Matt Beaudreu (0s):
You can't be a good man without having the ability to be bad, without being that savage on the inside and having that under control. And that's something that came from Young and Nche and I still very much subscribe to that. I, the ability for a young man to be a savage and to be aggressive, but to have that voluntarily under control and live just in that principled life.
Travis Chappell (21s):
Welcome back to the show. I'm Travis Chappell, and I believe that if you can connect with the best, you can become the best. So after creating 800 podcast episodes about building your network, I've come to realize that networking is really just making friends for doing it the right way. Anyway, join me as I make friends with world class athletes like Shaquille O'Neal, entertainers like Rob Deer deck authors like Dr. Nicole Lapper, former presidents like Vicente Fox, or even the occasional FBI hostage, negotiator, billionaire, real estate mogul, or polarizing political figures. So if you want to make more friends that help you become a better version of yourself, and subscribe to the show and keep on listening because this is Travis makes friends. What's up everybody? Welcome back to another episode.
Travis Chappell (1m 1s):
Sitting with me is Matt Borow. Matt, what's up bro?
Matt Beaudreu (1m 5s):
What's happening sir? Thanks for having me, man. I appreciate it. Yeah,
Travis Chappell (1m 8s):
Of course. Thanks for joining me on the show. Listen, before we hit the record button here, I was kind of telling you a little bit about some of the things that I wanted to talk with you about. Things that are gonna stem back to what it means to be a man in 2022 and and beyond in the modern era. And how, how to raise your kids, especially your sons, in an environment like that. But first, before we do that, I want to rewind the clock and build some context for those listening who may not know who you are. Let's take it all the way back to childhood here. Matt, 11, 12 year old Matt Boudreaux. Set the scene for us. Talk to us about what it was like growing up being you.
Matt Beaudreu (1m 39s):
Yeah, man, my grew up here in Northern California in the Bay Area and I was a middle class household, but I was in an area where we had a, a whole socioeconomic kind of whirlwind that came together at my, at my schools growing up. So I had friends that actually 11 or 12 was the first time I had a, a friend who went to jail when he went to jail for murder, right? So we had friends that were in the gang life here. And then I had some friends that were also multimillionaires and we were kind of this middle class in between. So I was kind of a pretty diverse neighborhood and I had two hard working parents who had split early on. Mom was great, dad was a rough dude, he was a law enforcement officer, but he was the sketchy version of it and was kind of a harder guy and had really kind of created, like he and buddy were kind of a gang within the system itself.
Matt Beaudreu (2m 23s):
So I, it was an interesting kind of dichotomy. I always kind of had these parallels going on around me and it created, I became kind of this
Travis Chappell (2m 30s):
Parallel when I was Did you know that at the time? Were you aware of that at the time?
Matt Beaudreu (2m 32s):
That was about when I started figuring out kind of what was going on. Definitely wasn't aware that I was learning to walk in parallel fashion, which is absolutely served me well now. Definitely didn't know that Ben. So it started to figure that out. I had gotten into martial arts early on at the behest of my father. And, and so by that time I was competitive in kickboxing and that was something that I would, I would do for, for a long time. And, but it was by all means stereotypical and normal at that point. And I, I figured out the school game early. So I got my straight A's just because I knew how to play the game, not because I knew anything and school was more about sports, it was more about girls. And it was, it was those things that kept me there. So then I graduate with my 4.0 and go, now what?
Matt Beaudreu (3m 15s):
I don't actually have anything to offer the world. I don't wanna live it at home anymore. I don't wanna live with that anymore. This is a sketchy thing. And, and so I'm out. So I graduated 17 and took off to, to never go back, but then I just did what a lot of people do, man, went to college, got better at sports, got better at girls, still got my straight A's. But as I was coming to the end of, of my college career, I still knew I had nothing to offer the world and nothing that I could really do. And that's when nine 11 happened, which kind of went, okay, well maybe secret service man, that was somewhere that, that I thought I wanted to go. So Secret Service is kinda what I went down, I accepted a job at the White House coming outta college and all I had to do was graduate two months later.
Matt Beaudreu (3m 55s):
And then I was talked outta that by a Secret service agent. Oh no. He said, no, don't do it. And, and so then I graduated from college with a 4.0 in college. Again, not knowing a lick about who I was or what I wanted to do and had to start figuring it out from there.
Travis Chappell (4m 11s):
S do you remember why they said no?
Matt Beaudreu (4m 13s):
Oh yeah, I remember why. Yeah. Yeah. It was about integrity, man. He was, he used nine 11 as part of his reference, but he just said, look, I lie to the world. I lie to, I protect people who, who often lie to the world. You hear partial truths and I tell partial truths and my wife and kids hear partial truths. And knowing what I know about your dad and kind of how you've had to expose the lies and how much you didn't like that, like, I, I don't think you wanna sacrifice your integrity, so I highly recommend you do not take this job. Wow. And he gave me a little more detailed insight, but it was Sure. Very much stay away.
Travis Chappell (4m 45s):
So did he give you anything beyond that in terms of like, here may, maybe this option would satisfy this desire but not be as psychologically demanding or whatever?
