're really proud of each one of them. For Jess and Pat, our oldest, literally, Ben have put together the most amazing homeschool curriculum. Just the way they run their House and the way that they educate their kids, they took what we did with them and took it to the next level. Our proudest area for Jess and Pat is parenting, literally, that we can ever imagine. So.

Yeah, they're actually in the process of doing just straight up homesteading. And to me, that's like, you can't get more of a down to earth education for your kids than that. So we're super, super proud of them.

Oh, my gosh. Yeah. I mean, animal husbandry and the whole hygiene hypothesis and being in nature common thread I'm actually finding, as I'm working on this book is so many parents emphasize nature immersion for their children. Of course, there are other factors like consequential based discipline and typically there's a lot of animals and some element of homesteading or even homeschooling. Now, you did mention before, move on to your other kids that Jess and Pat, you said something like they've designed the most fantastic homeschool curriculum. Do you mean that they've actually designed a curriculum that other parents can use, or is this like their own in house curriculum?

It's uniquely built for both of their kids. You know what I mean?

Yeah. So they've designed a very customized program for their kids. But sometimes when you crack the code in your own situation, you have something valuable to share with others. So that's kind of what they're thinking through right now. And Ben, that's a big decision. I mean, I remember when Missy and I had to really, really analyze whether or not we wanted to bring Lifebook out to the world. We had this system that we created for ourselves that we'd worked with for 10 years, that we'd never shown anybody that led us to the extraordinary life that we had. And that's wonderful when you create something like that that works really, really well for yourself. When you decide to share it, your life is going to change. That's a big decision. And so they are right now sort of trying to make that decision, whether they just continue to use this incredible system to benefit themselves and their family, or whether they want to open it up to the rest of the world. And I think they'll make that decision probably before the end of the year.

That's an important observation because, you know, we unschool in our house and the curriculum is very much based around a child's passions and interests and desires, thus raising the conundrum that if you share it with the rest of the world, other children may not share the same passions and interests and desires as your own. Children. But the model that we have of having certain blocks that are designed for certain aspects of finances or rhetoric or logic or core curricula that I think every young human being would benefit from, and then filling in all the gaps with the things that they're passionate about. We have an online kind of like an executive assistant who helps to send the schedule back and forth, and then a local person who helps to drive and implement and do record keeping. And I've thought about putting it out as an actual curriculum, but really it's a little bit loosey goosey. Probably more unschooling than homeschooling. But you know what? If Jess and Pat ever do do something like that, let me and let my audience know, because I'm sure that some people will be interested to get an insider sneak peek of what they do. So tell me about the others. In addition to Jess and Pat.

Jordan. Jordan is in his early 30s. One of the things that we're most proud of with Jordan, Jordan's an entrepreneur. All of our kids are entrepreneurs. And Jordan had two failed careers early on. When he was 19.

He made a couple records. And they're really good records. They were sort of conceptual rap and very good records. But he didn't have any financial success with them. The success was that he finished those projects and they were each year long projects. And that's a big accomplishment on its own. But that didn't really go anywhere for him financially. So what he did when he was in his early 20s is he moved to California and he tried to get in front of the Green Rush, the marijuana growing industry out there. He was trying to be a grower. Well, he missed that boat by about three or four years. By the time he got out there, it was basically a commodity. And the bigger companies had moved in and it was difficult for individual growers. So that didn't work out great for him either. But what Jordan did at that point, he had two failed careers, one in audio and one in the green area with marijuana cultivation. And so what he did is he combined both of those skill sets and he created a company called Growcast, which has become the world's number one marijuana growing podcast with a huge membership. And so he took two failed careers and combined them into a super successful career that really encompasses his passion. So we're super, super proud of Jordan for that. Wow.

Wow.

Amazing. Okay, so you've got Jess and Pat, you've got Jordan, who's doing, like, multimedia podcasting, combining that with, you know, an emerging market, like, like cannabis. And then and then one more and then two more.

And so now we're, we have to.

I'm losing track.

The older set and the younger set. Yeah, they're separated by, by 10 years. And so Jade is our 21 year old. And Jade's an artist. She's a painter, which, she's a third generation painter. My dad's the, the artist behind the Precious Moments collection. My dad taught me how to paint and I taught Jade how to paint and that's going to be her, her career. So she's been a very de painter. She's obviously just starting out, but man, I mean, she's in the right channel for sure. And then Justin, our youngest 17, his art form that he's discovered is cooking. And over the last couple years, he's made himself a master chef. He's really mastered a few areas of cooking. All of our kids are artists. I mean, we're a family of artists. And so I think that he'll probably end up going into music and a few other art forms. But right now he's really latched onto cooking as his artistic expression.

He cooks for us every day, every night.

We have a built in chef.

I know, it's amazing. Our own sons, they started, mom just started when they were three years old, joining her cooking from scratch. Now they bake, they cook, they do fancy risottos and crispy shrimp and they've got a cooking podcast. And you're right, it's nice because you can just kind of sit back with your friends, feet up and have a five star meal served to you in the comfort of your own home. And they'll make a couple of ladies happy someday, I think. So once again, to summarize, Jess and Pat are the oldest and they're just fantastic parents, homeschooling, doing a fantastic curriculum. You've got Jordan, who we just talked about doing the cooking, and then your daughter, who's the artist, her name again, Jade.

And Justin does the cooking. Justin's the youngest. He does the cooking.

That's right. Jordan does the cast.

Jordan is the podcaster.

Okay, okay, got it, got it.

