2023-02-02_Invest_in_Children

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00:01:49.160 | Welcome to Radical Personal Finance,

00:01:50.300 | a show dedicated to providing you with the knowledge,

00:01:51.940 | skills, insight, and encouragement you need

00:01:53.860 | to live a rich and meaningful life now

00:01:55.600 | while building a plan for financial freedom

00:01:56.960 | in 10 years or less.

00:01:58.340 | My name is Joshua Sheets, I'm your host,

00:01:59.780 | and on today's episode of the podcast,

00:02:02.020 | I want to share with you a framework

00:02:05.000 | for how to think about investing into your children

00:02:08.900 | in the early ages, the early stages of life.

00:02:13.900 | One of the ideas that I have defended vigorously

00:02:16.940 | throughout the history of Radical Personal Finance

00:02:19.160 | is the idea that most investments into your children

00:02:23.460 | are best made at an early age,

00:02:26.820 | rather than waiting for a later age.

00:02:30.020 | The best example I would use to introduce this subject

00:02:33.900 | is comparing the value of saving

00:02:37.100 | for, say, a college education fund

00:02:40.020 | as compared to working hard at your child's academic ability

00:02:43.980 | at a very early age, perhaps at the age of four,

00:02:46.940 | or at the age of eight, or at the age of 12.

00:02:49.260 | And I've defended the idea that in virtually all cases,

00:02:52.900 | if you have to choose between investing money

00:02:55.860 | at an early age versus investing money for use

00:02:59.420 | at a later age, you get a much higher return

00:03:02.900 | on your investment when you invest it at an early age.

00:03:06.500 | Now, thankfully, most of us don't have to choose.

00:03:08.980 | Most of us have enough money to invest in our children

00:03:11.820 | at an early age as well as at a later age,

00:03:14.220 | and both are good.

00:03:15.620 | But if you have to choose,

00:03:17.300 | I want you to choose to do it at a young age.

00:03:20.380 | I've defended this idea and this thesis

00:03:21.960 | in a number of different ways,

00:03:23.540 | but I've, to my knowledge and memory,

00:03:25.620 | I've never sat down and gone through a philosophy

00:03:29.380 | or a framework to help you think about how to apply this

00:03:33.620 | at every age, especially at the earliest of ages.

00:03:37.580 | And yet, I believe that that's where sometimes your money

00:03:41.820 | is most effectively spent and most effectively invested.

00:03:45.740 | And so on today's episode,

00:03:48.500 | I want to share with you a philosophy, a framework,

00:03:51.000 | and some advice for ways that you can invest

00:03:54.100 | into your children at an early age.

00:03:56.220 | And then in what I think will be the next episode,

00:03:59.900 | I want to walk you through on a daily basis how I do it.

00:04:02.540 | And I'll share with you in excruciating detail

00:04:05.580 | all of the ways that I try myself to invest

00:04:08.860 | into my children very, very intentionally.

00:04:12.580 | Now, clearly this is inspired by recent events

00:04:15.260 | in my own life.

00:04:16.340 | I've been playing Mr. Dad for the last weeks

00:04:19.640 | as my wife and I have recently welcomed our fifth child

00:04:22.740 | into the world.

00:04:24.140 | And it's very interesting the difference

00:04:25.620 | between my first child and my fifth child,

00:04:29.020 | because with now my older children,

00:04:33.140 | I've had a chance to see some of my ideas come to fruition,

00:04:37.660 | see some of them flourish,

00:04:40.020 | and I've had a chance to lay aside some of those ideas

00:04:42.560 | that I held when I was younger.

00:04:44.580 | And in the history of Radical Personal Finance,

00:04:46.940 | I also thought this would be interesting to you

00:04:48.600 | because all of the history is here recorded in the show.

00:04:53.060 | When I recorded my first episode of the podcast

00:04:55.180 | in July of 2013, my wife and I were expecting

00:04:59.320 | our first baby.

00:05:00.880 | And here we are almost 10 years later,

00:05:03.280 | and we have again welcomed our fifth baby.

00:05:06.420 | And so at this point in time, for your context,

00:05:10.720 | our oldest child is nine, we have a nine-year-old,

00:05:13.060 | a seven-year-old, a five-year-old, a three-year-old,

00:05:15.520 | and now a zero-year-old.

00:05:17.760 | And so I don't have personal experience

00:05:20.580 | with adolescence yet,

00:05:22.060 | but I have learned quite a little bit along the way,

00:05:24.840 | and I wanna share some of those ideas with you.

00:05:28.220 | I probably shouldn't make a disclaimer,

00:05:30.640 | but I'll make one disclaimer

00:05:31.880 | 'cause it will help me to feel more confident

00:05:33.480 | in what I say.

00:05:35.080 | I myself am going to try to speak very clearly

00:05:38.080 | and about what I know and what I believe to be true

00:05:42.120 | in these areas, and I'm going to share

00:05:44.400 | as forthrightly as possible my own experience.

00:05:48.560 | I warn you, I'm rather intense about this subject.

00:05:53.360 | This is, for me, this area of life

00:05:57.280 | is, represents some of my highest personal goals.

00:06:02.280 | I am fully persuaded that one of the most important functions

00:06:07.840 | and roles in a man's life relates to his function

00:06:13.660 | in the world, is his role in life as a father.

00:06:16.640 | And this is, as I can see, a tremendous source

00:06:21.140 | of personal joy and fulfillment.

00:06:24.080 | It is a tremendous source of impact on society,

00:06:28.040 | impact on lives and on a community,

00:06:30.840 | and indeed is the basic building block of a society,

00:06:35.740 | of a healthy and strong society.

00:06:38.200 | And so I'm very passionate about this subject,

00:06:41.360 | and I'm very dedicated to it,

00:06:43.440 | both in thinking about it and in practicing it.

00:06:47.400 | I am imperfect, as is to be expected,

00:06:51.340 | but I care a lot about this, and I'm pretty hardcore

00:06:54.580 | about my application in some of these things.

00:06:56.880 | And so when I share things, I'm doing so

00:07:00.120 | to try to encourage you and to inspire you,

00:07:02.480 | and I'll try to share as forthrightly as possible

00:07:05.920 | as to why I think the way that I do

00:07:07.780 | and what I've done and what has worked.

00:07:09.560 | Just know that it's not coming from any desire

00:07:12.360 | to be arrogant or to draw attention,

00:07:16.080 | but it's coming from a desire to encourage you

00:07:18.880 | and to give ideas.

00:07:19.840 | And I, of course, value any ideas that you have

00:07:22.480 | or any impact that you might make in my blind spots.

00:07:26.600 | So in this episode, we're gonna go in detail

00:07:29.340 | through a framework for ways that you can invest

00:07:33.320 | into the success of your child.

00:07:36.760 | If you do not have children of your own,

00:07:40.280 | then I think this information may still be useful for you

00:07:43.100 | because you know children.

00:07:44.920 | And even if you don't have children, for whatever reason,

00:07:49.560 | you know children.

00:07:51.020 | And one of the most important things that we can do

00:07:53.880 | as a society is to invest in a thoughtful

00:07:58.360 | and systematic way into our children.

00:08:01.480 | And regardless of whether you're caring

00:08:03.020 | for your own biological children

00:08:06.280 | or whether you're caring for children in your community

00:08:09.680 | in some way, shape, or form,

00:08:11.580 | many of these ideas I think can be implemented

00:08:14.520 | and will lead us to a healthier society.

00:08:16.660 | So I invite even those of you who are not parents

00:08:19.560 | to join me in this episode.

00:08:22.600 | What you should understand is that when you become a parent,

00:08:27.600 | much of your outlook on life changes

00:08:31.960 | and transforms in a systematic way.

00:08:36.240 | When you become a parent, you have basically

00:08:40.960 | a fairly clear expectation of what the next 15 to 20 years

00:08:45.720 | of your life are going to look like.

00:08:48.360 | And the goals related to your role as a parent

00:08:52.680 | quickly filter to the top of your list.

00:08:55.720 | And over the course of especially the first few weeks

00:08:58.360 | of a child's life, first few months of a child's life,

00:09:01.200 | you go through this natural transformation as a parent

00:09:04.880 | of generally losing a significant amount

00:09:07.440 | of your selfishness because you become more other-focused

00:09:11.680 | rather than self-focused.

00:09:13.920 | And so the things that I'm gonna share,

00:09:16.340 | if you're not a parent, just recognize

00:09:17.920 | that parents will generally resonate with the idea

00:09:21.160 | that these are the highest and most important goals.

00:09:25.040 | Where you see this as an example,

00:09:26.940 | I think that is quite commonly visible,

00:09:29.000 | is in the field of retirement planning

00:09:30.800 | versus college planning.

00:09:32.760 | Financial planners are generally very clear

00:09:35.680 | on the importance of your saving for your retirement,

00:09:39.500 | even to the exclusion of your paying

00:09:42.800 | for your child's education.

00:09:44.240 | But even though financial planners are very clear

00:09:48.480 | about the cold logic of that position,

00:09:52.040 | day in and day out, parents will ignore systematically

00:09:56.880 | saving for their own financial future

00:09:59.360 | in favor of investing into their children's future.

00:10:02.960 | There's just a very natural flow.

00:10:04.720 | So let's go to the ideas now.

00:10:06.960 | ♪ Let's live in the moment ♪

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00:10:36.420 | - Where do we begin?

00:10:38.340 | Well, we begin, of course, with babies.

00:10:40.540 | That's how children start.

00:10:42.020 | They start as beautiful, wonderful little babies.

00:10:46.060 | So what can you do to invest into your child

00:10:48.220 | at an early age?

00:10:50.440 | If we're truly going to approach this topic

00:10:52.380 | in a systematic way, we need to begin

00:10:54.260 | prior to the conception of the child.

00:10:57.940 | And we need to begin by discussing

00:10:59.780 | the topic of spouse selection.

00:11:03.100 | Now, this topic should probably be broken

00:11:06.720 | into two different categories.

00:11:10.540 | The first would be a discussion of basic genetic qualities.