Matt Beaudreu (4m 55s):
He said stay out of law enforcement altogether was, was kind of his deal, which was interesting. And at that time I was still, I was still a martial artist. I had started getting it, the whole UFC thing was relatively new at that time, but I had an interest in mixed martial arts. And so he knew that there was an aggression there. Yeah. For better or for worse. And he said, I just, I don't see law enforcement as the place you should go for that. So there was no other advice other than that.
Travis Chappell (5m 18s):
How did the relationship with your dad turn out?
Matt Beaudreu (5m 21s):
We don't talk anymore, but that's okay. There's definitely a peace with that and I'm so thankful for that now. Yeah. As a, as a father and as somebody who has business around, all of my businesses are around raising young people. Yeah. And, and building honorable young people. And we do it arguably better than anybody else in the world. So I'm very thankful cuz it showed me what I didn't want to do and who they didn't want to be. I have nothing against him and, and I hope he's well,
Travis Chappell (5m 47s):
Did did you at the time understand that that was happening in your mind? I feel like that could either, that could push you one of two ways. Like it could be the person that you look up to as the person that is like the example of how to live, live a good life. That that's who you see and perceive that person to be. And then you find out that these, he's doing these other things, it could just lead you into being like, well f it, I'm just, I'll just do what he's doing. Right. But it sounds like it had the opposite effect on you where you're like, oh, actually I still think that that's bad. But then how did you have that idea in your brain that there was bad if the person who was telling you what was bad and good was the guy that was doing the bad thing? Right,
Matt Beaudreu (6m 20s):
Right. And that's where I'm thankful for other mentors. I'm thankful for the, the martial arts and, and the mentors that I got through that I'm thankful that my work ethic put me into where it's 17, I'm like, Hey, I'm leaving the house and I don't ever wanna take another dime for my parents. So I start working three or four jobs at a time and putting myself through college and just being forced into a massive amount of responsibility early and had to be a good guy to maintain jobs and positions and opportunities and, and all of those, all of those things helped save me. Cuz then I could at least realize that a lot of times what I was doing and popping off and being the guy that, you know, being a just an idiot that had to show off or show that he could fight or show that he could, all of those fruitless endeavors.
Matt Beaudreu (7m 3s):
I was doing it still to be the, the young man that my dad was saying I was supposed to be. And they kind of helped show me that. And so it's okay, I could change that. I could take a different route. So
Travis Chappell (7m 14s):
In in your businesses and and ventures now, you obviously spend a lot of time with young people in, in helping them figure out life in that, in that way. Looking back now, do you see some of the lessons that your parents taught you? Cuz they obviously didn't screw up that bad for you to Sure. For you to end up leading a really good life and, and being that conscious at that young of an age to work three jobs, put yourself through college. A lot of people would just go, screw this, I'm just going to go, go hang out with my friends. And then they end up a drug addict and not doing anything and blaming the world for their problems and end up sleeping on the streets and stuff. Do you feel like they did anything to keep you in the pocket, so to speak?
Matt Beaudreu (7m 52s):
Yeah, for sure. I mean there was, there was still this code, right? So my mom, my mom, I've got nothing but great things to say about her. I mean, just the, the work ethic that I think I have now. I mean, she still exhibits that and she just retired at 67 after 45 years with one organization when just crazy hours a week. And she just was mission driven. And so I, I always had that work ethic and I had to take responsibility early. They made me get a job at tent. So there was a lot of really good things, that personal responsibility piece. They both worked together for that. But even my dad, if you watch Sons of Anarchy, right? If you've seen that show or what's a popular one, not Yellowstone or you've got some of these characters, right, who they may not always be good guys and they may do some really, really horrible things, but what they do is they live by a code.
Matt Beaudreu (8m 39s):
Yeah.
Travis Chappell (8m 40s):
They still, they're still principled to a certain extent.
Matt Beaudreu (8m 43s):
Bingo. Yeah. And that was, that was really the best way to explain my old man in his business. Like they were doing some things that weren't cool, but there were still principles involved. They had short fuses and they supported each other's short fuses and believed that men needed to have that kind of aggression. And there were some principles involved. They just sometimes went about it the wrong way or lost control. And I still believe in the ability to have that aggression. I still fall, you know, my friend Jordan beat and talks about the ability, you can't be a good man without having the ability to be bad, without being that savage on the inside and having that under control. And that's something that came from young and Nche and I still very much subscribe to that. I have the ability for a young man to be a savage and to be aggressive, but to have that voluntarily under control and live just in that principled life.
Travis Chappell (9m 31s):
Well, that's the only thing that makes a principled right?
Matt Beaudreu (9m 34s):
Correct.
Travis Chappell (9m 34s):
Like that, that's the problem. That's the problem. The option that is that when people are preaching this weak version of masculinity, they, they're equating weakness with being kind or being nice. Right. Or these other virtues and these That's right. Male driven, these male dominant character traits are often demonized as bad things rather than being good things if you harness them and have control over them. And that's really where the virtue lies, is the ability to do something, but the discipline to not do it, to
Matt Beaudreu (10m 10s):
To choose not to do it, but having that capability, that's exactly it. It's understanding those, those traits as the tools that they are nothing more, nothing less. Yeah. And a tool that is not being used for what it is made for can just be put on the shelf and should be put on the shelf when it can harm others.
