A book can teach you something new. It can inspire you to make positive changes in your life and can take you to a different level in your life. Reading is so important to me which is why I am excited for Allie Reads October here on the podcast! All month I am interviewing some amazing authors. We will talk about their books, life, and living a life of purpose and intention.
Bob Goff is the author of Love Does, Everybody Always, and Love Does for Kids. Bob is known for the way he loves people, especially the people who freak you out! Instead of avoiding those people and staying in your safe bubble, reaching out and being Jesus to them and loving them like crazy. He shares so much wisdom in this episode. So grab your coffee and get ready to listen, because I know you will walk away inspired in so many ways!
Use the hashtag #AllieReadsOctober to share with me this month. What are you reading? Did you get any of the books from the authors I’m talking to you about? Are you reading a different book? How are you taking this challenge to read more and putting it into action? I cannot wait to see what you share!
In This Episode Allie + Bob Discuss:
The importance of what we are speaking over the people we love most and how it shapes who we actually are.
Why discipline is kindness, not disapproval and how you can make sure your kids feel your kindness in the way you discipline.
How we are either reflections or reactions to the people closest to us.
Ways you can challenge yourself to be curious (which will inevitably challenge you to love other) and how you can teach your kids to do the same.
Mentioned in this Episode:
Allie’s Courses (Use the code PURPOSESHOW for 10% off!)
It’s giveaway time! Bob’s book, Love Does For Kids, is incredible and I am SO excited to gift it to one of you. Head over to The Purpose Show Facebook Community for your chance to win! I cannot want to connect with you this month on all things book related. #AllieReadsOctober
Mom life. We are surrounded with the message that it’s the tired life. The no-time-for-myself life. The hard life. And while it is hard and full of lots of servitude, the idea that motherhood means a joyless life is something I am passionate about putting a stop to. I’m on a mission to help you stop counting down the minutes till bedtime, at least most days. I want you to stop cleaning up after your kid’s childhood and start being present for it. Start enjoying it. I believe in John 10:10 “that we are called to abundant life” and I know mothers are not excluded from that promise. Join me in conversations about simplicity, minimalism and lots of other good stuff that leads to a life of less for the sake of enjoying more in your motherhood. I’m Allie Casazza and this is The Purpose Show.
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Hey, sweet friends! I’m so happy that October is finally here! For months I have been planning and dreaming this up for you and I’m so happy to finally unveil what it is I’ve been working on!
This month, October, is all about reading. We’re calling it “Allie Reads October,” and the purpose behind this is for me to inspire and encourage you to read more often. Reading is such a gift. We take it for granted way too often, myself included, but reading is powerful. You literally have a whole new life in your hands when you read a book.
A book can teach you something new. It can inspire you to make positive changes in your life and can take you to a different level in your life. Reading is so important. I read all the time and I wish that I would have started sooner and so I’m taking that passion of mine and turning it into Allie Reads October. Every October here on The Purpose Show, we are turning it into author central.
I’m interviewing some amazing authors this month and we’re talking about their books and I want to see you use this Hashtag. I’m going to be checking it every single day on Facebook and Instagram and I want you to use it. #alliereadsoctober.
Share with me. What are you reading? Did you get any of the books from the authors I’m talking to you about? Are you reading a different book? How are you taking this challenge to read more and putting it into action?
Let’s celebrate this month October! Allie Reads October. We’re going to talk about authors and books and encourage each other to read more books.
I encourage you to get other people involved in this. Get your kids involved. Encourage them, read with them, next to them or to them, or have them read in their own quiet time. Share this with your friends. Let’s encourage each other to get better equipped to live an intentional life by reading more.
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Hey, sweet friend. Welcome to The Purpose Show! Today’s guest, what a dream to sit and talk to him. Seriously, I’m so, so excited for you to hear this. Bob Goff is a lawyer. Actually, he calls himself a recovering lawyer. He’s an author. He’s hilarious, amazing, real, funny and just the kind of person that you want to sit and have coffee with all day long because you have so many life questions that you’re dying to ask him. He’s the author of Love Does and Everybody Always.
His newest book is Love Does For Kids, written by himself and his daughter, Lindsey, who is a teacher, for kids. I was sent an advanced copy. I loved looking through it. I’ve given it to my kids and my daughter Bella, who’s 9, is just loving it. She’s asking me questions about it and loving difficult people, loving people who are different from you.
Bob is a big advocate of loving people who kind of freak you out as he talks about a lot, especially in Everybody Always. He talks about spending time with Witchdoctors and just people that are in different communities that freak you out and are so different from you. Instead of avoiding those people and staying in your safe bubble, reaching out and being Jesus to them and loving them like crazy. And I love him for that.