00:11:15.540 | And the second topic would be character qualities

00:11:21.900 | or lifestyle qualities, et cetera,

00:11:24.300 | kind of the softer things.

00:11:26.140 | Now, very few of us ever set out

00:11:29.460 | with the goal of choosing a spouse

00:11:32.960 | in a perfectly analytical way.

00:11:35.480 | The older I get, the more I have come to appreciate

00:11:37.860 | how smart it would be for us to do that.

00:11:40.300 | When I was younger, and you talked to me

00:11:42.340 | about things like arranged marriages

00:11:44.640 | that has been common throughout history,

00:11:46.600 | I recoiled in horror at the idea

00:11:49.820 | of having an arranged marriage.

00:11:51.620 | I had the idea, well, love is all you need.

00:11:54.500 | And after all, what if you don't love

00:11:56.380 | the person that you're married to?

00:11:58.180 | As I have grown older, and as my wife and I

00:12:02.080 | have now celebrated 11 years of marriage,

00:12:04.660 | I appreciate the concept of love

00:12:08.980 | the way that people often refer to it.

00:12:11.780 | And here, when I'm using the term in this sense,

00:12:13.840 | what I mean is I appreciate the concept

00:12:15.380 | of a basic attraction, one for another.

00:12:19.460 | But I think that there's a fundamental component

00:12:21.740 | in which compatibility on every level

00:12:24.660 | makes a huge difference in the long-term outcome

00:12:29.500 | of your relationship.

00:12:31.180 | And so I think that the practical considerations

00:12:33.780 | are far higher than many of us have been led to believe

00:12:38.420 | by the fairy tales that we've been sold by culture around.

00:12:41.540 | One of the concerns that I have

00:12:43.740 | about relationship formation in the modern age

00:12:46.420 | is that in many cases, our concepts

00:12:51.060 | of what is a successful and healthy relationship,

00:12:55.580 | what is a successful and healthy family

00:12:58.780 | have been formed primarily by fiction writers

00:13:02.720 | creating movie scripts, creating stories.

00:13:06.380 | And those fiction writers have, in many cases,

00:13:10.980 | completely succeeded in helping people

00:13:14.300 | to create an idea, an ideal,

00:13:19.300 | an expectation of how life should be.

00:13:23.500 | And yet that script or that image

00:13:27.500 | is completely unmoored from reality in any reasonable way.

00:13:32.500 | And it is designed primarily to sell movies.

00:13:36.080 | It's designed to sell books,

00:13:38.540 | and it's not designed for human happiness.

00:13:42.720 | Perhaps a useful example that I would offer

00:13:46.400 | would relate to the subject

00:13:47.840 | of how a couple should celebrate a wedding ceremony.

00:13:52.160 | If you were to go and speak to a young 18-year-old man

00:13:57.160 | or a young 18-year-old woman,

00:13:58.480 | certainly more commonly a woman,

00:14:00.000 | but I think either sex would share this,

00:14:05.000 | and you were to ask that young 18-year-old man or woman

00:14:08.720 | to describe to you his or her ideal wedding.

00:14:13.720 | And listen, you would probably get an image

00:14:19.340 | that comes to mind that's pretty much

00:14:23.080 | the way that you would describe your ideal wedding.

00:14:26.220 | And yet that image would look very much

00:14:31.520 | like most ideal weddings that have been presented

00:14:35.520 | in pop culture, especially film culture.

00:14:39.400 | As a financial planner, I see this frequently

00:14:41.920 | when we talk about the cost of weddings.

00:14:45.600 | One reason that young couples give

00:14:48.040 | for the idea that they're not married

00:14:50.680 | is that they can't afford to get married.

00:14:52.980 | Now, getting married doesn't actually cost money.

00:14:57.200 | Weddings can cost money.

00:14:59.520 | And yet oftentimes you'll have young couples

00:15:02.040 | that desire to be married.

00:15:03.800 | They are already living together as though they are married,

00:15:07.340 | but they haven't been able to come up

00:15:08.880 | with the money for the wedding.

00:15:11.120 | I want to ask you something.

00:15:13.280 | Let's pretend that you had no preconceived ideas

00:15:17.760 | about wedding ceremonies and marriages.

00:15:20.400 | And let's assume that you were giving counsel

00:15:23.800 | to a young man and a young woman.

00:15:26.420 | And that young man or young woman come to you

00:15:29.400 | and they say, "Listen, we desire to be

00:15:32.240 | "in a relationship together, and we desire to

00:15:36.900 | "memorialize or to solemnize the initiation

00:15:41.740 | "of that relationship with a party.

00:15:44.500 | "And so what we're going to do is we're going to spend years

00:15:48.420 | "saving money, and we're going to throw

00:15:50.860 | "a huge, expensive party, like nothing we have ever done

00:15:55.500 | "in our life in any other context.

00:15:58.280 | "And we're going to host a huge and expensive party

00:16:01.480 | "for all of our family and friends.

00:16:03.660 | "And we're going to spend $10,000, tens of thousands

00:16:07.420 | "of dollars, we're going to spend a huge amount of money.

00:16:11.000 | "Sometimes we'll even borrow money

00:16:12.680 | "in order to accomplish this objective.

00:16:16.180 | "And at that party, our friends and family

00:16:18.660 | "will come together, they'll celebrate with us,

00:16:20.820 | "and then they'll leave having enjoyed a wonderful day,

00:16:23.060 | "and we're going to pay for it.

00:16:24.840 | "In many cases, we're going to pay for it

00:16:26.300 | "over the course of many years."

00:16:28.000 | Does that sound like a really lovely thing

00:16:31.540 | for the couple in question?

00:16:33.880 | And yet, many young couples have had their entire idea,

00:16:38.880 | their entire ideal of what a wedding is formed

00:16:44.760 | such that if it doesn't fulfill what I've just described,

00:16:50.640 | then they'll consider it to be something of a failure.

00:16:53.640 | And yet, who formed that idea?

00:16:57.200 | Well, movie script writers with a large production budget

00:17:01.960 | have formed that idea and have created that idea.

00:17:04.460 | They're the ones who've done that.

00:17:08.000 | Now, they did it based upon a shred of reality.

00:17:12.440 | There is a shred of reality, which is the glittering,

00:17:17.440 | wealthy, upper class have generally throughout history

00:17:22.480 | memorialized and solemnized these events

00:17:26.600 | by throwing a huge giant party.

00:17:28.960 | But of course, these are the people

00:17:30.120 | who can comfortably afford to do such a thing,

00:17:33.280 | and these are the people that should do such a thing.

00:17:36.000 | But that's very different than, say,

00:17:37.520 | your average 25-year-old couple and what they should do.

00:17:42.040 | I remember an example of mine,

00:17:44.440 | a good friend of mine growing up.

00:17:46.420 | He and his girlfriend, they were together

00:17:48.900 | for a number of years.

00:17:49.840 | They had three children together

00:17:51.920 | before they could afford to have their wedding.

00:17:53.840 | And he was a blue-collar worker.

00:17:56.080 | She was busy taking care of babies

00:17:57.680 | for a significant amount of time.

00:17:58.720 | They saved for years to throw a big fancy party

00:18:01.920 | at a fancy venue and spend thousands of dollars

00:18:04.080 | so that she could have the wedding of her dreams.

00:18:06.840 | Now, thankfully, they're still married years later.

00:18:08.880 | They're doing fine, et cetera.

00:18:10.200 | But the point is, this entire model is broken,

00:18:12.800 | but it's a model that is based upon a false image.

00:18:16.680 | And so you wanna be careful about the images

00:18:19.800 | that you have relating to marriage.

00:18:23.000 | I simply was using the concept of a wedding ceremony

00:18:26.360 | and what is practical and how you're kind of forming

00:18:31.280 | your idea and your ideal as an obvious example

00:18:35.560 | that would then relate over to building your relationship

00:18:37.940 | on the subject or on the topic of love,

00:18:41.280 | defined as some magical sense of attraction

00:18:44.980 | to another person without any context of practical thinking.

00:18:49.820 | In the same way that many historical wedding customs

00:18:53.800 | are much more sensible than our modern Hollywood-created

00:18:57.600 | wedding customs, so are historical marriage practices

00:19:02.600 | in many ways much more sensible

00:19:05.600 | than our modern Hollywood-created marriage practices.

00:19:09.560 | Historically, if a couple was going to get married,

00:19:12.520 | the community threw the couple a party

00:19:15.360 | rather than the couple throwing the community a party.

00:19:18.800 | Historically, if a couple was going to marry,

00:19:22.120 | it was a community affair where the community came together

00:19:26.600 | to launch the couple successfully into their married life,

00:19:31.440 | again, by solemnizing the event, making it a public event

00:19:34.980 | so that there was clear indication of who was marrying whom

00:19:37.840 | and who was now off of the mate market.

00:19:42.840 | Mate market sounds pretty terrific, sorry, horrific.

00:19:47.240 | Who was unavailable, who was taken,

00:19:49.480 | who was claimed and was no longer single.

00:19:52.400 | So there was a public nature to it.

00:19:54.920 | The community traditions for solemnizing the occasion

00:19:59.920 | are continuous from one to another.

00:20:02.680 | The vows or the commitments are consistent

00:20:06.520 | and it's something that the community does.

00:20:08.360 | And the community comes together,

00:20:10.320 | provides the couple with a party,

00:20:13.320 | provides the couple with presents

00:20:16.820 | and things to start their house, et cetera.

00:20:18.840 | There's just a great sensibility to it.

00:20:21.880 | Now, again, I'm not opposed to big fancy weddings.

00:20:24.680 | Certainly wealthy people throughout history

00:20:26.700 | and wealthy fathers have been able to throw

00:20:28.480 | and loved to throw their daughters incredible weddings.

00:20:31.400 | That's wonderful.

00:20:32.620 | But that is not the norm for all cultures.

00:20:36.960 | And as Hollywood has created this magic idea around weddings

00:20:41.960 | it has eroded the basic fundamental nature

00:20:46.560 | of a wedding ceremony.

