I failed as a dad this week

Guys,

I failed as a dad this week. But the family is better off for it. Let me explain.

It's a busy month. That's why it's been a couple of weeks since I've sent one of these out. I've launched another 30 day cohort of guys. And at my full time job at Because International, we're replacing two people after going quite a long time without losing anyone.

I've felt myself bring some of the stress home. To be honest, I feel extra pressure to be a great dad. It's one of the most important things to me. It's what I write about. It's a huge part of the program and movement I'm building. And wouldn't it be tragic if I gave so much of my free time to building this that I actually sacrificed my own ability to be a good dad?

So those are some of the emotions I'm working through.

And that leads me to what this week has been like. Most of us worry about failing with our families. We replay the moments we lashed out. We carry the guilt of how we handled something. But here's the thing most of us miss: those failure moments are some of the biggest opportunities we have. And most of us walk right past them.

When we lose our cool, it's usually not just one thing that pushes us over the edge. We're already on edge and then our kids are usually just being kids. They're doing things that anger or annoy us. That hits us on a day that we're carrying the stress of workload or maybe some tension in the marriage. Instead of calmly talking through things or matter-of-factly dishing out appropriate consequences, we react out of anger. And this week I got angry.

In our house, cleaning is the chore we struggle with most. What exactly does "clean" look like? I've had to get very specific and still there are constant disagreements. That tension was already in the air going into Monday morning.

I was already feeling the stress of the week. I did my walk-through of the house and immediately got annoyed. Toilets weren't wiped down. Fridges had obviously not been properly cleaned. And almost before the words got out of my mouth, kids started trying to defend and argue that things were clean but if somehow they weren't, it was because they somehow got really dirty again overnight.

I'm not a yeller and don't really escalate. Instead I tend towards coldness and sarcasm, borderline shaming them for not just owning the mistake. Instead of calmly applying our agreed upon consequence, I let my emotion overflow onto them.

None of us are perfect. These moments will come. But the strongest relationships aren't those that eliminate these mistakes. They're the ones that repair well. Without mistakes, we never have an opportunity to model humility and genuine apology.

Unfortunately, the apology can be the hardest move of all.

It's especially hard in the moment when your emotions are still heightened. Even later on, we might be willing to own our part, but we're not going to let them off the hook. So our apologies look something like "Hey, I'm sorry for not handling that better, but you....."

Real apology and repair comes first from honest acknowledgement when you make a mistake. Then it's being able to find the words to fully own your part while leaving out the part about them.

No "but you..."

Back to Monday morning. My daughter pushed back on how I was handling the situation. I knew I'd made a mistake. In a split second, I was somehow able to go from self-righteous and frustrated to say "You know what, you're right. I'm not handling this well. I'm sorry." She looked at me, waiting for me to add in another mention about what she'd done to set me off. But I didn't. And I saw the moment land.

That evening she told me she'd wiped down the toilet. And she admitted on her own that it hadn't been clean, as she'd insisted that morning.

We don't need to be perfect dads. Which is good news, because we'll never be. And honestly, the dads who come closest to perfect but don't see and use their failure moments as opportunities to repair are doing their kids a real disservice. They'd be better off failing more often and then showing their kids what it looks like to own up and apologize.

Modeling humility is way more valuable than trying to model perfection. Recognize your failures and use them as opportunities to connect deeply with your wife and kids. Sometimes you'll realize it in the moment. Sometimes it will hit you days or weeks later. You can grab a kid tonight and apologize for something from last week or last month. The moment will still land. And your relationship will be warmer and more connected because of it.

Keep showing up.

-Andrew