I’m so honored that he was on the show. I’m just really excited for you to hear this interview. So, let’s welcome Bob.
ALLIE: Hi, how are you? How is your day going?
BOB: It’s going good. I did a chapel for a school that everybody just kind of getting back to school today, so there’s a bunch of parents doing those big, ugly, snotty cries. I hated that. Even when my kids went to college, I hated that.
ALLIE: I bet. I actually homeschool my kids, so I haven’t really dealt with that. But I think sometimes I envy that.
BOB: Yeah. Totally. It’s just kind of interesting. I met with a friend and then I did a podcast with somebody this morning, Jo Saxton. So, I’m in San Diego, which I am loving and it doesn’t happen that often, so this is great.
ALLIE: Thank you so much. I’m so excited to have you here. I’m really looking forward to sharing just your insight with my listeners. My audience is mostly moms and I think it’s a really neat thing, first of all, just as a person to hear you talking about loving other people. Then immediately my mind goes to how can I teach this to my kids? How can I show them…live by example? And also help them kind of navigate life and difficult circumstances with this kind of love other people/everybody always kind of in mind, so I’m just really glad that you’re here.
BOB: Yeah, thanks. I just can’t affirm enough, moms that are listening, the importance of the work that you’re doing. I was reading something just this week. It said that young girls between ages of 7-13 lose 30% of their confidence. Isn’t that crazy? Just think one of the things that we could be doing is the words that we’re speaking over our kids, it isn’t just saying, “You’re nice.” It isn’t just words of affirmation, but telling them about who they’re becoming. “I see this in you. I see this happening. I see courage in you. I see bravery. I see commitment and loyalty.” To just let them know. The crazy part, moms or dads that are listening, it’s like you’re speaking that into your grandkids because your kids are going to tell them the same thing. They’re going to say, “I remember my mom used to say this, that you saw in me this person.”
So, we do that, not to just blow sunshine at each other. Even around the office, we just let each other know what we see in each other. It’s truly a beautiful thing. I hug everybody. I’m a total hugger, but I don’t hug the people that work for me because it’d be creepy. So we just do like duck, duck goose. Just take a moment to just say, “Hey, this is what I see.” If we could slow down the cadence in our lives to do that with people that we love the most we’d really see some big benefits.
ALLIE: Yeah. And I love, too, what you said about for girls, especially. I mean, that is huge. And I love focusing on who they’re becoming and what you see in them versus, “You’re beautiful. You have the prettiest hair.” Instead, “You’re really brave. I really admire you for doing this. I really see that in you.” I love that. And I agree. I do think it comes from slowing down a little bit and just noticing things in your kids.
BOB: I spoke at a school earlier today and there’s all these moms and dads dropping their kids off for school. It was just so beautiful to see moms and dads that are engaged in their kids’ lives. Whether you’re homeschooling or you’re doing a traditional school, to just be that parent that’s engaged in your kids and see who they’re turning into.
My daughter, Lindsey, we wrote a book together. Lindsey is like Mary Poppins with grenades. I mean she’s kind and nice, but absolutely fearless. She’s a second grade teacher and the one thing that she was afraid of more than anything is getting what’s called a PC. It’s called a Parental Communication. So if you don’t do something right or you do something wrong, then you get a PC. Lindsey was just perfect, so she never got any PC’s.
So sweet Maria Goff and I sat her down and said, “Before this year is over, you must get one PC. I don’t care what you do, you can park the principal’s car on the roof if you want, but one PC. And one day we go out to the lot and she’s coming out of school just weeping, and she has this PC. She forgot her homework or something. And we were like, “Yeah!” We went home that night and I got a big fat Sharpie and I wrote over the top of it, “Lindsey’s a great kid.” And we sent that back to school with her the next day. Lindsay’s now 30-years-old and she was telling me about how she had messed up something and her husband sent her a text message and it says, “Lindsey’s a great kid.”
The things that we start speaking over the people that we love the most, it starts shaping who we actually are. And some of us have believed these lies that got spoken over us. It was an old boyfriend or girlfriend or a teacher or somebody along the way, they said something that we actually believe this lie. And so, I think one of the things we can do beautifully in each other’s lives is to just say true things about that.
ALLIE: Yeah, for sure. I love the power of that. I love the power of talking to our kids and that we have that control. Even if they go to school, whether they’re homeschooled or they’re away from us for the day, whatever, that we have that control and that power with our words.
I have four kids, but two of them are very sensitive. Any look, my mom glare, “uh oh, I’m in trouble” Like, so sensitive. And I think sometimes the pressure of that…as parents, you don’t want to screw them up. I’m always thinking, “I just don’t want to screw them up.” Do you have any advice on how to balance that? Feeling empowered to see the positive in your kids and use your words with confidence instead of feeling like you’re going to say something wrong? Does that make sense?