00:20:47.640 | Now let's move to spousal selection.

00:20:49.440 | If you're going to have the best outcome for your children

00:20:55.540 | you need to begin by carefully choosing a spouse

00:21:01.920 | that is going to be a high quality parent for your children.

00:21:09.000 | On the genetic level, there is a real truth to the idea

00:21:16.800 | that the person with whom you conceive a baby,

00:21:20.120 | that basic genetic DNA will in many cases

00:21:26.320 | predict a huge component of the child's life.

00:21:30.840 | And so we want to look at markers such as health,

00:21:35.880 | vitality, strength, size, intelligence, et cetera.

00:21:40.880 | These genetic markers are fundamentally important.

00:21:46.500 | A significant amount of your child's genetic material,

00:21:51.500 | basic genetic code is going to be determined

00:21:55.900 | by your mate and your ancestors and your mate's ancestors.

00:22:00.900 | Recently with my family I've been reading a book

00:22:05.660 | called Deep Nutrition by Carolyn or Carol,

00:22:10.660 | someone or other.

00:22:12.980 | This really interesting, really experienced physician

00:22:17.980 | in the state of Hawaii.

00:22:19.740 | And I really even enjoyed the book.

00:22:22.000 | And one of the major points that she makes early on

00:22:24.180 | in the book is that beauty, what we call physical beauty,

00:22:29.180 | is strongly tied and connected to markers of health,

00:22:35.500 | of physical health.

00:22:38.060 | In our age we have in many cases taken the idea

00:22:42.980 | that physical beauty is only skin deep.

00:22:45.820 | We've said, well, that person may be beautiful,

00:22:47.660 | but you don't have to be beautiful to be healthy.

00:22:49.620 | And what the author argues in a way that is convincing

00:22:54.340 | and persuasive to me is that what we call beauty

00:22:58.340 | is a consistent and reliable indicator of physical health.

00:23:02.540 | She goes into a really interesting set of research

00:23:05.020 | about symmetry and how facial symmetry,

00:23:07.940 | which is the primary driving force

00:23:11.220 | behind what we call beauty, facial symmetry

00:23:14.900 | is an indication of basic health.

00:23:18.180 | She makes a super interesting argument

00:23:20.900 | in favor of body type.

00:23:23.700 | Let me look up a quick passage, super fascinating.

00:23:28.280 | When she's talking about female body type,

00:23:31.220 | there's this classic idea of a woman's figure

00:23:36.100 | being certain forms of a woman's figure

00:23:39.940 | being more attractive to men.

00:23:42.620 | And yet there's actually a strong correlation

00:23:46.260 | between the body type that a woman has and her basic health.

00:23:51.260 | Here is the quote under section entitled,

00:23:57.260 | "Female Body Type and Health."

00:23:59.100 | Beauty researchers have divided female body types

00:24:01.860 | into four categories.

00:24:03.320 | In order of declining frequency, they are,

00:24:05.840 | banana, apple, pear, and hourglass.

00:24:09.620 | Several studies performed in 2005

00:24:12.620 | showed that apple-shaped women with short waists

00:24:16.860 | and narrow hips had almost double the mortality rates

00:24:20.060 | of women with more generous curves.

00:24:22.700 | Why would that be?

00:24:24.100 | Voluptuousness is an indication

00:24:26.820 | of healthy female sexual dimorphism,

00:24:29.700 | while a lack of voluptuousness indicates a problem.

00:24:33.060 | Normally, the hips and bust develop during puberty

00:24:36.860 | as a result of a healthy surge in sex hormones.

00:24:39.760 | These developments involve expansion of the pelvic bones

00:24:42.500 | along with the deposition of fat

00:24:44.120 | and glandular tissue within the breasts.

00:24:46.620 | But women whose genetics are such

00:24:48.080 | that their spines are abnormally short

00:24:50.380 | or their hormonal surge less pronounced,

00:24:53.220 | or whose diet is such that it interferes

00:24:55.300 | with the body's response to hormones,

00:24:57.720 | end up with boxier figures.

00:25:00.060 | If they're thin, they'll end up as bananas.

00:25:02.300 | If they put on weight,

00:25:03.340 | it gets distributed in a more masculine pattern

00:25:05.940 | in the belly, on the neck, and around the upper arms,

00:25:08.380 | and they'll become apples.

00:25:09.940 | Today, after three generations of trans fat consumption,

00:25:12.840 | which interferes with hormone expression, C chapter seven,

00:25:15.580 | and with daily infusions of sugar,

00:25:17.520 | which interferes with hormone receptivity, C chapter nine,

00:25:20.780 | hourglass figures have become something of a rarity.

00:25:24.380 | According to a 2005 study commissioned by Alva Products,

00:25:27.700 | a manufacturer of designer's mannequins,

00:25:30.800 | less than 10% of women today

00:25:32.740 | develop the voluptuous curves universally recognized

00:25:35.660 | as the defining features of a healthy

00:25:37.880 | and attractive female figure.

00:25:40.060 | In a world of apples, pears, and bananas,

00:25:42.660 | writer Nancy Etkoff has suggested

00:25:44.860 | that the most beautiful among us are genetic freaks.

00:25:47.880 | It's not an insult.

00:25:48.920 | She is merely referencing the statistical improbability

00:25:51.740 | of someone growing up to look like,

00:25:53.460 | to use her example, Cindy Crawford.

00:25:55.780 | But the suggestion seems to capture

00:25:57.780 | Etkoff's general thesis accurately.

00:26:00.420 | When a stunningly beautiful person is born,

00:26:02.680 | it's largely the result of genetic chance.

00:26:05.460 | These select few, the thinking goes,

00:26:07.340 | play the genetic lottery and won big.

00:26:10.080 | But I couldn't disagree more.

00:26:12.080 | Why would biology program us to be hot for genetic freaks?

00:26:16.260 | It seems to me far more probable

00:26:17.900 | that we are attracted to beautiful bodies

00:26:19.720 | because they advertise superlative health.

00:26:22.460 | In keeping with this idea,

00:26:23.940 | researchers studying the effect

00:26:25.460 | of these four female body types on lifespan

00:26:28.120 | find that women with the most attractive

00:26:29.800 | of the four body types, the hourglass,

00:26:32.340 | not only live the longest, they also live better.

00:26:35.640 | Statistics consistently show that having a longer,

00:26:38.440 | slimmer waist, and more womanly hips

00:26:40.860 | correlates with reduced diagnoses of infertility,

00:26:44.600 | osteoporosis, cancer, cognitive problems,

00:26:48.060 | abdominal aneurysms, diabetes and its complications,

00:26:51.620 | and more.

00:26:53.120 | And of course, all of those are cited sources

00:26:56.740 | that you're welcome to look up if you're interested.

00:26:59.020 | So the book is called "Deep Nutrition"

00:27:00.300 | by Katherine Shanahan, MD.

00:27:02.060 | And it's a fascinating book.

00:27:03.380 | And so the comments that I'm making are simply that

00:27:06.140 | when you are selecting a spouse,

00:27:09.180 | it's important that you think about the basic genetic

00:27:13.860 | makeup of that person.

00:27:16.200 | And don't be ashamed to pursue someone who is beautiful.

00:27:20.260 | Don't be ashamed to pursue someone who is healthy.

00:27:23.440 | Don't be ashamed to pursue someone who is strong,

00:27:27.060 | who is vigorous, who is vitality, who expresses vitality.

00:27:32.060 | Because these basic things are going to be passed along

00:27:36.140 | to your children.

00:27:37.860 | This is also going to affect everything from,

00:27:41.020 | so your child's basic health,

00:27:43.460 | and it's going to affect your child's basic intelligence.

00:27:47.940 | In our modern age, which is very cognitively demanding,

00:27:52.140 | you wanna be very thoughtful about marrying someone

00:27:54.860 | who reflects your personal values

00:27:56.980 | and your own personal levels of intelligence.

00:27:59.660 | This is fundamentally important, at least in my experience,

00:28:03.260 | for your satisfaction and happiness in life.

00:28:08.260 | I would have a very hard time being in a relationship

00:28:13.440 | with a woman who was not my intellectual evil,

00:28:16.880 | evil, (laughs)

00:28:18.940 | my intellectual equal,

00:28:21.720 | because it would just be very hard for me to relate.

00:28:25.240 | And so if my wife didn't understand my little quirky jokes,

00:28:28.180 | if she couldn't discuss the way that I wanna live

00:28:31.200 | and the ideas and the abstract ideas and concepts

00:28:33.980 | that I think about on a continual basis with me,

00:28:36.480 | I would find my relationship with her very unfulfilling.

00:28:39.860 | But one of the side factors is that your genetic,

00:28:44.400 | your basic intelligence and your mate's basic intelligence

00:28:49.240 | are gonna be passed along to your children.

00:28:51.760 | Now, this is, I think, increasingly a major challenge

00:28:55.240 | in our modern society.

00:28:57.700 | I started thinking about this issue myself

00:28:59.780 | for the first time years ago

00:29:01.040 | when I read Charles Murray's excellent book

00:29:04.000 | called "Coming Apart,"

00:29:05.600 | in which he analyzes the culture of the United States

00:29:10.320 | and some of the things that are contributing

00:29:12.200 | to this weird, basically two stories

00:29:16.020 | that we have in American culture.

00:29:17.720 | And it's hard to summarize the entire book

00:29:19.920 | in a few sentences.

00:29:20.760 | But in that book, he talks about

00:29:23.080 | the increases in cognitive homogamy.

00:29:28.200 | And so homogamy, the word, it's not commonly used,

00:29:33.200 | but homogamy refers to the interbreeding of individuals

00:29:36.420 | with like characteristics.

00:29:38.480 | Educational homogamy occurs when individuals

00:29:40.840 | with similar educations have children.

00:29:43.440 | Cognitive homogamy occurs when individuals

00:29:45.940 | with similar cognitive ability have children.