Travis Chappell (10m 27s):
So getting a little bit more back, back into your story a little bit here. So yes sir, you're, you're done with college, you feel like you don't have much value to add to the world, but you're clearly a hard worker. You have some principles, what do you do next as a, as a young being early twenties.
Matt Beaudreu (10m 40s):
So I'd like to tell this part of it just because there was a huge upside to it. I mean, literally turn down that job and then I graduate and the day after graduation I'm like, cool man. Now I have no actual full-time career, but I'm walking in the mall and it was the old, the old Abercrombie and Fitch, Hey, you should work here, you know, kind of stuff. You could be a manager if you have a degree. I'm like, I got my degree yesterday. And so, but I'm, but I need a job. And so I actually went to work for that organization for, for a few years and helped open some stores in the Bay area and the greater Sacramento area.
Travis Chappell (11m 13s):
You still smell like Abercrombie and Fitch. It goes away.
Matt Beaudreu (11m 17s):
It, it takes about a, it takes about a decade now. It
Travis Chappell (11m 19s):
Does it's disgust. I'll stay with you Maggie. I can smell that. Go away. We're, we're driving up to the mall and I'm like, this mall has an Abercrombie Fitch. We're like three miles away. You can tell
Matt Beaudreu (11m 27s):
Yes. The amount of stuff that we spray into the air every morning was ungodly. Yeah. It was disgusting. And it was definitely not, but that time it was like the, it was the cool brand for the young, the late teens and early twenties and yeah, this whole culture that went along with it, which was, it was silly, but it was a job and I was gonna get in there and here's the, the silver lining. One of the stores that I went to, the first person I met as I walked in was a lady that I've now been with for 17 years, married for almost 14. And we have three amazing children. So Wow. Definitely. I I would not take that back for, for the world. Yeah, that's
Travis Chappell (12m 3s):
A line of the pro column for sure.
Matt Beaudreu (12m 4s):
Yeah, that's right man. So yeah, so ended up there for a few years and actually ended up helping a guy at one point, didn't know who the gentleman was, but ended up helping him, helping his family. When we got done, he goes, Hey, my own, you're in good shape and, and I appreciate the service. I appreciate what I'm seeing here, leadership style. I've seen you in here a a little bit. Would you be interested in coming, working at one of my stores? It's a completely different industry, but I'm in the fitness industry and I said, well, cool man. I, growing up, I've been an athlete. I was at that point competitive in mixed martial arts and was doing some amateur fights for, for Frank Shamrock at the time. And I'm like, yeah, that's, oh, nice. My degree's in kinesiology and, and so yeah man, I'm interested. And he goes, cool. I own a company called 24 Hour Fitness. I'm sure you've heard of it. You know, the gentleman was Mark Mastro, who was the founder of 24 Hour Fitness.
Matt Beaudreu (12m 45s):
And yeah, sure man, I'm, let's go, let's go do this. So I end up running some gyms for him and in the running at the gyms for him, I end up meeting another person who recruited me to Stanford University, which is really what kicked off, which is now going on two decades in education.
Travis Chappell (13m 2s):
And what was that conversation like? How does somebody approach you from opening up gyms to being like, Hey, come work for us at Stanford,
Matt Beaudreu (13m 9s):
Come work for us here. Yeah, it was a 24 hour fitness kind of an initiative to start putting on seminars at the gym, which that's something that's relatively commonplace I think in a lot of places now. It wasn't at that time, it wasn't that you just, you had a gym membership and you went to the gym, but it was their flagship club in the Bay Area. And so we started putting on various seminars and, and ended up filling in for, for one of the other trainers at one point, one of the other managers who said, man, I'm getting kind of nervous. I don't feel too good. Would you go give this seminar? So I went in there and, and gave that and, and was like, Hmm, I kind of like this. I kind of like this standing up in front of people and speaking and, and helping people and like, I kind of dig this.
Matt Beaudreu (13m 50s):
And somebody that was in there came back to a couple seminars and ended up being really kind of the head of a new corporate trading program at Stanford University.
Travis Chappell (13m 57s):
Oh, nice. No way. Okay. So that, that's,
Matt Beaudreu (13m 60s):
Yep. It's crazy how stuff works, man.
Travis Chappell (14m 2s):
It's always crazy. Yeah. It's like, yes, sir, what Steve Jobs said, you can only, you can only join up the dots when you look backwards. There's no way you'd be able to That's right. Draw those things when you're looking into your future.
