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The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast
1KHO 407: You're Gonna Be Okay | Sean Dietrich, Will the Circle Be Unbroken?
00:58:19
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- [00:01]
A
The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series 10, available for the first time in glossy, jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations. IPhone XS are later required. Charge time and actual results will vary. Welcome to the 1000 Hours Outside podcast. My name is Jenny Erich. I'm the founder of 1000 Hours Outside. And as we're heading into a new year, we have asked some of our very, very, very favorite guests to come back on. And this is the favorite guest that people have sent messages about, but also my own personal favorite. And, Sean Diedrich, you fit into both categories. I have been, like, really changed by your writing. It's like a grace that has come into my life when I needed it. So thank you for being here.
- [01:01]
B
Oh, my gosh, thank you for having me. I mean, those are flattering words. I don't know that I deserve them.
- [01:08]
A
Well, I think you absolutely deserve them because you offer the world a message of hope that life doesn't have to end when we have catastrophic events and that puzzle pieces can be put back together and that broken pieces can be put into a new, different kind of a whole piece. I read you are my sunshine. That was my first book I read of yours. And, I mean, I was floored with your writing. Floored. And then in researching, I didn't know your backstory, Sean. Like, I didn't know that you had dropped out of school. I didn't know that, you know, you'd had all these different things rejected. I didn't know. And it just is such a powerful reminder to all of us that we have a lot of A lot that maybe could be there in the future. A lot that maybe could come back together. There could be redemption. So the book I read most recently of yours is called will the Circle be Unbroken? And I just think everybody should read it. I mean, buy it for all your friends. Will the circle be unbroken? A memoir of learning to believe you're gonna be okay. I mean, I laughed. I laughed out loud, Sean. My kids would be like this. You don't usually laugh out loud when you're reading a book. They were like, what is going on over there? You. And you have so many books. Fiction. The incredible Winston Brown stars of Alabama. Lila Caution. This vehicle makes frequent stops for boiled peanuts. The other side of the bay Small towns, Labradors, Barbecue Biscuits, Beer and Bibles. And then there's eight nonfiction. And you have two new books coming out. This is from someone who dropped out of school.
- [02:38]
B
Yeah.
- [02:39]
A
John. Wow.
- [02:40]
B
Yeah, it's. You find yourself overcompensating. You spend the rest of your adulthood really trying to prove to yourself, not to others, because you're used to disappointing others. It's what they think of you as. It matters, believe me. But it's not. You know, you're never going to impress them, but you still have a shot at impressing yourself. So it kind of turned in writing, turned into a little bit of a compulsion for me because I would write something and it would feel really good and it would feel very therapeutic. And I think, well, I'm going to try that again. I'm going to try to. To emote more this time, or I'm going to try to make that the next one a little bit better or. And you end up. It ends up taking over your life. You end up not having. You end up not being able to experience much in your life without needing to go write about it. And when you do write about it, it makes the experience so much richer. It's amazing. It's. But, yeah, I dropped out of school when I was. I was. My dad died when I was 11, and that was when I dropped out. I went back to school the first day after he ended his life by his own hand. And the kids on the school bus kind of scooted away from it. I remember feeling kind of bad about that. And then I went into our gymnasium, where you had to sit and wait for your homeroom teacher to come get you. And I remember sitting in the gymnasium on the wooden bleachers, and the kids were kind of like scooting down the bleachers, and I was kind of by myself. And I remember thinking, I don't ever want to come back to school. And my mother was in such a shelf shock of a state, and we were so rural, that that wasn't a big deal. That was doable. So I quit school. And it was one of the worst decisions I ever made. And I've made some doozies, but it was also what made me who I am.
- [04:31]
A
Yeah, I had that part in my notes about even the teachers acting awkward. And then you said, and I totally related to this. Like, life just filled in. And that's what happens sometimes, you know, when you don't have that bucket set aside for those school hours, how quickly it just fills in with other things. And you can't really imagine trying to fit it back in.
- [04:53]
B
That's right. That's exactly right. In some ways, what I'm grateful for is that you realize how incredibly big and busy life is from a young age outside of school. And that is not your world, which I'm grateful for, because I was exposed to the. The real world from a young age. It was stark and it was shocking. I mean, I had a, you know, real job working construction with real guys, and it was just. It was a rude awakening. But in the same vein, by the time I was, you know, my 20s, I felt. I felt so much older than all my friends. I felt I never. I mean, not friends, but peers. I could never really, really, truly fit in with peers because I always felt like I had about 20 years on them. And that was a really isolating feeling. So most of my friends throughout my life, I would say all my close friends have been elderly men. Because those are the ones who I can understand and they can understand me. They understand me better. They're at a stage of life where their ambition is faded and now they're just wanting to live in the moment and be in this life that they have right now instead of what's ahead. What's ahead. Those are the men who've influenced me throughout my life. Those have been my friends.
- [06:15]
A
There was a part where you wrote something like, I feel like I'm a father of four. Or, you know, you're there with a bunch of college age kids or, you know, and. And you're feeling. This is completely in a different spot. You had written, we have felt like old people since our fathers died. Our mothers looked to us for big decisions. They relied on us. Before we ever went out on our first date, we were already acting like a retired father of four. All our paychecks went toward rent. So it just, you know, this coming out at the end of the year, I'm so grateful that you said yes because I think from the people that I talked to, it's been a heavy year. People have had a hard, you know, hard years, hard things. I can't really think of a. A better person to like, sort of help wrap it up with the message of learning to believe you're going to be okay than you. I talked to this woman last week. Her name is Dr. Edith Eger. She's 97.
