PARENTING

Teach Your Kids The Randomness Of Life

Trips with kids are meant to expand their minds, to show them something different. We took our three daughters to Paris where we stayed at a friend’s apartment. It was also their first time to Europe. That alone would have been mind expanding. But we had three random encounters that got them thinking about how […]

What I Actually Want For Father’s Day

As all mothers know, and most children have to be reminded, Father’s Day is celebrated every year on the third Sunday of June. To be clear, I think Father’s Day is a great idea. But I’ve got a few issues with this holiday that I’d like to be entered into the record. First of all, […]

A Dad Fighting The Good Fight – To Be Called First By School

When the phone rang from my daughter’s elementary school, with just two days left to the year, I scrambled to answer it. By some iPhone quirk it went to voicemail after just a ring. I wasn’t overly worried. I figured there was a 90 percent chance that the school nurse was calling with a reminder […]

How To Be Clutch As A Dad

I was talking to a high school athletics director this week from Trussville, Alabama. He had reached out to discuss a book I’d written 15 years ago. It’s about pressure and why some people excel under it and others don’t. There are five things that people who are good under pressure do, and each one […]

How Parental Uncertainty Can Help In Uncertain Times

Uncertainty abounds – in the economy, with trade, around jobs. It’s something working parents are acutely aware of. Uncertainty is never a good state to exist in. When you know for sure that something is going to happen – good or bad – you can make a plan and work toward executing it. When one […]

When There’s No Reason To Say No, Don’t Say It

There’s no get-better-at-work message here. It’s more about listening. And more precisely talking ourselves into listening before we answer when work and parenting calls at the same time. This week my youngest daughter had three days of out-of-school testing. I’m taking her because my schedule is easier to shuffle around, and as long as I […]

Waiting For A Call That Reaffirmed a Pause

On Monday I had two goals in mind: eat an enormous, filling meal, way more than I’d normally eat for lunch, and do as much work that required focus as I could possibly get done. I had five hours to myself while my wife was having hip surgery at HSS so I went to a […]

One Nugget To Enjoy Spring Break

I don’t like to scoop myself, but a piece that’s going to run in a month has a nugget for how to think about work when your kids are on vacation that’s helped me this week. Maybe it can help you too. This is our second week of school break the one that comes after […]

How The Paper Test Can Improve Life At Home

Do you know what your spouse does around the house? Does he or she know what you do? How much do your work schedules influence what you can do? A lot of couples don’t know, and not knowing has never been a recipe for marital bliss – or professional success. (How can you focus at […]

Parents Can Advocate for Reading As A Civil Right

What if we reframed children learning to read as a civil right? Would that change how schools teach our children, particularly the 1.6 million kids in the U.S. with dyslexia? On Friday, I went to the premiere of the documentary “Left Behind”. The documentary follows a group of mothers of dyslexic kids in New York […]

I Gave Up Complaining. Here’s A Better Strategy

This is my dog, Annie. She works with me most days. At night, she sleeps in my daughter’s room. She doesn’t ever complain. What she does[…]

What Grit Looks Like In A Kid

This is what grit in a kid looks like. Nothing forced. No tutors. No coaches. No overbearing parent. Just desire and opportunity. My youngest daughter has been an indifferent ice skater, content to slide around with a green-plastic frame. She doesn’t fall. She goes pretty fast. But she really isn’t skating. She’s sliding. And that’s […]

Sign up for The Dad.

Welcome to The Company of Dads!

QUICK LINKS