We have jobs, lawns, friends, wives or girlfriends (or not), houses, cars, bills, church or synagogue or mosque or meeting house (or not), volunteer commitments, and…

Did I mention we have kids?

We take our kids to cello concerts, basketball camps, ballet practices, soccer games, camp, Brownies, Cub Scouts, and—oh yeah—school!

And when we do have some little snippet of free time with our kids, we look at them and ask a big question.

“What should we do?”

We hope they have a good idea of some incredible bonding experience that only takes 15 minutes like tossing around the football while giving them advice about their very important personal issue.

More often than not, they have no flippin’ idea. And neither do we, because we just rushed out from a meeting or we’re trying to figure out if we have enough money to replace the water heater.

Sometimes we have good ideas, but often we’re stumped. And the precious minutes we have with our kids evaporate without us or the kids having much fun or growing closer.

That sucks. I want to us solve that problem.

I want us to build the Good Dad App.

Picture it—at that moment of “What should we do?” you pull out your phone (or hop online). It already knows how many kids you have, their approximate ages, what kind of thing you’ve enjoyed doing before.

You enter in how much time you have, and if you want to be outside or inside.

BAM!

The Good Dad App gives you 10 great ideas to do, given your preferences and circumstances. It’s cool stuff from other good dads, like a learning how to play Spud out in the yard, trying to solve a quick new riddle, building a water balloon launcher, answering a “would you rather” question, or exploring a park nearby. You can look through the options and decide what you want to do, or you can sit with your kid and talk about what’s the best option. Not thrilled with any?

BAM! Get ten more ideas!

So you don’t have to rack your brain trying to come up with the right idea at the right time. The Good Dad App will do it for you, and you just get to have fun with your kids and be their superhero.

I can’t do this by myself.

So starting on Father’s Day 2013, I’m starting to gather a core team of people who:

• think this should happen,
• can give input on what would be the most helpful,
• want to hear about progress first, and
• will tell others about it.

This will mostly be us guys who want to be a good dad more than anything. But women who love guys who want to be good dads will give valuable input, too.

Will you join me?

Pop over to signup.gooddadapp.com to enter your email and stay in the loop.

Follow @GoodDadApp on Twitter.

Like The Good Dad App Facebook page.

And would you please share this with a couple good dads that you think would be stoked about this project?

Let’s see if we can get this off the ground, so that on Father’s Day in 2014 even more kids say beautiful words:

“You’re a good dad.”

Things We Need More Of…

Eye contact

Patience

Salads

Silence

Parties

Paddleboats

Listening

Observation towers

Hand-holding

Neighborhood parks

Courage

Treehouses

Dancing

Courtesy

Afternoons in the sprinkler

Campfires

Hymns

Homecooking

Tea

Main Streets

Potlucks

Friends dropping by

Hope

Uncluttered homes

Amateur paintings

Gumption

I came up short.

What do you say?

But parties are a lot of work. Here’s how we do this without breaking our backs (or the bank):

1. Find your buddy. There are two of us, so the cleaning, set-up, and cooking gets shared.

2. Get more help. See #1 and share the load with a wider team. This time, we had help from Chrissy’s brother, my sister, my parents, and a handful of people we easily arm-twisted into helping when they showed up at the party.
3. Find your space. When you are familiar with a location, your brain develops a mental checklist of what needs to happen. You walk through and know what to do with minimal strain on your brain.
4. Move it out. We intentionally bought a house that wasn’t very big but has a big yard. So six months of the year, we can have big parties outside. This makes a huge difference in clean-up and also minimizes the stress of making the house look great beforehand. Mow your lawn at least a couple days before the party. We’ve added a fire pit, chicken coop, basketball hoop, garden, walking path, tireswing, and treehouse for a carnival feel. Next on my list is a Tilt-a-Whirl.
5. Give it a good name. A couple of ours in the last couple years have been Chicken Booyah, The Party of Biblical Proportions, and The Publication Celebration. With a fun name, it sticks in people’s brains and intrigues them.

6. Invite thoughtfully. What group(s) of your friends are you going to invite? Who do you want to meet whom? What would be really fun connections to form? Help those happen by inviting the right people, then introducing them with tidbits of helpful information.

