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Fathers (feat. Mr. Bobo)
95 Plays2 years ago
In this series, we are digging deeper into current and potential fatherhood. We are peaking through the eyes of several different men, all in different life stages. In this episode, we are interviewing Mr. Bobo!
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Transcript
Introduction to Season 3 on Fatherhood
00:00:41
Speaker
Welcome, welcome, welcome, beautiful people. Welcome, pioneers. We are in season three through the eyes of men, fatherhood. And I don't know if you guys have been blessed by this, but I have been so blessed to just hear all of these men talk about fatherhood and to get it inside peak, because I feel like through society sometimes, fathers get a really bad rep. So to hear all of these fathers
00:01:03
Speaker
only, not only talk about themselves, but to call other fathers out and to pull them up. It has just been blessing me.
Meet Mr. Bobo: Engineer, Teacher, Father
00:01:10
Speaker
And today we have here one of my favorite teachers ever, Mr. Bobo. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Sala. Thank you for inviting me. So tell us a little bit about yourself.
00:01:25
Speaker
Well, I am 51 years old. I'm a father of two. I have a daughter that's 27 and I have a son that'll be 22 in a couple months. I'm a grandfather. I have a four-year-old granddaughter and a son to be one-year-old granddaughter as well. I'm an engineer. I work as a network engineer. I work in the telecom field.
00:01:53
Speaker
Prior to that was a teacher in KV for eight years. And prior to that was 16 years in corporate America is all different types of engineers and graduated from preview. And I'm a golly man. And I'm just happy to be here.
Roles of Fatherhood Explored
00:02:09
Speaker
We're so glad to have you and I cannot wait to jump into this. All right. First question. What is fatherhood? Well, pretty good question.
00:02:23
Speaker
I believe fatherhood involves nurturing young people, supporting young people, also disciplining young people, shaping them, shaping and molding them. And it doesn't necessarily, in my definition, doesn't necessarily have to be biological kids. It just says I was a teacher. I looked at that as a way of fatherhood with my students. I attest to that.
00:02:54
Speaker
Good, good. What are some generalizations about fatherhood that need to be shut down? There's not a lot of good fathers out there. I'm sure you've heard that. I mean, that's been the buzz for forever. And so what I've learned is that there is a lot of good fathers out there. We're just not recognized. And we typically focus on the negative rather than the positive side of things. So kind of still where the generalizations come from.
00:03:24
Speaker
but it's not cool. Is fatherhood challenging and why? It has very rewarding at the same time. There's a lot of responsibility. The way God made it is for me to be the head of the household and comes with that is a lot of responsibility. And so having to be a rock
00:03:52
Speaker
most of the time, even when things are not going well, everything kind of trickles down or kind of starts with the father. If he falls apart, then typically the rest of everybody else kind of falls apart as well.
Inspiration from an Absent Father
00:04:03
Speaker
So I would say that's pretty, the pretty challenging part. Is your father in your life and how has that affected your fatherhood?
00:04:12
Speaker
Um, he's not active, active in my life. I didn't meet my dad until I was a senior in high school and really only contacted really now just kind of like holidays and stuff like that and catching, catching up. But, um, by him not being around, actually I think made me a better father. Um, cause I made a, I made a oath to myself when I was younger.
00:04:37
Speaker
that whenever I had kids, I was always going to be there for them.
Balancing Fatherhood with Personal Beliefs
00:04:40
Speaker
And so that's kind of been my thing to paint my hat on. Was being a dad your plan or was it God's? That's a good question. That's a funny question, actually.
00:04:56
Speaker
Guy, I believe, is all predestined us to be a dad. But the timely part of it, I think the timely part of it probably wasn't Guy. It was probably more my time and more than Guy's time. If you can explain that. Have you and your spouse ever had to deal with the miscarriage or stillbirth and how did that affect you?