But you know, Ben, at the end of the day, the most important thing to us is that our kids are happy and fulfilled. That's what matters to us. We don't care what the conduit is to get there. As a matter of fact, one of our most important parenting strategies is we provide our children with shelter and food on their plate into their adulthood. We don't want them to have to worry about putting a roof over their head and putting food on their plate. That's an easy thing to do. We provide that. And then here's the deal. Go out there and find out what you were put on this earth for. Figure out how you're going to create a path to happiness, balance, success, and fulfillment. You don't have to think about the basic survival necessities. That's one of our big parenting strategies.

Playing devil's advocate. If you're not having to worry about Maslow's hierarchy, it's freeing up creative power and skills to be able to be more impactful of one's life purpose. There are other folks that I've interviewed, for example, Rich Christensen, who does a lot of family legacy planning, who has this philosophy that there's a certain age at which you don't pay for any of the child's needs. You don't pay for their education. You teach them how to, he says, kill their parents and cut the umbilical cord and go off and be independent on their own. It sounds to me like you have a little bit of a different philosophy.

Yeah. Well, here's one of the important philosophical premises that we should share at the outset. The most important thing that we've learned from our lifebook work over the last 30 years is there is no one right strategy for everybody in any area of life, period. You're going to have to figure out what works for you in every important area of your life. There just isn't. And that's one of the things that separate us from most people in the personal development industry, is that we absolutely know that our way is not the right way for everybody, but it's the right family. Exactly. And so we've decided that taking care of those survival strategies allow our children to focus on the reason that they're here, full expression of themselves without having to worry about survival. Why the hell should they have to worry about survival in the 21st century, the most abundant time in human history, in the most abundant place in human history? I want to let you know, as far as becoming independent from parents, we started working on that when they were three. Independence is our number one value when it comes to parenting one of them. So that's not something that we take lightly.

And to balance it, it's not like our kids are totally entitled. That's the beautiful thing about this. I mean, we've taught them good values from day one. But, like, by the time, you know, we kind of came up with this about four or five years ago, and our other. Our two oldest kids were already grown and they're already doing their thing. But it's like, look, guys, you really can develop yourself, because the bottom line has been we're all. All of us are artists and creatives and entrepreneurs, and we're from a different mold. Right? It's not. We're not going to fit into any kind of cookie cutter situation. And so for us, it's like, they're not going to lose the values of hard work, integrity, self esteem, because we teach those in other ways.

Next question. Leading off from details about who your children are and what they do is what we' elements that really stand out to you that you would consider to be particularly unique in your parenting approach.

Everything about our parenting approach was unique. Literally everything. Like, we looked around at how our culture was. We looked around at how people parented. We looked around at the. At the culture around us, and we realized people aren't happy. This is not successful. Whatever they're doing is not leading them to where we want to end up. So we developed what we call a respectable disregard for how anyone else chooses to live any aspect of their lives. And we're going to reinvent every single aspect. We followed our own drummer and a couple of the most important educational strategies that we had. Well, first is Lifebook. The LifeBook methodology. The 12 categories of life that we examine deeply in Lifebook, to us are the areas of life that one needs to master in order to create an extraordinary life that works at a high level in every important area. So those were the areas that we wanted to focus with on our kids. And school only teaches one or two of those. Like, nobody learns how to have a great love relationship. Very few people learn the real fundamentals of health and fitness. As you know, no one talks about their emotional life or their character. These subjects just aren't in the course of a normal American education or wealth creation. I mean, wealth creation is another huge career, right? So, yeah, the Lifebook categories. We've always focused on the Lifebook categories with our kids from an educational standpoint. But the biggest thing that we did that separated us from most parents that we know when it comes to education is that we traveled the world with our kids. That was our strategy from the time they were 4 and 8. I'm sorry, probably 3 and 7. We've been to 50 countries with our kids, and we've lived in 12 different countries with them. And the reason that they're not entitled is because they spent six months in Indonesia and they went to a bamboo school in the middle of the rainforest. And they lived in Myanmar for over a month. And, and they lived in Nicaragua and they lived in South Africa and they lived in Cairo. And. And so they understand what they have and why they have it and they understand that the rest of the world is not America. And so that took care of that entitlement piece for all of our kids.

Plus we communicate with them at a high level that we've always done that when they were little. Because kids, they know what's up, Ben. I mean, kids are coming through. I don't have to tell you this. You get two amazing bright shining stars. They're coming through more and more evolved and they know what is up. And here we have been trying in the past hundred years, these beautiful new souls come through and we say, oh, here, let's kick you in this old system that no longer serves humanity and that will crush all of your creativity and your inspiration and become like everyone else. So that was what we were like, this isn't working. And like you, we unschooled them at first and said, guys, none of that stuff matters. Let's go, let's go be citizens of the world and see what is out there. So it's more of a philosophical thing for us then. It's like, school is there to serve, it's there to serve us and to help us become better. Learning should be absolutely the most enjoyable thing you do. And we were seeing it. Our kids were like, this sucks, school sucks. And we didn't want them to.

We agree. Let's do something.

Yeah, we agree.

Exactly.

You know, I may even continue to play devil's advocate on a few of these questions. And here's what I'm wondering. Did you ever think about the idea that if your children were traveling a lot, they might not have the ability to form roots at home? You know, like deep friendships at home versus, you know, shallow kind of flash in the pan acquaintances, or that they, they might get so nomadic that they didn't really have like, you know, the idea of a home as a castle, a place to come back to, so to speak.

Have you been in our home? It's quite a castle.

But anyway, I've been in your home, but I know some of the listeners may not have been so.

Go ahead.

Well, in any case, I. It's a great question. And the bottom line is we would really, we would travel for about four to five months out of the year.

It would be, it would be four, five or six months every year. We would take them out of public school and go somewhere in the world to live. And then we put them back for the last couple months, and they had incredible friendships that they still have to this day. They had amazing friends at home, but they also made friends in every other country.

