Dr. Jessica Peck Hello, and welcome to the Dr. Nurse Mama show, prescribing hope for healthy families here on American Family Radio. Here's your host, professor, pediatric nurse practitioner,

Dr. Jessica Peck and mom of four, Dr. Jessica Peck.

Dr. Jessica Peck Well, hey there, friends, and welcome to my favorite time of day, my favorite day of the week. It is fry. Yay, everybody, it is Friday. We've made it to the end of another week, and I'm so glad that you're here for our Healthy Habit series. Back in January, we started. Every Friday we talk about a habit for healthy families because it is in the everyday obedience that we have to the word of God that magic is made in our families. Really, truly. There is no instant cure, no life hack know something that's going to solve all of our problems just without any cost or convenience. It's just the everyday obedience. Obedience. And there's grace to be found in that. We started with four core spiritual disciplines back in January. We went through some communication, some rhythms that you need, some communication skills. We talked all summer about tech, and we did a safety series early in the fall. And right now we're in what I call the be attitudes, and we're talking about different ways to be. Last week, we talked about being with family that can be really complicated and difficult, especially at the holiday times, and so talked about what that m might look like. This week's habit is beginning. Content. Now, I know you may think, ugh, I, know. I know I am content. Or maybe I want to be more content. Contentment is a really tricky thing, but it is a quietly expanding presence in our family life, and it's impacting our kids more than I think we think it is. And so we've got to learn how to be content in a world that is thriving on and marketing discontentment. And you know this because if you've opened your phone, just not really feeling any particular negativity going into it, but all of a sudden, you close it thinking, oh, I hate my kitchen. My vacation was terrible. My skin looks old. My kids. My kids are not achieving nearly as much as other people. I need this organization system. I need this car. I need this toy. That is the system that we're up against. And maybe you loved your house until you saw someone else's renovation. Maybe you enjoyed your family vacation until another family posted theirs. And all of a sudden, your camping trip doesn't look as glamorous as their overseas cruise or whatever that they took. Or you felt proud of your kid until someone else shared something else their kid did. We live surrounded by constant invitations to be discontent, to be dissatisfied. Advertising offers something that we lack. They are selling us a problem we didn't even know we had. So then they can turn around and give us that solution. An influencer culture makes else's lifestyle feel like that is the goal, that is the standard. That is what I want my house to look like. That's what I want my life to look like. And parenting culture tells us our children, they need every opportunity. If you don't get them this sports coach, oh, they're going to be so behind. If you don't get them an SAT tutor, they are never going to get into college. And it feeds this fear that we have that should be a warning sign. And even wellness messaging can turn caring for our bodies into just this exhausting process of continual improvement. These pressures are meeting us right in the middle of our real life and real circumstances because groceries cost money and families face illness and grief and financial strain and dreams that they had that just have fallen through. We've got to distinguish some of those genuine burdens, some of those real hard things that we're facing, whether that is financial, relational, circumstantial, from these manufactured things that are, are stoked for our discontentment. That is really important because imperfect life is a reality that we are facing. Nobody's life is ever going to be perfect. So this week's habit. We're talking about being content. And we're asking, how can families learn to enjoy what they have, trust God with what they lack and just stop postponing contentment until something changes in your circumstance that is important. To do that, we've got to take a look at consumer culture because that is the message that we have. I'll be happy when I get a bigger house. I get a newer car that doesn't break down all the time, when I can stop paying for my kids school or college or whatever it is. But discontent really isn't new. Its reach has just gotten more sophisticated and expanded because we have long linked possessions with success Here in America. It's all about what you have. That's the American dream. And we saw this marketing in the 1920s with you can have it now and you have mass advertising and you have installment buying and you have normalizing, just buying stuff just instantly. And. But then in the 1930s and 40s and up to World War II, we had to have a little more constraint. Now, just having constrained or restraint didn't mean that people weren't discontent with it. They just learned to do with what they had. And a lot of people did learn contentment through that. My grandparents certainly did. But then a lot of people did not like that. When we saw the 1950s and 60s, it was the American dream, really expanded its shopping list. And we see this and still obsession today with mid century modern houses, right? Everybody wants to have that because everybody wanted the ranch house with the pink bathroom and the blue bathroom and all of those things that are there, whether it's a car or an appliance or a sunken family living room. And then we saw in the 1950s, children became for the first time really a direct consumer audience. Now you just did this by watching Saturday morning cartoons and you couldn't fast forward through the commercials, which kids today don't understand at all, and you would become