00:05:25
Speaker
No, I'm glad we have not. And I raise up those who in prayer for those who have. And that's pretty difficult to deal with. But no, we haven't had to experience that. Do you have a good slash close relationship with your kids? Absolutely. Absolutely. Made it made it a point that we had a close relationship and a good relationship. We're real hard to make sure we have that.
Building Strong Relationships with Children
00:05:49
Speaker
Yeah. Do your what do your kids do that soften your heart?
00:05:56
Speaker
When they see them smile with joy and their hugs, yeah, those are the primary things. How did you deal with disobedience physically and emotionally? For my kids, disobedience with my kids. Yes.
00:06:20
Speaker
I always start off by listening and always trying to hear their side of the story about things before I reacted and try to put in any type of disciplinary actions. And so if it did turn out that they were disobedient,
00:06:39
Speaker
you know, my son, he was a little challenged at times. So he would get some spankers on the bottom, nothing like abuse or anything like that. But just a little tap warnings. My daughter, she was very sensitive. So you didn't have to, you just talked to her and things would make sense.
00:07:02
Speaker
explain why you while i was doing them or disciplining them and help making sure they understood why and so uh that's kind of how i handled all that just the disobedience type stuff but my head had pretty good kids so it wasn't like a lot of occasions yeah what are you trying to or what do you want to instill in your son um
00:07:27
Speaker
to be a kingdom man. And when I say, you know, there's a lot of people say to be a man, but to me, I think it's a difference of being a man versus a kingdom man. And so, and so basically just following under authority of God and following his lead. And then once you follow and you're in a line with God, then he puts everything that's under your authority in line also. So that's kind of one instilling him.
00:07:57
Speaker
And what were you trying to instill in your daughter? Something similar. Of course, they had two different roles of the male and the female. But of course, respect, to be a hard worker, and to be a godly woman, and to pray about. Both of them used to come to us all the time with issues and problems.
00:08:22
Speaker
you know, as a young kid, you know, we, me and my wife, we try to direct them as best as possible. But as they got older, we want to steal in both of them to go to God first.
Teaching Values and Respectful Relationships
00:08:33
Speaker
Did you pray about it? Absolutely. Yeah. Oh my gosh. I love my mom, but she gets on my nerves. She asked, she, she, um, my middle sister, she's starting to get that more for my mom now that she's in college. But oh my gosh, every time I cut my mind, she was like, well, did you talk to God about it? And I'm like,
00:08:51
Speaker
Fine. Oh. I mean, you know, that's where it starts. What are some unspoken promises, principles, characteristics, et cetera, that you wanted them to grasp just by watching you? Definitely how a man should treat a woman in every regards to like my wife
00:09:16
Speaker
And I used to think of it from what I wanted my son to see, but I didn't realize until a little bit later how important it was for my daughter to see the exact same thing. So that's probably one of the biggest things for that area. How do you incorporate your walk with Christ into your parenting? I have been
00:09:45
Speaker
convicted several times on how I was parenting my kids early on as a father. And God reminded me a few times, what if I was as hard as you are on them as you are on them?
Balancing Work, Family, and Spirituality
00:10:04
Speaker
And so they kind of changed my perspective of things and kind of started looking more through God's eyes more than my eyes.
00:10:15
Speaker
How do you balance work, spouse, ministry, kids in your own personal walk with God? Um, so that was a challenge. Um, but one thing I do is first just try to take one day at a time. Um, and then I always start my day off with, with daily, with some meditation. Um, I've learned that.
00:10:36
Speaker
started my day off that way, the day smooths itself out, you know, and I may, I may plan and write down a whole bunch of things that I think I need to do for that particular day. But then when I asked God to direct my plans that morning, I sometimes I end up pushing things off to the next day there that I thought was that really, really important had to be done that day, but maybe then later on, I just realized, okay, it's not as important. So I push it off to that next day or next week or whatever.