We'd bring one of their friends. They got older, we'd bring a friend for a month or so and then fly them back. So we're very conscious of that pen. And that's a big thing with homeschoolers. It's like, you're gonna homeschool. What about social? Right. That's a big question. We always did at Lifebook, and there's a lot of ways to do that. And one of the ways that John and I do it is that our friends that have kids, our kids ages are friends, like the Giantempos, Pat and Laurie Giantempo. You know those dudes. Their two kids are exactly our two youngest kids ages, and they're best friends. They've known each other since day one, and they travel together all over the world. They're just awesome. So there's ways around that, but it is a concern. It is a definite concern.

Yeah. And during this time that your children were coming out of school and going off and traveling, was this a public school, a private school? How exactly did you structure that, being able to pull them out of school?

It was mostly public school. And this is one of the things that in the parenting category of Lifebook, we discussed, because so many parents said to us was, how did you pull your kids out of school for three, four, five months a year? Our school won't even allow us to pull our kids out for two weeks to take a family vacation. And we're looking at them dumbfounded, saying, did you just say that your school wouldn't allow you to do what you wanted to do with your own kids? I wouldn't even understand the words you're using right now. What the hell are you saying to us? It's like, when did we give our kids over to the government for? They were the government's responsibility. We waltzed into the principal's office, and she said, here's what we're going to do. Go ahead, baby.

Yeah, I want to share this, because it's basically like this, Ben. I went in and I met with the principal every time. And I really. The first learning curve was the first year. This was when Jade. I don't know Jade was in first or second grade. Justin wasn't even in school yet. And I said, here's what we're going to do, guys. And I got them rallied around Jade. I was like, this is how we live, and we travel every winter, and we'd like to take the curriculum with you. So that Jade is, you know, she continues her education. And they. They were like, this is very peculiar, and this is very unusual. But they hung with me and they, like, planned and they would. They. I even did Skype calls and stuff like that. I just went in and said, guys, this is what we were going to do, so let's do it together. And they were so helpful.

It was.

It was really unbelievable. Now, there were a couple other schools, like, when we got to middle school, that's a whole different thing because they want to put you on the system track of college. And so basically that's when it all broke down. We're like, okay, we're no longer schooling. So basically it was just for grade school.

Let's talk about my wardrobe. When you see me, I'm usually 9 times out of 10 wearing a certain product made by a certain company because it's incredibly versatile. Not only that, but it's. It 100% offsets the carbon footprint from the clothing, so it's good for the planet too. So they have this stuff called their performance apparel, which is perfect if you're sick and tired of traditional old workout gear, meaning it fits amazingly, it looks good even if you're not at the gym, at the boardroom, or in yoga or whatever else. And you guess that the name of this company is Vuori. V U O R I I am not the only person in my house that wears this stuff. My wife loves and supports Viori almost all the time. My kids, when they go to tennis, when they're doing school, when they're wandering around the house, even at church, sometimes they wear their Vuori clothing. You could literally shop your entire family at just the Vuori website, especially with this fat discount code I'm about to give you and get everything you need to have incredible versatility and comfort, but also the ability to be able to exercise at the drop of a hat if you want to, because it's perfect for the gym too. So I'm gonna give you 20% off your first purchase and free shipping on any US order. Over 75 bucks and free returns. You can try it on. If you don't like it, send it back. So vuori.com Ben spelled kind of funny. Here we go. V-U-O-R-I.com Ben that's where you can get your hands of this Vuori clothing. And if you go to vuori.com ben v U-O-R-I.com Ben that'll give you 20% off. You don't need a code or anything else. And free shipping on any US orders, over 75 bucks and free returns. Check it out. I am coming to London June 16th through the 18th and I'm going to be a part of the health optimization summit over there. And if you go to BenGreenfieldLife.com calendar you can check out that event. Fantastic. Kind of like biohacking meets wellness meets massive health technology expo. But while I'm there I'm going to be in London with my whole family. We're actually going to head to Italy afterwards and cycle through Italy. But I decided to put on a very special private intimate VIP event with me while I am in London. It's at this crazy place called Hum2n. Hum2n. Like human except for the two so Hum2n labs. They are a creme de la creme biohacking facility. I mean the best hyperbaric chambers, amazing selection of IVs, super nutrient cocktails, cryotherapy, red light therapy. We're basically going to party and biohack and do a Q and A with me and the fine proprietor of that facility, Dr. E. Who's a wealth of knowledge in and of himself at that event. It's Monday, June 19, so it's going to be private networking, live Q and A, great food, great cocktail, mocktails, experiential biohacks, a variety of healthy gourmet foods. It's just going to be really amazing. You're going to get a swag bag too. Your swag bag includes super nutrient IV cryotherapy, red light therapy and hyperbaric oxygen. That's worth £750 alone. Then you got the H2MN supplements. They're going to give you their brain sharpener and their super blend protein. You get a travel voucher to take you to and from the event, meaning using a company called uno. They will bring you to and from the event if you have trouble finding it or don't want to drive. So there's a lot more that are going to go into those Sway bag too. But right now I have to tell you this thing is going to fill up fast. It's in London June 19th and you get there by going to BenGreenfieldLife.comHUM2N London that's BenGreenfieldLife.com HUM2N London and that will allow you to claim your spot at this fantastic event. So BenGreenfieldLife.com HUM2N London do you feel.

That college is only appropriate in certain scenarios? Or what's your take on a university education?

