When you think about families, do you think about a nest? Or do you think about a multi-generational family that you’re contributing to a legacy? Most Western families think about a nest and they think about getting the kids out of the nest. My guest today, Jeremy Pryor, who runs familyteams.com really flips that on its head and instead talks about a multi-generational family and how we should view families differently, and how the western view of family has really messed up so many fundamental things in how we raise our kids, how we talk about family, and how we create multi-generational families that love each other and actually invest in the generations to come.
Show Transcript
[00:00:00] Jeremy Pryor: Making a, like imagining a family as a collection of individuals or a springboard for individual success. You think about family as a vehicle through which you live life, and…
[00:00:13] Mike: Welcome to the 2 cent Dad podcast, where we interview dads to discuss their journeys of intentional fatherhood while doing work they care about and living a life of purpose.
[00:00:23] I’m your host, Mike Sudyk.
[00:00:31] When you think about families, do you think about a nest? Or do you think about a multi-generational family that you’re contributing to a legacy? Most Western, um, families think about a nest and they think about getting the kids out of the nest. And my guest today, Jeremy Pryor, who runs familyteams.com really flips that on its head and instead he talks about a multi-generational family and how we should view families differently and how the
[00:01:00] western view of family has really messed up so many fundamental things in, in how we raise our kids, how we talk about family, and how we, um, create multi-generational families that love each other and actually invest in the generations to come.
[00:01:16] And so real excited to have Jeremy Pryor on today’s uh, podcast, and he is really gonna challenge a lot of your thinking. And let’s jump right into the episode.
[00:01:26] Well today on the podcast we have Jeremy Pryor, who’s the founder of Family Teams. You can find them at familyteams.com. He’s also a father of five, I think.
[00:01:36] Just five, right. And, uh, he’s, they’re, you know, doing a really cool thing where they’re, um, working with teams to. To build family teams and he’s gonna talk all about that in today’s show. But, um, really a, a cool movement to counter kinda where family finds itself in today’s culture. And I’m excited to talk about that, talk a little bit about some of your house church
[00:02:00] initiatives too, Jeremy. So thank you so much for being on the podcast.
[00:02:03] Jeremy Pryor: Oh man. Thanks for having me, Mike appreciate being here, love talking about this stuff.
[00:02:07] Mike: Yeah, and I recently listened to a podcast of yours where you’re talking a little bit about this, and I actually sent it to my wife and I was like, I gotta have this guy on, on the show.
[00:02:14] So she was excited, . So she had a bunch of questions that she said to me before the, before this call, but, um, I, I wanted you to maybe start off like the family team side of things, um, and how you, what is family teams? What’s a family team? What is that about and how did that evolve and, and come to be.
[00:02:33] Yeah. Yeah.
[00:02:34] Jeremy Pryor: Basically it’s a philosophy of family where instead of basically, um, making a fa, like imagining a family as a collection of individuals or a springboard for individual success, you think about family as a vehicle through which you live life and your family is your team. And, uh, and so how it happened was I was, I grew up in a, you know, in a region I, the Seattle area where
[00:03:00] there was just so much brokenness that I saw in families and it looked like an experiment that had just gone off the rails.
[00:03:06] Like, you know, so much divorce, so much, so much suffering happening with, with men and women, with children, and especially I was a youth pastor for a number of years there as well. And just saw, you know, as we were working with kids, just such devastation and I, I honestly really lost any optimism or hope that family was like a really positive thing.
[00:03:26] It’s kinda, I, you know, I was probably just annoyed when people talk about like, I really wanted to follow the Lord. I really wanted to, um, you know, understand what it’s like to, you know, to be part of God’s kingdom, but how fam like family just looked like it was, you know, really, uh, uh, just a, an idea that that had some somehow expired or something.
[00:03:45] Mike: Um, so you weren’t married at that time?
[00:03:47] Jeremy Pryor: No, I was single. Yeah. No, I was single. Um, I was excited about getting married. There was a lot of, you know, benefits to being married that as a Christian you can imagine, but, um, but you don’t have to have kids, right?
[00:04:00] Or you, If you do, you can really minimize, uh, the number or space them out or make sure they don’t interfere with your life or, you know, just being concerned in general about like, how, how.
[00:04:13] Whether or not that even bring kids into this world is a really positive thing. I mean, these are all deep questions I was asking as I watching a lot of my friends, you know, choose to, to abandon some, some choose to abandon having kids and just like, let’s have pets. Like let’s just live downtown. Let’s have a, you know, let’s really think about like a crafting a lifestyle that, you know, we really want.