00:29:49.120 | Let me read an excerpt here

00:29:50.680 | because it'll put this into focus

00:29:54.040 | in terms of how things like basic intelligence

00:29:57.040 | are transmitted generationally

00:29:59.700 | and what this can and is increasingly resulting in

00:30:03.980 | in our modern society,

00:30:07.240 | from a section called "The Increase in Cognitive Homogamy."

00:30:11.760 | "Before the age of mobility,

00:30:13.080 | "people commonly married someone from the same town

00:30:15.960 | "or from the same neighborhood of an urban area.

00:30:19.500 | "The events that threw people together

00:30:21.040 | "seldom had anything to do

00:30:22.540 | "specifically with cognitive ability.

00:30:25.380 | "Similar cognitive ability was a source of compatibility

00:30:28.200 | "between a young man and a young woman,

00:30:30.160 | "and some degree of cognitive homogamy existed,

00:30:33.740 | "but it was a haphazard process.

00:30:35.960 | "Meanwhile, educational homogamy was high

00:30:38.520 | "because hardly anyone went to college.

00:30:40.640 | "In large proportions of married couples,

00:30:42.520 | "both had less than a high school education

00:30:44.680 | "or both had a high school diploma.

00:30:47.060 | "As the proportion of college graduates increased,

00:30:49.720 | "so did the possibilities

00:30:51.140 | "for greater educational homogamy at the top.

00:30:53.880 | "As college graduates found,

00:30:55.240 | "they had more potential marriage partners

00:30:57.080 | "who were also college graduates.

00:30:59.280 | "Drawing on the extensive technical literature and the CPS,"

00:31:02.680 | which is, I forget what the acronym stands for,

00:31:05.720 | basically a large, standardized,

00:31:08.160 | continually collected body of survey data,

00:31:11.600 | "sociologists Christine Schwartz and Robert Mayer

00:31:14.840 | "examined trends in, quote, assortative marriage,

00:31:17.920 | "as it is known in the jargon, from 1940 to 2003.

00:31:22.080 | "They found that homogamy has increased

00:31:24.280 | "at both ends of the educational scale.

00:31:26.560 | "College graduates grew more likely

00:31:28.340 | "to marry college graduates,

00:31:29.680 | "and high school dropouts grew more likely

00:31:31.720 | "to marry other high school dropouts.

00:31:34.040 | "For our purposes," which is trying to understand

00:31:36.680 | how the new upper class came to be,

00:31:39.280 | "the effects of increased educational attainment

00:31:41.420 | "may be seen in a simple measure.

00:31:43.400 | "In 1960, just 3% of American couples

00:31:46.000 | "both had a college degree.

00:31:47.680 | "By 2010, that proportion stood at 25%.

00:31:51.300 | "The change was so large that it was a major contributor

00:31:54.100 | "to the creation of a new class all by itself.

00:31:57.180 | "But increased educational homogamy

00:31:59.180 | "had another consequence that the academic literature

00:32:01.280 | "on homogamy avoids mentioning.

00:32:03.320 | "Increased educational homogamy

00:32:05.320 | "inevitably means increased cognitive homogamy.

00:32:08.780 | "A college education, starting with admission

00:32:11.000 | "and continuing through to graduation,

00:32:12.660 | "is a series of cognitive tests.

00:32:14.880 | "To be able even to begin a major in engineering

00:32:17.300 | "or the hard sciences,

00:32:18.600 | "students have to be able to do advanced calculus,

00:32:20.960 | "and that in turn requires logical mathematical ability

00:32:24.200 | "in roughly the top decile of the population.

00:32:26.920 | "To be able to cope with genuine college-level material

00:32:29.460 | "in the social sciences and humanities

00:32:31.220 | "requires good linguistic ability

00:32:33.260 | "in the top quartile of the distribution

00:32:35.100 | "if you're content with scraping by,

00:32:36.940 | "closer to the top decile if you want to get good grades

00:32:39.560 | "in a moderately demanding college.

00:32:41.560 | "To graduate means passing all these tests

00:32:44.060 | "plus a general test for perseverance.

00:32:47.040 | "The result is that each level of educational attainment,

00:32:49.900 | "high school diploma, AA, BA, MA,

00:32:51.880 | "and a professional degree or PhD,

00:32:53.980 | "implies a mean IQ for people attaining that level

00:32:57.300 | "that has been remarkably stable among whites

00:32:59.340 | "at least since the beginning of the 1980s."

00:33:02.020 | And here the author goes and shares a paragraph

00:33:04.360 | on why he is limiting this data to whites only.

00:33:06.700 | Most of the book is whites only data.

00:33:08.120 | He has an appendix on non-white data,

00:33:09.680 | but whites only data avoids a lot of the racial issues

00:33:12.440 | in America over the course of the 20th century

00:33:16.760 | and gives for better analysis.

00:33:19.160 | Then he presents a chart showing how basically

00:33:23.800 | the IQ levels for degree attainment

00:33:27.080 | are very, very obviously driven

00:33:30.140 | by the height of educational attainment, right?

00:33:36.600 | For the mean IQ for persons completing

00:33:38.640 | no more than no degree in the year 1982 to '89 is 88.

00:33:43.480 | 2005, it's 87.

00:33:44.960 | High school diploma, 99, 2005, 99.

00:33:48.320 | Associate's degree, 105 and 104.

00:33:51.160 | Bachelor's degree, 113, 113.

00:33:53.320 | Master's degree, 117, 117.

00:33:55.340 | And then PhD, LLD, MD or DDS, 126 and 124.

00:33:59.920 | The stability of the scores over the three decades

00:34:03.140 | from the 1980s through the 2000s is remarkable

00:34:05.800 | considering that the number of bachelor's degrees

00:34:07.920 | expressed as a percentage of 22 year olds

00:34:10.000 | increased from 22% in 1981 to 37% in 2008.

00:34:15.000 | But the country was also becoming steadily more efficient

00:34:18.000 | at getting the best students into college over that period

00:34:20.480 | so that the greater size of the college population

00:34:23.100 | didn't mean a markedly less able population.

00:34:26.880 | If the mean IQs at the higher levels

00:34:28.600 | of educational attainment have been stable,

00:34:30.480 | then the growth of two degree couples

00:34:32.040 | has meant, inevitably, greater cognitive homogamy at the top.

00:34:36.120 | But that's just the beginning.

00:34:37.480 | The college sorting machine has also been at work.

00:34:40.060 | College brings people together at the time of life

00:34:42.280 | when young adults are beginning to look around

00:34:43.760 | for marriage partners.

00:34:44.880 | And the college sorting machine brings the highest IQ

00:34:47.400 | young women and young men together

00:34:49.280 | in the most prestigious schools.

00:34:51.360 | As if that weren't enough,

00:34:52.360 | graduate school adds another layer of sorting

00:34:54.600 | so that the brilliant young woman

00:34:55.880 | who went to a state university goes to Harvard Law School

00:34:58.920 | where she is brought into the elite pool.

00:35:02.020 | For the prospective members of the new upper class

00:35:04.140 | who don't find a marriage partner as an undergraduate

00:35:06.660 | or at grad school, the names of the schools they attended

00:35:09.600 | give them badges that signal their status

00:35:11.460 | to prospective mates.

00:35:12.900 | The substance of their education also sorts them

00:35:15.400 | into occupations that increase the likelihood

00:35:17.600 | that they will eventually marry people

00:35:19.120 | with similar characteristics.

00:35:21.260 | So it's not just that college graduates

00:35:23.280 | are likely to marry college graduates,

00:35:25.920 | but that graduates from elite colleges

00:35:28.840 | are likely to marry other graduates from elite colleges.

00:35:32.440 | Back in the days when Harvard men and Wellesley women

00:35:34.920 | were more likely to be rich than to be especially smart,

00:35:37.800 | this meant that money was more likely to marry money.

00:35:40.480 | In an era when they are both almost certainly

00:35:42.480 | in the top centiles of the IQ distribution,

00:35:44.960 | it means that very smart is more likely to marry very smart.

00:35:49.640 | Goes on and talks a little bit about shared culture,

00:35:52.200 | how cognitive ability is just kind of a marker

00:35:55.000 | for having a shared culture.

00:35:56.160 | And then we read this section here.

00:35:58.540 | Transmission of cognitive ability to the next generation.

00:36:01.040 | As I read this, pay careful attention

00:36:03.200 | to the comments on the durability of wealth.

00:36:06.480 | Another consequence of increased educational

00:36:09.620 | and cognitive homogamy is the increased tenacity

00:36:12.520 | of the elite in maintaining its status across generations.

00:36:17.520 | The adage, shirt sleeves to shirt sleeves

00:36:19.860 | in three generations grew out of an observed reality.

00:36:24.100 | If the children and grandchildren are only average

00:36:26.600 | in their own abilities, money from a fortune one

00:36:29.220 | in the first generation won't keep them

00:36:31.260 | at the top of the heap.

00:36:32.740 | When the parents are passing cognitive ability

00:36:35.040 | along with the money, the staying power

00:36:37.540 | of the elite across generations increases.

00:36:41.340 | Specific numbers can be attached to such statements.

00:36:44.020 | The stability of the average IQs for different levels

00:36:46.540 | of educational attainment over time means

00:36:49.040 | that we can predict the average IQs of children of parents

00:36:51.740 | with different combinations of education.

00:36:53.940 | And we can also predict where the next generation

00:36:55.960 | of the smartest children is going to come from.

00:36:58.460 | On average, children are neither as smart

00:37:01.220 | nor as dumb as their parents.

00:37:03.300 | They are closer to the middle.

00:37:04.620 | This tendency is called regression to the mean.

00:37:06.920 | It exists independently of genes.

00:37:09.360 | Regression to the mean is a function

00:37:11.180 | of the empirically observed statistical relationships

00:37:13.740 | between the tested IQs of parents and children.

00:37:16.840 | Given the parameters in the note on page 366,

00:37:19.420 | the expected value of the IQ of a grownup offspring

00:37:22.520 | is 40% toward the population mean

00:37:24.760 | from the parent's midpoint IQ.