- [07:06]
B
Oh, wow.
- [07:07]
A
She went through the Holocaust at 16. And the interview, it was a tricky interview, Sean. Cause she's 97, so I couldn't really grill her on anything. And her grandson was there and I would ask a question and then he would kind of repeat it to her. But one of the things that she talked about in her book was she had this moment that she called a severing. It was this moment where she's in the line at Auschwitz and she has to say if she's standing next to her mother or her sister, and if she would have said sister, I mean, her mom looked young, her. Her mom would have stayed with her, but she was 16 and didn't know what was going on. And it's scary. And she says, mother and her mom gets separated to this other line, and that's the last time she sees her mom. And I wanted to ask her about it, but I just. I really couldn't. Just because of the situation and her age and that type of thing. And there's such a similar situation in your life. Like you had a severing, like one moment. She said, if I were to distill my life into one moment, one image, it's this last moment that we had together that you didn't even know until hindsight to look back on. And in your story, you know, you have this severing. Like the last time you see your dad, he's being taken away.
- [08:15]
B
Yeah. Into the.
- [08:16]
A
Into the cop car and he doesn't look back either. Do you think that a lot of people have that in their life, or do you think it's fairly unique to have a severing moment?
- [08:26]
B
No, I think everybody is about to have one if they haven't had it yet. It's going to happen. Hard times of any kind, but. But this one for sure, it's going to happen to you and you kick a can down the road. When you're a kid playing a game and you kick a can and you walk a little bit and you kick the can and you hope, mentally, proverbially, I should say, that you can kick that can far enough down the road to where it's not going to happen for a long time. But sometimes you have no control over that. And I mean, all the time you have no control over that. And there is going to come a moment where you will be faced with a very, very difficult time, some sort of reckoning, a severing. I like that word, actually, because you. You'll go through it. You. You're going to lose someone you love, you're going to lose your health, you're going to lose something, and this is going to change you forever. It's ironic that you mentioned concentration camps and trauma like that, because one of the books that, when I was coming along growing up, that maybe helped me more than any other book was a book by Viktor Frankl, who was a psychologist who underwent concentration camps in Nazi Germany. And I identified with everything he said. But one of the things that stuck with me for all my life was that when you can't change your circumstances, you have to allow your circumstances to change you. And so it's that change that comes about within you that is what transforms a human being in history into a saint. All of our saints, that the people that people have in every religion almost, they've all undergone immense suffering. And it's that suffering which pushes them into, at least in other humans perspectives, the sainthood. And I believe that there is a lot of truth in that. When you allow your circumstances to change you, when you don't fight what's happening to you, you will undergo a change that will push you so profoundly into a deep, deep, deep love that you never knew existed. And this love is the only way that you're going to survive. And that's the only way I survived. I found love from so many different people who just came out of the blue. I had no inclination that they were going to come and find me. I had. I still can't imagine how logically how these relationships fostered, but they happened and they, they altered the course of my life. And I'm alive and I am happy and healthy because of the love that was shown to me by strangers. And that is only available to you if you allow yourself to be altered by what happens to you. I don't know if that made any sense.
- [11:17]
A
You know, this Dr. Edith Eager, and she's 97. The thing that changed her circumstances was the same book by Viktor Frankl. Really, they became very good friends.
- [11:27]
B
Oh, wow.
- [11:28]
A
And she was in such a dark place with all that she had gone through and could not pull herself out of it. And I think someone had given her that book and she didn't want to read it. She was scared to read it. And she said when she finally opened her heart to it, it completely changed her life. And that's what spurred her on to tell her story. And she went back to school. You know, she had gone through the Holocaust at 16, so she had dropped out of all the things that were meaningful to her. Ballet and music and all of that. And she went back to school at 50.
- [11:55]
B
Oh my God.
- [11:56]
A
And became a psychologist. And so just a lot of, you know, parallels, but, but the story of, you know, the threshold, the threshold into just a completely different life that you're not expecting. You're completely not expecting. Like you had written four. This child, you know, who's out in the sun and swinging on a tire swing, has no IDEA that in 24 hours, you know, your whole life is going to change forever. We lost almost everything you wrote, you know, your house, your land, your, your creek, your family, your identity, your pride. You lost yourself. So I think that part about love, and maybe that's the full answer, but I was wondering, you know, your, your dad, it was like you broke a generational pattern because your father was abusive and also had some really good points too.
- [12:40]
B
Right, Right.
- [12:41]
A
But your father struggled with abuse and then he would cry about it. He was like, he was tormented and he came from abuse as well.