[00:04:33] Um, and, you know, really questioning whether or not it was smart to bring children into that equation. So I, I was, which I was really, you know,
[00:04:42] Mike: This is, this is how many years ago? Sorry, I didn’t mean to cut you off. I mean, this is, this is, this is what year?
[00:04:46] Jeremy Pryor: Yeah. This was the, this was the mid and late nineties.
[00:04:50] Yeah. This was like, you know, 25, almost 30 years ago. Yeah. Where, Yeah, it’s gotten a lot worse in a lot of ways. Yeah. So, but we, uh,
[00:05:00] um, and so yeah, that, that was kinda where I was at. And then, then I, I, I just, I was, uh, doing a semester abroad in Jerusalem. Um, and so I was just there to learn Hebrew. I wasn’t really there to have any, You know, cultural experience, but I just kept seeing men and children like everywhere, like on the plane and just them playing and just, and there was one day where I was minding my own business, sitting, you know, I think next to one of the walls in Jerusalem.
[00:05:23] Cause our school was right. It was, you know, right next to the old city. I watched this group of dads like, uh, pushing strollers with all these little kids in tow, you know, kind of like what I’d seen mommy brigades before, but I’d never seen a daddy brigade. And I was like, What is this? Like, why are these men?
[00:05:39] And I, I just, and I saw this with, uh, I was making, I had some friendships with, you know, some Arab men as well that lived in the old city and they were, all they wanna talk about was their kids. I mean, it was just like, I’m like, What, what is going on here? Like, I, I, Cause I, it was such a contrast to go from a place where men in particular, but I would say just culture was just really, really
[00:06:00] not excited to talk.
[00:06:01] Let’s talk about work. Let’s talk about creative hobbies. Let’s talk about lifestyle design. Um, kids, that’s not something we were excited about too. A culture where, um, everyone want to talk about kids, especially the men. The men especially want to talk about kids. I was like, where did this come from? So I started asking ’em questions and um, kind of being a little bit of a, you know, a cultural.
[00:06:23] You know, like archeologists like trying to dig up like what, what are the ideas? Where do they come from? And uh, and man, I was just shocked how different they thought about family. Like the, the ideas they had about family were different, Um mm-hmm. and, and you know, and, and so I started to try to understand, okay, what are they saying family is and what do we say family is?
[00:06:43] And, and to me, as I started to try to bring it down into a language I could understand from even my cultural perspective. The simplest way to describe it was that, you know, men in the Western culture or you know, men and women, and the more western they are, the
[00:07:00] more they tend to think about family like a nest.
[00:07:02] You know, like the nest is the perfect metaphor for the Western family. You know, you nurture the chickies for a while. They, you push ’em out of the nest, they fly away. It all starts over again. And you, you, you know, that kind of family, that springboard for the individual success, it kind of resets every generation.
[00:07:19] You don’t really know who your great grandparents are, you’d have a really hard time naming them because they’re not really relevant to your life. Like, because we, we reset every generation, like that’s how we think about family. And to me, I thought everyone thought about family that way. Like I’d never even heard of another way to think about family.
[00:07:33] And here I was in a culture, I’m like, What do these guys say? And I, I think the best way that I could sum up very, very succinctly how these Jewish and Arab fathers thought about family was a multi-generational team on mission. So they, they would think. , they primarily saw family as a multi-generational, like they, they were very connected to, um, you know, their ancestors.
[00:07:56] They, they really saw family as some a, a group that continue
[00:08:00] to work together into adulthood, you know, and throughout their life. And then if they were to take on things, whether it’s like a religious thing, you know, where like we’re gonna, or a business thing, they, they, they would, their first group, they would, they would pull to, to accomplish a mission was their family team.
[00:08:17] And if you ask them where this came from, both Arabs and Jews talk about Abraham like all the time when it comes to being fatherhood. Father Abraham, Father Abraham, you know, in the New Testament, Jesus, when he was, you know, telling the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, he called, you know, Father Abraham multiple times.
[00:08:31] Paul refers to Abraham this way and the epistles. I’d never thought about this. In fact, I had studied Abraham, uh, in seminary specifically. Yeah. And we only talked about Abraham as a man of faith because we all assumed, I certainly assumed that his vision for fatherhood was just a cultural artifact, right? He was obsessed with descendants.
[00:08:51] I mean, if you ever read the book of Genesis, Abraham was like, Oh God, give me descendants like the stars, you know, give, you know, what can you give me? God, what can you give me? I don’t even have a son
[00:09:00] like, like this. This sounds, you know, very Middle Eastern. Um, you know that that’s the way Abraham thought.