7. Stop caring. Or to put it another way, start caring about the right things. This is a big one—if you want your party to be perfect for everyone, you will have a terrible time. Trust that people can take care of themselves, find the taco dip, and make connections with one another. The important thing is to draw people together.  And lighten up.  We recently found a little girl had pooped on our bathroom floor.  Such things happen.

8. Consider your timing carefully. Party at 1:00 on a Saturday? People are unsure about whether to eat beforehand. The party we just had was 2-4 pm, a great window that says, “We are not providing a meal,” comfortably and easily setting expectations.

9. Make it a potluck. Why cook for 80 people when you can have 80 people cook for you? If you go for a meal time for an epic party, have people bring something to share. This can be around a theme, like how we recently had a fancy cheese/crackers and pie potluck for Chrissy’s birthday. Other good options include blue foods, pirate foods, fried foods, or dessert-for-dinner, a longstanding birthday tradition for me. Last year, we even did a zucchini night where everyone showed up and cooked our garden overflow!  And on our “someday” list are a kiddie swimming pool full of pudding dip, a pig slaughter/roast (starting with a live pig), and a garlic mustard pull.

10. Have your go-to recipes. You inevitably have to contribute something, even to a potluck, and it’s good to have a big dish that’s delicious and easy to anchor the meal. Chili, casseroles (or “hot dish” for the Minnesotans), sloppy joes, lasagna, or something on the grill all fit the bill.

11. You never have too many chairs. We have seating for 24 when you take some patio furniture, cheapo plastic ones that remind us of years in the majority world, camp chairs, and our mismatched dining room chairs. It’s still not enough.

12. Buy cheap, reusable plastic dishes. This will help on the clean-up, and keeps another bucketful of trash out of the landfills. Make sure they stack well.

13. Get a big Igloo drink jug, like they use to dump Gatorade on winning football coaches. Drinks can end up as the most expensive part of a party, or one of the least. You can ask folks to bring some or provide some juice in one of these bad boys. And if you live in Wisconsin, brewing your own beer could save you 30% of your party budget, and earn major points with your beer nerd friends.

14. Empty the dishwasher before the party. Some kind guest will inevitably carry a stack of plates to the kitchen, rinse them, and fill it for you. Awesome!

15. Start walking around while brushing your teeth. This will indicate to everyone that your epic party is winding down. They’ll laugh, grab their stuff, and roll out, having had a great time.

 What other tips do you have for throwing great parties?

• get in shape
• read more
• spend more time with your kids
• stop gossiping
• read the Bible this year
• learn to sew

How’s that workin’ out for ya?

If you made a resolution in January, you have almost certainly given it up, forgotten it, and basically remained the same person you were on December 31^st.

Why?

It could be that you didn’t really need to change. Or perhaps you sincerely changed your mind. Or maybe you already accomplished.

Yeah, right.

I can tell you—in one word—why you gave up on those New Year’s resolutions…

February.

In my neck of the woods, February is cold, dark, and desperate. We even made February one day shorter than even the 30-day months. That wasn’t enough, so we trimmed off another day.

February is a grind. You’re inside all the time. If you don’t have Seasonal Affective Disorder, you almost wish you had a diagnosis, some indication of why you want to stick icicles in your eyes. There’s snow and slush and more snow. Everybody bundles up and looks at the ground when they walk.

No one is grilling out.

No one is tossing a Frisbee around.

No one is smiling.

No one is stopping to smell the roses, because they’re under ugly white Styrofoam, like giant upside down coffee cups from church social hour. Oh, and those are covered by snow.

It’s enough to break anyone’s resolve. February is no time to make a change. It’s no time to kick a habit or start a new one. It’s the month to hunker down, to make do, to survive.

But May is a month with potential! The snow’s gone. The days are longer (and getting still longer). The slush and slop has all dried up. Flowers are starting to open. You leave your jacket at home. Baby ducks cross the road in front of you on the way home from work.

So how about some spring resolutions? The time is ripe! Choose what you will change. Make some plans. Tell a friend. Drop some pounds, lift some weights, throw some parties, smell the roses, and give someone a big sloppy kiss.

Now is the time. Tomorrow is Saturday. Most of the country’s going to have a pretty nice day (sorry, Tennessee). So start something good.

Who’s with me?