- [12:49]
B
Yeah. And who knows how far back that went? You know what I mean? That could have gone all the way back to, you know, who knows? So I'll tell you though, you mentioned this and I probably derailed your question before you even asked it. But the most beneficial thing for me writing this book, because I wasn't going to do it. The publisher had asked me to write, to come and write this book because I'd written a few blogs about my life and I didn't want to do this because I consider myself kind of a humorist, you know, kind of a. And they, they, they really kept after me and I turned them down and they came back and they were so kind and so gracious and understanding with me and they seem to have the right motive, you know, because when you share your life story, you really, this isn't like marketing a book, you know, you don't want to, like, I mean, this is very, very intimate and personal. You don't care how well it performs on a bestseller list. You don't care about this. There's none of that matters to you. This is about your life. This is a, a third party position that you're taking and retelling your things you've gone through. So I told this story, I agreed to do it, and I wrote this story. And I noticed immediately that when you take that outsider's perspective, which you have to take when you tell a story, the people in your life, including yourself, become characters in a story. And you're watching them move and perform and talk to each other and interact with each other. You're seeing it happen on a page before you and the, and one of them is you. And this really separates you from what's, what's occurring in this kid's life. And it gives you A compassion for yourself, but for a. For a piece of yourself that is gone because you're no longer a child. And I would lay in bed after I had finished writing for a day, and I would think about that little boy. And I would think to myself, just in case, you know, what Einstein says about time is true, where, you know, this time continuum is like a circle or whatever, and the past is still out there, still happening, I am going to say a prayer for this boy, just in case those prayers can jump across space and time. And that this boy knows that he's going to get through it, that he's going to make it, and that he has the strength to get through it. And I would. I would put my hands together and I would pray for little Sean that in the vast universe, help him get through it. And who knows, you know, maybe if that is a thing, maybe some of my prayers helped me get through it. That's a weird concept I just shared there that Jamie, my wife, would just freak out like what you were talking about. What? But I guess what I'm getting, what I'm hinting at is that when you write a story, like, about yourself and especially about trauma, you become a detached party and you see things and you feel compassion and you feel a love you didn't know you could share with yourself. And I feel, I felt such compassion on little Sean and on my mother and my sister and on my. And. And this is what I was really getting at on my father. I felt an incredible sense of compassion on my dad. And even though he was in many people's lives, including my mother's, the villain, he was a human being who got lost in the ocean of his own bad choices. And I felt, I felt compassion on him I'd never felt before. And that was a profound experience. And ultimately, hopefully, it led toward breaking that, that curse, you know, and you.
- [16:29]
A
Did, you broke it because you wrote, my father had a troubled childhood. His mother was a Swiss German with six children and a drunk for a husband. She was tall, lean and angry. She used her hands to get her messages across. His father was also thick handed and strong. And when he drank, he was a fury. And I just thought, wow, there's such hope in this story. Like if you've got this past, if you have this lineage that you would like to shift. Shift your story for what's to come.
- [16:54]
B
Yes.
- [16:55]
A
And you did that. And so it's a beautiful part. And this, I mean, I think everybody, every single person should read this book. I already bought a second copy I'll show you here. I'm like, I'm already like, okay, I already have people in mind. Who am I giving these to? I'm like, I, I, oh, I loved it. And I laughed and I cried.
- [17:11]
B
Well, I'm glad you said that about laughter because like I said, I, my, I make my living as a humorist. I mean when I told the publisher what I had in mind, my editor was such a beautiful soul, Stephanie. And she, she said, so what do you, how do you see this but going? I said, well I see it being, telling my story, but I also want it to be, have a big amount of humor and fun and I want it to be fun because that's, that's who I am and that's who I've worked so hard to become. Because it's hard to refine your humor after something so bad. But it also is, I believe humor is the only thing that keeps mankind sane. And so I, I said I really want to be able to tell this story with humor. I don't want it to be a bitter gall to drink. I want it to be a nice tasting, well bodied drink, you know, like if it, if it were, you know, a drink. And she said, well that's really hard to do. I, I don't know if that can even be done. And that should have been my cue to like, you know, you know, it might not work but I did try to take a light hearted view of most of the things that I went through.
- [18:21]
A
What I wrote was it's like stand up comedy in a book. It was phenomenal.
- [18:27]
C
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- [22:56]
A
I have a whole section here of parts where I laughed out loud. I made a note where I laughed out loud. I laughed out loud. When you forgot your shoes to your wedding. You said you looked like Tickles the Clown. You said that you had to borrow someone's shoes. And you said they look like pontoons because they were so big. I mean, I laughed. I laughed at that. I laughed when you were dressed like a Care Bear, couldn't find a job and you end up at this ice cream place and the uniform you like, I don't care. I need a job. Like, you're going to have to wear pink.
- [23:31]
B
Yeah.
- [23:31]
A
And you know, you're wearing the thing. And there was ruffles. It was like a whole thing. And then someone came in that you knew that you had used to date and had broken up with you because they didn't think you were, like, high class enough. You said I was dressed. The uniform was indeed pink. Also, management dictated that employees were required to wear a pink sun visor. The serving apron had ruffles. Had ruffles on the edges and an embroidered teddy bear on the chest. You know, and in walks Mary, you know, this girl who is, you know, wealthy and she's walking with. You called him James Bond. You know, a guy with. The girl was with a tall man who had devastatingly broad shoulders, a square jaw, and teeth so white he looked like the risen savior. And you said I look like, you know, Strawberry Shortcake or a Care Bear. I mean, I laughed.