[00:09:05] And, and now I’ve started to understand why like, if, if this is what family is, if we’re stewarding a multi-generational line, And we get to work together, uh, across generations and for our whole lives and the families, the team through which we live life, and that when we think about mission, we think about whatever those things we want to accomplish in life, whatever our columns or assignments as, as things given to the family and not to the individual.
[00:09:28] Now, all of a sudden, especially as a man, I get super passionate about, about family. Yeah. And so I, I just had a incredibly hard, I would say, transition, like very fast. Like I went. I don’t know if I want to have kids to, Oh my gosh, when can I have kids? You know? Yeah. And, and that’s why I think ideas matter and what a lot of Christians say, and this is what I grew up with, focus on the family and other ministries really were teaching that.
[00:09:51] What was wrong with the family is that, that we just need to teach dads to love their kids more, to be more present, to focus on their family more. Um,
[00:10:00] those are symptoms of a deeper problem. It’s not that, And what I learned in living in the Middle East, it’s not that these men, these Middle Eastern men were, were less loving.
[00:10:08] than my friends in Seattle, you know, that were Christians. It wasn’t that. They, they thought about family differently. And so, um, my question was what would happen if a Western father started thinking about family the way that Middle Eastern fathers thought about family? And, and that’s, that’s what family I, so I started to, I did that.
[00:10:27] It had a massive impact. I suddenly started valuing and seeing the world differently. It’s just a very different way to see the world.
[00:10:36] Mike: So that’s, that’s a great story. I think that is, it’s spot on. And it’s interesting that you had that experience like 20 something years ago, you know, in the, in the mid to late nineties because like, like you said earlier, it’s kind of just gotten worse.
[00:10:49] Right. You know, I would’ve thought you would’ve told that story that happened just like a few years ago. Right. . And, um, my question is like, what, um,
[00:11:00] Why do you think that resonate you? You said with the folks on the family, they’re saying you just need to love or be more present with your family. Why does it resonate more?
[00:11:08] Why was that so impactful for you to see that as a team and as kind of a mission as a man specifically and a father? Right. Why did that resonate so much more? And then as you’ve kind of done your work with, with this family team’s initiative and, and all that, how have you seen that play out? You know, the, maybe seen those light bulbs go off.
[00:11:27] And then I wanna talk about a little bit how you fulfill that, but I’m just curious.
[00:11:30] Jeremy Pryor: Yeah, yeah. Well I think, I think that, I think that the, that kind of focus on the family, um, and it’s not, not just, not to pick on them. There’s every Christian ministry in the Protestant western world I would say. All were attempting to figure out, you know, they all saw the problem with family and, and then, but I think their solution was that to make fathers into good mothers.
[00:11:50] And, and I really think James Dobson had like typified this. He was a psychologist, he was a very nurturing man. And so I think that, I think that, that there’s a small
[00:12:00] percentage of men who, you know, who really resonate with that message. They always wanted to be, have kids. They can’t wait to have kids. You know, they want to nurture kids.
[00:12:09] Like, yes, there, there are men who, who have that. Um, but I would say that the majority of men want to build things that last. Yeah. Like they, they wanna lead teams. Like the reason why men go into the military, the reason why men love sports, there’s something different about men. And so when you’re telling men that in order for you to build a good family, you need to become more of nurturing, better at building a nest, like I said, like, you know, 10, 15% of men are gonna be okay.
[00:12:34] Well, I think I really would love that. I would love to have kids. Um, but the vast majority of men will say, That’s okay. If I have to do that to do my duty, you know, I’ll, I’ll do my best. I’ll try to stick with that. But then I’m gonna go find my teamness somewhere else. Like I’m gonna build things with in work, I’ll build things in, in my hobbies, I’ll, you know, whatever.
[00:12:54] So that’s what I think happened. And what I noticed in the Middle East was that it was the opposite. Um,
[00:13:00] there, like the men in the Middle East were very aware that when you’re building a family, you’re building something. In fact, to them it’s the most lasting team you could ever build. Yeah. And so it was really weird to blow up that.
[00:13:14] That had been handed to you by your grandfather and your father, and you’re having it for a, a certain period of time, and then you’re gonna pass on to your children and your grandchildren. Um, like that’s, that is so much more meaningful, uh, than, than anything I could build at work or any kind of sports team I could participate in.
[00:13:33] Um, and so, so that, that, that’s where I feel like really we, and this is a really weird thing to say. But I don’t think western men in particular even know what family is. I think that they, they are actually confused, and that’s very strange because people, if there’s anything people feel like they’re an expert at, it’s the definition of family.