Matt Beaudreu (14m 10s):
That's exactly right. And I don't remember who said it, but somebody said, and somebody may have said it to me on my pie at some point, but somebody said, the average man has seven once in a lifetime opportunities and he is almost never paying attention and never catches any of 'em. That's, and I thought that was crazy profound. And, and so we talk about that with our, our own kids. The kids that I get to serve the young, the young people I get to serve. It's like, man, if you will just spend your time collecting experiences when you are younger, say yes, collect experiences, you will have less of a chance of missing those opportunities that are gonna be those things. You look backwards and just go, man, I'm so thankful
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Matt Beaudreu (16m 27s):
So what now? What now, Matt, what's got you going now? What are the things that you're working on after all the things we just talked about? Yeah, so got to know education inside now. And so from, from higher ed, Stanford University to public school teaching public school administrator, private school teacher, private school administrator, which ended up in this speaking career where I did 400 and some odd keynotes over the last seven or eight years for Fortune 500 s all over the world. But in the process of that, I've been opening schools and serving young people. So in part of the Acton Academy network, I own a few campuses in Northern California. People hear school and they think school, these are workplaces for young people. We've got people in high school making 50, 60, 80, $90,000 a year while they're in high school.
Matt Beaudreu (17m 6s):
We have horses that, at my house, at this ranch that I have in California, I have horses because my daughters who are currently 11 and nine bought the horses a couple of years ago with their businesses that they created here at this school. So it's a very different kind of school altogether. Wow. That's I got. That's awesome. A few of those I help. It's amazing, man. I help owners all over the world open these schools and then teamed up with friend of mine, Tim Kennedy, who a lot of people know. Oh yeah. And Tim and I started a mentorship program for young men. I also got Tim, we opened one of my schools with Tim as well out in Texas, but he and I started Apogee Strong, which is a mentorship program for young men. So good men pouring into young men and, and then we have a college alternative, a you that'll launch this fall as well.
Matt Beaudreu (17m 50s):
So all of my businesses are geared towards helping young people develop themselves and and collect those experiences in the most efficient manner possible.
Travis Chappell (17m 59s):
Yeah, I love that this is a mission that you've taken on because it's desperately needed. Yes, sir. And I think that sometimes it can be taken on by people who were raised with one, one worldview, with a bunch of other people, with one worldview, and then went to a place that also taught only one worldview, and then That's right. Went and worked in a field that had that one worldview and then that's the only way that they see the world and it's all a fact. So what I love about your background, which is why I ask a lot of questions about people's background, is that you have very eclectic mix of experiences of people that you grew up with, people that were friends of yours, that had a lot of money, people that were friends of yours, that were going to prison, people that you were working with at in Abercrombie.
Travis Chappell (18m 44s):
It's totally different crowd than working at 24 Hour Fitness, which is totally different crowd than working at Stanford, which is a totally different crowd from being public school administrator, private school. Absolutely. Like there's so many different backgrounds and experiences and people and context and perspective. And it allows, I think a more holistic approach to being able to train young people in, in a positive direction and gives them the ability to think for themselves instead of giving them a guidebook of rules that they have to follow for the rest of their life. And if they don't, they're not a good person anymore and things like that. So that's right. I, I wanna talk to you a little bit about this. It's something at forefront of my mind is one of, one of the reasons literally that when we're starting this podcast is, is that we have, we have two young kids, most of my daughters one, my son is going, going on three, he'll be three awesome in May and nothing teaches you more about how much you don't know how to parent than having kids.
Travis Chappell (19m 33s):
And so that is right. So one of those selfish reasons we're starting to show is to talk to people and be like, Hey, what are we doing wrong here? You know what, I f is hard. This stuff is really hard. So yes, yes sir. I want to, I wanna hear your perspective on what you think it takes. Let's start with young men. I think that, I think that that's a good place to start just because I think a lot of being, being a man and being a a strong young man is something that's under attack in our culture. And I, having a, a son wanna be conscious of, of that and combating some of that from a young age.
Matt Beaudreu (20m 6s):
Man, you are so right about that being under attack. And you're also so right about not, I always tell people, you are the perfect parent until you have kids. Everybody knows how to parent, dude. Everybody knows what they would do. Everybody knows all of that until you have kids and you go, oh my gosh, so much harder. Yeah. Than I thought it would be. And again, so much more fulfilling as well. Right? You know that intellectually, but you can't feel that until you actually have those kids. Totally. You are right. The, especially raising young men, it is something that is culturally under attack and it's under attack from multitude of angles. It's under attack from the media and, and kind of this woke sort of deal and, and all masculine traits, those honorable virtues, that set of virtues, that code that we talked about a little bit earlier is automatically that that's discredited altogether.
Matt Beaudreu (20m 57s):
It's just masculinity is toxic, right? In that whole term, there is no such thing as toxic masculinity. It's like jumbo shrimp. It's a inherent conundrum because masculinity is honorable, set of virtues that are inherently non-toxic. But the media tells you otherwise education. And when I say it, it's really not education, it's schooling from university down is built and predicated upon masculinity being toxic. And so you're getting attacked there. You're getting attacked by distractions. Young men or the like video games, man, kill me. Like because these young men get the opportunity to have all these dopamine hits and feel like they're actually accomplishing something, which you used to only get if you accomplish something, now you get it because you frigging build something in Minecraft or you did well in Call of Duty, I don't even know what the popular games are now.