BOB: Yeah. You kinda need to know what you’re cooking with. Is this bone china or is this steel we got here? So, for some of the kids you just know that they’re wiring harness is such that a sharp word from you would just take them out. And so, I’m a lawyer. I mean this is 30 years. I’ve never lost a case. It’s not because I’m an awesome lawyer. I’m a good picker. And so you’d know if we’re arguing because I’d be winning.
But one of the things is that I’m not trying to argue with people anymore. People in our faith communities, people out there. I just don’t argue with people anymore. I write books and put balloons on the cover. I’m just like that guy.
We get to decide who we’re going to be in the world and we get to decide who we’re going to be in our family. In order to do that, we got to figure out what we got to deal with. So, are you hip to that Enneagram? Have you read any of the books about that? For those of you listening, like the Enneagram is a personality profile. You could be a 1-9 on this.
So like a 7, that’s me. I’m a like a flaming 7. My arms are usually over my head waving. But my sweet Maria Goff, she’s a loyalist. She’s a nine. I have a son-in-law who’s a perfectionist. He’s a 1. So you’ve just got to figure out who you are. How did God wire you and how did God wire your kids. Right?
So try this with me. Go with me to Florida and we’re waist deep in the water. Okay? It’s a beautiful day. And now this fin is swimming at you really fast. Tell me, is that a shark or a dolphin? And there’s no wrong answer. What do you think?
ALLIE: Shark.
BOB: And you’d say a shark. Now somebody else listening, they’d go “dolphin.” I’m a seven. Even if it was a shark, I’d say dolphin with a lot of teeth. Right? So the things in your past would cause you to reach that conclusion. We’re both guessing. We’re kind of guessing about life. What limiting beliefs do you have? What things have happened to you which would cause me to say “dolphin” and you to say “shark?”
And I think when we’re in relationships with the people around us, whether it’s people at school or people you’re married to or dating, you just got to figure out how are they wired. And if we could spend a little bit of time and instead of asking the first question, which is, “How was your day,” go to the third question, which is “How did everybody make you feel today?
So, “How was your day today?” “Great, pass the potatoes.” But if you say, “Tell me a high and low point today? Tell me something you’re dreaming about.” Get involved in these adventures with your kids.
When our kids were 7,9, & 11, we wrote to every leader on earth and we asked them if they wanted to come over for a sleepover and if they couldn’t come over, could we come over to their house? This hasn’t stopped. Our kids are big kids now. They’re ready to start having kids. But we’re still writing to people.
May 14th, I knew I was going to be in London at this thing, speaking. And so in April, I wrote to the Queen. I said, “I’m going to be in London on the 14th. If you’re going to be in London on the 14th, we should hang out, right? Your place or mine?”
And so I got a letter back a week later from one of her Ladies In Waiting. (I’m like, “Lady, what are you waiting for?”) But one of the beautiful things she said, “The Queen is terribly disappointed…” People, write to the Queen with your kids today. Don’t put it on your list. Pick up the phone. Google it. It’ll take you about 30 seconds if you stop for coffee. What’s the Queen’s address? Write the letter. Your kids will be rushing to the mailbox.
Write to the people you don’t know. You’re a low hanging fruit because you’re like super nice. I mean who wouldn’t love you? But find some people that creep you out a little bit to say I’m going to actually engage some people that I don’t understand, and then just these beautiful winsome things will happen. There’s something beautiful that happens in our kids’ lives and in our lives when we do that. We start by getting a better hold of who we are. What’s our role in this big life that we’ve got?
ALLIE: I absolutely love that. You’re very curious and very adventurous and it’s like this childlikeness that I want. I’m an eight so I’m like super driven. I think this is why maybe God gave me two sensitive kids because it is such a trial for me to reel it in, be careful and slow to speak. It’s a challenge. So, it’s really interesting to watch you be so curious and childlike like that and why wouldn’t you write to the Queen? I feel like my thoughts are very logical and so I just don’t go there.
And so, I think that’s why I love your books too so much because you tell these stories in there and it’s like this guy is like a psychopath.
BOB: {laughing} With balloons.
ALLIE: It’s amazing and it’s so encouraging and inspiring. I was telling my husband that before we got on the call together that I’m so grateful that you are where you’re at right now, writing the books right now while my kids are little, so that I can get this inspiration and not feel like “Dang it. They’re grown.” You know, grandkids and stuff, but I want to do this while they’re here and they’re home with me. It’s just so encouraging. I love it.
BOB: Yeah, I get easily distracted. That’s one of the things that go with being a 7. It’s like that dog and squirrel thing.
