Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 29:02 — 17.0MB) | Embed
Welcome to Stuff I Learned Yesterday. My name is Darrell Darnell, around 50% to 60% of all physical mail sent in the U.S. is categorized as “junk” or marketing mail (such as coupons, flyers, and credit card offers). And I believe that if you aren’t learning, you aren’t living.
It’s the fifth Monday of June, and that means it’s Monday Mailbag day! We have a full mailbag today, including a first time contributor, so let’s get started. Our first story comes in from Jeff.
This is Jeff, the other Jeff.
Comedian Jim Gaffigan and his wife have five kids. When asked “Why so many kids?” he answered:
“Well, why not? What exactly am I missing out on? Money? A few more hours of sleep? A more peaceful meal? More hair? These are nothing compared to what I get from these five monsters who rule my life.”
Another famous comedian said, “My wife and I have five children. And the reason why we have five children is because we do not want six.”
My wife and I have five children. All adopted. All from different birth mothers.
We now have a thirty year old, three who turn 25 this year (no, they aren’t triplets), and one who would have turned 22.
I have learned many things from my children and by being a parent. Today, I want to share one of those lessons.
My wife and I had been married for over 6 years and had many failed attempts to get pregnant. We came to terms with the idea that we would be childless. The term back in the day was DINK – dual income, no kids.
One Wednesday night, a friend called and said her sister had taken in a girl who was pregnant, she was due in two weeks, and would we like the baby. Exactly two weeks later, our oldest daughter was born. We were at the hospital when she was born, and we got to feed her her first bottle.
Since the birth mother did not intend to keep her baby, she didn’t give her a name. Her birth certificate said Female and the birth mother’s last name. It listed the birth mother as the mother, and no one as the father.
When we adopted her, she was issued a new birth certificate. Her name was listed as Melissa Renee Childs, and my wife and I were listed as the parents.
John 1:12-13 says, “But to all who did receive him, he gave them the right to be children of God, to those who believe in his name, who were born, not of natural descent, or of the will of the flesh, or of the will of man, but of God.”
When we accept God’s gracious gift of salvation, we are given the right to be His children. In other words, we are adopted. We are issued a new birth certificate with a new name and a new parent listed. We become sons and daughters of God, and we are adopted into His family. We are born again. We become new creations.
Paul said in 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, and see, the new has come!”
I always told my children that God intended them to be our children — He just had to work a little harder to make it happen. Their adoption wasn’t God’s plan B; it was always His plan. God chose them to be our children, and God chooses all who are saved.
Oswald Chambers said, ““I have chosen you.” Keep that note of greatness in your creed. It is not that you have got God, but that He has got you.”
This is Jeff, the other Jeff. And that’s what I learned yesterday.
Next, we have first time contributor, Ollie.
Dear Darrell, this podcast has been something I look forward to every Monday and is one of my two favorite podcasts (TSTP being the other one). I’m sure glad you found that forum post 18 years ago. Thank you for this amazing podcast.
Next is a contribution from Bradley.
This is Bradley leaving feedback for stuff I learned yesterday. Monday mailbag and my top and my third favorite show of all time is Twin Peaks, and it influenced my favorite video game of all time, earthbound and my favorite Zelda video game of all time, Link’s Awakening. And I’m here to attest that if you aren’t learning, you really aren’t living.
One of the people I’ve learned life lessons from most is you, Darrell, I want to rewind back to Nashville during the pandemic podcast movement. You so graciously invited me up, let me stay in your Airbnb you had, and we ended up going out. You took me out to a place to eat and paid for the meal. I still owe you for that one. Eventually, if I’m ever out your direction or you’re out this way again.
But I remember I was having such a great conversation. You talked so much about your family, and opened up to me about that. Being a younger dad at the time I opened up to you about just my family and everything about that. And you had such encouraging words and such great words of wisdom and advice that I just took to heart. And it was just a lot of things that helped me as a new dad.
You know, it’s so easy to be nervous and to think you’re doing a terrible job. And you sort of reassured me like, hey, I don’t think anybody really does a great job or thinks they’re doing a great job. And usually it’s the best dads who second guess every decision. And you told me some stories about things in your own life that you felt like you had lived with, had done, and maybe, maybe not regretted, but that you felt like you could have handled differently. But you said that if you’re not doing that, then basically you aren’t really a great dad or, you know, you get what I’m saying there.