- [24:22]
B
You know, that's such a fun thing to do for me to process that was a really painful moment in my life. But to process it with humor, it's such a. I wish I could share that with kids who are going through a really hard time because it's so healing. You feel you get so much good out of it if you can paint the story in your mind in the way that makes you laugh. It's so healing. But, yeah, what, what an experience. But I love humor. Humor, to me is, is the goal of life. And probably the reason I love Mark Twain so much is because he suffered and went through so much junk, and yet he maintained such a, a viable sense of humor. That's what makes him remarkable to me. It's not even his writing as good as it is. It's that he maintained that. And there's so few people, not just writers, but people who can maintain humor and, and cheerfulness, you know, in, in this, in spite of life.
- [25:26]
A
I liked this. Are you a post grad? Nope. Baptist. Okay, here's the other thing, Sean. I was like, I have never in my life heard anybody talk about this. You had a whole thing because you go back to school, it takes you 11 years. So you, you go back to school, you're going to make it through. Takes you 11 years. And you're talking about like learning the MLA format. All everyone's like, oh my goodness. And then you're talking about the parentheses. It's so good. So you say 11 years of research papers and you're like, you know, do I use the appropriate parentheses or the square looking one? Do I use the square looking ones or the curved ones? And then you put, why does no one use the curly looking ones ever?
- [26:10]
B
Those are my favorite.
- [26:12]
A
No one ever uses them. But they're so cute. They're right on the keyboard.
- [26:15]
B
They really are.
- [26:16]
A
I never in my life thought about the curly looking parentheses. I laughed. When you get up to speak for the first time and you're speaking in this high school and I think everybody can relate with this, you know, you're freaking out. I learned that you pass out sometimes, you know, you're like, whatever thing you have some people just pass out and then they poop their pants. So you're like, I hope if I die, I hope I don't poop my pants. If we're. To all these high schoolers and you're saying how, like the sound system. And I think people relate to this. It's like a echo, echo, echo, echo.
- [26:47]
B
Yeah.
- [26:47]
A
And I just was not expecting that. When your sweet dog Ellie May comes running at you, I just wasn't expecting it. It. You know, you would have. You would be saying something, good to be here. Good to be here. Good to be here. You know, it. It is this echo. And then Ellie May comes running like Free Willy. And you say, ellie May. I said in a schooling voice over the microphone. And then it's Ellie May, Ellie May, Ellie make.
- [27:15]
B
Oh, I remember that.
- [27:17]
A
The writing is phenomenal.
- [27:19]
B
Well, thank you. I. That book, that. That's my. I put my heart and my soul into it. I mean, I do that with all my books, but that one stands out as the most special thing I've ever done, taking the time to do. And my mother, it was. It was too. It was just too much. She wouldn't read it for the longest time. She couldn't read it, bring herself to read it. And then finally, a long time after it came out, she. She read it. And I was wondering how much I'd get from her in a response. And she. She gave me a very. Kind of a quick response, but it was heartfelt. And she said, I read your book. And I thought, oh, oh, okay. And she said, you told it. You told it all. And that was it. And I thought, well, that was high praise coming from my mother, you know, because we. We didn't talk about a lot of this stuff. And that's. That's one of the defining characteristics of trauma in families, especially like a one that everybody experiences together. You just kind of don't talk about it, you know, you just kind of move on. And so my goal is to get people to talk about it. Talk, you know, talk about what happened. In my case, it was suicide and abuse and all that talk about it. It's like releasing hus from a wound. You know, the infection is freed and you can finally heal.
- [28:43]
A
It's so cool, Sean, because that's what she asked you to do. She asked you tell them our story. Will you promise me that?
- [28:51]
B
Yeah.
- [28:51]
A
And so if her response was, you told it all, that was you completing that promise.
- [28:56]
B
Yeah.
- [28:57]
A
And doing the thing that she had asked of you to do.
- [28:59]
B
You know, I've forgotten I've forgotten that I put that in there. That's. I mean, that just gave me chills because that's. I remember the day that she told me that. And I. And I just. In the story that I just told you about her, that just gave me all sorts of goose temples.
- [29:15]
A
Yeah. The response. I mean, that's what she had asked you to do. There's a lot of kids that listen in, Sean, and I think a lot of people who come from broken homes. One of the things you wrote is everyone has had a hard life. Some have had it harder than others, but all have suffered. And suffering is suffering. I learned that everyone has had a difficult childhood. Everyone has felt alone at one time or another. Everyone has felt the same way I felt. I came to understand that I was not alone and never had been. You wrote this sentence that, wow, is so thought provoking. And it's so clever. I think because the way that you word it is so clever, it sticks with you. My childhood was not a pretty one, but I believe ugly childhoods make pretty people. Can you encourage the person who is in an ugly childhood right now or who has gone through one themselves and now they're an adult?