We’ve got this old Suburban and sweet Maria and I’ve been sharing this thing. It’s a 2000 Suburban. I went down to pick up this trailer of ours… You know when you’re driving somewhere and you realize, did I shut the door? Did I turn off the oven? I’m driving down the highway and I thought to myself, I just don’t remember latching the trailer to the ball. I didn’t slam on the brakes. I kind of pumped the brakes and pulled off. Sure enough the trailer is hanging on the ball, but it’s not latched. So I was one bump in the road away from having that thing pass me in the fast lane.
And I think if you want to really lock things down, you can look like you’re going somewhere as a family. You look like your hooked up without actually being hooked up. You can look like that in your marriage without actually having a latch on it. And I think that’s what you do. Each of these winsome things, it’s that childlike faith. It’s like putting a latch on it to say, I don’t want to just feed you and clothe you. I want to do all those things certainly. But what will really be the memorable things are these ideas that you pass along to your kids.
I’ve got something. Why don’t you just do geocache messages for your children? Put little messages in jars and just start putting them. I go all around the world and I bury stuff for my kids everywhere.
We’ve got schools in Iraq. We started a school in Afghanistan four months ago. The Taliban won’t let little girls learn how to read and write because they’re are girls. That just ticked me off. So we started talking to this guy on WhatsApp. I’m not kidding, we’re talking to him on WhatsApp and I don’t know what team he is playing for. It became evident I actually needed to fly to Kabul to meet him, and Kabul is the most dangerous city on earth right now because there’s just a lot of instability there. Well, we get off the plane and there’s a text message from him and he said, “Bob, I can’t meet you at the airport.” I’m like sh…actually I didn’t say shoot. So he said what you need to do is leave the airport grounds and start walking through Kabul and after a while you’re going to find a car. The license plate has a number 7 on the back. The engine will be running. Inside there’s a guy that doesn’t speak English. You need to get in the car and go wherever he takes you.
So what you do? Number 8 on the Enneagram?
ALLIE: I wouldn’t have even been at the airport!
BOB: Well, I’m a 7, so I started walking. There’s a car, the engine is running, we get in. It turns out this guy had security for the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. He wanted to know if I would trust him enough to do what he told me to do, and if I would, he trusts me enough to start a school for girls.
I think sometimes as a parent you need to say, okay, so how am I wired? And I know some people don’t have a relationship with ambiguity, like you’re seeing other people. Ambiguity and I go everywhere together because that’s my wiring harness. But find out how God wired you and then live fully into that.
If your wisdom says, “don’t go” well, then certainly don’t go. But I don’t want fear to chase us off from being the men and women, and I don’t want fear to chase our kids off, fear in our lives, that would prevent them from growing into the people that God wants them to be in. The way you tease that out is again, by asking the third question, not “How was your day?” But, “How did that make you feel?” Boy, you’re going to get some real answers because people don’t listen to what you and I have to say. What they listened to and what they remember is how we made them feel about what we talked about.
And so I think if we could get at that with our kids then we would really have a ball game and we’d have some really meaningful conversations? Where the woundedness is and where the joy is, and everything in between.
ALLIE: Yeah, for sure. I was talking with Nicole Nordeman on this show.
BOB: I love that girl.
ALLIE: I love her. And she brought up something that I feel like I’ve seen in you with the whole teaching your kids to be curious and letting them know that you are too. And you don’t know it all. She talked about being okay with telling your kids “I don’t know” to something, especially difficult issues like big social issues that are going on right now and you don’t really know what’s right and wrong or what you’re supposed to say. Just the power in letting go of this facade that we tend to want to carry around of knowing everything as parents to our kids.
I wanted to know, have you had experience with that? What are your thoughts on that? That power of “I don’t know” in raising kids because I feel like I see that in you with just being curious and like, “I don’t know, let’s go find out.” You know what I mean?
BOB: Yes. I remember going to Africa the first time. I read up on all the how to be polite and how not to offend everybody. I get there in Uganda and I’m there for 10 minutes and I tick off the first Ugandan. Did you grow up the way that if you forgot to say “thank you” then your parents would correct you and say, “you’re welcome?” These words of correction? Well that happened to me. I’m there five minutes and this guy says, “you’re welcome.” And I’m like, “thank you.” I didn’t know what I had done wrong. And then it happens again. Somebody else says “you’re welcome.” And I’m like, “thank you.” But I still didn’t know what the deal was. And after the third time I slowed it down, and I realized he’s saying “you are welcome here” and that these aren’t words of correction. They are words of invitation.
So I think if we just invite our kids into these things. Not always words of correction, constantly saying “do this, change this to this.” If you’ve ever had somebody tell you when you cleaned up your office or your room, you say “you missed a spot?” That has never warmed my heart. I’ve never thought, “Thank you so much for pointing that out.”