Today, I will travel 1300 miles, from Madison, Wisconsin, to Orlando, Florida, with a layover in Cincinnati.

I will get more done today, with security checkpoints, three airports, and Cinnabon. (At least I hope there’s Cinnabon.)

Simply put, I will get more done today, because I am forced to go into Airplane Mode.

I have three hours on flights where I first have to shut down my phone and laptop, and then can only use them offline. (I have yet to be on a flight with free wi-fi, and I wouldn’t use it anyway, as you’ll see below.)

Forced into Airplane Mode, I do not have distractions—no social media (which, though part of my job, still can distract

me from larger projects), no interruptions from colleagues (again, part of my job, but still sometimes problematic), no videos of ridiculous compound fractures or Do You Even Lift.

Rather, I have a list ready of important tasks:

• documents to read (as hard copies),
• magazines I’ve been wanting to get to (tip o’ the hat to Greg Jao for that), and
• a couple of projects that need my undivided attention, like strategic plans, upcoming talks, an app I’m dreaming up (it’ll be helpful to many, if I can find the right co-conspirators), or outlines for books I might want to write down the road.

Now, here’s the rub—I realized how effective I was in Airplane Mode on a trip back in January. It was confirmed by another trip in February. I told myself, “ I should do this a couple times a week, even when I’m in the office!”

Despite my plans, I’ve not done it even once, except while traveling. The wise words of Clif Morton, my high school forensics coach, come to mind: “Good intentions are worth a thimbleful of donkey urine.” (Click to tweet this.)

So, I’m going into Airplane Mode today and again on Friday. And I plan to do it again next Monday…when I’m back in the office.

Do you get more done while in Airplane Mode? What trick are you trying this week to get more done and decrease your stress? Comment below.

Stuff your stress way down deep and get ulcers.

Meditate on the word “peace” until the knots in your shoulders melt away.

Revert to a preschool state and let ball pits, nap time, and pudding pops calm you down.

Take some hard drugs.

But the absolute worst thing you can do?

Vomit your stress all over a spouse, friend, or coworker. (You will likely ruin their outfit.)

I realized this a couple weeks ago. I was on my way out of the office after a full and frustrating day. I did not get to the things I hoped to accomplish. And as I packed up and walked out, I barfed it all over my friend Dan:

Oh, I have so much to do! I didn’t get anything done today. I had five and a half hours of meetings and three hours of interruptions! I have 75 emails I’ve not read—just from today! I need to have a difficult conversation with somebody in the office tomorrow, and I’m not ready! My boss says I have to report on that big project tomorrow, and I have a cavity to fill! I haven’t been able to exercise in weeks, my car needs new tires, it’s raining today, my kid got yelled at by the bus driver, the paint’s peeling on my house, and we have a houseguest I don’t know arriving tonight and staying through the weekend!

Barf. I threw up the vile bile of stress all over Dan, the innocent bystander. He was now covered in my stinky, orange, chunky…stress.

Did this help Dan? No way. Unless he’s really rotten—“Golly, I’m glad I’m not Adam!”—he’s pulled down by my load. He might even feel pressure to share all the ways he’s stressed, even if he’s not really stressed, just to empathize a bit. Yes, good friends bear one another’s burdens (Galatians 6:2), but I’m not sure this fits the bill.

Did this make me feel better? Not really. It can be helpful just to articulate what’s stressing us out but vomiting it onto someone else doesn’t help. It’s really a selfish move—“Oh, look at me, feel sorry for me, buy me a drink, tell me how I’m such a good victim!” At its best, this is taking mental stock of my life in the presence of someone else. At its worst, it’s trolling for assurance and comfort, while covering others in our mess.

I am stressed today. I have a lot to do. I have a lot of meetings. I am behind. Others are waiting on me. I want to do a good job. There’s not enough time.

But today will be different. Today, I won’t vomit stress on innocent passerby. (Click to tweet this.)

Am I alone in this? Do any of you barf stress on others? (Or get barfed on?)

Take a listen, and let me know what you think.

Click here to listen.

Here it is:

Read the rest…

I forgot them! This trip is going to be terrible! I always check for them! How could I forget? Why didn’t I stop for half a second to make sure I was all set?