00:11:05
Speaker
But then I look back and say, that was God's way of allowing me to plan out my day. I put it on paper, but then I handed it over to him to say, hey, get rid of the things that you don't want me to do and give me the strength to do the things I need to do. Yeah, so good. What challenges do you have as the head of house and how did you overcome them? What challenges?
00:11:33
Speaker
just kind of learn how to be the head of household. Like I said, my father, my father wasn't around growing up. So a lot of things I had to learn through trial and trial and error, I guess you can say, from mistakes and, you know, learning from those mistakes and having a family that
Learning and Self-Care in Parenting
00:11:54
Speaker
was receptive to my apologies and being able to pick myself back up and not hang on to the mistakes I made and just try to improve on it, move forward. That's the biggest challenge. Yeah. What falls through the cracks because of whatever is happening on a daily basis? What area are you slacking in? Taking care of myself the most. I typically put
00:12:24
Speaker
everybody and everything in front of my personal needs and wants. And so I will say, you know, I'm not saying I'm lacking, but I would say that's part of the area that suffers the most because I just want to make sure everybody else is good. That's what's most important to me. Yeah. Do you find yourself overcompensating in any way for any reason? Yeah. You know, by my
00:12:53
Speaker
my dad and I've been around, you know, I'm just trying to go over and beyond and make sure that we, I don't have a good relationship with my kids. So I've learned, I've learned not to be too much overcompensate because I don't want to be too much to my kids where I end up pushing away instead of making them closer. So just finding that right balance was, was a key to that.
00:13:23
Speaker
What do you do on the days you want to quit? Pray. And then I think about who is depending on me and take that very serious. And then also remember that, you know, even through the hardest times, I can always recall on some times that may be a little harder.
00:13:50
Speaker
And God will remind me of those times and say, okay, if you made it through that, you can make it through this. Who has helped support you through your journey as a father? I would say my wife. I was probably my biggest supporter. And I think even some of the things, her approach from some of the support I may not have always been cool with, but she came from a different perspective because she grew up with her dad.
00:14:20
Speaker
And so she would be able to tell me, hey, my dad used to do this. And I used to take it defensively as if she was comparing or saying that I wasn't a good father or whatever. But I realized there was some lessons to be learned from her experience. Yeah, so good. Is a spiritual father as important as a biological slash at-home father?
00:14:46
Speaker
Absolutely. I mean, if you can get different channels to be fed from, then I think the more the merrier. You know, because sometimes your kids don't always listen to the home father. You know, although we may tell them the same thing that
00:15:07
Speaker
a spiritual father may tell them just the fact that it's coming from someone and probably someone that they respect because if they're a spiritual father, then it sinks in
Understanding the Father's Role and Purpose
00:15:18
Speaker
better. So I think they're both important. What do you wish you were told about fatherhood beforehand? I wish I was told before fatherhood beforehand.
00:15:33
Speaker
The kids weren't going to always listen to the advice that you give them. It's a hard thing to swallow, but everybody got to live their own life and travel along their own path and journeys. So that's one thing I had to learn, but I wish somebody would have told me that first. What is one thing you wish you were told by your father?
00:16:00
Speaker
Oh, many things. I don't even know if there's anything that just being told, just being there so I could see what it meant to be a father. What is one thing you were told by your father that you use often? Nothing. Sadly, but nothing.
00:16:30
Speaker
Yeah. What's one thing you want to tell other fathers? To stand up and take the role seriously. And like I say, I think a lot of men feel like they have to do it on their own. But I think that's partial because you may not be aligned properly under God and His authority. And then I think once you're aligned in that way, I'm not saying everything because, ooh,
00:17:01
Speaker
but there's more guidance and more support that you're going to get from the man above that you probably didn't think you had, you know, strength and wisdom and stuff like that. So that'll be, that'll be it for me. Yeah. What do you tell your kids often? Uh, I love them and I'm proud of them and, um, you know, take one day at a time. I'm going to tell them that a lot.
00:17:31
Speaker
and tell them we used to have a little family model and I still tell them this is do your best to get the rest. So. I remember you saying that in school. I think it's powerful. I think it's powerful.