- [30:02]
B
Yeah. That could be my favorite part of the book, that line. And that happened. I was typing and I was weeping while I was typing, which doesn't often happen, and I had to stop working. And I. I remember thinking about little me and. You live in this void. When you go through a broken family life, when you go through a bad childhood, when you go through a. A, A trauma of any kind, when you suffer, you live in this void, this vacuum, where you feel utterly and entirely isolated from humankind. Alone. That's the. The feeling. But it's just a thought. It's just a thought coming from your brain. It's not the truth. And thoughts in your brain are really just phenomena of the brain. It's just the brain has to keep thoughts running and running and running and running. It doesn't mean it's the truth. Just because you thought. It doesn't mean really that you're the one thinking it. It's just. It's the brain that did that to you. It's not true. You're not alone. And you will learn that one day. One day you will get into a place, not just in life, but a physical place. And you will meet somebody. And maybe you'll meet more than one somebody. Maybe there'll be four or five somebody. And you will realize in that moment that this person understands me. Like on a Deep level. This person doesn't just, you know, kind of understand. They've been through something too. And so does, so does this person. And wait, so does he. He understands it too. And that will blow your mind. You will think to yourself, oh my gosh, I'm not alone. And that experience, if you open yourself up to it, will continue to happen to you over your life and you will be constantly reminded that you are not alone. The suffering will not necessarily go away. You can't change the past that you've been through, that you will experience something that alleviates it and that is companionship with like minded people who love you the way you love them. And that to me is the goal of life itself.
- [32:20]
A
I love this wording. This does not tie in at all. It's on my page and I don't want to forget it. There's no transition here. My apologies. I love this wording. Wearing your cleanest dirty shirt. That's so good. I think everybody has that time in life where like this is. These are all dirty. But of all of these dirty shirts, this is the cleanest one. I don't know if they had nothing to do with anything, but I had it circled and I'm about to turn the page.
- [32:49]
B
That's my life. When I wake up in the morning, I look on the floor where my clothes are shed from the night before and I sniff one to see if I can get a few more days out of it.
- [32:58]
A
There we go. There we go. I love in this book how you introduced Jamie, the story of where you met. I mean, there was something about her. This is so good. She proceeded to remove the tendons from her front teeth. Oh, she. No, she proceeded to remove the tendons with. She's eating chicken and she takes yours, I think. Right? She proceeded to remove the tendons with her front teeth like a grizzly bear cleaning the carcass of wild boar. When she finished with my bones, they sparkled, we touched elbows and my life would never be the same. And I was like, oh gosh, this is so good. Part of the story is you're just dealt this such a bad hand. And additionally, people are kind of nuts, like your uncle who's like, you're the man of the house now. You're going to have to spread the ashes. Like you can't even, like, you know, when you're an adult, you're like, who says that to a middle school boy?
- [33:49]
B
Exactly.
- [33:50]
A
So you're dealt a bad hand. No one's talking about it. In fact, they're dealing with it in these ways that are just like really wild and odd and yet your life changes in these, like, really small, kind of random moments. You know, meeting Jamie and what year. She's like, amazing at eating chicken. She got more chicken than the, you know, than the church ladies normally give you. She's, you know, she can work the system. And there was another one where you're like, I started a blog on a whim. Yeah, it's funny how one miniature decision can change a man's life forever. And that's what the blog did for you. And then now, you know, you're touring and you've got, I mean, so many books, your blog is read by, I don't even know, countless people.
- [34:33]
B
Well, isn't that. But that's so. That is such a. I mean, you brought this up and I hadn't really ever thought about it quite in these words, but it's so true. My whole life, everything that really had a lasting impact on me was never the major decision. It was never the major decision that we all held hands and really thought, talked about to see if this was going to be right or wrong for us. It was never those, it was always the little split second decisions that happen in this tiny little moment or the things that, that happen to you that you really had no control over almost. And that's. Those leave the biggest impacts on your life, but also they become the biggest exit off the interstate that you end up taking, which leads to this other road. And it's never the big decisions. And that's. Meeting my wife was just, you know, a whim, a total fluke. At least I felt like it. And I see now that it wasn't because she, she led me into joyfulness again. I mean, I found myself again in my wife. And same thing with certain friends. I mean, it would just happen. A little tiny thing would happen. And I, I happened to be here at this time and oh my gosh, here's, you know, here's one of my lifelong friends or I decided just, you know, in the spur of the moment to go here and do this. And next thing you know, that happens my whole life is, is a series of reverberations from small things that I've done or small things that have happened to me. Most of it's probably happened to me because I'm not smart enough to do anything to.
- [36:09]
A
Well, should that scare people or should that give them hope? Because it's a really just a sort of interesting random thing where you're like, if not for this, then not that.
- [36:19]
B
Yeah.
- [36:20]
A
And you're not even planning for it.
- [36:22]
B
I believe strongly that there are no accidents. I hadn't always thought that way. But if there are no accidents, then you really have very little to do with what's going on. And there's enormous freedom in that. I think if you can just go with what's happening, you'll discover that you feel better. A, but B, the opportunities that present themselves to you, that are given to you, these wonderful little blessings that just all of a sudden appear before your eyes are infinitely more valuable and better than anything you would have manufactured or self engineered for yourself. You could have imagined this and you could have imagined that and it might have been cool even if it would have happened, but you could have never imagined this. And watch this. And I, I just, I truly believe that. That there is nothing accidental.
- [37:18]
A
Wow. And isn't that biblical? More than I could ask or imagine.
- [37:22]
B
Yes, I, I agree.
- [37:24]
A
Yeah. And I would imagine that for someone. And, and you talk about the school thing. You're like, look, I, this is something that. And like, from my perspective, I'm like, these are some of the best books I've ever read in my, in my life. I mean, I think you will go down in history as one of the best writers that has ever lived.