[00:13:50] We all were raised in families, we, so it’s very counterintuitive to challenge somebody’s. Underlying definition of a family, what is a family? Um, and, but I, I
[00:14:00] personally realized I didn’t know what it was, um, until I had this experience. And so, uh, and so when I started to see family differently, and I think that one of the reasons why I think we can, at least as believers, uh, we can, we can understand, uh, I would say like a, an original definition of family, uh, uh, because the scriptures actually give us a, a revelation of what that is in the first chapter of Genesis.
[00:14:24] God actually gives us a definition. He says, To the first family be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it and rule. In other words, he, he had a, he had a massive, multi-generational task to bring the, the presence of God and, and the order of, of this garden, um, into the rest of creation, into this kind of, uh, chaotic, um, uh, the rest of, of all the, the created order.
[00:14:47] And in order to do that, he, he, Not to start a business, not to, you know, not to build a government, but to create a family and give them a mission. And a mission that could only be
[00:15:00] accomplished multi-generationally, cuz they couldn’t do it in one generation and could only be, And he gave it to the whole family as a team.
[00:15:06] And so I think right in Genesis one, uh, you have the definition of families, a multi-generational team on mission. So I don’t think that we need to be confused as, um, about the definition of family, but I do think we’ve been, and you know, this is a, this, this definition of family is a springboard for individual success or as a nest.
[00:15:23] That sort of self-destructs, you know, um, that, that’s a very,
[00:15:28] Mike: When you put it that way, it’s kind of funny, but it, that’s kind of what it, it is like, or like that’s how it’s lived out, right? It’s like, yeah, you empty the nest and you just self-destruct and you’ve launched these people out of the world,
[00:15:40] Jeremy Pryor: Right? We have a nest right now on our porch and I was really fun watching the birds, um, you know, raise their chickies, but it’s totally empty now, you know, And there’s nobody there. I mean… And just as men, when you know that what you’re building is basically going to self destruct and you actually know the, I mean, imagine being a man, this picture, this, so.
[00:15:59] Mike: I
[00:16:00] am a man, so I don’t have to imagine being that way. .
[00:16:03] Jeremy Pryor: Yeah. . This won’t take too much imagination for you, Mike. Um, but anybody else out there, Imagine being a man and you are, you know, you, you are being tempted to make a major mistake, let’s say with your, uh, in your marriage. Like you’re being tempted to maybe cheating your wife or something.
[00:16:21] And you know, you, your kids are kind of getting older, you know, maybe they’re teenagers and you’re trying to decide whether or not to give into this temptation. And you know that the nest that you’re building with your wife is gonna self-destruct, you know, like they do after your kids grow up and all leave the nest.
[00:16:37] And you, you have to decide, do I resist this temptation for the sake of this nest that’s gonna self-destruct in a few years? You know, is it worth it? I mean, you know, and obviously you have the scriptures or reasons to, to try to be faithful to your wife. You made a covenant. Mm-hmm. , but that’s a big one.
[00:16:52] Like, Yeah. But imagine, imagine a somebody else who, who’s, who looks at and says, Do I want to destroy
[00:17:00] my primary team? Do I want to, um, do I want to end what my grandfather and my father has have given to me and what I’m about to be able to hand to my children and my grandchildren? Is it worth indulging in this affair, you know, for this momentary pleasure to destroy the work of generations, not just from the past, but into the future?
[00:17:22] Yeah, that’s a different proposition. And I think that Western men, they’re only really wrestling with the first property. Not just about affairs, but everything. Like, why would I want to work less? Why would I want to, you know, integrate my kids more? Why would I want to train my children? Like every time you have to make a sacrifice as a man, you are saying that there’s something so valuable about this family that I’m willing to forego whatever I would naturally want in order to work.
[00:17:51] On my role in this, in this household, in this family. And that’s man that you, you, we have to have a reason to do that. Cause that’s a lot. That’s asking a lot of.
[00:17:59] Mike: Thank you
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[00:18:47] Yeah, no, I, I, I think you’re spot on. I think that’s a good perspective to have.
[00:18:51] So how do you, um, If the emphasis in the, let’s say, worldly view of families is
[00:19:00] to launch them out of the nest, and so the, you know, the saying goes, you know, you’re, you’re supposed to train up adults and train them to leave or whatever. What, how does that, how do you, the natural. The natural negative of what you’re saying would be like, Oh, you’re just gonna coddle ’em because they’re just part of this team.