But one other thing I wanted to talk about during that is I did make an off handed joke that I asked what was, who was harder to, to raise girls or boys. I think you said something along the lines of boys on the front end, girls on the back end, or something of that nature. And I sort of joked and quipped that, uh, I’m glad I don’t have to worry about that. At the time, I had two boys, had a third boy, uh, now with my wife twenty two weeks pregnant, and we found out we just recently found out that it is a girl. Um, I guess that is and I’m so happy for that.
But sort of funny in hindsight, looking back at the at that conversation, because I really didn’t think I would ever have girls. It’s not really something that runs in our family. Not a lot of people have girls. So, um, it’s, it was just really funny to me. And you gave me so much encouragement then and even talking about my job, I was very unsure what I wanted to do there. I was in a sort of a situation where there was this big fish in a small pond. There was no upward mobility, even though it was in a leadership role in the position I had.
And you just gave me some really great words, talking about how sometimes it’s better to, you know, make a bet on yourself basically, and go try to achieve something bigger. And, you know, and that really stuck with me. And, and so I think I’m in a better place, a lot better place. Now. I did quit that job, um, not too terribly long after that and or maybe a couple of years after that and ended up getting a job elsewhere starting at a lower position.
But I have since worked my way up to a leadership position where I have a lot more upward mobility. The pay is better and the benefits are better just overall and, without your advice, I don’t think I wouldn’t be in this situation right now. I wouldn’t have taken a bet on myself and, thought that hey, sometimes it’s it’s better to do that on the front end and, and maybe take a take a little bit of a loss because I think we get in the mindset sometimes that, hey, I don’t want to try something new and start from scratch.
And, even in relationships, even when I was dating, I remember I would stay in relationships because I’d invested so much time in this relationship that it’s almost like, even though it’s sort of not the ideal situation, you just sort of want to stay complacent.
And even one thing that I think that you’ve helped me with is in faith. Sometimes we can be complacent and, and just in life in general. And you, one of the I really like the episode you did a couple of weeks ago, me and you had talked privately about it, but you’d opened up more about the business side of things and how complacency had sort of happened there. And it’s hard sometimes to open up and talk about your shortcomings, especially on a bigger stage like that. So I do appreciate that, Darrell, you opening up and talking to other people about that.
I remember us talking about it years later when we were doing the Entering the Fifth Dimension podcast and you opening up about that. And it’s very easy, easy to realize there’s a mistake, but it’s very hard to address it, realize it, and then try to change things going forward. So the fact that you were able to do that, I really think so much, so highly of you, Darrell, I can’t say enough great things about you.
I’m sure we’ll talk more as I get more advice about raising a girl, because that’s going to be such a culture shock to me, but I’m looking forward to it. I know, it’s just there’s so much going on in life and, I don’t really know what my point of this was just, I just wanted to mostly give a life update. I wanted to talk about just how thankful I am for you.
There’s a lot of things I know. A lot of people realize how great a person you are. There’s a lot of things even behind the scenes that, I mean, you’ve talked about that you’ve done that I don’t think will ever come to light that I don’t think you ever really wanted to do it for the glory or whatever, but it just so happened that it would come up in conversation or something.
I mean, you used to talk a lot before and after recording and I don’t know, I just want to thank you, Darrell, for being such an amazing person. I’m so glad. Going back to the episode you talked about podcasting, because without you, man, I don’t think I would ever have podcasted. I don’t know, I didn’t have the confidence to do it, but I never thought it could be so attainable. Or I thought, oh, you know, there’s too much of a barrier to entry. I don’t know if it’s worth it.
And then I remember the first time you were like, hey, we’re looking for guests for the Stranger Things podcast. And so I sort of took a big leap out and tried it and realized that I really enjoyed it, and the camaraderie and being able to talk to somebody about things you love. And from there, I started my podcast journey. Just mostly listening to podcasts about things like history and, and just topics for knowledge and stuff, you know? But then once you get there, once I expanded it, I don’t know, I had a newfound appreciation for it.
To wrap this up, I just want to say thank you, Darrell, for being such a great person, such a great, great human being, for having such a great taste in television shows. Uh, except for maybe LOST. We can forgive that one. Uh, I’m just kidding. But then again, thank you, Darrell, thank you for giving me the opportunity to not only be your friend, but be your podcast host. A lot comes with that and I never take anything for granted. And I never take your friendship for granted. So thank you so much.
Last up, we have a contribution from Andrew.
Andrew here from Northern Ireland. And first off, apologies, Darrell. I have been wanting to send Monday Mailbag feedback for the last few times, but here I am today.