Matt Beaudreu (21m 53s):
And so yeah, you've got young men being distracted and brought off it. So it is under attack in so many different ways. So from a parental standpoint, our job is to not just, it's not to shield them from it and pretend it doesn't exist, is to acknowledge the enemy that's in front of you and then give them tools to navigate it. Right. Because if you let 'em be prey to it, they're in trouble. If you pretend like it doesn't exist and you shield them so they never know you're also in trouble, you just might be in trouble further on down the line. So if you wanna raise a dragon slayer in times where dragons fricking exist, you've gotta let them know early that there's dragons out there and here's how we find 'em.
Matt Beaudreu (22m 38s):
Right. And so that starts with you fighting 'em as dad. Yeah. Right. I can't preach hard work and character and working harder than others. Treating others the right way, pursuing dreams, being disciplined, remembering that I only have one life to live. Always do. I can't preach any of that to my kids if I'm not first living that day in and day out. Yeah. And surrounding myself with other men who are doing that day in and day out. Right. It starts with me doing the right thing first before I can hold that accountability for my kids and my young man.
Travis Chappell (23m 14s):
Yeah. When they are at such a young age. And you are, and, and I, Jordan Peterson's kind of like absolutely dream guest for us on the show. And guys, I listen to so much of his stuff and I've found it to be extremely helpful in how we're kind of crafting our, our household. But he talks about how the ages between like two and four, two and five are, are so crucial to early child development. Yep. And it, it seems like just an impossible age to get through to a kid cuz it's just they're all over the place. You're not quite sure if they can even understand what it is that you're trying to tell them. Yeah. And when they behave poorly and you punish them for it, sometimes they don't register what it is and then they get mad at you and then they still repeat the action.
Travis Chappell (23m 59s):
And it's just like, man, what do you, how do you, how do you navigate this? What are you supposed to do? How do you, how do what conversation to be having if you can have a conversation versus what you know, things that you wanna put in place to make sure that they don't grow up to be that kid that nobody likes being around, including you.Matt Beaudreu (24m 15s):
Yeah. Because you do want them to be liked at that age, right? You do want, you do want manners and you want those kind of things and it's people, oh, you shouldn't force that upon kids early. No. You want them to be a likable human being because that's going to allow them opportunities later. And people will remember that. People will remember they're likable and I wanna work with them and I want be friends with them and I wanna communicate with them or people will remember. I don't want be around that, that young person and and that sticks with them. And it's a battle that they end up having to, to fight if you don't give them that gift. So you, there's a few things there you were talking about and there's a few Cs you were talking about. You're talking about conversations and that's first and foremost understand that they will be able to make sense of, of much more than you think they will.
Matt Beaudreu (25m 0s):
You won't get, you and I are having a conversation right now and if you're saying something and I'm following you, I'm tracking you, you might see my head kind of nodding, right? You might hear me go, yep, yep. Boom. You're right. Like you have these cues. The young person doesn't necessarily have the ability to understand those cues. They don't necessarily track that same way. So you're not getting that feedback as the communicator. You're not getting that feedback. That does not mean that that young person is not understanding sometimes to a t what you are talking about. You've got it. So give them more credit because they understand almost everything early.
Matt Beaudreu (25m 43s):
They're not gonna understand high level, they're not gonna say metaphysical, they're not gonna understand abstract, they're not necessarily gonna get that. But they're gonna understand. So have the conversation explain even if you don't get the feedback. This is why I said this, this is why it's better for you to make this choice. Right. It's better for you to make this choice because here's the outcome. A, B and C. Yeah. If you made this choice, which is not a good choice, your outcome would be this. So we make this choice as a family and it's not, hey you make this choice young man. It's, this is what we do, meaning we're all in this together. Dad does this too. If dad had this choice, I would also do this.
Matt Beaudreu (26m 23s):
Right? Because he looks up to you and so boom, this is, this is what we're gonna do. And then you continue to always talk about choices. Your choices get you good things, your choices get you bad things. We always do the choices. We make the choices that are gonna get us the good things. And you get 'em used to making choices by presenting 'em with choices. But you present 'em with good choices, you're gonna make choice. Would you like choice A, B, or C? It's what we do from an educational perspective. Do you want to go build this, create this or make this? I'm gonna give you those three choices. All of 'em are good choices. I'm not gonna give you choice. D, E, F, G, h I. Cuz those are all shitty choices. I'm gonna you choice A, B, and C. Right? These are all good. So you get 'em making choices, you understand, you give them the idea of what you would do.
Matt Beaudreu (27m 4s):
You do it calmly. That's another C. So choices, the conversations, choices, bringing it to a point where you're always calm, staying, it doesn't mean you're unemotional. People go, oh the stoicism and you wanna be unemotional. No, stoicism means you're in control of your emotions. Emotions are a great thing. You just need to control those, especially around your kids. You don't want to, you don't need to freak out and yell. You don't wanna make a big deal around those things. You just stay calm and go, okay, well you chose this and so the outcome of that is this. So here's, this is the consequence, right? This is what that looks like. And it just is what it is. Yeah. Plan is day. You let 'em fail on the other side when they make a good choice, that's where you can go over and above in your reaction and have a contrived emotional response where you go, oh my gosh, dude, I saw the way you just walked in.