[00:19:15] Or if there’s not that impetus of like, they need to be self-sufficient to get out of the nest, like to push them out, then how does that function beyond as they go and set up their own teams? Like, can you talk about that? Mm-hmm. ?
[00:19:27] Jeremy Pryor: Yeah. I, I think so. I would say most Western parents actually aim at happiness for their children.
[00:19:34] Mike: Mm-hmm.
[00:19:35] Jeremy Pryor: Like that, that, that is, I think, the most natural thing that they’re aiming at. . So they’re trying to define what that looks like, you know, And that, that’s a tough thing to figure out. Like, do I aim at? Um, and I think, but I think that’s natural. And I think, again, I think mothers especially might struggle with, Okay, is that the right thing to aim at?
[00:19:49] It’s very intuitive. I, I think that multi-generational families aim at making their grandchildren happy. And so that really does require you to be very
[00:20:00] careful how you parent your children because you have to prepare them to lead the next generation.
[00:20:05] Mike: Yeah.
[00:20:05] Jeremy Pryor: To represent the family. Um, you know, and this was really well described in, um, in a parable, Jesus told, you know, one of my favorite kind of descriptions he gave of, of what a son is.
[00:20:16] Cause usually when you talk to most Western people and you say, you know, what comes to your mind when you think of a son, they think of like a five year old. You know? Yeah. Um, that’s not the way Middle Eastern people think, like they think of a grown man.
[00:20:27] Mike: Yeah.
[00:20:27] Jeremy Pryor: And, um, because they don’t, we don’t actually understand what a son is.
[00:20:30] Um, anyway, Jesus told the story about a father who had a vineyard and then he left and he kept sending these tenants. Representatives or messengers to come and get the produce from these, uh, these tenants. But they, they were selfish and they kept beating up the various messengers and not, not giving them the produce.
[00:20:45] And so the father finally fed up. Jesus says, the father says, I’m going to send my son. They will respect my son. That’s a son.
[00:20:55] Mike: Yeah.
[00:20:56] Jeremy Pryor: Like he’s coming in the full power and representation of the father.
[00:21:00] And so to your question, when you, when you were raising a son or a daughter, um, like those, those are not children.
[00:21:07] Those are, those are the future leaders of the family, right? They’re, they’re, And so, uh, if you have that vision Yeah. To coddle your children to endlessly aim at their happiness, those things really do destroy the next generation. But we do have to have a vision that allows us to really, you know, uh, parent and raise our children.
[00:21:27] To be strong for, for what they’re going to meet, what their, what their, what their responsibilities are gonna look like in the future to carry on and to expand, um, expand the family.
[00:21:37] Mike: Yeah. No, this is getting me amped up, man. I’m like, excited . That’s get getting me excited about, you know, my role in, in that.
[00:21:45] Um, so what you. I wanted to go down the kind of tangent of, you know, without a biblical worldview, what’s the purpose of a family? Because there’s a, there’s a narrative out there, especially that’s, I think, tied to kind of like climate
[00:22:00] change. Like there, what are you doing? Like I’m, I have five kids and people are like, I think some people could say, Oh, you, you know, there’s already enough people in the world.
[00:22:06] What are you doing? And there’s kind of this, this outlook that, I guess it’s a wor, it is more of a worldview. And so how is that addressed? I mean, like, I mean, apart from a biblical world view, you can’t really address it. But it’s, it’s, it’s so prevalent, you know, the, the, the narrative, the thinking that, that worldview in the world today, you know, which is a, it’s a very pessimistic, like sad, depressed worldview because it’s like people are having, Oh, you should just have a pet, or like a pet is the same, like a, like dog dad.
[00:22:37] When you see like someone that’s like a dog dad, like, It’s just like the epitome of the brokenness of what’s going on in the world. I guess I shouldn’t say that too, like against anyone , but I don’t know.
[00:22:49] Jeremy Pryor: That’s right. Well, this, this is where I think people have to understand that worldviews and, and the, and the away the way to really understand meaning is to try to understand how the story
[00:23:00] ends, right?
[00:23:00] Mike: Yeah.
[00:23:01] Jeremy Pryor: And if the story ends with, you know, the earth kind of crispifying because of, you know, um, just eventually we just deplete all the resources, you know, then, and of course that idea that, you know, come do be as, be as gentle as possible. Don’t reproduce, don’t consume, you know, and then, you know, try to leave the, uh, the planet with as little, um, you know, uh, impact as possible.
[00:23:24] And, you know, and so having children just sort of perpetuates the, you know, the disease that human beings are on the planet. Yeah, of course. Believing that, that, that’s the end of the story is going to really implicate your idea of family. Um, I mean, and humanity as a whole. Um, and so I think that our story in the scriptures, you know, ends in a wedding feast, you know?