Again, there is no one right strategy for everybody. College is incredibly important if you're going to be a lawyer or if you're going to be a doctor are professions that you absolutely must go to college for a long period of time in order to get into. But we're a family of artists and if there's anything that will screw up in art career, it's friggin formal education. It's not for us and we've all realized that. And so basically when the kids were in grade school and Missy was working with the schools to get done what we wanted, the intention was we're going to go in there and tell them how it's going to go. We're not going to go in there and ask permission for what we want to do with our kids and that energy. And it wasn't like we're being assholes. Missy always went in there and just very calmly said this is what we're going to do this year. We're going to live in Nicaragua, we're going to live for X amount of months and then we'll be back now so how do you suggest we handle these? Should we do Skype calls? Like if we're in the western hemisphere we have the possibility to have our kids join the class through Skype. But if we're in Europe or if we're in Asia or if we're in Africa, we're going to have to figure out something different. And it was different every year. Some years we took tutors with it and so it was different every year. But by the time they got to junior high and it was now, like Mrs. Said, the college track, that's when we said okay, this just no longer works with us. For us we're just going to yank that, we're going to yank the whole thing and we're not doing formal school anymore with our kids. And that's when we just started living life with our children.

That actually is impressive and also promising that that worked out for even a public school type of environment. I think many parents might assume that they have no say and no choice in the matter. But it sounds to me like because you guys do have very outside the box, you know, defy the status quo type of, of approach that you were willing to go and just talk, just open up the conversation. I think a lot of parents might have a fear or an anxiety or even just a block to doing that or think that they have to be in some fancy pants, expensive private school in order to make those, those kinds of adjustments. But that's actually quite promising that you guys are able to pull that off just by open, transparent communication with, with the school itself.

Before you can get to that communication, you've got to realize yourself. It's a fundamental premise. You are the one in charge of your children, not the government, not the teachers. Doesn't matter what rules they've put around it, they don't get to put rules around how your children are raised. And that was simply our premise. We didn't have to shout it, didn't have to, you know, get emotional about it or put it on the table and make a big deal out of it. It's just going in there with a confidence that this is who we are, this is how we're going to run our house. You guys have your system, so let's sit down together and talk about how we can put something together that works for all of us. But the premise was never that we're going to follow your instructions and your directions. We're in control of our children, you're not. And we're going to figure out what the right system is for all of us.

Yeah, that's right. And I'll say this, when I did go in and talk, it was like the teachers were like, oh my gosh, this is an amazing opportunity for your kids. A couple of them were resentful, didn't like it, were like, no, it has to be, you know. But mostly the people were just that we worked with were like, oh my gosh, this is magnificent. And they made exceptions and they, like, the kids would like, come back and share their, you know, they make a report of wherever we went, a PowerPoint, and they would share with the class. And a lot of times it was just really awesome. I love what you just said, Ben. It's like, just really have the courage to do what you want and what you really believe, you know?

Yeah, I love it. And you know, one thing that I tell my children, because they're also very artistic, they both paint, they cook, they record and sing music. And that's really what their passion is in life right now. And they're also very interested in a liberal arts education. And I think that besides the exceptions of like an astronaut or a physician or an engineer or some other vocation that requires in many cases, some type of formal education, a piece of paper that displays that rocket ship you're building is something you actually know how to Work on. The idea of a liberal arts education and a classical or classically rooted immersion in things like rhetoric, logic, writing, and skills that could serve you no matter what career you go into would be, in my opinion, one exception that I would make to the university type of model that I'm largely disillusioned with. But I tell my sons, look, if you want to go get a well rounded liberal arts education, it's probably going to serve you in your art career later on in life anyways. And so they're interested in that. And I'm not too worried about that. But you're right, but the idea of simply Ben, let me just going to college to drink beer is not that great.

Yeah. I want to echo my incredible support for what you just said. A classical education, learning human history, learning the laws of logic, learning critical thinking. These are things that used to be taught in universities that really aren't anymore. In many of these, of course, that form of education is absolutely indispensable. You're 100% right. It doesn't matter what career you go into. That's a foundation that's going to serve you for life. We taught a lot of that on our own. We'll talk a little bit more about what it was like to educate our kids all around the world. What kind of things did they learn? Because they, they fell behind in learning some of the traditional stuff that is completely, in my opinion, meaningless to creating a great life. But they can tell you the symbols of Upper and Lower Egypt because we lived there. They know currency exchange. They know how to handle themselves at night markets. They know how to handle themselves through customs. I mean, they, they learn things that kids don't learn.

They learned religions and cultures and they met people from all over the world and they learned art history. Their little house in St. Charles, Illinois, outside of Chicago is not the world. Right. That's actually one page of a book called the World.

And you said normal kids, but maybe we don't want normal kids, right? Little bit weird. Keep your kids a little bit weird. You did mention that the Lifebook process was a core part of your children's education. I love that. Of woven purpose and gratefulness and character development and many of the skills that I learned from my Lifebook process with you in our own son's education. And so for those of you who want a deeper dive into the Lifebook process, go listen to the previous podcast that I did with the butchers. You can find that BenGreenfieldFitness.com TheButchers where I'll have shownotes for everything you're listening to right now. So it's B u t C H e r s. Go to BenGreenfulFitness.com TheButchers and I'll put all of the show notes in there for you. So the next question I have for you is in terms of your proudest moment as a parent, if one thing leaps out to one of you or both of you, as one of your prouder parenting moments, what would you name?

What comes to mind?

There's a lot of them, but one stands out because it was so pivotal. This changed our lives completely. When Jade, our third, who's 21 now, when she was in second grade, she was in a private school for gifted children, which my sister actually started. The teacher called us in for a parent teacher conference, Missy and me, because Jade was having trouble. And we learned in that conference that Jade was behind on everything. She was making all of her letters backwards. She was behind on ratings, she was behind on writing, she was behind on math. And her second grade teacher had students from her class tutoring her in the corner of the class while everybody else was learning, which is devastating from a self esteem perspective.