Matt Beaudreu (27m 52s):
You just shook, you walked up to that guy, you said nice to meet you. You looked him in the eyes and you shook his hand. Are you kid? Do you know what a big, like, do you know what a big kid that is? Do you know you just held the door for your mom and she walked through the door? Yeah. That's what a gentleman is. That's what daddy does. I'm so freaking proud of you. Right? You go over and above that way. Yeah. And the key around all of that is the last seats that being consistent, you do that every time, every day. And that's the hardest part about parenting. Yeah. Well yeah. Is being consistent. But if you're consistent for those first four or five years, I promise you the next 13 while they're in your house Yeah.
Matt Beaudreu (28m 37s):
Are a breeze. Relatively speaking.
Travis Chappell (28m 39s):
Yeah. They're, they're gonna go a lot better
Matt Beaudreu (28m 41s):
Anyway. Yeah. A lot better. Insanely better. That's
Travis Chappell (28m 46s):
The dichotomy of being a parent, right? It's like, yep. During the age where they're the cutest, they're also the most dangerous because if you don't address it, they'll become a nightmare later on. That's when they're not, that's and then they're not cute. And then they're also a nightmare. They're nightmare. They're forced to both.
Matt Beaudreu (29m 2s):
That's right. Oh, for two And you're like, I'm good, I'm all set. I'm moving out actually. Yeah. Yeah. Totally.
Travis Chappell (29m 10s):
So how do you balance as a parent, this might be a loaded question, how do you balance wanting to be their friend and also being their parent? And I know that probably, I think I know the answer already, but it's just so like before, again, like you said earlier, before you're a parent, the answer's easiest. It's like, well I'm a parent first. But then you have a kid and it's like that's the only person in the world that you just want to like you so bad cuz you have this unexplainable, uncontrollable love for them. Yes. Yes. And you just want them to like you. But at the the same time, it's like, damn it though. I know that if I don't, if if I let this go, you're gonna become a little asshole and I don't want you to be a little asshole.
Matt Beaudreu (29m 47s):
For sure.
Travis Chappell (29m 48s):
Now I have to be the asshole.
Matt Beaudreu (29m 49s):
So here's the, we were talking earlier about the ability to be a savage, right? And I, we raised as we have these young men in Aji program, we, we talked to 'em about being the savage gentleman. You want the ability to be a savage, the ability to be a gentleman. You're gonna live most of your life as a gentleman, but you want the ability, you're making that choice. And it seems like this walking contradiction, right? But they actually are complimentary. I am ridiculously aggressive around building my businesses and I want things now, now, now. So I'm gonna work really, really hard. And at the same time, I know things don't happen that fast. So I'm also ridiculously patient. Those things seem like they're opposites. They're not, they're complimentary. It allows me to run that contradiction allows me to do well in the businesses.
Matt Beaudreu (30m 31s):
The answer surprisingly is both. It is both. They're not at odds with each other. Hmm. Being like it's, they're actually not at odds holding the line consistently of here's who we are and this is what we do is not at odds of actually being able to be a friend as well. And I know that's not so people take it too far and they just wanna be a friend, meaning they don't hold the line and they get pushed over. Yeah. Well believe it or not, your young people, especially your young men, they actually wanna know what the boundaries are. Hmm. They actually feel safer if they know. Right? It's like being in a, if I'm in an uncontrollable freaking rollercoaster Yeah.
Matt Beaudreu (31m 15s):
Going 80 miles an hour and I got nothing around me that doesn't feel too safe. But if I'm going 80 miles an hour and I've got the nice cars around me in the leather seats and you
Travis Chappell (31m 22s):
Got the harness and I feel safe to keep your hands harness inside the vehicle at all times,
Matt Beaudreu (31m 26s):
I'm still in a machine that's going like a bad outta hell. Right? But I feel safer. They want that same thing. So if you're consistent, you can hold the line and go, look, these are the non-negotiables man. This is just how we do things. This is the right choice, this is the wrong choice. And then as you're doing this, I'm also gonna have a great freaking time with you and we're gonna be buddies and you're gonna be able to come to me like that's it. But as soon as you cross that line, I'll go, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Hey man. Right? Calmly y you made the wrong choice. Wrong choice means here's your consequence, you can do both.
Travis Chappell (31m 59s):
I was raised very one track minded, one worldview of just lead dogmatic type of a context. And so what I noticed with a lot of my friends when we all kind of grew up, and some of 'em are still kind of in that, some of us kind of left that and some of them, my friends that left, I see them making decisions that I would look at and be like, this is out of integrity for you, for the person that I know you to be. You're making a decision that's not based in the moral code that I know that you've had in the past. Right. And I think it's because they used to tie that moral code to the sense of religion or spirituality that we were raised with. And now that that piece is missing from their life, they lost a tether to a foundation of core values that can drive them those non-negotiables that they have.