00:37:27.180 | Suppose we have four white couples

00:37:28.840 | with the same level of education,

00:37:30.400 | plugging in the average IQs for those levels of education

00:37:35.400 | as given in table 2.1.

00:37:37.740 | I added a fifth couple who both have degrees

00:37:39.940 | from elite colleges with a midpoint IQ of 135.

00:37:43.460 | Here is what we can expect as mean IQs

00:37:45.740 | of the children of these couples.

00:37:47.340 | Parents' education, two high school dropouts,

00:37:49.900 | expected IQ of the child, 94.

00:37:52.520 | Two high school diplomas, expected IQ of the child, 101.

00:37:56.460 | Two college degrees and no more,

00:37:58.580 | expected IQ of the child, 109.

00:38:00.660 | Two graduate degrees, expected IQ of the child, 116.

00:38:04.420 | Two degrees from an elite college,

00:38:06.020 | expected IQ of the child, 121.

00:38:09.800 | These represent important differences in the resources

00:38:12.900 | that members of the next generation take

00:38:14.740 | to the preservation of their legacy.

00:38:16.780 | Consider first a college graduate

00:38:18.460 | who marries a high school graduate,

00:38:20.460 | each with the average cognitive ability

00:38:22.580 | for their educational level, 113 and 99 respectively.

00:38:27.020 | Their expected midpoint IQ is 106.

00:38:29.860 | Suppose they have built a small business,

00:38:31.660 | been highly successful,

00:38:33.060 | and leave $5 million to their son.

00:38:35.560 | If their son has the expected IQ of a little less than 105,

00:38:39.780 | he will have only about a 50% chance of completing college,

00:38:42.920 | even assuming that he tries to go to college.

00:38:45.520 | Maybe he inherited extraordinary energy

00:38:47.860 | and determination from his parents, which would help.

00:38:50.440 | But those qualities regress to the mean as well.

00:38:53.080 | Shirt sleeves to shirt sleeves in three generations

00:38:55.560 | is a likely scenario for the progeny

00:38:57.380 | of that successful example.

00:38:59.220 | Compare that situation with the one facing the son

00:39:01.520 | of two parents who both graduated from elite schools.

00:39:04.520 | If he has exactly the expected IQ of 121,

00:39:08.220 | he has more than an 80% chance of getting a degree

00:39:11.020 | if he goes to college.

00:39:12.440 | These percentages are not a matter of statistical theory.

00:39:15.140 | They are based on the empirical experience

00:39:17.100 | of both the 1979 and 1997 cohorts

00:39:20.700 | of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth.

00:39:23.260 | If you had an IQ of 105 or one of 121 and entered college,

00:39:27.540 | those are the probabilities that you ever got a degree.

00:39:30.700 | In addition to those differing chances of graduation

00:39:33.220 | are qualitative differences between young people

00:39:35.260 | with IQs of 105 and 121.

00:39:37.980 | First, the reasons that someone with an IQ of 105

00:39:41.340 | doesn't finish college probably include

00:39:43.900 | serious academic difficulties with the work,

00:39:46.740 | whereas the reasons a person with an IQ of 121

00:39:49.320 | doesn't finish college almost certainly involve

00:39:51.480 | motivation or self-discipline.

00:39:53.780 | No one with an IQ of 121 has to drop out of college

00:39:57.180 | because he can't pass the courses.

00:39:59.300 | Second, there is a qualitative difference

00:40:01.140 | in the range of occupations open to those two young persons.

00:40:04.580 | The one with an accurately measured IQ of 105

00:40:07.480 | cannot expect to be successful

00:40:09.240 | in any of the prestigious professions

00:40:10.860 | that are screened for IQ by their educational requirements,

00:40:14.500 | for example, medicine, law, engineering, academia.

00:40:17.460 | It is unlikely that he can even complete

00:40:19.220 | those educational requirements.

00:40:21.020 | Someone with an accurately measured IQ of 121

00:40:23.980 | can succeed in any of them if his mathematical

00:40:26.920 | and verbal talents are both strong

00:40:28.820 | or succeed in the ones geared to his talents

00:40:30.940 | if there is an imbalance between mathematical

00:40:33.060 | and verbal ability.

00:40:34.860 | Now, think in terms of an entire cohort of children.

00:40:38.940 | Where will the next generation of children

00:40:40.980 | with exceptional cognitive ability come from?

00:40:43.540 | For purposes of illustration,

00:40:44.780 | let's say that exceptionally high cognitive ability

00:40:47.700 | means the top five centiles

00:40:49.300 | of the next generation of white children.

00:40:51.540 | More than a quarter of their parents

00:40:52.860 | may be expected to have a midpoint IQ of more than 125.

00:40:56.820 | Another quarter may be expected to have

00:40:58.380 | midpoint parental IQ of 117 to 125.

00:41:02.000 | The third quarter may be expected to have

00:41:03.680 | midpoint parental IQ of 108 to 117.

00:41:07.120 | That leaves one quarter who will be the children of parents

00:41:09.860 | with midpoint parental IQ of less than 108.

00:41:12.860 | Only about 14% of that top five centiles of children

00:41:16.260 | are expected to come from the entire bottom half

00:41:19.140 | of the distribution of white parents.

00:41:21.900 | Therein lies the explanation for that startling statistic

00:41:25.020 | I reported earlier about SAT scores.

00:41:27.620 | In 2010, 87% of the students with 700 plus scores

00:41:31.740 | in critical reading or mathematics

00:41:33.600 | had a parent with a college degree,

00:41:35.340 | and 57% had a parent with a graduate degree.

00:41:39.000 | Those percentages could have been predicted pretty closely

00:41:41.880 | just by knowing the facts about the IQs

00:41:43.880 | associated with different educational levels

00:41:45.980 | and the correlation between parental and child IQ.

00:41:49.340 | They could have been predicted

00:41:50.260 | without making any theoretical assumptions

00:41:52.140 | about the roles of nature and nurture

00:41:53.980 | in transmitting cognitive ability,

00:41:55.820 | and without knowing anything about the family incomes

00:41:58.340 | of those SAT test takers,

00:42:00.260 | how many test preparation courses their children took,

00:42:02.580 | whether they went to private schools

00:42:03.900 | or how ingenious the educational toys in the household were

00:42:06.660 | when they were toddlers.

00:42:08.140 | In an age when the majority of parents

00:42:09.780 | in the top five centiles of cognitive ability

00:42:12.120 | worked as farmers, shopkeepers, blue collar workers,

00:42:14.840 | and housewives, a situation that necessarily prevailed

00:42:18.040 | a century ago, given the occupational

00:42:20.100 | and educational distributions during the early 1900s,

00:42:23.500 | these relationships between the cognitive ability

00:42:25.740 | of parents and children had no ominous implications.

00:42:29.160 | Today, when the exceptionally qualified

00:42:31.320 | have been so efficiently drawn

00:42:32.600 | into the ranks of the upper middle class,

00:42:34.760 | and when they are so often married to people

00:42:36.640 | with the same ability and background, they do.

00:42:39.400 | In fact, the implications are even more ominous

00:42:41.520 | than I just described, because none of the numbers I used

00:42:44.000 | to illustrate the transmission of cognitive ability

00:42:46.120 | to the next generation incorporated the effects

00:42:48.840 | of the increased educational homogamy of recent decades.

00:42:52.320 | In any case, the bottom line is not subject to refutation.

00:42:56.000 | Highly disproportionate numbers

00:42:57.900 | of exceptionally able children in the next generation

00:43:00.960 | will come from parents in the upper middle class,

00:43:03.240 | and more specifically, from parents

00:43:04.960 | who are already part of the broad elite.

00:43:09.660 | (sighs)

00:43:11.660 | One sidebar that was included that I skipped over earlier

00:43:17.100 | in the text that's important.

00:43:18.580 | Which comes first, education or IQ?

00:43:21.980 | Educational attainment is correlated with IQ,

00:43:25.780 | but education does not have much effect on IQ

00:43:28.660 | after the child enters elementary school.

00:43:31.240 | By that, I do not mean that the absence

00:43:33.460 | of any education after age six wouldn't make a difference,

00:43:36.140 | nor that exceptions do not exist.

00:43:38.380 | Rather, I mean that if 1,000 children

00:43:40.820 | are administered a good IQ test at age six,

00:43:43.700 | and those children then attend a wide variety

00:43:45.940 | of elementary and secondary schools,

00:43:47.940 | their IQs at age 18 will be very similar

00:43:50.340 | to what they were at age six,

00:43:52.120 | and statistical analysis will not show

00:43:54.220 | that the children who went to the expensive private schools

00:43:57.140 | got an IQ boost as a result.

00:43:59.900 | This finding goes back to the famous Coleman Report

00:44:02.300 | in the 1960s.

00:44:03.820 | Scholars still debate whether additional years of education

00:44:07.140 | are associated with increments in general mental ability

00:44:09.540 | or just increments in test scores,

00:44:11.140 | but no one contends that education routinely transforms

00:44:14.160 | average children into intellectually gifted adults.

00:44:19.120 | The point that I want you to draw is

00:44:25.220 | basic, the basic genetic makeup of the person

00:44:31.660 | with whom you choose to procreate

00:44:34.280 | is going to have a significant effect

00:44:38.120 | on the long-term results

00:44:41.640 | that your children experience in life.

00:44:43.720 | In a perfect world, you would marry somebody

00:44:48.080 | who is exceedingly beautiful, exceedingly strong,

00:44:52.000 | exceedingly healthy, and exceedingly smart.

00:44:55.000 | In a perfect world, you yourself would be

00:44:57.500 | exceedingly beautiful, exceedingly strong,

00:45:00.160 | exceedingly healthy, and exceedingly smart.

00:45:03.120 | Now, none of us chose the genetic makeup

00:45:05.480 | that we personally enjoy,

00:45:07.660 | but we all have a responsibility

00:45:11.520 | to maximize our own gifts and abilities.

00:45:15.880 | We have a responsibility to maximize it.