Totally.

Yeah.

Before the end of that parent teacher conference where I let Missy handle the whole thing so that I didn't get arrested for homicide.

Before the end of that parent teacher conference, I had made the decision in my mind and I imagine that Missy probably had too. We're out here. This is it. We're out of here. So what we found out for you.

Guys, we're out of here.

What we found out was that Jade was dyslexic. Pretty severely dyslexic. I'm mildly dyslexic. My dad is probably more severely dyslexic. It's hereditary.

My wife also, by the way, she's an amazing artist. Amazing artist. It's funny. So are you and dyslexic?

They usually are.

One or two sentences on dyslexia, it's a learning difference. It's always associated with an above average IQ, always with an IQ above 100. So these aren't stupid people. But they learn different when it happens is first, second, third grade. My dad failed third grade. I almost failed second grade. That's when it comes up and it manifests itself. And you can't read, write or do math like the other kids. And teachers who can't diagnose it properly always think you're either lazy or stupid. That's. That's what they think. And that's what this teacher thought.

Because the kid doesn't fit into the cookie cutter. One way of teaching.

Exactly.

Yeah.

So here's what happened. This is what happened to change our life. The first thing is Missy dove in to understanding what this condition was. She studied for a year and she understood everything there was to learn about dyslexia at that time. And we sat Jade down and we said, sweetie, here's the deal. Your brain works different. I've got the same thing. Your grandpa has the same thing. A lot of artists has the same thing. Richard Branson's, he's horrendously dyslexic. The guy can barely put together six words right, but he's a friggin genius. And what we said is, this is a challenge for you right now. It's a drawback for you right now. It makes it more difficult for you to do what other kids can do easily. But it also gives you superpowers. And that's what we need to lean into, is your superpowers. Because Ben, what happens with dyslexia is, well, all the other kids are reading and they're getting all their information, the words on the page. A dyslexic can't do that. So what they do is they overcompensate. They're looking at the teacher's face, they're looking at the kids face, they're looking for any cues that they can get. They're basically learning in 3D, trying to figure it out. And they eventually do figure it out. But their coping skills that they've had to develop along the way to figure it out, give them superpowers. And that's mostly in the realm of art and intuition. So what we did was the following. We said, a, we've got to figure out a way to repair Jade's self esteem, and B, we're done with school, we're out of it. So we made plans that year. That was the first year we took our kids on a big trip. We took them to Southeast Asia for, for six months. We, we, we were in Laos, we were in Cambodia, the temples of Angkor. We, we got on the Mekong river on a long tail boat and we sailed into the jungle together. We lived in Thailand, we lived in Indonesia, we took our kids to Southeast Asia. We just had the most amazing year ever. But the other thing that we did that year, which was huge, is Jade's a painter. And she was a painter then. She was doing amazing. At seven years old, she was doing beautiful abstract paintings that I Kind of showed her the technique to do. And what I said to her, sweetie, if you want to work hard for two summers and do a great collection of work, I'll talk to some of. Because I'm in the arts obviously contemporary art pretty deeply. I'll talk to some of the gallery owners I know and I'll get you a solo show where you can show your work in downtown Chicago. She agreed to do that at 8 years old. Had a solo show at the Peter Miller Gallery, a major world class gallery downtown Chicago. The opening night was packed. The entire show sold out in 45 minutes. And that fixed her, that fixed that problem. And then we took off and we traveled the world and never looked back. Wow.

Yeah. And that's true. Beautifully said, John. And I will. I'll add this. What, what we did after that, Ben, when we took that six month trip is I learning about dyslexia. I got turned on by the. Just the whole, like, we're going to educate our kids ourselves, right. And I began learning how our kids learn by observing them in 3D, you know what I mean? Because that they all learn. All of our kids learn in immersion. Basically. It's like it's. The immersion process is the best for our kids. So we really learned how they learned.

And do you mean when you say immersive process, like experiential based education versus curriculum 3D learning?

Yes, yes. Experiencing. Yeah.

Amazing. The thing that comes to mind for this is my own son, river, and also Taran, although I haven't yet done this with him because I'm taking this one son at a time, has spent hours and hours designing a mural on his bedroom wall. And I've helped him to produce that entire mural, 96 different pieces of art, as an NFT, a digital NFT in which people can bid. And as a utility that's associated with that, folks can get access to a private online art creation class with River. But you could see the light bulb moment occur for him as a kid who you might just think was painting with markers on his wall was something that a lot of children might even get in trouble for. All of a sudden, when he saw that people were bidding on his NFT and owning his nft, not only did his eyes light up, but he went to work twice as hard on even more mural creation because he was liberated from the idea that it was weird to create this art. He came to recognition with the fact that he was actually doing people a service that people actually wanted and they liked. He saw the business utility and I Think that's important. Important is that you not only observe your children's passions and interests and help to fuel those, but you also help them to introduce those to the world so they can see how that process of loving other people, which is a core human desire, is something that they can do with their skill set. As weird or funky as that skill set might sometimes seem.

When you have that approach and when you're able to help them develop the skills and talents and passions that they really want to focus on, and then once they, once they can have a grip on that in their own lives, then they can start to share it and those ripples go out. And when you're able to help them monetize their craft in a way such that this happened with Jordan, it's just getting ready to happen with Justin in a way such that Ben, they go to sleep at night and they wake up in the morning and they see how much money was deposited into their bank account the night before when they were asleep. That's when they get addicted to it. That's when they say, oh, this is pretty friggin cool and I'm gonna go all in with this. And so I agree with you 100% that that connection to the rest of the world is kind of like the final thing that you need to put in place in order for them to just soar.