Travis Chappell (32m 50s):
And so yeah, one of our missions with the show, we want people to like really think about what are those non-negotiables? What are these core values and how do we live by them? My question to you is more about how do you go about finding what those non-negotiables are? Are these universal non-negotiables? Are these things that everybody should adopt or do they vary case by case at some combination of the two? How do you go about finding
Matt Beaudreu (33m 13s):
Those for yourself? Yeah, that's a really good question man. And so, you know, there are, I, I'm a big believer in, in a number of things, one, that there is such thing as absolute truth. I do believe in some ways there are things, but I think you should always have, I think good questions are infinitely better than good answers. So you, I think you get closer to truth by always questioning. I like what you're saying on that. I think you get closer to the truth by always questioning the truth
Travis Chappell (33m 36s):
Doesn't back down from questions,
Matt Beaudreu (33m 38s):
It does not back down from question. Right. And if anything, you're never gonna find it unless you have more questions. Right. And so any stance that I have on anything, I always take it from the perspective of in with the experience that I have and from the research that I've done, this to me right now seems like the most credible version of what true actually is based on evidence A, B, and C. But I'm also willing to change my mind should better evidence be presented. Yes. I always take it from that. And I have conversations with my kids around that too. And then there are, and I think those a lot of times those specific truths that we are looking for, those do tend to be more of the spiritual or the metaphysical or however you wanna look at it.
Matt Beaudreu (34m 21s):
Right? I think as you kind of come down into more of a micro level, well there's also some just inherent basic truths that serve you well that are still absolute truths. You still need food to survive, you still need water to survive. That is inherent across all humans. I don't care what religion you are, I don't care what country you were born in, I don't care if you were born poor, rich, whatever, anywhere in between, you need to be able to eat and you need water, right? Otherwise you're gonna die. And I think there are some virtues that are going to serve you well. Much in the same manner. I think if you are willing to put in effort to move forward somehow and to try to serve other people, right?
Matt Beaudreu (35m 3s):
And you're gonna, you've got kind of that, we call it work ethic, right? But you're gonna try to make some things happen and create more than you consume. Things tend to work out relatively well. If you want to help other people as much as you can, things tend to work out well. If you treat people well and give them respect, things tend to work relatively well. Right? And so I think you start to combine these, and again, those things all need context, but those are some of those things where I think the more you can kind of align your day-to-day with those things, then you know life tends to work out relatively well. And and we kind of manifest that with in our schools and in our home.
Matt Beaudreu (35m 44s):
We create contracts of, look, currently this year, the elementary studio here will go this year, what do we want our common virtues to be? And the studio will create a contract that's a set of virtues and that says, you know what, we all agree, at least right now, that this set of virtues or principles, if we all live by thoses, this is gonna be a pretty effective studio and we're gonna work really well together, let's create that. We'll sign that and for this year we're gonna go by that and we're gonna see how that goes. Yeah. If they wanna change it next year, they can. That's great. We've done the same thing as a family. We've created 11, the only 11 rule rules in our house.
Matt Beaudreu (36m 25s):
Yeah. That we've all agreed, if we all hold these things sacred, I think things are gonna work out. Which means if I see you vi, if I see my wife violating, I get to call her out. If I see my da, one of my daughters violating, I get to call her out. Hey, by the way, if my daughter or my son or my other daughter, they see me violating, they get to call me out on that. And I have to own up to where I'm missing the boat on that. But having those set of agreed upon principles allows a whole lot less drama in our life and a whole lot less guesswork. We can change 'em if we need to, but it's providing a good roadmap.
Travis Chappell (37m 1s):
What are a couple of the, the ones on your guys' list?
Matt Beaudreu (37m 4s):
I'll give you the 11 ray here so we can have 'em. Got the whole picture of it that is framed in our house. And so rule number one for us is, is to be honest and that's a multi-level sort of deal. So it's being honest obviously as just like a, you and I are having a conversation, I'm not going to lie to you ever. So we don't even, and again, wherever parents wanna go with is fine, but we don't even do like the whole Santa Claus thing in our house. Right? Because guess what? It's not real. So be honest. But it's also be honest with yourself. Be a copycat, which just means follow the patterns of success for people that are doing things you wanna do. Being an emotional ninja, it's kind of that stoicism, be the hardest worker in the room. Be the nicest person in the room, no complaining, fix it.
Matt Beaudreu (37m 46s):
So don't come complaining without a solution. Think because most people won't. Discipline equals freedom. For my friend Jocko Memento Mory, again, just understanding that this life ends right? And so don't waste time. You are personally responsible, meaning it is always your fault. If there's something on the ground that's garbage and needs to get picked up, you're the one responsible for doing it. If there's a chore that needs to get done, that's not being done, you're the one responsible for doing it. If we all take that attitude, things get done and the right doing the right thing is always the right thing. So those are the 11 that are hanging up in our house.
Travis Chappell (38m 18s):
Love it. Now that's, that's awesome. That's a great, a great start. I think for a lot of people out there who maybe, maybe don't have that and is there, is there, do you think there's too many, do you think that you could like kind of go overboard? Like how important do you think it is to maybe start with a list of 30 or 40 and whittle it down to the ones that you think make the highest impact?
Matt Beaudreu (38m 36s):
Yeah, I, I think especially as you got young kids, right? If you got, when you think about it from a coaching perspective, if I'm teaching a kid how to play basketball and, and I'm coming at 'em with 40 different plays, that's a tough deal. But if they're learning the fundamentals and there's just a few basic plays, yeah, we can expand from there, then great. And then they start to add their own flavor to the game. That's great. But yeah, start small.