a consumer. And advertisers were deliberately cultivating this in kids and now it's just everywhere and that messaging. Your life will feel complete after you get this, oh, this will change your life. This is going to, this is, this is life changing. And we see these kinds messages really normalized in comparison culture because someone else's life is there to prove that yours feels inadequate. Maybe you love your house, but you go to somebody else's house for dinner, for a life group, for a family gathering and you leave thinking man, my house is terrible. That is such a bad mindset. But we all fall prey to it. We also can fall prey to achievement culture that we feel good about our achievements till we see somebody else's. We feel good about our beauty and wellness routine until we see someone else's. We feel good about the experiences we were giving our kids. Until we open our social media and see someone else's, we feel even comparison with outrage culture. There's always something, I'm more angry than you, I'm more fired up than you. I'm more out of activist than you. And many businesses benefit when we are, just keep looking for the next improvement. We don't have an internal definition of enough. There's never ever enough. We are prey to this upgrade mentality because we're constantly encouraged to replace or improve or optimize everything from our phones to our homes to our bodies. And we start to feel like, okay, nothing we have is enough. Parenting is a competitive sport these days and we see these public scorecards now because people post their kids accomplishments on social media. Now that's not necessarily a bad thing, but it can be a lure for discontentment in our own lives, with our own families. We see everybody's curated lives on content display. We can pair our everyday reality the worst moments of our day with the best 12 seconds of someone's Tuesday afternoon, that's going to breed discontentment. We also see commercialization of belonging. Now, what do I mean by that? Well, this is a brand delivery promise. Like, if you buy this, if you have this brand, you'll feel content with this. You know, when you put that purse over your shoulder, when you put that perfume or cologne on and you have this brand, buy this, you'll fit in. Oh, buy this. People will think more of you. You'll be more content with this. Your public perception, that is a really, that's a real thing. And busyness is even worn as a badge of honor because when we have packed calendars, this just signals to others, hey, I'm really important and I'm a really good parent because I don't have any margin in my schedule. I am packing every single minute to the max with every possible experience that we could have. And, and then parents take on this pressure to create this magical childhood. We see this in the holidays, like, okay, my kids, Christmas isn't going to be good as their cousin's Christma and I can't afford to give that kind of Christmas experience to them. And are my kids going to feel left out? Are they going to, are they going to not like our popcorn garland? And we just get so materialistic. And then we idolize our personal fulfillment as the highest goal that we can have. With every commitment, we think, oh, I'll be really happy when I get married, when I have kids, when I have a house, when I have a new car. It's the goal post is, always moving. And then it really overshadows those ordinary sacrifices that we have in everyday life, in everyday marriage and everyday parenting, everyday caregiving. It just starts to look like evidence that we're doing something wrong. And that is not the truth. Another thing that concerns me about contentment, that's stealing our contentment is not just feeling jealous of what other people have and longing for something better. It's using outrage as entertainment. We see the, the word of the year a couple of years ago. By one dictionary, society was rage bait. And that's a word that younger cultures use on purpose to make somebody, unhappy, make them discontent, make them angry on purpose because I think it's funny. Let's make them, pull them to disentang, dis, to outrage as entertainment for ourselves that is not godly or good. And we also see in another way something that looks good, that nostalgia, nostalgia for the past that devalues the present. Oh, I wish that we were still in that phase. Oh, I, wish my kids were still younger. I wish my kids were still, you know, at home. I wish they hadn't grown up. I wish we still lived in this house. I wish we still lived in this neighborhood. I wish we still went to this church. Oh, these are things that I feel very deeply when we treasure the past and we, instead of helping to find that purpose in its own time, that recognize that just because this stage is different doesn't mean that it takes away any of the value of that. But how do we be content in this stage? And we've all got real financial pressures that are paired with rising expectations. We're struggling to afford what we need, but we still just, oh, treat yourself. That whole culture, culture keeps, expanding the definition of what is enough. We can prayerfully decide what we're going to be content. And we have a really good example for that in the Bible. But before we get to that just yet, let me tell you a little bit more about why comparison is so powerful. Because we compare our entire lives, everything, the good, the bad, the ugly, the very ugly, with usually the best moments that other people are, are putting on display. And even we see increase increasingly. This is something I don't need to tell you. You know, major medical organizations, major child advocacy organizations are saying, hey, when kids are on social media more, it makes them more discontent. Because comparison can make a good thing feel disappointing without changing whatever happened. This is really important for us to recognize. So maybe you're proud of your kids report