00:45:19.280 | I was sick the day after Christmas,

00:45:23.960 | in bed for a day, and every time I get sick,

00:45:31.240 | I just reflect on the fact of how difficult it is

00:45:35.120 | to do anything productive when you don't feel well.

00:45:38.040 | And one of the great gifts that I have been given

00:45:40.160 | has been just enjoying robust personal health.

00:45:44.560 | For all of my challenges and shortcomings,

00:45:47.160 | I've always generally enjoyed good personal health.

00:45:49.920 | I've generally felt good.

00:45:51.040 | I've generally lived most of my life pain-free

00:45:53.080 | and pretty well cared for.

00:45:56.440 | When I compare, and so when I'm sick,

00:46:00.020 | I'm just shocked at how much of my own personal success

00:46:03.320 | in life has been due to this factor

00:46:06.040 | that is significantly out of control.

00:46:09.080 | I do my best to maximize my health.

00:46:10.640 | I try to be wise with my decisions, as we all do, right?

00:46:13.440 | But at the end of the day, a significant amount

00:46:15.800 | of my genetic heritage and my robust personal health,

00:46:19.320 | I didn't do anything for it, right?

00:46:20.860 | I didn't deserve it.

00:46:22.080 | It's just my genetic lot in life.

00:46:25.240 | And same thing with intelligence,

00:46:27.920 | with physical attractiveness, et cetera.

00:46:30.740 | None of us did anything to deserve where we are,

00:46:33.880 | but we do have a responsibility

00:46:35.860 | to maximize those gifts that we have.

00:46:38.260 | When you're choosing a mate, a spouse,

00:46:45.240 | I believe that is a time in which you should be,

00:46:50.520 | and you have every right to be, perfectly selfish.

00:46:56.680 | I believe that marriage is a permanent institution.

00:47:00.680 | When my wife and I said, "I will," to each other,

00:47:06.720 | I signed away my life with no escape.

00:47:09.960 | I said, "I will have you and hold you, keep you,

00:47:13.480 | "in sickness and in health, for better or worse,

00:47:15.720 | "no matter what, in poverty and in wealth,

00:47:17.500 | "no matter what, till death do us part."

00:47:20.360 | That is a huge commitment.

00:47:23.600 | That commitment is a necessary precondition

00:47:27.080 | for what we'll talk about in the future,

00:47:29.220 | of the stability that children need to grow up in.

00:47:32.400 | If you're going to make a commitment

00:47:36.440 | that is going to affect the rest of your life,

00:47:39.960 | you must be very, very careful

00:47:45.440 | about entering into that commitment.

00:47:51.000 | Be thoughtful and careful about your spousal selection,

00:47:55.600 | even to these very practical, very visible things,

00:47:59.940 | 'cause it will make a huge difference in your life,

00:48:03.960 | it'll make a huge difference in the lives of your children.

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00:48:39.680 | - Let's now pivot from basically those kind of objective,

00:48:45.480 | hard physical factors,

00:48:47.480 | and let's talk about some of the sociological factors.

00:48:52.000 | As you'll hear as I continue in this podcast episode,

00:48:58.560 | in discussing the care and nurturing of a baby,

00:49:03.120 | care and nurturing of children, et cetera,

00:49:06.120 | what will quickly become apparent

00:49:07.920 | is that questions of character,

00:49:10.520 | questions of personality,

00:49:12.720 | questions of virtue,

00:49:14.760 | questions of psychology,

00:49:16.960 | questions of worldview,

00:49:21.280 | of religion and theology,

00:49:25.520 | these questions will be exceedingly important

00:49:30.240 | in the care and nurture of your children.

00:49:32.540 | One of the comments I'll make in a little bit

00:49:36.240 | when we talk about babies is the importance

00:49:38.160 | of babies being surrounded by nothing but love.

00:49:41.760 | Love and caresses

00:49:45.200 | and gentleness and kindness, et cetera.

00:49:49.960 | If you marry somebody who is loud,

00:49:53.960 | who is harsh,

00:49:55.600 | who doesn't know how to express love and care,

00:49:59.280 | who doesn't know how to cuddle a baby,

00:50:02.840 | who doesn't have the personal patience

00:50:05.220 | to deal with a crying baby without lashing out

00:50:08.640 | and getting frustrated and angry,

00:50:11.000 | then your hopes and dreams

00:50:12.360 | for your children's long-term future

00:50:14.560 | are going to be significantly harmed.

00:50:17.120 | And so you wanna be very, very careful

00:50:19.040 | about the character of the person that you are marrying.

00:50:24.040 | You wanna be very careful about the character

00:50:26.800 | of the person with whom you are procreating.

00:50:30.000 | Because if you have a child

00:50:32.760 | with somebody who is of low moral character

00:50:35.720 | and you're fundamentally,

00:50:38.280 | you're running from behind,

00:50:42.520 | so what do you wanna look for?

00:50:44.180 | Well, you make your own list,

00:50:46.160 | but I think that of utmost importance

00:50:49.000 | is basic issues of virtue and of character.

00:50:53.000 | You want to be in a relationship with somebody

00:50:55.680 | who has high moral character

00:50:58.160 | in all of its fullest expressions.

00:51:00.640 | You want someone who is patient.

00:51:02.440 | You want someone who is kind.

00:51:04.080 | You want someone who is exceedingly self-disciplined.

00:51:06.880 | You want somebody who is compassionate,

00:51:12.120 | loving, tenderhearted.

00:51:13.860 | All of these character qualities that we can go through

00:51:17.020 | need to be reflected in your prospective spouse.

00:51:21.120 | If you were to go through a list of virtues

00:51:23.420 | and character qualities,

00:51:24.760 | what you'll see is every single one of them,

00:51:29.340 | if present and in its strongest form,

00:51:32.940 | can have a very positive impact

00:51:35.500 | and influence on your children.

00:51:38.220 | And each one of them, if absent

00:51:41.700 | or only present in a very weak form,

00:51:45.100 | can have a negative impact.

00:51:47.540 | Think about assertiveness.

00:51:51.160 | If you are in a relationship with someone

00:51:57.120 | who is not assertive,

00:51:58.880 | then your child may grow up

00:52:01.020 | to be the dominant force in a household

00:52:03.660 | rather than being the submissive one in a household

00:52:07.100 | and understanding very clearly his role in society

00:52:10.460 | due to the assertiveness of a parent.

00:52:12.380 | Or cleanliness.

00:52:13.700 | If you are in a relationship with someone who is unclean

00:52:17.940 | or who is slovenly in his or her manner,

00:52:21.200 | his or her dress, his or her deportment,

00:52:23.240 | his or her way he or she keeps his or her house,

00:52:27.100 | then this can negatively impact it.

00:52:29.540 | If a child is surrounded by a,

00:52:31.420 | grows up in a slovenly hovel,

00:52:33.900 | then that child is not going to achieve his potential.

00:52:37.580 | He's gonna have to work to escape it

00:52:39.780 | rather than growing up in cleanliness

00:52:42.700 | and in carefulness, right?

00:52:44.420 | Helpfulness or moderation or modesty or orderliness

00:52:47.820 | or purposefulness or gentleness or generosity.

00:52:51.460 | Again, go through a list of character qualities

00:52:53.940 | and what you'll see is that all of these are important.

00:52:57.020 | They're gonna be important for the functioning of a parent

00:53:00.780 | and they're gonna be important for the example

00:53:04.780 | that is gonna be set in front of your child.

00:53:08.240 | If a child has a positive example set of strong virtue

00:53:12.940 | and strong moral foundation,

00:53:15.420 | then that child will naturally absorb the idea

00:53:18.580 | that this is the normal way of living.

00:53:20.780 | And then that child will be as one who stands

00:53:23.940 | on the shoulders of the giants before him.

00:53:26.100 | But if the child has a strongly negative example,

00:53:30.820 | that child has to go through this long

00:53:32.780 | and circuitous pathway of systematically discarding

00:53:36.620 | the negative example to which he's been exposed

00:53:39.380 | for all of his formative years

00:53:41.620 | and then surrounding himself with positive examples.

00:53:45.140 | So all of these things matter, they matter hugely.

00:53:49.000 | And even a person of the highest virtue and character

00:53:54.000 | is going to be tested in the crucible of babies and children.

00:54:00.020 | I remember distinctly an experience that I had

00:54:02.780 | when we had our first baby.

00:54:05.100 | I always had, I continue to have and have always had

00:54:08.620 | a fairly high opinion of myself,

00:54:10.600 | a strong sense of self-confidence.

00:54:13.540 | I know where my strengths are, where my weaknesses are.

00:54:16.020 | And I am generally a fairly patient man, et cetera.

00:54:20.220 | But I remember so much when we had our first child

00:54:23.420 | and there was a time in which he was just crying

00:54:26.300 | and crying and crying and my wife and I were tired

00:54:29.100 | and were worn out and up all night and no sleep

00:54:31.740 | and trying to figure out what is wrong with this baby

00:54:34.340 | and is he physically hurt?

00:54:35.620 | Is there something that we're doing wrong?

00:54:37.200 | We're inexperienced parents, of course, et cetera.

00:54:39.900 | And one of the things, by the way,

00:54:41.460 | that happens in your parenting journey

00:54:45.660 | is your tolerance for something like crying increases.

00:54:49.500 | Obviously, none of us want a child to cry,

00:54:52.620 | but I remember, or I see sometimes,

00:54:54.980 | if a single person without children is around

00:54:59.500 | and your baby's crying, like the person just like starts,

00:55:01.940 | especially men, they start shifting their chairs.

00:55:03.740 | They're like, "I don't know what to do."

00:55:04.820 | And they're super uncomfortable.

00:55:06.820 | And as a parent, after a while, you just learn,

00:55:09.740 | sometimes children cry and you can't fix it.

00:55:11.900 | And at least if he's crying, it means he's not dying.

00:55:15.260 | Right?

00:55:16.080 | You're okay, okay.

00:55:16.920 | Crying is annoying, but he's crying because he's overtired.

00:55:19.760 | We'll be home in 15 minutes.