We got our floors redone here a little bit ago and the guy missed a spot and when he came back over he said, “oh, that’s a holiday.” I’m like, “a holiday?” I’m really into entomology, the origin of words. And so I looked up “holiday.” Sure enough when they were making these big square riggers, like in Christopher Columbus’ time, the gaps in between the boards they would fill with tar. And if they missed a spot of tar, they’d say the person was “on holiday.” In other words, they just weren’t looking. It was just such a kind way to say that.
So, when your kid mess up just say, “Oh, that’s a holiday.” You can find another way to express it rather than words of correction. There are words of celebration. It’s like “I get it.” Finding kinder ways to express ideas.
Faith’s a big deal for me. It may be for some of your listeners and not for others. There’s something that some people in our faith community that says, “always be ready to make a defense for hope.” Like we’re supposed to be Jesus’ lawyer. And they forget the last sentence and it’s to do with kindness and gentleness. And so that’s why I call things holidays. When somebody that works for me messes up, I’m like, “that’s a holiday. Paid vacation.” Just like “you missed a spot,” but it’s just such a nice way.
I was talking to somebody and they asked me in the middle of the conversation, are you a friend of Bill W? I’m like “I don’t understand. I don’t think so.” Bill W was the founder of Alcoholics Anonymous and they thought maybe what I was talking about was kind of like a 12-step program and instead of saying, “are you an alcoholic” they said, “Bob, are you a friend of Bill W?”
That was just such a kind, kind way to communicate. It was almost like they said “if you had a holiday, if you kind of missed a spot, I just want you to know you’re safe with me.” And so, as a person that makes a living choosing words, I just think we could just choose better words, kinder words like gentler words with one another. When they mess up, just find another way to say it. It’s like you wrote right across it, “Lindsey’s a great kid.”
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ALLIE: So I’m curious, what did discipline look like in your house when your kids were growing up? Like when they really did something wrong that you needed to correct? How did you handle those kinds of things? You’re just such a fascinating parent.
BOB: Yeah, it would be a kindness, not disapproval to say, “oh yeah, yeah, that’s just not how we roll.” But I remember when the kids were growing up my boys were like daggers for each other. They were using words I hadn’t even heard and I thought I heard them all as a lawyer. And I’m like, “wow!” And then they all went away to college. Now they’re all inseparable. So under my watch they were saying all kinds of rotten things to each other, and as soon as they got out from under me they did great. So I would preface this by saying I’m no authority on this.
But one of the things that we did is sweet Maria and I, we didn’t have disagreements in front of the kids. We just had an atmosphere of kindness.
When Lindsay was going to high school, I wanted her to be a nun, but she liked guys. So I said, “When guys come by and want to take you to the prom, just ask them this: What’s your definition of love?” And if they come back and say “It’s like butterflies,” I mean you could get that from bad pizza but “love, sacrifice and commitment.” And so, if we tell our kids it’s sacrifice and commitment. Right now, one of the things that we don’t sacrifice are some of these values that we have. You get a holiday on this one, but one of the things I want you to return to is this
We didn’t have a place for time outs; we called it the seat of knowledge.
ALLIE: That’s amazing.
BOB: “You need to go to the seat of knowledge.” We didn’t make them wear a hat or do anything, but it was just a better way than shame. “Go to the seat of knowledge and you’ll figure it out.” I don’t know if anybody learned anything, but if they did learn something, they learned kindness. One other thing around our house, kind of a banner over our door, is “100% kindness and 0% drama. Because what makes for a great TV show will make for a lousy life.” And I think I’ve seen that in the kids. There’s just not a lot of drama. There’s not a lot of intrigue. If you need to catch your breath, you go to the seat of knowledge if you need to, but we’re just not going to do a bunch of drama.
Wouldn’t you agree that we’re either reflections of or reactions to the people that were closest to us?
ALLIE: Absolutely. Yeah.
BOB: How are you a reflection and how are you a reaction? Tell me from the way you grew up.
ALLIE: A reaction? I went to school at a very prestigious, very legalistic Christian private school and I am a reaction to that by just going the other way and focusing on studying Jesus instead of coming out more like a Pharisee. And I would say I’m a reflection of my parents in that they counteracted that for me and they were more this way of just, “Look, we just didn’t want you to go to this school. So we sent you to this one, but it’s kind of crazy over there, so just go to chapel and be good. Just love other people and follow Jesus.” I’m more reflection of them in that way.
BOB: I go to the deep south a lot to talk and when I come back, if I’ve been there for a week, I’ll say “ya’ll.” And the total of nobody in San Diego says “y’all,” and that’s rounding up. So I’m a reflection of that. But I’m also a reaction.