Travis Chappell (38m 59s):
Yeah. I like the idea of kind of crafting their identity from a young age as Yeah. As to what's expected of you. Cuz I think, I think kids, and again, I, my kids are still pretty young, so we'll figure this out as they get a little bit older. Yeah. But I think kids a lot of times are like, parents are playing catch up with the mistakes that their kids are making. Yeah. And they have to like go back and say, this is why you shouldn't do this. Or they just go with the whole like, well, it's because I said so things since that works out so well. Awful. And I, I think something like this is so important, especially like if you have something like literally hung up in your home, like it sounds like you do and, and like we do, it's just something that this is what chapels do, this is what bores do.
Travis Chappell (39m 44s):
Like this is what, this is just what we do. Like, so that's right. You were caught doing this thing and then you made an excuse about it and you blame it on somebody else. It what, what does that rule say right there? Like says ex like take radical responsibility. Is that taking radical responsibility? That's right. Is that how a chapel should behave? No. Like this is, this is who you are. This is your identity. This is not a thing that you do. This is the person that you are, the person that you need to become is the person that does these things and acts this way.
Matt Beaudreu (40m 11s):
Bingo. And that's, and what you said was so powerful. This is what we do. This is what a chapel does. This is just what we do. Right. When you, when that is the thing, and you as dad are actively doing that thing all of the time. Yeah. Or if you mess up, you go, whoa, whoa, whoa. Hey everybody gather around. I just screwed this up. Yeah. I need to change that. Then it is what you do. You don't ever have to say, well, because I said so because it's far more powerful to say because I do so.
Travis Chappell (40m 44s):
Right,
Matt Beaudreu (40m 45s):
Right. When you say, because I do so, and those young people know that that is absolutely true, then they just go, okay, this is what I need to do. Yeah. When it's just because I said so. And especially if they see you doing something else. Yeah. That's never gonna stick, man. There's, they're, they are smarter than you think they are. They understand more, they're more con contemplative. Like they, they just, they get things, man. Yeah. So they're gonna put that together that you're not, that there's hypocrisy there.
Travis Chappell (41m 12s):
And, and to me that just leads to, even if it's not even conscious, it's a subconscious mistrust in you as the parent. Right. Which will make your job, I feel like exponentially more difficult as they enter teenage years and have more opportunity to rebel when it's correct. If, if they can see that we have principles that are guiding us and these principles lead to an incrementally better or exponentially better life overall than like That's right. Some of their friends who, who maybe they were pointing out and being like, well, why does Scotty get to do this thing? And it's like, well, we don't worry about what Scotty does. We worry about what we do. And then that's right. They see that over time be like, oh, well Scotty's parents seem to live this type of a way and they seem to have these types of issues and it doesn't seem like we have these things.
Travis Chappell (41m 59s):
And they start to see the evidence of the principled living and how that actually that's right. Comes to fruition in life. And I think all that stuff, like, like you said, is just data being collected in their little brains that just informs the way that they're going to treat you later on anyway.
Matt Beaudreu (42m 14s):
That's exactly right. And you'll be crazy surprised how quickly they make those connections and the things that will come out. Again, if you're consistent in pointing those out, consistent in pointing out when you made a good decision and you made a bad decision and apologizing when you went away from the values. And like the more you're just consistent with that, you'll, your mind will get blown when it, all of a sudden it's your six-year-old or your seven-year-old who goes, Hey, yeah. So I was taking a look at it like Jimmy said that this is what happened at home, but of course this is what happened to his family of course, because they made the, like, they'll be able to put that, those kind of concepts together so ridiculously early. It will blow your mind.
Matt Beaudreu (42m 54s):
Thanks. They really, really will. They really will. But it's, they have to be consistent to get there.
Travis Chappell (42m 60s):
Matt, this has been a a lot of fun for me as a conversation too, ma'am, thank you for allowing me to ask a bunch of selfish questions that that's awesome. Should, that's awesome. Inform, inform us a little bit more and, and hopefully our audience as well before we get going here, how can we help you? How can we support you? Where, where can our listeners go find more?
Matt Beaudreu (43m 15s):
That's awesome, man. I appreciate it. Most active on IG under my name at at at Map Bore. But our podcast is at the essential 11. Again, it's just top notch advice from real world leaders to young people. The the schools are called the Acton Academies, A C T O N, and our mentorship program for young men is apogee strong.com. Any of those places are great.
Travis Chappell (43m 36s):
Perfect. So go check out Matt's Instagram. I know he posts a lot of content over there and I think the other things that he mentioned are also in his bio there as well. So if you want just one place to go, go find at Matt bore. Bore is B as in boy, E A u D as in dog, R E A U at Matt bore over on Instagram. Give him a follow, check out some of the stuff he's got going on. Subscribe to his podcast. You're listening to a podcast right now. You clearly care about these things. If you liked what Matt had to say, go subscribe to their podcast. I'm sure you will not regret that. Matt, thanks so much for coming on the show today, man. This is a lot of fun.
Matt Beaudreu (44m 7s):
Honored sir. Thanks brother.