card until you see someone else's kids report card or one of your other kids report cards is better. Or maybe you really enj your anniversary dinner, but then you saw what someone else's spouse did for them for their anniversary. Nothing changed about the experience you had. You walked away from that experience thinking, I enjoyed that. I like that. But then all of a sudden, it's not enough. Now, that gift didn't shrink. It didn't change in any way. The reference point changed because our brains assert, assess rewards partly in relation to what, what others receive. So all of a sudden we just downgrade it in our mind because we're comparison and we're comparing it. And an observation can very quickly become a judgment. This is another way that we get pulled into comparison traps because we can think like, oh, she has a beautiful home. But all of a sudden that means, oh, my house is embarrassing, Their child is successful, means I'm failing as a parent, and the painful Part is often that meaning that we attach to the difference. We're not not talking about what we actually see. We're saying what does that say about me? And comparison can turn someone else's success into a personal loss for you. Like if they get something that maybe we didn't even think we wanted, but they just get something and all of a sudden I think, well, why do they get that attention? I did that same thing, I didn't get that kind of attention. And science shows that frequent upward comparisons during social media browsing can lower our mood and our self esteem. Their good news, someone else's good news is not a bad indictment or report on your life. And comparison is the thief of joy. Sometimes the purchase that we have represents an emotional need because your child want may want expensive shoes because they are longing for belonging and they think that's what's going to make them belong. You want a renovated kitchen because you want to feel successful or comfortable inviting other people over. So we think, okay, what do you hope having that would change for you? And there's a same example that can inspire us or discourage us. Sometimes we think, oh, that's great, that's aspirational, I want to do that. Or man, I'll never be able to do that. And so we've got to ask ourselves, is there something useful to learn here or am I just using this person to punish myself unnecessarily? Watch for that moment when your mood shifts. You pick up your phone feeling fine and then all of a sudden you start scrolling and your mood shifts and you think, did something happen in my life or did I just spend 20 minutes looking at other people's lives? Kids hear what adults use as measuring sticks for their own contentment. I'll tell you about that and what we do about it. I'll have some help and some hope on the other side of this break. Hello, I'm Jessica peck, host of Dr. Nurse Mama. Did you know that this show is listener supported? Without people like you, this show would not exist. And that's why we need you. A generous monthly gift of any amount will help sustain American Family Radio, specifically this show as we reach thousands of people each week with biblical truth. Please consider becoming a monthly financial partner today by visiting afr.netgive that's afr.net give.

Dr. Jessica Peck Lord, it feels good to be loved. To be loved, to be loved. To be loved by you. Wow. To be loved by you. Your love is like the sunlight that shines on my face every day. It meets me in the morning dawning in a thousand new shades Man I know I don't deserve Ain't nothing short of perfect I ain't done a thing to earn it but you give it anyway Thought it feels good to be loved to be loved to be loved to be loved by you to be loved by you Ain't nothing I can do I'll be loved, I'll be loved it's enough to be loved by you it's why I would love.

Dr. Jessica Peck Welcome back, friends. That is Lord, It Feels Good by Toby Mack. And it does feel good to be loved by the God of the universe. And sometimes we lose sight of that and we get discontent real quick. And we get really discontent really quickly. And that's, what the habit for today we're talking about is being content. How do we be content now? We may think, hey, I'm perfectly content. I actually, I do a pretty good job of that. But our kids are really great accountability partners, and they will tell us the truth even when we don't see it. Believe me, they'll tell the fifth grade Sunday school teacher everything that has happened to me way more than once. They will tell on you. And children use what, they're hearing adults say as their measuring sticks for the world. So when we repeatedly admire other things that we don't have, maybe that's the biggest house, maybe that's what we see as the better physique, the most accomplished child, they hear what we value and they see that as, a commodity that they need that will get them social capital, that will get them relational capital within the family. So we need to catch ourselves when we are comparing and just say something out loud and say, you know what? I just got myself comparing. I can appreciate what they have and still enjoy what we have. Let them see that correction in real time. Sometimes we think that, but especially when we have kids around, we need to say that out loud. It's a good accountability practice. It helps us model that. And so we can say, just interrupt that cycle, hey, I'm noticing a difference. I'm telling myself a story about that difference, and I can check whether that story is fair. So, okay, I'm noticing a difference in the way that I feel. All of a sudden I'm feeling discontent because I'm looking at this. I am telling myself a story about that my husband doesn't love me that way. My, you know, my. I, can't be that successful. I don't have that kind of money. And we can check whether that story is fair or not. And then Return to something concrete. What is the meal that's in front of you? What is your child's effort