I grew up in a family where there wasn’t tons of hugs given. Right? So, I hug everybody, because I’m just a reaction to that. It’s just too good to miss. What are you reflecting? What are you reacting to?
Oh, I grew up with grandparents. My grandfather was a firefighter on the docks in San Francisco. For 40 years he worked the graveyard shift. Guess what? He never put out a fire. I don’t even know if he knew how to. But he was the kindest person. I try to be a reflection of him because I had these examples. I think your kids are dying for us to be somebody they can reflect.
ALLIE: Is this the same grandparents as the grandmother with the bike?
BOB: Yes! Bingo!
ALLIE: I love that story.
BOB: That’s how you do it. Find something. I don’t want my kids to grow up in thinking my dad’s a lawyer (and I got a piece of paper in a file cabinet somewhere that says I am) but actually that’s old Bob. Old Bob’s on the bus.
One of the things that I would say to some of the people listening is don’t be limited just by your capabilities. I’m capable being a lawyer, but I am made to be fun, to be adventurous. It will lead you in different ways, in different directions. Sometimes we think people that go across an ocean are doing noble things and it actually isn’t noble at all because think of all the tens of millions of people I flew right over the top of doing nothing. What Jesus told his friends is what’s a big deal, what really wows Him is when we go across the street. Go across our office place. When we go across the school yard or the PTA or we find somebody who’s actually a little bit creepy and we just love them without an agenda. Because when love has an agenda, it ain’t love anymore.
And so one of the things that I think I’m a reflection of in my grandparents. They just loved people. Jesus didn’t vet the guy on the cross next to him and say, “What do you think about same sex relationships? What do you think about this? What do you think about the president?” He just said, “See you in paradise.” Like literally, check it out. So, if I meet somebody really difficult, I just say, “See you in paradise.” It just reminds me of why I’m doing… If you know why you’re doing what you’re doing, now we got a ballgame.
Oh, you will not see me without wearing a Boston Red Sox hat. I’ve never gone to a Red Sox game. I’m not even a baseball guy. But my neighbor, Carol, was a huge Red Sox fan and so she ended up getting cancer. We knew she’d start this eternity long dance with Jesus by the end of the week. So we made a deal. I said, “I’ll wear your Red Sox hat for the rest of my life and represent the Sox here, but every time Jesus walks by you, you need to mention my name.”
ALLIE: Hey, that’s a pretty good deal.
BOB: I know. I’m keeping my end of the deal up.
One of the things is if you know why you’re doing what you’re doing when it comes to your kids, and you go like forget this whole count to ten thing, ask the third question. How did that make you feel? Ask them to ask you, “Will you ask me how that made me feel?”
Give them the language to ask questions that they wouldn’t think to ask, because we’ve been around the sun a couple more times and we say, “I’m going to ask you this question, then will you ask me this question?” You just de-escalated that whole thing. I’m going to ask you how I made you feel, then you ask me how I feel.
And then if you could have the presence of mind to say, “It made me grateful that you’re my daughter.” I’ll tell you, you just replaced 30% of her confidence. You just blocked all those statistics. Because then she’s like, “You know what? I made my mom feel like a boss even when I felt like I was at my worst.” There’s something beautiful, like kind people, they just have this impact that just can’t be calculated.
Oh, I live down on the bay with sweet Maria Goff and people now know where we live.
It’s so awkward. They come by on their boats and they talk about me and it’s so awkward because I can hear what they’re saying. Their voices carry over the water. What I’m learning is that humble voices carry the furthest in this world. To carry far, continue to do your podcast, have a humble voice and say things that are true.
ALLIE: Oh my gosh. I love that. I have two questions for you that I am obligated to ask because we did Everybody Always in the book club that I host. I never say that I’m going to interview anybody if we happen to pick their book in the book club because I just feel like it sounds annoying. Like, “Oh, I’m actually going to be on the phone with him.” Nobody wants to be friends with that girl. So, I didn’t say anything but at the end I said, “If you guys could talk to Bob, you know, what questions would you have?” And I didn’t say a word. They don’t even know this is happening.
And so I got two questions that were actually really good that I just have to ask you that came up. The first one is how do you connect to God enough to have this much that you have to pour into others? I know that God is probably blessing your heart and your efforts like crazy, but we were wondering like, are you just crazy extroverted? Like how do you have this much energy? Like you raised a family and you have a marriage and you’re a busy guy and the Uganda Ambassador thing, how do you have this much to pour into other people?
BOB: I think I’m just curious about everything. I think I’m a reflection of my grandparents, so we’re just curious.
Did you know a banana is a berry and a strawberry isn’t? Mind blown. Yeah, really true.