[00:23:45] Yeah. Like we, we are heading for a table where we we’re gonna sit around our father’s table, you know, and we’re going to, uh, be united with Jesus forever and be in this, the new Jerusalem and being this perfect garden city where, uh, nature and
[00:24:00] creativity and innovation and all of these things are perfectly intertwined.
[00:24:03] And so all of those, that picture of, of the new Jerusalem and our family spends a week every year just celebrating and talking and telling stories and studying the parts of the scripture because I do think we need to really be aware of what that story is and that, and that the families of the Earth are preserved.
[00:24:17] And you know, even there’s this really amazing, um, you know, verse in Micah where it describes at the end where, you know, in the latter days when the, the tour of the Lord is like descending from Mount Zion and then it ends with the words, Every man will sit under his own fig tree and under his own vine, and no one will make them afraid.
[00:24:34] You know, which was this, This was just absolutely massively inspiring to the founding fathers of America. I think George Washington, this was like maybe his last speech. He quoted those words, like the idea that eventually what we’re aiming at is our families, you know, um, having this flourishing, uh, within the borders of our households.
[00:24:54] Where, where the, where the produce of the goodness of the household is there. Um, again, around a
[00:25:00] family table. Um, probably my favorite passage in the whole Bible about sort of the celebration of the meaning of life is, is in Psalm 128 where it describes, may, may, may you be, um, you know, at your table with your children’s children, may your wife be like a fruitful v may your ch my your sons be like, olive shoot.
[00:25:15] Thus is the man blessed who fears the Lord. Um, and so I do think we need to inspire one another as men in particular. Fire each other with this vision. You know about, you know, what I want for you, Mike, is that someday you’re gonna be 85 years old and you’re gonna see your, you know, your children and your grandchildren around this, this massive table.
[00:25:35] You’re gonna see the legacy of generations and you’re gonna be able to not contain the incredible meaning that you’re gonna feel in that moment.
[00:25:42] Mike: Mm-hmm.
[00:25:42] Jeremy Pryor: about the, about what your life really represents and that your life is going to permeate what you and your wife have done is gonna permeate through generations.
[00:25:51] And that’s gonna culminate the kingdom of God, where you’re all gonna be together like that. That is a, These are just different stories, and so we can pick. What you believe is true
[00:26:00] about the end of the story, and that’s gonna have radically different, uh, impact on the way that you choose to have children and raise families.
[00:26:07] Mike: Yeah. So tell me a little bit about how you do that, Jeremy, tell me about like, what family teams does in terms of like the training, the equipping to, to give those, those light bulb moments like you had in the Middle East and then to take that, that spark and that inspiration and then equip, I think especially fathers, but um, also mothers and, you know, um, children to fulfill that family team mission.
[00:26:33] Jeremy Pryor: Yeah. Well, I think for us, first of all, you know, these kind of conversations is a big part. We’re just trying to help people understand that, that the nest and the team are not the same. That you get to choose, you know, it’s a free country if you want to be a nest , If you wanna build a nest, you know, go for it.
[00:26:49] You know? But I think, I think that, that we’re seeing demonstrated that, that, that, that is a really broken idea. It’s a very recent idea and it’s very broken, especially for men. So once
[00:27:00] you choose, if you do choose to say, Okay, well I want to build a multi-generational team on mission, the next problem you’re gonna run into is that you’re gonna open your toolbox for how to build your family, and it’s gonna be empty, Because every single tool in our culture is designed around the nest is designed to, to really help flourish the individuals of the family.
[00:27:18] And so sports, schools, churches, um, shopping, everything, you know, TV shows and channels. And everyone now has their own little, you know, avatar on, uh, on their Netflix account. Like it, everything is separated by the individual. Everything is to basically deliver to the individual exactly what they want to consume.
[00:27:38] Nothing’s really designed for the family. How many sports are designed for the family as a whole to stay together and to work together? Like that doesn’t exist really in our culture. Um, which is strange because again, if you decide to be a family team, then you need tools to build a family team. Like you can’t.
[00:27:54] And if you’re gonna be absolutely immersed in a culture that’s gonna assume that we’re gonna separate the family into its individual
[00:28:00] units, every time you step out of the house or maybe even you step into the house, that is a disaster for a family team. And so we start to equip, you know, families with just loading up the tools.