00:17:47
Speaker
It is. One thing more now that I've been telling them more that I talk to them as they're older is to be in the now, be in the moment. Don't worry about the past so much. Start worrying about the future so much. But put a lot more energy into the now. Yeah, definitely. What do you think needs to be talked about more as it pertains to fatherhood?
00:18:11
Speaker
Kind of what I've been alluding to throughout this conversation is the alignment with how important that is. I read the book called King Demand by Tony Evans.
00:18:33
Speaker
I'm older, like I said, I'm 51. And I just read both those books within the last two years. And it's really changed my perspective and helped me understand more my purpose as a man, as a kingdom man. And so I think that's kind of where we need to, the direction we need to be headed. Yeah. It's so funny you say that, because that's been my heart for so long. And it's, as of recently,
00:19:03
Speaker
my heart's on fire for men and to just see men step up into the authority and the power and the position that God has called them. And for us as society and as women to give them that space to do that, to be the leaders, to be the head of house, to be the husband, to be the father, to be boss or whatever it is. Like, I'm not saying we can't have women empowerment, but like, why are we pulling down men in order to push up women? Or I mean, it's just,
00:19:34
Speaker
Because I think, I think a lot of people, a lot of things have gotten out of, I keep going back to the alignment. But if you, but if you follow the way God lays it out in the Bible, one thing that Tony Allen was talking about is that, and this may be a question you're going to ask me, but
00:19:53
Speaker
a lot of responsibility. And I don't know how the Bible verses, but Tony Evans was kicking them out to him one day and saying he was pointing the verse of the verse of the verse that the man, the father is the one responsible for raising the kids. But really in society, that's kind of a lot of men have viewed now have had the procession that yeah, it's the woman's job to take care of the kids.
Societal Impact of Absent Fathers
00:20:17
Speaker
But if you look biblically, it's not, it's not, it's not designed that way.
00:20:22
Speaker
And then, so then you ask, people will ask the question, what was the woman supposed to do? What was she designed to do? She's a help man. And that's, and that's no, that's no, cause I'm pro women, I'm pro women, I'm pro women. So there's no, any cross to any type of woman. I'm just saying the way God designed it. And it doesn't mean a man's ruling with the iron hammer. It's not what I mean at all.
00:20:53
Speaker
But you want to know what's funny. I mean, even if you look at like some of the similar problems, it is very common. You see a lot of people who don't have dad in their life. It's not saying that they can't, but it's very hard for them to accept and understand and submit to God because they never had to do that to a physical earthly father. So to do it to one that they can't really see or touch one that's not tangible, they struggle with it. And it's like,
00:21:19
Speaker
And there's so many other things psychologically, there's so many other rooms that are directly tied to dad not being in the home and dad not being, not just in the home, but head of the home. When the dynamics are off, just like you said earlier, like everything is off and it's been burning my high for like the last two years of my life. Well, you know, a lot of people blindly may not see at times
00:21:48
Speaker
is that if they don't send me to the guy above, they're gonna send me to some other type of guy. And the other guy could be drugs, the other guy could be sex, the other guy could be shopping, it could be your job, your title, it could be some other type of form. So I think that one way or the other, of course we should be believing in the higher guy, but I think if you don't, or if you're not aligned properly, you're gonna find some type of guy
00:22:22
Speaker
Do you think there's a lack of fathers and why? Do I think there's a lack of fathers? Yes, I do. Like I mentioned earlier, I think there's a lot of good fathers, a lot of great fathers, but I think that a lot of fathers have submitted to
00:22:41
Speaker
kind of what I was saying a few months ago that, you know, we're not responsible for, you know, raising their kids. I think we kind of, we've lost our, for whatever reason, we've lost our kingship. Yeah. And so a lot of us don't even think that we're kings or know that we're kings. And so, you know, so if you don't have that thought process, then your actions are going to follow that.