You can pet a bee on his back when he’s drinking water, and it won’t sting you.
ALLIE: I am going to tell my boys that and I will email you if somebody gets stung.
BOB: Oh, and don’t do the whole Mentos and Diet Coke thing. That’s for sissies. Go get dry ice and put it in a one-liter bottle, add a little water. Run! Because that will blow up.
ALLIE: I’m writing this down because they love that kind of stuff.
BOB: If we’re curious about the things around us, the world around us, you’ll actually be curious about your faith and whether the people that are listening will feel like you’ve been hanging out with Jesus for 20 years or 20 minutes or not interested. Just stay curious about everything.
I was driving here from the North County and there’s a guy with a pickup truck and there’s this beautiful dining room table in the back, like claw feet and all that. Every time he went on a bump, it moved six inches closer to the end. I’m like honking the horn. Every time it’s another six inches, another six inches. And sure enough, it goes right out the back of the truck into a hundred pieces. Well, because I’m a 7, I’m thinking I can fix it. But I took a picture of that and I just am trying to capture images along the way, not to put them up on social media but I want to capture that and remember that and make sense of it later.
So, I will write down, maybe send myself a hundred emails a day. I’ve written down everything I think about, everything in one place. I have a document that’s 1.6 million words long. I’ve been at for 20 years. I just write down everything. I think about everything. Some people in our faith communities have what are called “quiet times” in the morning. I’ve never had one. 20 years. I’m clean and sober on those. Mine are super loud. I take everything I thought of the day before and I say, I know it sounds right, but is it actually true? What can I learn from this? What can I pass on? How can I be curious about this and talk to my kids. I’m not looking for talking points. I just want to be so engaged in life that I’m actually curious about my life. I’m curious about my kids.
When people ask me, “Bob, how you doing?” I could say “fine,” but what I do now is I go through this little checklist. How’s sweet Maria? How’s Lindsey? How’s Richard? How’s Adam? Because like you, if they’re okay, I am okay. If they’re not okay, I’m not okay.
And so I’ll literally think if Lindsay’s okay, Richard’s okay, Adam. And if I don’t know the answer because I haven’t called Lindsay in a little bit, I’ll literally call her up and I’ll say, “Lindsey, somebody asked me if I’m okay. And I don’t know if I’m okay till I know if you are okay?” It slows it down a little bit, but wonderfully so. And it hasn’t happened yet, but wouldn’t it be great if she said, “Dad, you know what, let me call my husband John and see if he’s okay. If he’s okay, I’m okay. And if I’m okay, I know you’re okay.”
So if you ask me, “Bob, how are you doing,” I’d be like, “This is gonna take a second.” But again, if you know why you’re doing what you’re doing. Because I literally don’t want one of my kids to go for very long without me knowing how they’re doing. The third question…not “How are you doing?” But, “How are feeling about what you doing?”
ALLIE: I love that. Oh my goodness. Okay. The last question, we’ll wrap up with this. We had this big conversation about this and I’m getting a little vulnerable just sharing something that I struggle with and just wanting to know how you do this?
So, I’m really good at setting boundaries. Maybe it’s something that I’m a reflection of or reaction to. I haven’t thought about it before. I’ve got four little kids that I homeschool. I love my husband and I love our time together. So, I’m a fierce protector of that. I love my business and my mission and I kind of worry that there’s so much on my plate that if I don’t carefully guard my time, you know it’s not going to get done. And I’m not going to have my stuff done. And so when reading your books I really began to feel like maybe sometimes I use healthy boundaries as kind of an excuse to maybe shut people out a little bit or not reach out and help them, not really serve. And I’m like, “Man that’s such an “8 thing” to say, right? Head down, focused.
You also have a ton going on, so how do you handle that? Where is the line for you between…You’re so available and you’re loving and you’re serving other people? Do you have boundaries? How do you balance that?
BOB: Yeah, sometimes people talk about balance and I felt like there was a period of time in my life that I spent so much time trying to find balance that I tipped over. You need to chase this, chase this. And I felt like at some point I was kind of tilting at windmills. So I just, hey, I’d make some rules that kind of like actually worked internally for me.
For instance, I don’t make appointments with people, so somebody says, “Can we go out for coffee next Tuesday at 3? I’m like, “Oh, heck no, but we’re actually talking right now so we could have coffee or tea, whatever you want.” But I just don’t make appointments. It’s been 3½ years since I made an appointment with somebody. What I’ll do is I’ll tell them the trajectory. I’ll say, I’m in North County, I’m in San Diego, I’m in Point Loma, and if somebody wants to intersect that, then that’s terrific.