Yeah. And I think that's important for people to note that despite you caring for your children's base needs, their base survival needs, they're still motivated by the financial impact of what they're creating as well, which shows that, you know, even if, you know, your parents are. I was the same way. I had a core drive, even though some of my needs were taken care of by my parents to still benefit financially from the work that I did. And so I think some parents are afraid their kids are going to turn into lazy, you know, good for nothings who are spending their time playing video games.

Well, let me disqualify really quickly because I think this is important because this will alleviate that concern. I want to qualify really quickly what we mean by giving our kids shelter and food. We're building a sustainable farm here on a remote Pacific island. And farming is fun and it's incredibly fulfilling, but it's also hard work. The deal that we've made with our kids is that we've built two beautiful little bamboo houses here on the ocean. They've always got a roof over their head and they've always got. They've always got food on their plate. As long as they're here working the farm, if that is fulfilling to them, if that's what they want to do, great. But that will alleviate the scarcity mentality that so many of us have and allow them to really explore their passions and their talents and their loves where they don't have to be compromised by trying to monetize unless they're really willing and able and unless that's really the right strategy for them. Again, this is not a suggestion for everybody because there's no suggestion that works for everybody. We learned this from Deepak Chopra. That was the first person that I ever heard his son Gautama. He basically said, you will never have to worry about a roof over your head. You'll never have to worry about food on your plate. Now go out there and figure out why you were put on this planet. Right? Yep. Good stuff, man.

Yeah, Yeah, I love it. I love it. Okay, so here we go. Next question for you. You have multiple children. I think this is another thing that a lot of parents struggle with. How'd you find time or how did you create a scenario in which you were able to. This is going to be a multi part question, so that's okay. I know you guys can roll with this. A, half time for yourself, your own self care, your own career, your other interests, and B, have one on one time with your children. If you did carve out like dedicated present one on one time, we were.

Very good at that. I must admit. We had a pretty good system for that. So how we found time for ourselves, Missy and I, as you know, would never even consider compromising our love relationship. Ms. And I always stopped work at five. Always. And Ben, you know how busy we are and how many companies we have. But that was a, that was a non negotiable. We stopped work at 5 and we took our ringwalk around our garden and then it was family time. From that point forward, we had a family dinner every night. A lot of parents don't do that anymore. And to protect our love relationship, Missy and I always had an overnight date away from the kids at least once a week. No matter where in the world we were, we figured it out. Overnight date means you leave the kids and go to a hotel. In our case, we had penthouses in the city that were specifically designed for this purpose. But if we're, if we're living in Myanmar, we figure out childcare, we go to a nice hotel down the street or whatever and we have our adult sexy, grown up time. We've done that every week. For the last 30 years it doesn't matter where in the world we are. That's something we never compromised. And then as far as one on one time with the kids, our best, I think our best strategy was once a week I'd have a daddy daughter date with Jade and Missy would have a mommy Sunday with Justin or we, or we'd switch it and we really kept that going for a lot of years and it was wonderful. They loved it, we loved it. It was great.

Now we take trips with them like I'll do a solo trip with Jade or I'll just go with Jade and Jesse, my girls. John takes our kids on a 16 year old trip every year wherever they want to go in the world when.

They turn 16 we let them choose whatever country in the world they want to go to and I take them on a triple O. Jesse chose each of your children.

When they're 16 they get to choose one area of the world that they get to go to and you take them.

Right.

Amazing. Just you and one of those children.

That's right. And we went and we went deep. We went to the Ifugao province and we went places that you couldn't get to without, you know, flying in a little puddle jumper plane and then driving hours in a four wheeler jeep and then getting out and hiking for hours and we were in some amazing places. Jordan picked Bangkok which was pretty fun and Jade picked Seoul, Korea and Amsterdam. Justin got knocked out, he got 16 screwed up by Covid. So I still owe him, he's 17, I still owe him his trip and that's probably going to be coming up as soon as the world comes back to their centers.

How about yourselves? Did you run into any struggles with carving out time for yourself versus your children? I know some parents would just set the alarm and get up super early for their workout. Some would include their children in their workouts. Others would simply have their dedicated time in the morning that they perhaps a little selfishly protected for good reason, for self care. How did you guys go about doing things?

Ben, we did all those things you said get up early. I would say our biggest strategy there was we would trade, John would take the kids so I could go take a bath and just chill out or I would take the. And I always protected John because he works at home so I would always make sure the kids weren't bothering him while he was working. Right. We took turns and also another thing that we do is we would also take turns with our friends, their kids, our kids, friends, parents would take everybody for the weekend and then we would take everybody for the weekend. And in fact we still do that. We kind of do village, I don't know, raising your kids right because we are youngest 17. He'll come here, he's got two buddies, two or three, four friends that'll come here for two or three weeks and John and I will take him through a Molokai man camp and we'll do a bunch of fun stuff and then they'll all go to Pat and Lori's house for two weeks and they'll do something there. And then we've got, we have a.

Little community where we can trade these kids. It's like we're done with a teenager for three weeks. Who wants to take them?

You guys gotta take it for a while. The bottom line is the more creative you can be, the better it is. Like just get creative and be with your kids and like working out with your kids, take them grocery shopping, do the things that you do all day long with your kids if you can. If you're a stay at home mom, that's easy, right? So yeah, creativity is pre.

