I’m in Mexico for a very good friend’s wedding so this will be brief because it starts shortly and I’m in it! But there’s a cool lesson here for me - and possibly for you.
Dan Griffin is in Mexico for a friend's wedding. This is for our conscious fatherhood piece. I don't think anything I'm about to say wins anybody any points. But I still think it's an important part of thinking about when thinking about being a father.
A father says yes to his daughter's request to go to a John Vincent III concert. The challenge sometimes with parents is we say yes when really what we need to be saying is no. Sometimes we say no when what we really need tobe saying is yes.
All right. Well, hello, Cadresphere. This is Dan Griffin checking in here. And, well, let's see, where am I? I am at Sandos Playa car outside of Playa del Carmen in Mexico for a very good friend's wedding. And I got in yesterday. A little bit of drama, but nothing worth mentioning. And, yeah, the wedding starts in about 2 hours, and in about ten minutes, I'm going to go join the rest of the groomsmen. So the title of this is, what do you say yes to? And this is for our conscious fatherhood piece.
So here's the deal. I don't think anything I'm about to say wins anybody any points. I think it's a common part of parenting, but I still think it's an important part of thinking about when thinking about being a father, how we show up. So I had work. I had a wedding to be at, and I had a request from my daughter. And the request from my daughter was, well, the first request was, can she go to this guy, John Vincent III? Some of you may be familiar, but can she go to his concert? This was a long time ago.
Six months ago. Yeah, absolutely. Go to your concert for your birthday. Yeah. You know, then a little later when we're like, hey, you gonna get tickets? Or she was like, I gotta get tickets. And we're like, okay, who do you want to go with? And she's like, she and I had listened to it quite a bit, so she was like, well, do you want to go with me? And I said, absolutely. And she said, how about mom, too? We're like, great. First time family ever going to a concert together, so great idea. Then I get the details from my buddy, and he is having a rehearsal for the wedding, right?
So that was on yesterday, on Friday. So in order for me to be at the rehearsal, I had to leave on Thursday. Guess what day the concert was. That's right. The concert was on Thursday night. So what do you say yes to? You're in the wedding. You have to be there for the rehearsal dinner. And it's not just even what do I say yes to, it's how do I communicate? So I contact my buddy, and I'm like, look, man, you know me. I would be there in a heartbeat. I would be there for the rehearsal dinner, no problem.
And Grace really wants to see this person. We got tickets. And it just so happens that it's on the night before your rehearsal dinner, which means I need to fly in on the day of your rehearsal dinner, which means I get in right around the time of the rehearsal, and I'm gonna do my best to get from Cancun down there. But I. He was very understanding. We had a wonderful time at the concert. I said yes to my daughter in a way that felt good, felt right and appropriate. Right. And I think the challenge sometimes with parents is we say yes when really what we need to be saying is no.
And sometimes we say no when what we really need to be saying is yes. And so the question is, how do you figure that out? How do you know exactly what to do? Well, part of it. Right. Is, like, when I. Because I know how much my daughter loves John Vincent III, and I know what it meant for her to go to that concert. And the fact that a 15 year old wanted to be with two her parents, that felt special to me. I don't think it's gonna continue, but you never know. You know, I have rejected the belief in the philosophy that says our kids have to reject us in order to find their autonomy and their development as adolescents and teenagers and blah, blah, blah.
Maybe, maybe not. But so far, it hasn't happened, and I'm really, really grateful for that. So, for me, it was easy to say yes to that. Missing the rehearsal, not ideal, but were they gonna be okay now? What if it had been missing the wedding? Well, then it would have been a different conversation, and it probably would have been even more different. Like, I've got friends who are examples for me, and you know what they do? They would go to the concert, get on a red eye, fly through the night, sleep as much as they could, come in, and then be there for the wedding.
They might even do that for the rehearsal. So, like I said, what I did doesn't win any points, but it's an important point about when we say yes to our kids, when we say yes as fathers, when we are of service, and put our kids before us, and when we know how to navigate what's most important. You know, I have done this live stream from Grace's volleyball games multiple times. It felt like the right thing to do. You know, it felt like I wanted to be there, and I wanted to do the live stream. And, you know, I'll do it quickly.
No problem. So, something to think about when it comes to your kids, when it comes to being a parent, when it comes to being a father, what do you say yes to? All right, happy Saturday, and I hope everybody has a very wonderful weekend.
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