- [37:39]
B
And we need to raise your standards a little bit.
- [37:43]
A
I know. Come on, Sean. I mean, this is, you know it, you know it. And that's why they keep having you write books. And that's why your blog is read by so many people. And that's why people are like, can you please come talk to us? Because they relate with your stories. So you talk about, you know, you drop out of school and this is something that, you know, really affects you. And the wording was like, you don't even want to talk about it. And you're so embarrassed about it, you don't even want to talk about it. And here you are putting it in the book. I can't find it in my notes. The exact, oh, there was no way on earth a flunky like me would ever become a writer. My schooling isn't a topic I like to discuss. It embarrasses me. You talk about, I went to school right after, you know, after your father had died, and the students gawked and the teachers seemed unsure of what to say. And you wrote, who wants to read a book written by a guy who quit the seventh grade? And yet I hardly know. I mean, I've read a lot of books. You hardly ever see when it says other books Written by Shawn Diedrich. The list is so long, like you can. It's like that's the thing. More than you could have asked or imagined. You start a blog on a whim.
- [38:48]
B
So true. I, it is a, that was a subject. I mean, you mentioned biblical things. I mean, if, if God has a sense of humor, he's been very liberal with it with me and I, I appreciate it now. But one of the things that embarrassed me the most was, you know, the schooling thing, because especially in that world of writing. But I'm, I decided early on that I was just going to embrace it. I wasn't going to talk about it if I didn't have to, but I was just going to embrace it if it ever came up. And man, the humor part of it is, is that that was all anybody wanted to hear about. They wanted to hear about. They bring me in, they want to, okay, tell everybody again about how you dropped out and now you're a writer, you know, or whatever. Tell, tell people this, or here, here's your high school group. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we, we enjoy that. But tell us about how you dropped out and now you're a writer. And so I'm looking at all these school kids who come from, you know, kind of, I would get, I would imagine, you know, medium to well off, you know, middle class people. And I'm telling them about how I dropped out and some of them just couldn't care less. And some of them are really connecting with it. And it's in. The more I told that story over the years, over the last like 10 years, I've told that story just, I mean, I've told it so many times that I could do it in my sleep. Over the time that you do it, you keep doing it, it loses its power over you immediately once the embarrassment and the shame loses its power over you. The more that you embrace it and the more that you talk about it, the more that you own it, because you have to own it. If you're going to speak about it in public or you're going to tell someone about it, it loses all power. And then you go through another transition where it becomes not just a powerless entity in your life, it becomes what makes you unique. And then you transition from that into. It's almost a badge, a badge that you earned in warfare that you're moderately proud of, which is bizarre, but you really do. The more you process something openly like that in a public setting, you really do come to a space where you don't only accept yourself, but you love you, love yourself. I love that I went through that. And I love the boy for getting through that. I really do. And that's such a silly phrase that I just said, but it's true. I really. I went to the library right after dad died. I loved the library. I fell in love with libraries. And I felt so embarrassed not having gone to. Not having going to school. And all the librarians knew it. And I kept up on reading. I read all the time. I just read so much because I felt bad. It wasn't like I was reading because I was smart. It wasn't because I was reading because I just loved reading. I mean, I did grow to love it, but I was reading to make up for something, to prove to myself I wasn't an idiot. And over time, that reading is what saved me. That reading is what got me through when I went to college. I mean, the reading is what kept me relevant in any way. I don't even know where I was going with that. Except to say that the more you. You confess your embarrassing moments, the more you admit the shame that you feel over certain things, the more empowered you are. You are empowered. Not just a little bit, but it's. It's pretty amazing. I've stood before some very large crowds and admitted the most horrible things that ever happened to me and watched them laugh at it. And I laughed at it too. And we, you know, there's no. It has no control over me, which is kind of neat.
- [42:30]
C
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- [43:55]
D
When it comes to raising kids, there's so much to consider. Things like, what do we feed them? When do we feed them? How do they sleep? What does it look like to raise kind kids? How does their nervous system work? How do I keep myself calm? What are my triggers? There's so much that comes into play and we are distilling all of that information for you at Voices of your Village podcast, where we bring experts in the field of early childhood and education and psychology and across the board so that you don't have to comb the Internet for information. You get to show up and hang out out and have shame free judgment, free conversations and insights into what it looks like to raise kind, empathetic, emotionally intelligent humans. I'm Alyssa Blask Campbell. I have a master's degree in early childhood education. I'm a mom of two and I am walking this journey right alongside you doing this work. Come hang out with me at Voices of your Village and we can dive into real conversations with actionable tips.
- [44:55]
A
Well, and it's just a thing that you can go about things a different way. It doesn't have to be this prescriptive path. You wrote I might not have gone to high school, but I've read a lot of books and I thought, well, that's a different kind of learning. And that kind of learning counts, too. And that kind of learning gets you somewhere. And it wasn't your fault that you were in this traumatic situation and had to drop out of school. That wasn't your fault. And still there was a path for you. There was a path for you.
- [45:19]
B
Yes. And there always will be. You know, to anybody listening to this, there always will be a path for you. This is not the end. Even if it looks like it, you know, there is. There is a way. There is a way. It's probably right in front of you.