Yes, there are a lot of important things to bring on a work trip. For me, my mental list include a minimal amount of clothing, my always-packed toiletry caddy, a book or three, my laptop and phone, power cords, ID, and money. (Leave your ideas in the comments.) But there is one item—or two depending on how you look at it—that I forgot this time. And my reaction to leaving it behind indicated it was probably the thing I needed most.

Sleep is important all the time, but while traveling, it rises even higher. And there are additional challenges while on the road—new noises outside, people in the hall or even sharing a room, different lighting inside and outside of where you’re sleeping, different energy levels due to the work going on, jetlag, and the bed and pillow themselves.

I have one silver bullet for making everything alright, one tool I use to solve all of these problems. And yesterday, I freaked out when I realized I’d forgotten them.

Earplugs.

Earplugs have a psychosomatic effect on me. When I put them in and close my eyes, I know I’m supposed to fall asleep. Noises are shut out, and everything else is put in perspective. My earplugs tell my brain and my body, “Knock it off! You need to sleep now.”

I use the rubber kind with stalks that stick out. They block more noise than other types, in my estimation. I look like a weird alien with them in, but it’s worth it.

So as I panicked about never falling asleep last night, I ripped apart my travel gear in desperate hope they’d made it into my roller bag. No dice. But then, an idea flashed.

I reached into my bag for work that I’d also brought. Down in the bottom was a pair of earplugs I’d thrown in a week ago. “Yes!” Earplugs are my secret weapon as a travel ninja. (Click to tweet this.)

And it’s a good thing I did. I was sharing a room at a retreat center with a coworker. Watch the video, with your volume all the way up, and then mentally double the volume, and remember what time it is.

I was very glad I had the earplugs.

What are you always sure to have with you while on the road? Leave a comment.

Andy Crouch, the author of Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling, said something there that intrigued me: “The form is more formative than the content.” He went on to say that the Facebook Like button itself is forming our culture more than the content people are “liking.”

As someone who spends a lot of time thinking and working to put good content up with Like buttons on it, I had to follow up. I asked if he’d written anything more on the “culture making” of social media platforms, or if he’d like to guest post on this for the InterVarsity blog. He replied that he hadn’t, he wouldn’t, and “You should write it.” I really respect Andy Crouch.

Here I am.

Now, I’m not a brain scientist or a software engineer or a theologian. But I am employed to use social media for good, to equip others to do the same, and I think critically about what I do. So I aim here to reflect a bit and start some conversation on this.

So what are the effects of the Facebook Like button?

We share only what is positive, and its corollary, don’t be a downer. This might be overstating it, but there is a clear preference of one over the other.

We’ve all seen friends lament the lack of a “dislike” button. Is it appropriate to click Like on a post about someone finding out they have cancer and that they’re going to fight it? You like the latter but not the former. So, we are subtly pushed to share what will cause others to read, smile, nod, and Like.

Does this keep us from important topics that are difficult? Are those reserved for face-to-face conversations? As more of our relationships are mediated, do we lack the time and physical space to deal with the hard things in our lives? (Click to tweet this.)

We are inordinately focused on others’ opinions, and its corollary, these are the opinions that matter. I think it’s human nature that we want to be liked, and that this even has some positive social norming to it. We may be more desirous of a life that is worth living—that others commend—as a result of the Like button.

But more often than not, we can end up chasing the approval of the crowd, even if the crowd is headed in the wrong direction. Rather than hearing heroic voices, those who are living—and thinking—in exemplary fashion, we are voted up and down by people who may be trying to feel good about their choices. This is why we need to choose our Facebook friends carefully. (Click to tweet this.)

We have an illusion of action and relationship when we use the Like button. (Click to tweet this.) Does it really matter that I’ve liked a friend’s update or the page of an anti-human trafficking organization? I may have an undue sense of accomplishment from the weakest of all responses: clicking a virtual button while sitting on a couch.

A million little actions can build up into something significant. Maybe the publicness of Facebook inherently fights off hypocrisy. But there is certainly a temptation to Like something and then not write a thank you letter to someone or a letter to your public official, right?

Other effects of the Like button come to mind: it’s hard to have respectful disagreements, we may inflate ourselves, we substitute a thousand shallow connections for a few deep ones, we waste time, numbed to the effect of the tool itself.

So, do you think “The medium is the message?” How is this form forming us? Let’s interact in the comments.