Yeah, the way I structured it was early on. I would just get up early and get it done, comma, always have the jogging stroller, the bike trailer, you know, taking the kids to the gym with me and putting them in the kid care at the ymca. Like we joined a gym intentionally with really good children's care. And then as they got older I simply started because every Sunday night I write out my workouts. Typically I'll work out almost every day of the week, but at least two or three of those workouts I'll write them out. So they're a multi person group workout conducive to include children. And so I've wound up for the past several years as my boys of age just basically taking them out with me. And yeah, I'll admit it's a little annoying, right? Having the you don't get your me time or listen to that audiobook you wanted to listen to. You're, you're coaching them on form, blah blah, blah. But ultimately it really seems to work out well to do it that way. And I think a few parents have even expressed a little bit of regret over not carving out that time for self care. So I think it is important you got to put on your own oxygen mask and be able to prepare and provide and also be able to play with your grandkids when you're older.

Assuming.

Let me throw in a quick workout strategy that's really in that vein, Ben. I worked out with my kids. Like Justin and I went through about a three year period when he was, I would say 11 through about 13 where we would sword fight with hard foam swords. The, the Nerf swords.

Oh, yeah, My brother's not used to that.

Yeah. So like we put on the armor, we get our shields, we go out there in the driveway and it would be a serious workout for me. We figured out a way to use our kids for weightlifting and we didn't do it every day, but that was a nice little piece of variety when it came to workout. A lot of fun.

Yeah, exactly. Those type of rough and tumble roughhousing games are really great too. I printed out a whole poster of rough and Tumble games, like 20 different games. And we have that printed on our living room wall. When there's downtime, I can grab the kids and say, hey, you guys want to do the arm tug of war or the leg wrestling or you know, games on there?

I need to see that. Yeah, I need to see that.

Yeah. It's actually now it's hanging out in my gym, but I'll take a photo of it and send it over to you. Maybe I'll put it in the show notes as well. But it's just a.

The problem is right now my 17 year old can probably kick my ass.

Yeah. Proceed with caution. If you've got older children, you don't.

Want to break them neck.

Now it sounds like how many of your children have actually grown up in. Moved out of the house?

Well, Jade. Jade. And in between right now?

Okay.

Well, yeah, Justin was on his own at 15. I was on my own at 15. We moved from the Midwest to Hawaii and he sort of stayed back with his friends for a while, went back and forth. Jade's got an apartment in Chicago, so she sort of goes back and forth. Our kids are super independent. Independence was our number one parenting strategy. We realized early on that our job as parents was to get our children up and running, functional and autonomous as quickly as we could. That's the job of a parent, to make sure that your kids are functional in your absence. That's your number one job. And we took it seriously and we started training that stuff from. From day one three years old. So our kids are extremely independent. They know how to travel on their own. They know how to live life because that's the school that they went. They went to the school of the world. They learned how to live life. So they're all very independent. But you know, our home is the home base and we love that.

Did any of the children have an actual, like, rite of passage or anything like that to foster independence?

One did, and there's the one that needed it. Justin went through a vision quest, and Mithy and I went with it. Do you know Shaman? Manesh? Ibar, do you know Manesh?

I had dinner with Shaman when I visited you in Chicago, so yes.

Oh, hell, yeah. Fantastic. So. So Manesh is a shaman in the south of France. He runs these wonderful vision quests in the Pyrenees. So when Justin was 14, matter of fact, it was the year that we were with you in Estonia. Then, right from that trip, we went. We went to Spain and France and we did a vision quest with Manesh. It was a couple days of instruction, and then it was four days by ourselves in the mountains. We were about two miles separated from each other. All by ourselves, no food for four days, all alone in the wilderness. It was a transformational experience. One of the things that happened with Justin that made the experience extra intense is the morning that we were getting ready to go up into the mountains. I tried to get him out of bed, and he was late. And I said, just, you got to get your shit together. You got to pack everything. And. Right. And so we took off. We went into the mountains. We put Missy in her spot. We can continue to hike a couple hours till we got to Justin's spot. And Ben, when we got to Justin's spot, we realized that he didn't bring the outer cover for his tent. He had no protection from the elements. He had his free, but he didn't have his outer cover. And there was a storm. I couldn't help him right out of the gate, I couldn't help him. So it was like Justin, I gave him a hug. I said, good luck, son. This is gonna be the first lesson. And then. And then Manish and I went and went to my spot and set me up. And that night, the storm rolled, and it stayed for two days, and it was freezing, and it was thunder and lightning, and it was a torrential downpour. And he was out there at 14 years old in the forest, in the elements, getting hammered, weeping, and. But he did not. He could have packed up and walked two and a half hours back to Missy, but he didn't do that. He hung in there, and that was one hell of a transformational experience. All of us, not just him, for all of us.

Oh, my gosh. Yeah, Totally.

Wow. Amazing. So, yeah, those intentional rites of passage, I think, are important, but of course, we should name that. It's so important that up till that point you had fostered independence. You don't just rip a kid out of a non independent type of scenario and throw them into rite of passage. There's a lot of training that goes into that. My own son, Ben.

Did you do rite of passages with your boys?

Yes, they've been through rite of passage into adolescence, which they trained for for six years for with wilderness survival classes to get to that point where they could do their vision quest solo in the wilderness. They'll do another when they're 15 and that'll be a little bit more intensive. It'll be a longer period of time out with a wool blanket and a knife and a backpack in the woods of North Idaho. But yeah, absolutely. For them to dissolve their ego and face their fears and face their shadow self, they did it with another person who's featured in this book, Tim Corcoran from Twin Eagles Wilderness School. But yeah, there was a great deal of training leading up to that point. Don't just take your children, if you're listening in, kick them out the door with a bow and arrow.

So you have been able to really maintain and grow the relationship with your children who have moved out of the house then?

Oh yeah. Yes. It's a joy.

It just gets better and better.

We've enjoyed that phase so much, Ben.