- [45:35]
A
You had this part in the book where you talked about it was actually your mom said it. She said she was talking about your dad. Like you said, you didn't talk too much, but she Says to you he always thought you'd turn out to be either a writer or a musician or maybe even a preacher. And at this point you wrote 2 out of 3 ain't bad, right? Because you're a writer, you're a musician. Well, you sure are a preacher too.
- [45:59]
B
It was all, oh, I don't know about that. God helped the world. If I'm a preacher, I have nothing original to say except things that I have read that I know have helped me and things that I've. That I believe, but they've all been said by other people. Nobody needs another voice. And my mother would have probably loved it had I done that, gone that road. But there was no.
- [46:26]
A
What even is a preacher though? I mean, you're getting up and you're sharing these truths about life. Like, I don't know. To me, that's what a preacher is. That's what a preacher does.
- [46:34]
B
That, that. I mean, I hadn't thought of it that way, but. But you know, this book, I, I don't classify myself as a religious man. I really don't. But this book put me in touch with way more than I thought that I was. Because when I would write things and like I just said earlier, you know, you, you're on the third party perspective and you're seeing all this happen. You're like, whoa, wait a second. I mean, that happened. Wow. I never really stopped and thought about that. But how, what are the odds of him being there and that happening at the same time, you know? Oh, you know, and then you, you kind of, you believe a little stronger than you might have before and it's kind of the same thing, only to get come like full circle. I think it was Viktor Frankl who said I could be wrong. I think it was Viktor Frankl who said. Someone asked him and they said, well, do you believe in God? He said, well, no, I don't have to believe. I know. And that to me is, is really incredible. I don't need to believe because I know, I know I've touched it. I've tasted it. For me, it's real.
- [47:45]
A
Yeah. All these little miracles you wrote. The miracles hadn't looked like I thought they would. They never crashed like ocean waves. They have been small, quiet rivers. Embedded within the mess of it all were miracles. Small ones. Oh, what a book. What a book. And then your uncle who smelled like peanut butter. It's everything. It's everything. He had peanut butter with every meal.
- [48:08]
B
Yeah, he loved the book now. He loved that he was featured like that. He man he was. He was all about it.
- [48:17]
A
So funny. Oh, yeah.
- [48:19]
B
He was proud of all that. He thought it was wonderful, which is no shock.
- [48:26]
A
Yeah. All these little details that. That go along with life. What about dealing with regret? One of the things that. A story that stuck out to me was your dad, or. Regret's not the right word. Like your dad wanted to be in the Blue Angels or he wanted. He didn't. Or he wanted to be a pilot. He wanted to be a pilot. And he couldn't be. He couldn't be because he had ear infections and had lost some of his hearing. And, you know, I think this is a time of year where we reflect. We look back on the previous year, we look back on our life, and sometimes we're just dealt a bad hand and we can't do with our life what we had hoped or what we wanted. How do we deal with those?
- [49:04]
B
I was just talking about this yesterday with somebody because he wanted to be a pilot. He wanted to be a Navy pilot, specifically. That's why the Blue Angels really spoke to him, because he wanted to be a Navy pilot. He is. Our entire garage was peppered and plastered in jet posters and Navy planes, and he knew everything there was to know about any fighter jet, and yet he could not do it. And so that was a real turning point in his life. When he realized he couldn't do it, my mother said he just. When they rejected him, he. He just lost some of the vigor he had before he just gave up. He became an iron worker, which is what his daddy was, which is what his daddy's daddy was and all his brothers. And it just was kind of like life was making decisions for him now. He wasn't making decisions about life. And I realized, and this is what I was talking about the other night with a friend of mine, that my dad's using my dad as an example, because I'm the same now right now as I'm talking to you. I'm the same age as he was when he died. I never thought I'd get to this age, but here I am. So I'm constantly comparing my own life to my dad's now because, oh, my gosh, I look in the mirror and I'm the same age as he was when he died. My dad's number one stressor, I would say the number one thing that pushed him to the edge, aside from mental illness, aside from all the other factors that he had, the troubled childhood, the one factor that really was the nail in the coffin that pushed him toward making that Decision to end his life or that made him depressed was his job, his work. He was not gratified in what he was doing with his life, with his hands. And he was with people who treated him poorly. His boss treated him terribly. His. His co workers, they were. It was always another story. Every night, you know, someone was treating him badly, treating him poorly. And I look at this now and I think all these external things happening at work are what pushed him to that. Because these aren't small things, you know, in your life, what you're doing with your life, what your life's quote, unquote work is, is so important to who you are. I mean, even in Ecclesiastes, which, this is the only time you're going to hear me say a Bible verse, but here I am. I mean, it says the seat. Basically, Solomon says the secret to happiness is to find joy in what you're doing with your hands and do it with all your mind. That's the secret to joy. And he could not find that. And he had all of these opportunities in his own life. He didn't have to be a pilot. He could have pursued something else that would have put him in that realm, or he could have pursued something and taken a chance and gone towards something that made him happy. Because life is so unbearably short. And I believe if he would have done that, he would not have felt regret, that he would probably still be here today. I believe that his work circumstances were not just something small. This was perhaps the greatest contributor to his end. And so I say that because anybody listening to this who is not satisfied or is finding deep. Let me say it this way, because I don't know if satisfaction truly exists, but who is finding deep misery in. In some form or area of their life. The problem isn't small. This is killing you somehow. And it is up to you to make the decision to get out of it and find you again, find what makes you you, and enjoy your life, because it's already almost over.
