🌬️🔥 The Antifragile Dad: Intro, Doing What You Say You're Going to Do, Paying Attention to Words & Lowering Negativity Threshold
Be fire and wish for the wind.
Welcome to the 1st edition of The Antifragile Dad. A weekly newsletter on using the challenges of fatherhood to level up. Expect it every Friday.
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Five Things for You This Week.
An Intro to The Antifragile Dad 🌬️🔥
A Post on Integrity - Doing what you say you’re going to do.
An Idea to Experiment With - Paying attention to words.
A Thought for the Week - Lowering your negativity threshold.
A Podcast/Video on Happiness - from Mo Gawdat.
One - An Introduction to The Antifragile Dad 🌬️🔥
The part about becoming a father that no one tells you about is the tidal wave of new 💩 thrown at you.
Or maybe they do tell you and you just ignored them.
Regardless, when staring down the storm - you have two options.
Let’s call them The Blue Pill & The Red Pill.
(You bet your 🍑 I’m turning this into a Matrix metaphor)
Option 1 (The Blue Pill): You let the surge of pressures & challenges wash you away over time. You become more cynical, more angry. Less connected, less happy. You throw your hands up and capitulate. You crave escape and find “happiness” in short, artificial dopamine rushes. You view this as a time in your life to simply endure. To white knuckle and get through. Time flies and before you know it, your wish is granted; those years are over. You’ve gotten through. And you’re left with…what?
We’ve all seen dads that have chosen Option 1. I hear dads in my life talk like this every day. And not for a second do I fault them. Option 1 is the default in our world.
But, as Morpheus offered, there is another way. Option 2. The Red Pill.
Option 2 (The Red Pill): You use the surge of pressures & challenges to fuel your growth into a stronger, happier, more successful, more loving father and human. You greet the stressors of fatherhood with a toothy grin and open arms. You have no desire to escape anywhere because…why would you want to escape such a wonderful life? A life filled with such incredible magic. A life where you’re served opportunity after opportunity to learn, grow and love in new ways every single day.
This is why The Antifragile Dad was built. To inspire fathers to choose the second path. The Red Pill. The path of Antifragility.
Or, as my favorite line from the book Antifragile puts it:
You want to be the fire and wish for the wind.
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And if fatherhood lacks for nothing, it’s the wind.
So the question is:
Will you use the wind? Or will you be extinguished by it?
I believe that the winds of fatherhood are a chance to elevate all areas of life - parenting, mental resilience, relationships, health, finances, creativity, leadership, and contribution - to name a few. This newsletter aims to provide ideas and inspiration to fuel that journey, delivering actionable value every week.
I hope you find it valuable, and that it changes how you view your journey as a dad. I also hope you can’t help but share it.
☝️ This was paraphrased from The Antifragile Dad 10-Bullet Manifesto. Read the full version here.
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We’re also building The Antifragile Dad into a community. There’s not enough of that kind of stuff for dads. If you feel the same, join us.
Two - A Post on Integrity.
Here’s a post on Internal Integrity. Does your Video match your Audio?
The Big Takeaway: How you do anything is how you do everything.
Three - An Idea to Experiment With 💡
💡 Pay attention to words when describing parenting (and your wife).
Do you find yourself using a lot of negative words (“hard”, “frustrating”, “exhausting”) experiment when describing parenting experiences? I hear them almost every time I talk to young dads.
Try using the total opposite words in their place (“easy”, “fun”, “amazing”). There’s lots of evidence that the words we use can change our experience of the world.
While it may feel silly, disingenuous or even like lying at first, you may find that changing your words changes how you experience events. Even if they’re events you’ve experienced negatively in the past.
Events that were previously frustrating or exhausting can, like magic, become exciting and energizing. While the only thing that changed was your perspective.
If this sounds too “woo woo”, give it a try anyway. It works.
Example: Your friend asks you how your solo-dad weekend was with your kid(s). Instead of saying “exhausting”, say it was “awesome” or “fun” or “energizing” - even if your kid(s) was up at 3AM every night. What’s the point of describing it negatively? What benefit does that provide outside of hoping to gain some pity from your friend?
Bonus points: Try it with how you talk about your wife.
Four - A Thought for the Week.
What’s something that’s been bugging you that you’re simply “putting up with” instead of taking action on? Can you lower your negativity threshold and not let things pile up (both physically and mentally) so much?
Example: I removed the old metal cover from my fireplace and put it on my deck…where it sat for weeks, staring me in the face every time I walked by the back door. It eventually just became part of the scenery. But one that low-key stressed me out. When I finally mustered the 2 minutes of energy to move it around front + later to take to the dump, the mental weight lifted was surprisingly significant.
Five - A Podcast/Video on Happiness.
I’ll leave you with this video from Mo Gawdat.
Big Takeaway: You control your happiness in every single moment. But it requires a muscle that is perpetually atrophied in many of us. Exercise that muscle.
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Be fire this week & wish for the wind. 🌬️🔥
Thanks for reading,
Chris