00:55:20.860 | He can just cry for 15 minutes.

00:55:21.940 | We'll get him in his bed, he'll go to sleep, et cetera.

00:55:24.020 | But that takes time to learn.

00:55:25.700 | And so I remember our first child,

00:55:27.300 | there was a point in time where I was so frustrated.

00:55:29.740 | I was holding my baby and all of a sudden,

00:55:33.660 | I was swept by this overwhelming urge

00:55:37.020 | to just like frustrated to shake my baby.

00:55:40.320 | And it scared me to death.

00:55:42.700 | 'Cause all of a sudden I realized,

00:55:44.940 | oh, that's why shaken baby syndrome or whatever is a thing.

00:55:48.820 | Like this is what happens.

00:55:51.160 | You're so filled with frustration and anger.

00:55:54.140 | And like, you're at the end of your rope and you're tired

00:55:57.740 | and you can't fix it.

00:55:59.140 | And you just wanna fix it that you're just like,

00:56:00.780 | ah, you wanna just lash out.

00:56:03.420 | Now I understand why people shake their babies.

00:56:05.460 | And I didn't for the record, I didn't.

00:56:07.660 | I put him down in his crib.

00:56:09.360 | I walked out, I closed the door.

00:56:10.980 | I walked to the end of the house.

00:56:12.700 | I sat down, breathed for a few minutes

00:56:15.580 | and then went back five minutes later and started again

00:56:17.900 | and calmed him, soothed him, et cetera.

00:56:19.780 | But I just vividly remember,

00:56:21.860 | it's those times when you come face to face

00:56:24.020 | with your own wretchedness as a human being.

00:56:26.660 | And you realize, wow,

00:56:29.220 | if I didn't have the self-control that I have,

00:56:33.580 | I could have just done something really horrific

00:56:35.860 | and harmed my baby.

00:56:37.660 | And he's totally innocent in it.

00:56:39.940 | And so those things matter.

00:56:41.980 | They matter hugely, hugely.

00:56:45.460 | Now, a couple of important comments specifically to men.

00:56:50.020 | One of the things that you need to think

00:56:52.820 | very carefully about,

00:56:55.420 | if you want your children,

00:56:57.220 | if you desire to have children

00:56:59.000 | and you want your children to flourish,

00:57:03.540 | you need to very carefully choose a woman

00:57:07.180 | based upon her qualities and her abilities

00:57:11.340 | and her aptitude for motherliness.

00:57:13.880 | One of the great challenges that we face in our modern era,

00:57:19.580 | on the backside of four waves of feminism,

00:57:23.660 | is that very few women are ever encouraged

00:57:27.980 | to develop abilities, skills, qualities,

00:57:32.980 | or appreciation even of motherly characteristics.

00:57:38.240 | Most young women in our modern Western societies

00:57:42.480 | are being systematically trained for careers

00:57:46.880 | in business, in medicine, et cetera,

00:57:50.680 | rather than as mothers.

00:57:53.800 | And so this makes it very challenging

00:57:56.280 | to distinguish and navigate

00:57:58.440 | between a woman who's going to be a good mother

00:58:03.060 | versus a woman who's going to be a great career woman.

00:58:06.360 | I see a little bit of a change

00:58:10.260 | where I see that there are broad swaths of women

00:58:15.260 | who are wishing that they could have more

00:58:19.520 | of the old-fashioned motherly style of living

00:58:24.100 | and are feeling frustrated

00:58:25.440 | with how they've been basically shoehorned

00:58:27.160 | into modern business-making, money-making careers.

00:58:32.160 | But it is very challenging because a lot of times,

00:58:36.120 | the women who are the most successful

00:58:39.440 | in the modern business world make the worst mothers.

00:58:44.440 | And the women who are probably the best mothers

00:58:49.040 | are probably not going to be very successful

00:58:51.320 | in the business world.

00:58:54.080 | It's important that you think about this

00:58:56.600 | and think about what you want as early in life as possible.

00:59:01.600 | If you desire to be in a relationship with a career woman,

00:59:08.040 | feel free, it's your life.

00:59:10.240 | If you desire to be in a relationship with a mother,

00:59:13.880 | it's also your life, and you can choose that.

00:59:17.560 | On this topic, I myself feel like I dodged a bullet

00:59:22.880 | when it came to choosing my wife.

00:59:25.880 | The reason I feel that way is I was not confident

00:59:29.320 | when I was 20 years old that I wanted a woman

00:59:32.360 | who was willing to be a great mother and a great wife.

00:59:36.280 | I was so infected with the modern kind of feminist worldview

00:59:41.280 | that I thought it was discriminatory for me to say

00:59:43.840 | that I would want a woman who would be a good mother.

00:59:47.040 | I wouldn't have gone out and done that.

00:59:48.680 | And there were several women that I was interested in

00:59:50.960 | who, in hindsight, it's now blindingly obvious to me

00:59:55.320 | that it would have been a horrific relationship

00:59:57.920 | for me personally because they were very career-driven.

01:00:01.480 | There were three different girls that I was interested in,

01:00:03.800 | all three of whom went on to become doctors.

01:00:06.400 | And if I had ever ended up in a marriage relationship

01:00:09.720 | with those women, it would have been very difficult for us

01:00:13.520 | because their careers were very important to them.

01:00:17.480 | And yet, with my interest in traveling the world

01:00:20.960 | and living a free lifestyle, et cetera,

01:00:22.680 | I would have found it difficult to be married to them

01:00:26.200 | because of the many compromises.

01:00:29.720 | Now, I'm not casting any aspersions on them.

01:00:31.880 | I think I haven't, I'm not in touch with any of them.

01:00:33.920 | I know that at least a couple of them are mothers now,

01:00:36.120 | and I'm sure they're wonderful mothers, et cetera.

01:00:38.440 | But their life decisions have,

01:00:41.280 | and the importance of their careers

01:00:43.880 | set them on a different track.

01:00:46.160 | And that track would have been frustrating to me.

01:00:48.240 | Back to what I said a little bit ago,

01:00:49.480 | when you're choosing a spouse,

01:00:51.560 | you should be completely and entirely selfish.

01:00:55.520 | And you should be thinking about your vision

01:00:59.320 | for your children, and you should choose the best mother

01:01:03.680 | that you can for your children.

01:01:05.400 | My wife and I, prior to being married,

01:01:08.080 | it was not like we sat down and kind of had this,

01:01:11.120 | you know, tremendous, you know,

01:01:15.480 | long-term plan that we were gonna go

01:01:17.240 | and have five children.

01:01:18.720 | Kind of just emerged naturally.

01:01:20.280 | But in hindsight, with experience,

01:01:22.160 | I can now see that one of the reasons

01:01:24.480 | it emerged naturally is because we had

01:01:26.320 | a high degree of compatibility on some of these issues.

01:01:29.760 | My wife was working, she had a job, et cetera,

01:01:32.360 | but she wasn't super career-oriented.

01:01:34.240 | She wasn't trying to earn a million dollars

01:01:36.680 | as, you know, a lady boss.

01:01:38.640 | She was working 'cause she needed to work,

01:01:41.120 | and she was happy to be married to me.

01:01:43.160 | And in hindsight, it's one of the things

01:01:45.080 | that I appreciate the most about her

01:01:46.920 | is that she can be fully focused on being a mother.

01:01:50.600 | And I consider that a major asset.

01:01:53.600 | As you'll hear when I talk about some of the things

01:01:55.560 | that you can do with babies and children,

01:01:58.320 | one of the most important things that you need is time.

01:02:02.560 | And you especially need time from your children's mother.

01:02:07.560 | And so if you are attracted to somebody

01:02:11.240 | who expresses motherly qualities,

01:02:14.160 | or if you're attracted to somebody who has developed skills

01:02:18.680 | and ability and knowledge and prepared herself

01:02:21.760 | to be an effective mother,

01:02:23.600 | that's a hugely important thing for you to consider.

01:02:27.960 | And if you want children,

01:02:29.600 | and you want your children to be raised well,

01:02:33.180 | the choice of the mother and her character qualities,

01:02:37.640 | her inclinations, her personality,

01:02:40.120 | is going to be a choice that you cannot

01:02:44.080 | overcome, meaning you cannot go beyond that basic choice.

01:02:48.320 | You are going to succeed or fail to the degree

01:02:51.760 | that she possesses those character qualities that you need.

01:02:55.860 | Now, I want to speak to my female listeners.

01:03:01.400 | The exact same thing applies to you.

01:03:07.120 | If you're going to be in a relationship with a man

01:03:09.480 | and you are thinking and caring about the long-term success

01:03:13.680 | and future of your children,

01:03:15.560 | you need to be exceedingly discriminatory

01:03:19.400 | around choosing a man who's going to be

01:03:21.960 | a high-quality, capable father.

01:03:25.880 | You need to be very, very careful

01:03:30.000 | about who you conceive children with,

01:03:32.400 | and make sure that you are only conceiving children

01:03:36.400 | with somebody who is going to be a world-class father.

01:03:40.400 | Because if you wind up raising a child by yourself,

01:03:43.640 | your child will never be as successful

01:03:46.680 | as he otherwise could be if he were raised

01:03:50.920 | by a mother and a father.

01:03:54.320 | A child who doesn't have a strong, virtuous father

01:04:00.840 | in his life is going to begin his life completely handicapped.

01:04:07.720 | And that will express itself more and more

01:04:11.400 | as the years go by.

01:04:12.840 | And so your choice of a man of high moral character

01:04:16.880 | and integrity is exceedingly important.

01:04:20.560 | Your choice of somebody who is going to provide you

01:04:23.200 | with the lifestyle that you want is exceedingly important.

01:04:28.200 | One of the conclusions I've had for years

01:04:30.800 | and have proven again over recent weeks

01:04:33.120 | is if you're going to be a committed parent

01:04:37.080 | with young children,

01:04:40.080 | I do not believe it is possible to do that

01:04:43.120 | as well as it could be if you are trying to also earn money.