Facing Generational Challenges in Fatherhood
00:23:07
Speaker
So, so yeah, I definitely,
00:23:14
Speaker
What is your hope for your future as a father and what is your hope for your kids? For me, continue to grow, continue to learn, to stay focused on being aligned. My hope for kids, like I mentioned earlier, is for them to develop that same type of relationship with God.
00:23:36
Speaker
Um, and of course it'd be successful and whatever they, they, they decided to do in their lives, careers and families and stuff like that. Do you think this generation of fathers have things harder or easier than you had them? Um, I don't necessarily think one is harder than the other. I think both errors have their set of challenges. I think it's just different.
00:24:04
Speaker
you know, my generation, I'll speak for what I kind of went through, is just, you know, the lack of finances, the lack of fatherhood around, the lack of resources, because probably the lack of finances, the lack of some of the opportunities that fathers have now.
00:24:27
Speaker
But now, you know, the fathers have opportunities, but there's a lot more things that they're facing with the social media and just the social pressures and coming in all different directions.
Encouraging Purpose and Leadership
00:24:44
Speaker
And then them not having fathers around or them being young fathers, because I feel there's a lot more younger fathers now than there were younger fathers back then.
00:24:55
Speaker
You know, if you, you're not gonna be wrong on the statistics, but it just seems that way. Yeah. So I think just think both, both errors. I don't think one is easier or harder than other, just different challenges. Yeah. What is something that you have to say to this generation of men and fathers? Like I was saying earlier, let's, let's understand our purpose and our role in the men.
00:25:26
Speaker
And I think once we started to understand our purpose, then things just starts to make more sense. And then you find your purpose, and it makes more sense to you being an increase in your hope. And that just gives you more likelihood to be a better person at home, within your home, within your community, and within the church. And then all that spills over to the world.
00:25:53
Speaker
But it all starts with us, it is men. What is something you have to say to this generation of women and mothers? Also understand what it says in the Bible about the role of a woman.
00:26:13
Speaker
You know, I know I keep beating this alignment, but, you know, it says that for us as men to be aligned with God and the church. And so I think a lot of times women have a hard time following men because the men are not properly aligned.
00:26:33
Speaker
So I think if a woman sees a man that's trying to be a lion and fall and cry, things might not always look rosy at the time. But if he's headed in that direction, you can see that in him. Like, I wouldn't want to give up on him to see another cat that might not even have a clue. And for mothers, women and mothers,
00:27:03
Speaker
Just staying strong. There's a lot of obstacles for women that I've learned being married to my wife and the challenges that women go through. You've always heard stuff, but to really have an inside ear to someone who has a big voice, it makes me aware. And I'm very
00:27:29
Speaker
We just like to really encourage women to stand up and not bow down. And I think this is the hard part. There's maybe a hard thing to swallow for women and mothers. I'll say women or spouses is that as long as your man is aligned properly, a woman's responsibility is to respect her husband. If that man doesn't feel respected,
00:28:00
Speaker
then he's not happy. He's not being fulfilled. And the things just kind of get ugly. So it's always a two-way street. But I think a lot of women forget about what it says in the Bible about respecting a man. I mean, when a man feels disrespected, it's bad. And you can see me and being disrespected by other men.
Conclusion: Wisdom for Community Change
00:28:21
Speaker
So just imagine if you're being disrespected by your spouse. That hurts for a woman, period. It hurts.
00:28:30
Speaker
So good. So good. So good. I wish I had more questions. Oh, well, that pioneers and beautiful people that concludes the end of this episode. Mr. Bobo, thank you so much. This was so good. And guys, go to the website, go to the Patreon, like, follow, share, subscribe.
00:28:50
Speaker
And you guys take this and run with it. You go pray, go ask God to give you wisdom and to understanding to help you change not only your life, but to change your community and to change the world. And with that, we say bye, pioneers, bye, beautiful people.
00:29:23
Speaker
Bye!