- [52:49]
A
Wow, what a book. I mean, Sean. Oh my. Oh my goodness, what a book. I love this line. I burned up entire days on that swing. Talking about your tire swing. Burned up entire days. I mean, isn't that such a good depiction of how childhood should be that we're just out there? I love the line about your mom. This woman didn't just raise you, she grew up with you. What a beautiful way to look at our parents that they weren't whole in already at the end of their journey when you came along, right? And when all of these things happen, they're growing alongside of you. I just thought that was such a deep part of. I mean, there were so many things that I laughed about. I loved when you talked about with Jamie. This was married life. It was not fancy living, but it was heaven to me. I learned that love could paint over my world in the same way grief had, but in reverse. You wrote, I've never felt like a richer man. Home is not a place on the map, you know, Home is here with this woman, the animal who sleeps beside you. Home is a feeling and an idea you have to fight to preserve because this world tries to take it from you. And then in the next breath, you're talking about sleep, Jamie, and you're talking about the time that you trick or treated as Jesus. And, I mean, it's just. It's just wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. I laughed. I mean, I. It was. It was like standup comedy. You're not expecting it, and you just. I liked the Humboldt beginnings. There was a chapter called Humboldt. I was like, that is the most clever thing I've ever heard. Women. And when you were trying to get writing jobs, and they're like, have you ever used a computer? It's great. Oh, my goodness. It's just such a fantastic book. I would love to wrap it up here. Heading into a new year, people have had a hard year, and maybe they've had a hard childhood. Maybe they're in the midst of a hard childhood. Ugly childhoods make pretty people. What's the song? Will the Circle Be Unbroken? I hadn't heard of it. And I watched a video. I went to go look for a video of it, and I saw the video that Zondervan made. It was like a minute and a half of like. It was for the book. It was a really cool.
- [54:59]
B
Oh, the book trailer. Yeah.
- [55:01]
A
Yes, the book trailer. I didn't even know those existed.
- [55:04]
B
I didn't either.
- [55:06]
A
That is really. It's like a minute and a half. I was like, this is incredible. I even took notes on that, but I can't find it at the moment.
- [55:12]
B
So that. So that song is an old hymn, mid to late 1800s, and it's traditionally, at least in the south or in the rural parts. It's a hymn that is sung mostly at funerals. It's a funeral hymn, and it's a riddle, really, because there's several different ways to interpret it, and the song meaning is not necessarily clear until you dive in and sing the actual verses. Will the circle be unbroken? What does it mean? What Is it. You know, is it. What is that? Well, what it means is the family circle is what they used to call it a family circle. I think there was even a magazine called the Family Circle, that. That is what the country people called their family. So will the family circle remain unbroken? Will the circle be unbroken? What they're saying is, when somebody leaves this world, your family circle is interrupted. And there is no. There is no family circle anymore, because once you break the circle, it's not no longer a circle. And the song, what I love the most about it is it is a question. It doesn't. It has one of the only hymns that ends with a question mark. And it. It. It's expressing. I don't know. I don't know if the family circle. I don't know if the family circle will be unbroken, but the verse of the song is, will the circle be unbroken by and by the Lord, by and by. And it clinches it with the B part of that phrase. There's a better home awaiting in the sky, lowered in the sky. And to me, that sums up my entire life, not just the book. This circle of life is a lot. It's a lot to go through. Every day you suffer every day you go through something and you just kind of hope to get to the next day, but there's something better awaiting, and you just can't even imagine. Like you said earlier, you can't imagine that is. But it's coming.
- [57:15]
A
That Zondervan video, one of the things you said was, life is not as heavy as we make it out to be said by someone who went through a severing, a before and an after, a very ugly childhood. But you have managed to change the world, Shawn, with your stories. You know, here I am, I'm some random mother in Michigan. And I know because people travel from all over to come hear you speak. And you are such a powerful voice in our world, Shawn. Thank you for these books. There are two new ones coming. The titles are I have no Idea what I'm Doing and Tomato Sandwiches are Eaten over the Kitchen. It's random. I have no idea. Publishes two books at one time also. I'm like, wow. The second one is they say, right, Tomato Sandwiches are Eaten over the Kitchen Sink.
- [58:12]
B
Yes, that's it.
- [58:13]
A
Yes.
- [58:13]
B
Which is true. It's a true. It's a true statement.
- [58:16]
A
And I have two other ones here. I have. I haven't read them yet. I have Kinfolk and the incredible Winston Brown. These are some of the best parts of my adult life.
- [58:26]
B
Well, I'M flattered. I'm flattered that you had me on the podcast at all. I appreciate this. This is my favorite one.
- [58:33]
A
John, I. I am truly honored. Thank you for saying yes again. I just, I so felt like, you know, your voice is needed at sort of this end of the year wrap up time. And I, and I really appreciate it. I know you're very busy. You're writing all of these books, you sing, you have shows all over the place. And so this is really such a blessing and a gift to me and to everyone who's listening in. Thanks for being here.
- [58:55]
B
Thank you so much.