01:04:48.120 | I am a very, very skilled father

01:04:52.040 | on the day-to-day functioning of my household.

01:04:54.400 | And when we have a new baby, as I'll talk about in,

01:04:57.520 | I guess at this point I should probably

01:04:58.480 | do a separate episode,

01:05:00.160 | but when we have a new baby, my wife has one job,

01:05:03.000 | be with baby, that's all.

01:05:04.320 | And so I'm running the household and I'm very good at it.

01:05:07.520 | I am very skilled at it.

01:05:09.440 | It actually annoys me when people make jokes

01:05:11.800 | about men being incapable of washing their towels

01:05:14.800 | and cooking and whatnot.

01:05:15.840 | I'm very skilled at it.

01:05:17.800 | Even with my skill, I find it very hard to create the time

01:05:22.200 | to sit down and do something as simple

01:05:23.440 | as recording a podcast for you,

01:05:25.400 | even though I know what I want to say,

01:05:27.080 | because the demands of young children are continuous.

01:05:32.080 | And so if you want to be a full-time mother

01:05:37.800 | and be able to pour into your children,

01:05:40.120 | you better choose a guy who can make enough money

01:05:42.600 | to support you and who wants that,

01:05:45.680 | and who's willing to do that with a happy attitude.

01:05:48.560 | You better be careful of choosing somebody

01:05:50.600 | who's gonna be patient with you,

01:05:52.720 | who's gonna be patient with you

01:05:53.920 | when you are your most vulnerable.

01:05:56.240 | One of the times when a woman is in her most vulnerable state

01:06:00.480 | is during childbirth and immediately after

01:06:02.440 | when she's recovering, exceedingly vulnerable.

01:06:06.240 | And so you need to choose somebody

01:06:07.700 | who's gonna provide for you, who's gonna care for you,

01:06:09.520 | who's gonna protect you, et cetera.

01:06:11.640 | So you must be very, very careful

01:06:14.960 | and very, very discriminatory in choosing someone

01:06:18.560 | who is the highest quality for you in your relationship.

01:06:23.560 | Don't succumb to the idea that the only thing

01:06:28.800 | that matters is the feels.

01:06:31.840 | Don't succumb to the idea that the only thing that matters

01:06:34.640 | is whether your heart goes pit or pat when he looks at you.

01:06:38.220 | That's important in some measure,

01:06:41.060 | but it's not in any way the kind of thing

01:06:45.640 | that's going to survive the decades.

01:06:48.860 | And you want something that's going to last.

01:06:51.800 | And if you want your children to succeed,

01:06:54.420 | you can't just depend upon the basic genetic material.

01:06:59.300 | Your goal is not to go out and find a sperm donor

01:07:02.820 | who is tall, dark, and handsome and has a high IQ.

01:07:05.380 | You need somebody who has those basic qualities,

01:07:11.160 | but also is going to be a world-class father.

01:07:16.160 | Be careful and discriminatory in that process.

01:07:22.840 | In summary of what I've said so far,

01:07:28.220 | if you want your child to invest

01:07:31.580 | into the long-term success of your children,

01:07:34.460 | it begins with who the parents of your children are.

01:07:40.760 | And since you're going to be one of those parents,

01:07:44.580 | the primary choice that you have is who is the other parent?

01:07:49.580 | Who's going to provide the genetic seed necessary

01:07:55.220 | for the growth of this baby?

01:07:58.480 | And who is going to be there throughout the long,

01:08:02.720 | challenging life course of this child and of this baby?

01:08:07.720 | Make sure if you want children that you're marrying somebody

01:08:13.680 | that you want to have children with.

01:08:15.980 | Make sure also, of course, that you talk about it

01:08:17.680 | and that you want to have children.

01:08:19.420 | That's a fundamental component, of course,

01:08:21.440 | of those important conversations.

01:08:23.880 | But be very, very careful and discriminatory in advance

01:08:28.880 | of your mate.

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01:09:06.560 | - I think I'm going to conclude this podcast episode here.

01:09:12.320 | I was planning to go through every step,

01:09:14.620 | but I've spoken a little bit in greater detail

01:09:19.160 | about these topics than I intended to,

01:09:20.760 | but I'm satisfied with what I've recorded.

01:09:23.000 | I believe it's appropriate.

01:09:25.000 | So we'll pick it up in the next episode.

01:09:26.360 | Also, of course, my children have awakened

01:09:28.600 | from their nap time and I'm now needed in my household

01:09:32.480 | in order to allow my wife to rest and to sleep.

01:09:35.880 | I can hear them in the other room,

01:09:37.280 | and so I'm needed for daddy duties.

01:09:40.500 | So we'll make this into a multi-part series

01:09:42.760 | instead of a two-part series,

01:09:44.720 | which was the original intention.

01:09:46.800 | I hope that these ideas have been useful to you.

01:09:49.280 | I hope that these things have been helpful.

01:09:52.320 | I guess the final comment I would make,

01:09:53.680 | it's just simply that for many of us,

01:09:55.240 | these things, these decisions are already made.

01:09:58.120 | For many of us, we already have a child, right?

01:10:00.240 | We've already chosen who we're married to.

01:10:02.000 | We've already chosen these kinds of things.

01:10:03.920 | The child is already generated and created, et cetera.

01:10:06.820 | But I do have a significant amount of my listening audience

01:10:13.040 | who has not made those choices.

01:10:14.480 | And I believe that these things matter

01:10:17.360 | and they should be considered,

01:10:18.920 | they should be talked about, et cetera.

01:10:21.560 | We should be talking, one of the important classes,

01:10:25.880 | it's funny, in our homeschool co-op,

01:10:27.760 | I believe that education should reflect reality.

01:10:32.440 | And so in our homeschool co-op every year,

01:10:33.960 | we talk about, okay, what classes do we wanna have?

01:10:35.860 | And my wife suggested to the group, she's like,

01:10:38.760 | "You should have Joshua teach a class

01:10:40.080 | "on espousal selection class."

01:10:43.160 | And the teenagers, shockingly, didn't jump on the idea

01:10:48.020 | for whatever reason, but it's certainly a class

01:10:50.880 | that I'm going to be teaching systematically

01:10:52.840 | in my own homeschool and that I think

01:10:55.440 | we should teach to children.

01:10:57.680 | The life course that people are on is so blindingly obvious

01:11:02.680 | that if we'll walk away from the Hollywood mumbo jumbo

01:11:07.880 | and all the garbage that they create

01:11:09.960 | about the way life works and we just look at it,

01:11:13.320 | it's so blindingly obvious, right?

01:11:15.120 | You don't want, character matters, physicality matters,

01:11:20.120 | health matters, et cetera.

01:11:21.420 | This stuff makes a huge difference.

01:11:23.400 | And what I believe is so important

01:11:26.180 | is when you build a foundational relationship

01:11:29.900 | based upon compatibility, respect, et cetera,

01:11:34.260 | based upon a philosophy and a worldview of love, right?

01:11:38.060 | My definition of love is that love is an action.

01:11:42.060 | It's not a feeling, right?

01:11:43.660 | Love is an action, like Voddie Bachum's definition.

01:11:46.080 | But love is an action, excuse me,

01:11:48.400 | love is, what does he say?

01:11:50.120 | Love is a decision, love is a, now I'm blanking on it.

01:11:54.560 | Love, act of the will, that's what it is.

01:11:57.320 | Love is an act of the will, accompanied by emotion

01:12:01.920 | that leads to action on behalf of its object.

01:12:05.060 | I'm surprised I forgot that.

01:12:07.800 | I find that to be one of the most useful definitions of love.

01:12:10.840 | Love is an act of the will, accompanied by emotion

01:12:14.280 | that leads to action on behalf of its object.

01:12:17.200 | The idea is love is not something that you just feel, right?

01:12:20.100 | Those are chemical reactions and they come and go

01:12:22.840 | and they're important, but they're not fundamental.

01:12:26.780 | They are the important and worthy and wonderful icing

01:12:31.780 | on top of the cake that makes the whole cake wonderful.

01:12:35.640 | But if that cake is just icing, right?

01:12:38.400 | Icing is gross, children think icing is great.

01:12:41.440 | Like, oh, I can just eat icing.

01:12:42.800 | Then you reach about 15 and you realize

01:12:45.380 | that eating icing is not nearly as wonderful

01:12:47.580 | as eating a really delicious cake with icing on top.

01:12:52.580 | What Hollywood calls love and what our culture worships

01:12:57.880 | of these emotional reaction and feeling to another person

01:13:01.600 | is the wonderful icing on top of the cake

01:13:04.840 | that makes it spectacular, right?

01:13:07.880 | Makes it just burst in your mouth with flavor

01:13:10.840 | and you love it, but it's not the foundation for a cake.

01:13:14.600 | And so we need to, if we're gonna see

01:13:16.760 | our great-great-grandchildren succeed,

01:13:18.700 | we need to establish a family culture

01:13:21.760 | in which these issues are discussed consistently

01:13:25.880 | and thoughtfully so that our children arrive

01:13:29.720 | at marriage age of 20, 25, 30 years old

01:13:33.360 | and they have a clear understanding

01:13:35.720 | of what they're looking for and what is available to them.

01:13:38.840 | So enough for today.

01:13:40.120 | Thank you so much for listening.

01:13:41.120 | I'll be back with you as soon as I can.

01:13:43.720 | Remember, Radical's less than one week

01:13:45.480 | before the live class of my newest course called Hackproof.

01:13:50.360 | Hackproofcourse.com, sign up today.

01:13:52.880 | The live class that you will definitely want to be a part of

01:13:55.800 | is on February 8th.

01:13:57.860 | So sign up today at hackproofcourse.com.

01:14:00.480 | You'll wanna be a part of that live class

01:14:02.520 | so that not only can you receive the prepared curriculum,

01:14:05.480 | but you can also ask all of your personalized questions,

01:14:08.320 | which my co-host and I, Gabriel Custodiate, will answer.

01:14:12.240 | So hackproof, how to beat fraudsters,

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2023-02-02_Invest_in_Children_Early-1