This here is a little off season because today I’m going to be talking about Christmas. Yes that’s right, Christmas at the start of the summer, by the way, one hundred and seventy nine sleeps to the big day. Yes, I’m one of those people.
For some time I have had a story in my head, even my heart. You may say that I have wanted to tell. It’s set at Christmas time, a true story about myself in the nineteen eighties, growing up as a kid about the Christmas Nativity and wanting to be a certain person in the Christmas Nativity. And it wasn’t Joseph, or it wasn’t a shepherd, and it wasn’t even wise man number one or two. It was wise man number three. And if you want to know why wise man number three, you’ll have to watch the video.
But it was a story that was in my heart to share, and I wanted it to be aimed at kids, but also that adults could enjoy too. And I wanted to bring in a lot of references from my childhood and a lot of warmth, a lot of humor, and most importantly at all, it would be a Christian message at the end of it, tying it all in together.
But there was something stopping me from making this video. Time is certainly one of them. To make any kind of video or animation, it takes a considerable amount of time. But that wasn’t really the real reason. It was fear of what other people would think. But last year, last October, in fact, I decided this is a story I need to tell, and I set a deadline of the start of December and I worked towards it.
I completed the video and then the fear came upon me again. Would I set the video live or would I just keep it to myself? And I set it live and the response I got was truly amazing. And I’m not saying that because it’s an amazing animation or anything like that. It was just the feedback was not what I was expecting. There was no negative feedback, or at least not in my face or online. It was nothing but positivity.
I got messages on social media. I had parents coming up to me in church saying that they sat and watched this animation at home and even got messages saying, can we use this for our Sunday school or our kids ministry? And I was truly blown away.
But you know what? The fear of making it, the fear of putting it out there stopped me for at least a year, maybe two. And what did I learn? Two things, mainly.
One, I hope not to let fear take over me again. Or at least if I have something on my heart or as a Christian, I believe something that God has placed in my heart to get out there. I’m not going to stop. I’m going to follow through with it and get over the fear, so to speak. There’s maybe someone listening and they have something in their heart or something that they would love to do. Maybe it’s not make a video or animation. It could be a multitude of things. Just go for it. Just do it. Take the plunge, so to speak.
The second thing I learned was about encouragement. You have no idea what a simple message on social media, a text message, or somebody saying that they showed this to their kids and they loved it. One parent even said their son watched it on repeat. And you know what? None of those people had to send me a message. None of those people had to say any of those kind words to me. I was so, so encouraged by their kind words.
And since then I have made a real point in any situation. Of course you have to be genuine, but if I see someone do something or say something, I will make a point saying to them, well done about something or I really enjoyed this. I really enjoyed that. So maybe today, maybe this week, if you see something, could be work, could be church, could be a club, could be even in your own home, in your family. This be people that encourage each other.
I was encouraged so much that I just didn’t stop with one animation. And if you think it was bad me talking about Christmas, I’m going to talk about Easter now. I made another animation for Easter and just getting back to Christmas in three weeks time I’m going on a family holiday to Spain. I’m planning to write another script. It’s a continuation of the story, and it’s going to be set at Christmas time again.
And if you’re curious if you want to watch these animations, don’t feel you have to. And this certainly isn’t the reason for this feedback. But if you go on to YouTube, if you type in Andrew Goodman Wiseman Number Three, you should find the Christmas one. And then from that you’ll also find the Easter one.
And just before signing off, I just want to say to you, Darrell, you have no idea how much this podcast means to me through your stories, through your learnings, through your honesty. It’s the one podcast, when I see it come into my feed, I have to listen to it. And normally I listen to it a few times. So thank you for the effort you put into it, for the time to think about each episode, to script it out, to edit it, and to get it out there. I really appreciate it. And in closing, Darrell, I just want to say, if I’m ever in the United States, I never mind if I’m driving through your state, I will drive through multiple states just to meet up with you to have a coffee and even a five minute conversation. And just to say, Darrell, thanks for the impact you’ve had on me and I’m sure many others.
I’m Darrell Darnell, and this has been Stuff I Learned Yesterday.
I want you to be a part of the next Monday Mailbag on August 31st! Monday Mailbag is your opportunity to Share what YOU’VE learned, so that other listeners and I can learn from YOU. It can be a message as short as 30 seconds or several minutes long. It really doesn’t matter just as long as it’s something that will benefit others. You can send in questions or responses to my SILY episodes, and I’ll respond to them via Monday Mailbag episodes.. You can participate in Monday Mailbags by visiting the Golden Spiral Media listener feedback page.