Yeah, there's this idea of consequential based parenting, letting your children just know what the consequences are of any decision they might make in life, then having them deal with the consequences. And that seems to be a common theme amongst many parents who I interview. Yet some still do seem to have certain non negotiable rules, such as we don't lie ever. That's a big no.

No.

Or others will go all the way down to the nitty gritties of enforced screen time. Did you have any non negotiable in your own house?

I don't know that I would go so far as to say non negotiables, but we had three values that were.

Very simple, our parenting values and our whole situation is very, very simple.

Yeah. So the three values of our home which, which are carved in stone, literally in Japanese characters on the nine ton stone that sits in front of our entry gate. So these values are written in stone, so you might say they're pretty, pretty intense. And the three values are the, the Japanese characters are. The first one is freedom, the second one is self responsibility and the third one is love. But it's a particular form of love. The Japanese translation could as easily be mutual Respect. And what those three values, how those three values play out, are kids. Your life is yours. You own it. We do not own you. Our job is to do as good as we can, getting you the tools that you need to run a functional life. You are your own person. You have the freedom to operate in any way you choose. That's number one. But number two, you will take responsibility for the choices and actions you take and you make. You will not assign blame to others for the mistakes that you make. You have the freedom to operate in the way you want, but you are responsible for the choices you make. And thirdly, you will treat the people around you with love and respect. Always. Those were the three rules of our home that were written in stone. And I'll tell you what, having values like that crystal clear to everybody alleviates a lot. It simplifies everything. Because here's one way that that played out when our kids break the rules. Like, for instance, when Jesse was 16 or so, he snuck into our wine cellar, and she got a big, expensive bottle of wine. She had a romantic dinner with her boyfriend that night, and she drank the wine. And we woke up the next morning to a note saying, mom and Dad. I went into the wine cellar and got wine. I had a wonderful night with Steve. I know that was wrong, and I'm willing to accept the consequences. Our kids never got upset with us for punishing them. They always knew I made this choice. Now I've got to. Now I've got to sit in the consequences of my actions. Those three values served us so well, I can't tell you.

To us, they're the basis of everything else. It's like everything comes from that.

Yeah.

Because if you have personal freedom. Well, what does that mean? You better freaking take command of yourself. So that's ultimate responsibility. And love is love. I mean, love is the basis. It's the thing that animates us all.

Yeah. And I think it's important here to note that you wrote them down, and you wrote them down in a very reverent and sacred and ceremonial manner. You know, engraving them in Japanese on a stone. I, of course, hold the Ten Commandments. I hold quite dear. Do not lie, do not steal, do not murder. And yet we don't just talk about them. They're actually engraved in stone in my children's bedroom so that they see those and they can use those as rules for life to live by. And the same thing for our family mission statement. It's printed on the wall of our living room. Our family crest is it's like a $20,000 piece of art that hangs above our fireplace. But. But it really impresses a child versus you. Just saying we don't lie. Versus that being an actual structure.

They know you're serious, man.

Yeah, it holds a sacred space in the home. Well, speaking of engraving something on something, I would also like to ask you a final fun question. If you could have a message on a billboard to any parent out there and it were going to be a billboard, fittable message, what would either one of you or both of you want to put on such a billboard?

Well, just so you know, we don't really do that. I'm going to answer the question. But again, the most important thing that we've Learned in our 30 year personal development journey is there is no one right strategy for everyone in any area of life. So we're very careful with our billboards. The things that we have implemented in our lives work for us. We're happy to share them. And if they work for you, great. If they don't, throw them out and find your own path. That's what we all need to do. We all need to assemble our own series of strategies in the most important areas of life that work for us. And that path is going to look different than anybody else's. So we never put our stuff on other people as universal truth. So that's the qualification. Before I share this, here's what I think have identified as literally the most important parenting strategy. It's the example that you set. It's the way you live your life. It's the way you talk on a normal day to day basis. It's the way you behave on a normal day to day basis. It's the way you treat each other. It's the way you treat your children. It's the way you come at small issues and big issues. You can sit down and lay down the rules for them all day long. You can talk to them all day long about how they should behave. But what it comes down to is to your children, you are their world, you are their example. It does not matter what you say, it matters what you do. So the most important thing when it comes to parenting is to be the best person you can be, to have the best relationship you can have as a mom and dad and to set a shining example for what living like a successful human being on this earth looks like far none. No. Close second to that parenting strategy.

Amen, baby, amen.

I think probably my favorite part of this interview, even though I loved all of it was your three what you might call non negotiables. But at least these three things that you've engraved freedom, self responsibility and love with the idea of love being that mutual respect. And there's so many other golden nuggets here that I really hope parents will pay attention to and take away from this interview. And again, I'll put all the shows notes along with the previous interview that I did with the Butchers about Lifebook if you go to BenGreenfieldFitness.com TheButchers BenGreenfieldFitness.com.

The B U T C H E.

R S and John and Missy, I just want to thank you for giving your time, for being so devoted to your children, for having such a passion for parenting and being so brave and courageous in the way that you've gone about creating a very unique scenario for your children. And I just, I think it's going to pay dividends for you when it comes to the legacy that you create.

Thank you so much, Ben.

All right, well, cool, guys. I appreciate you and I love you and I'll keep in touch between now and now on our Molokai trip.

All right, brother.

Okay, bye.

More than ever these days, people like you and me need a fresh, entertaining, well informed and often outside the the box approach to discovering the health and happiness and hope that we all crave. So I hope I've been able to do that for you on this episode today. And if you liked it or if you love what I'm up to, then please leave me a review on your preferred podcast listening channel, wherever that might be, and just find the Ben Greenfield Life episode. Say something nice. Thanks so much.

Means a lot.

It.