Welcome to the Daily Dad podcast where we provide one lesson every day to help you with your most important job being a dad.

These are lessons inspired by ancient philosophy, by practical wisdom, and insights from dads all over the world.

Thank you for listening, and we hope this helps.

Remind yourself of this.

Every parent struggles with it, the game of comparison.

We see what other parents are doing and we question our own choices.

We may even hear snide remarks.

We're told there's a right way and a wrong way from our government, from our school districts, from the experts.

We can get flack from our teachers, from our neighbors, even from our own parents who

think that they know better, who wonder why we're doing things differently than other people,

differently than how they've always been done. And that's not even getting into the criticism we get

from our own children, who, of course, have their own reasons for not liking the rules we put

into place or the standards we hold them to.

We have to tune all of this out, as Marcus Aurelius, a father of many, reminds himself,

the moment you wake up, ask yourself, is it going to bother me today if the matters that are

being fairly and properly attended to are criticized by someone else. No, it is not,

because we have done the work, because we've done the research, because we've gotten on the same

page as our spouse, and we've made the decision, which is enough. Besides, the people you compare

yourself to, he notes, what do they really know? He says, look at the decisions they make,

the things they are tempted and distracted by, and why would you let their opinions matter to you?

It can't bother you that people disagree, especially those people. Trust yourself, trust your

process, do your job. Come what may. My newest book, Courage is calling Fortune Favors the Brave,

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