I put my cell phone number in the back of 1½ million books. It’s been terrific. For me, living a life of constant interruptions kinda reminds me of the way that Jesus lived His life. He was constantly interrupted and He didn’t give off this vibe like, “I’m too busy.” I can’t think of one time where somebody said like, “You’re really busy.”
So if somebody says, “Hey Bob, I know you’re really busy, but…,” it makes me pause to say, “Am I doing something that’s giving off the vibe that I’m self-important, or busy or something?” Because I’m just the opposite. So, tomorrow is Wednesday; I will be at Disneyland. You know why? Because I go to Disneyland every Wednesday. From 10 to 2, I’ll be sitting on Tom Sawyer Island. I promise there’ll be 10 people waiting for me because there’s always 10 people waiting for me and it’s just so beautiful.
So, if anybody wants to meet or have that, like let’s hang out. I say Tom Sawyer Island, Wednesday, I’ll be there.
And then I drive up to Pepperdine and teach a class at their law school. It’s a class on failure. It’s awesome! All my friends who screwed up, bring your biggest screw up sometime.
Do you know why you’re doing what you’re doing? This idea of availability?
But now let me speak to your 8. This beautiful, precious, wonderful God-created 8 that needs order in their life and that needs to have a sense of purpose. Just live into that girl. Just continue to be just full blown, the healthiest version of that. The humblest version of that
So what I do, and tell me if this would be helpful to you, I’m 59 so I spend most of my time talking to 69-year-old Bob, like 10 years, me plus 10. So if there’s something that’s stressing me out, I say to 69-year-old Bob, “How do you feel about that?” He’s not stressed out at all. He can barely remember his name. And I also have the 10-year-old version of Bob, like little Bobby Goth. He is full of hope. He’s not distracted by that stuff.
So, I would say for your listeners, add 10 to your age. Take wonderful you, where you are right now. Take that person as 10 years older and take the 8-year-old version, the 10-year-old version of you and all three of you make one really well-adjusted person, and you make decisions together and let those other two out vote you.
ALLIE: I love that! That is so amazing! Thank you!
BOB: Thanks so much for making some time and talking. I’ve got a new friend.
Did you know if you get a handful of sand, it has 400,000 grains of sand in it? I haven’t counted it but Wikileaks wouldn’t lie to you. So, Wikipedia. Wikileaks is actually trade secrets.
So, if you meet 12 people a day and live for 92 years, that’s what 400,000 is? So that’s what I’m telling you to do. 12 actual authentic conversations every day. If you can have your listeners just do that, 12 conversations a day, it will blow your mind what will happen to your life and the people around you. And make your kids, your spouse, the people that you love among them. Have a couple of conversations. You gotta to go to question number 3, not just the easy one. Just say, “How do you feel about that?”
Now, here’s the primer. If you’re married to a male, you say, “Now is the time where you ask me how I feel about this. So go!”
ALLIE: Yes! We do date night once a week, every week. We’ll be on the drive, and I always start the conversation and then I’ll ask my questions and it’s just like comfortable silence. And I’m like, um, “I’m good too. My day…” Like he just doesn’t…
BOB: Prompt him. Just say, “It warms my heart when you ask these questions of me. You don’t know that because you’re a guy, but it warms my heart. It actually makes me feel accepted, engaged, loved and appreciated, when you ask questions about not just where did you go.”
Maria drops me off every morning at 5:45 in the morning and I fly somewhere to go talk and then I fly home. But we never talk about geography. When people ask her, where’s Bob, she always says he’s on his way home. Because that’s a way to honor her. I just get home.
And so if we can continue to run home to each other, but don’t just be in proximity to each other. Once you’re there, (I’m speaking to the guys now and to the women to prompt the guys to say), “Ask me how I feel about the day” and I’ll tell ya, I’ll feel so good because you cared that much.
ALLIE: That’s amazing. Thank you for this conversation and all this amazing advice. I can’t tell you how excited I am for this to air. I really am!
BOB: It was so great talking to.
ALLIE: Yeah! Maybe I’ll see you one time at Disneyland because I live right there.
BOB: 10 to 2! I’ll be the guy wearing the Red Sox hat.
ALLIE: Perfect! Thank you so much.
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This was an episode of The Purpose Show. Did you know there is an exclusive community created solely for the purpose of continuing discussions surrounding The Purpose Show episodes? And to get you to actually take action and make positive changes on the things that you learn here? Go be a part of it. To join go to facebook.com/groups/purposefulmamas.
Thank you so much for tuning in. If you are ready to uplevel and really take action on the things I talk about on my show, and get step-by-step help from me, head to alliecasazza.com. There are free downloads, courses, classes, and ways to learn more about what the next step might look like for you and to focus on whatever you might need help with in whatever season you are in right now.
I am always rooting for you, friend!
See ya next time!
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