[00:28:10] We’ve got tons of tools. And so, um, and so, you know, uh, one of them, like I just described, is crafting a multi-generational family meal where you get to experience your family ness, where once a week you don’t have anywhere to go. This isn’t the typical Western family dinner where we’re, you know, weekday dinner where we’re all sort of
[00:28:29] you know, uh, catching up on the day before we all blast out into our individual activities. Again, , like we’re just saying, no, no, no. Once a week stop, like be a family. Like don’t have anywhere better to go or anything else to do as an individual.
[00:28:43] Mike: Mm-hmm. ,
[00:28:43] Jeremy Pryor: Like, have the father sit the head of the table. You know, have everyone be their family role.
[00:28:49] Like, bless the sons. Bless the do. And so we learned this from Jewish families because Jewish families have this just magical. Shabbat dinner that they do on Friday nights,
[00:29:00] which, you know, has allowed them to, to continue to think multi-generationally in the face of Western civilization, which is really, that’s why I kind of go to that because, you know, I don’t want you guys to like just hear, oh, here’s an idea I dreamed up yesterday.
[00:29:14] Um, this has been working to keep families, uh, thinking multi-generationally for thousands of years. And so I, I think that’s the number one tool is you actually have to craft a meal and the, you have to learn how to steward the table. If you’re gonna be a multi-generational family, and so I wanted to create a meal in which my children, as they started having kids, couldn’t imagine not being there.
[00:29:35] Yeah. Like, oh my gosh. They know exactly where they belong.
[00:29:38] Mike: Yeah.
[00:29:39] Jeremy Pryor: You know, there’s a place where they just feel like, Wow, I love being a son. I love being a daughter. I love being a part of this family. That’s just one example,
[00:29:49] Mike: Which I think that’s like, um, It’s set, the tone is set from the top down, right? I mean, it’s, it’s like if, if the parents don’t, aren’t acting like they wanna be there, obviously the kids aren’t gonna wanna be there.
[00:29:59] Right? .
[00:30:00] Um, so that’s, that’s a, that’s a huge deal in terms of just, you know, the hierarchy and the, the, with the parents. Um, having the right vision and outlook around the family as opposed to like, Oh, just, you know, can’t wait till you, they can leave the nest kind of thing, you know?
[00:30:16] Jeremy Pryor: Exactly. Yes. Totally. Yeah.
[00:30:18] There’s, And as, as a father, you have to understand, Yeah, you’re this, that’s why, like for me, I kind of wanna always start by talking to dads because if they fall in love with the family, then I think it’ll be infectious to the whole family.
[00:30:31] Mike: Yeah.
[00:30:31] Jeremy Pryor: If they are really annoyed by their children and by their family, which I understand why you would be, if you, if your. vision
[00:30:38] You know, is typical Western, like I said, I, I share that a hundred percent. I really, I’m not a kid person. I’m not a nurturing person. That’s, those are not my natural instincts. So there’s nothing about the Western family that particularly feels, um, like it’s something that, that just attracts me.
[00:30:54] Mike: Mm-hmm.
[00:30:55] Jeremy Pryor: But this, this idea of building a multi-generational team, I am, I am all in.
[00:30:59] Mike:
[00:31:00] Yeah.
[00:31:00] Jeremy Pryor: And so, um, so that, that really then helps me to fall in love with, you know, my family, my kids, and love them as individuals and as a team properly. But I had to, I had to find, and I think part of this is like your own identity as a father.
[00:31:13] You have to find, you know that that spot in your heart, you know, there’s a place in your heart that has to wake up. Like you have been handed something. And it used to be our fathers and grandfathers used to wake this up inside of us just seeing. How much they love their families seeing. But if you, your, if your dad abandoned your family, if you, or if your dad was annoyed and like, you know, was really caught up in work all the time, this is, this is gonna be a major transition for you because you, you will not have seen modeled for you, um, a fatherhood in that kind of passion for fatherhood.
[00:31:46] And that’s why when I saw these multi-generation or these, uh, Middle Eastern fathers, I just was so blessed because I, their, their passionate love for family was just contagious. And so we can create that.
[00:32:00] Like you can get around dad’s, you know, today that, that have this, this love and his heart, but you have to wake that part of you up.
[00:32:06] Mike: Yeah. What are you seeing out there, like, and you guys are doing like events and stuff like that. I know you, you have a hard stop here pretty soon, but what, um, There’s enormous cultural headwinds you’ve already talked about to this type of thing, but you know, this is a very counter-cultural thing.
[00:32:21] There’s so many things that. That are, um, coming against it. What are you seeing? That, that’s, to me, I assume that would be really bad, but also can be really good because there, it it, the culture then is ripe for something that’s gonna come in and, you know, the, you know, the harvest kind of thing. But can you talk, speak to that of like, what, what are you seeing?
[00:32:40] What, what’s, maybe, are you guys doing events where you’re, you’re talking about this and you’re seeing kinda light bulbs going off, or you.
[00:32:48] Jeremy Pryor: Yeah. Yeah. And I’m very happy to be, um, a participant in the counterculture. Yeah. I’m very grateful that we live in a free country, you know, as long as the Amish can build what they’re building, which is crazy, you know, I’m like,
[00:33:00] you know, then there’s no threat to, to any family building something that’s different and counter-cultural.
[00:33:06] Um, and so, yeah, as long as that freedom exists, then I’m so excited. To be able to do this and be a part of that, because I do think then the darker things get, the worse family gets out there. The more the contrast gets clear to the next generation and they can decide for themselves what do we want to do?
[00:33:21] Like, yes, if you want to, you know, have a dog, you know, and you know, and, and sort of make that your, uh, experience of family and you’re not going to reproduce that idea into the next generation. I definitely think that’s appropriate. And you can, you can also choose. But I think the future will always belong to those who are reproducing and who are training the next generation.
[00:33:43] So, um, in terms of our events, yeah, basically to us there is this sort of two steps. And we do want to be really, um, you know, really gracious with people as they, as they kind of consider these two steps. The first is that this is a very different way to see family. So we don’t
[00:34:00] want, I’m, I’m always really careful sometimes.
[00:34:02] We come into churches to do an event, and I, I try really hard to tell, you know, the leaders of the church and the, um, you know, the people that we get to talk to, Look, I, I mean, this is extremely different. And, and so to, to change the whole way you view family, you know, uh, from the way that you assumed family was, that’s a huge transition.
[00:34:22] So we wanna give you time and tons of grace, uh, and say like this, just lay this before you’re, you know, and see, see if this fires you up and gets you excited. If this resonates and if it does, great, like, um, if it doesn’t, we understand again, you know, you can continue to try to find ways to, to try to make, uh, the way you think about family work for you.
[00:34:40] If it, if that’s possible, then go for it, you know? Um, but so that’s the first thing is just sort of the very carefully lay this before people and, and let them to choose. Um, and then for those who choose, yes, we want to build this kind of family. We want build a be a multi-generational family. You know, then we do try to engage them in, in
[00:35:00] this process of learning tools.
[00:35:02] Mike: Yeah.
[00:35:02] Jeremy Pryor: You know, I mean everything like from like a family sport like I described earlier, like most people even thought about that. Like our, our family for years has, I love sports, but I, I don’t want to be running my five kids to five different sports. Um, that’s so destructive. These are the best years for us to learn to be a family team.
[00:35:20] This is the only time we really have to create that foundation. And so, yeah, I’m not gonna adopt the culture’s, uh, vision for what individual life looks like. Um, I’m going to, I’m going to go after this. We’re gonna go after this as a family.
[00:35:34] Mike: That’s, that’s awesome. Thank you so much, Jeremy, for being on, um, and just sharing your, your heart and it’s, it’s, it’s very contagious, but it’s, and it’s so genuine.
[00:35:42] So thank you for, for packing so much value into a short time. I appreciate it.
[00:35:46] Absolutely.
[00:35:47] Jeremy Pryor: Oh man, I appreciate it. Thanks for having me on.
[00:35:49] Mike: So people can find you mostly at familyteams.com, is that correct?
[00:35:53] Jeremy Pryor: Yeah, yeah. That’s the best place to We’re on Instagram. Um, a lot. And yeah, you can follow us there or all of our resources are there on the
[00:36:00] website.
[00:36:00] Mike: Awesome. Well, thank you very much.
[00:36:03] Thank you for listening to the 2 Cent Dad podcast. If you enjoyed this podcast, please share it with another dad who you think would benefit. That’s really the best thing you can do to help this show it A, gets the word out, but B, and most importantly, it helps another father be better at his role as a father.
[00:36:22] And that’s what this show, that’s what this podcast, that’s what the website, that’s what the blog, everything exists for. So if you could, share it with another dad who would find value in it. You can always head over to the website, 2centdad.com, the number 2centdad.com. And if you have any feedback, feel free to email me, mike@2centdad.com.
[00:36:41] I must also thank the sponsor EC group. If you’re looking to hire software developers or you need extra development capacity, check out teamwithec.com. Thanks.
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About mike
I strive to be a good steward of all that I am blessed with. In the end it's all about the legacy that you leave. Trying to love my wife and raise kids that are grateful.