that's in front of you? What's the conversation? One useful next step, because contentment grows when we stop treating every difference that we see between our world and someone else's as a deficiency. We can just see it as, okay, this is just. Just someone else can have something wonderful. And that doesn't make my life, my experiences, my possessions any less valuable. Because when we're discontent, it impacts us emotionally, psychologically, relationally, physically. There's a cost that comes with that. Emotionally, we feel envious, we're irritable. We all of a sudden are disappointed with our own life. We may resent what we have or don't have. And we just have difficulty enjoying good moments because we think, oh, well, if only I had this, it would be a little. Psychologically. We start replaying what is missing. We leave stuff hanging in our carts. We try tie our worth to achievement or appearance. We believe that happiness is going to follow that next milestone. It's okay to be unhappy now. I'll be happy when. And relationally. Then we start comparing our spouses. That's tough. We start pressuring our kids to be like each other, like other kids. That's tough. We start competing with our own friends. That's. That's terrible. Or being physically present while we're mentally sitting there living in another life in our head. And physically, when that comparison and striving just contribute to ongoing stress. That stress is going to affect your sleep, your muscle tension, give you headaches, give you indigestion. And that is really important because discontentment is not a medical diagnosis. Please. But it does lead to chronic stress that has a holistic impact on us. And we've got to recognize those, sentences that we tell ourselves. When I get. When my child, when I do this, when I have that, when we retire. And new circumstances can bring real benefits. But if we just continually make contentment m conditional on the next milestone, each achievement just introduces another requirement. It just moves the goalpost over and over and over again. So I want you to think, really, really think right now and think, what did you recently feel satisfied with until you compared it to somebody else? What was the most recent thought that you had about discontentment? And how did that play itself out in your life? How would that have been on display for your family? Or did you keep it to yourself? Well, recognizing those pressures is the place where we begin. So when we, when we begin, we want to go all the back to Scripture. When we start talking about how do we address this, let's go back to Scripture. One of the most famous verses in the Bible is Philippians 4:13. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. You can see this marketed everywhere, and it's a great verse. I love seeing Bible verses everywhere. But we, we know that Philippians 4:13 by heart. But what are the all things. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Well, this was written by Paul, and we don't often look at the verses that were preceding that. What were the all that he was talking about when he said that? When he said I can do all things, he wasn't saying I can, you know, make the. I can hit a home run. I can make a, success in business. The preceding verses give us the setting and plenty. He's experiencing need, whether he's hungry, whether he's full. He is in prison. He is describing strength for faithfulness amid very difficult circumstances. So I think that's really important. Paul is writing as a prisoner. His freedom is restricted, and his teaching is coming from lived dependence on Christ amid great uncertainty. He did have tremendous status. He probably had a lot more resources when he first started out on his journey than when he was in prison where he had nothing. But he we don't have to wait until life becomes easy to begin learning contentment. Because Paul's saying, I have learned and he's sitting in a prison. He describes contentment as something he learned through both scarcity and abundance, that his circumstances really didn't matter. And that gives us room to practice, because if we are disappointed, if we're struggling, that's okay. That can be a sign that we're still learning. And Paul also included having plenty and abundance brings its own questions, like, can we receive good things gratefully? Can we enjoy them without making them our security? Can we share them? Yes, we can. We learned that from Ecclesiastes. We just need to learn how to have less without losing hope and how to have more without always needing more. But when we isolate that verse 13 in Philippians 4:13, we're turning it into a promise that Christ is going to help us accomplish any outcome that we want, that we choose. Winning the game, getting the promotion, getting the right relationship that you want. But when we read verses 11 through 13, we see that immediate emphasis. Christ is strengthening Paul to live faithfully through both favorable and difficult circumstances. And so when we apply that life lesson, we are teaching our family members, our children, that, hey, we rely on Christ. Christ can help us do all things, whether that's success or disappointment or waiting or loss or plenty or scarcity. And so we can apply this just in our everyday life. So before a competition, yeah, ask, ask, pray and ask God to help you prepare well, ask him to help you act with inte. Ask you to help him help respond graciously. Those things are really good. After a disappointment, we know that Christ strength is there and he will help us get through that. During financial limitations, we can make wise decisions and ask God to sustain us in success. We can thank God for that success, but we can stay humble and be generous with what we have. We can hold contentment together with honest needs and also practical helps. Because Paul, he tells the Philippians, thank you so much for your support. He acknowledges that they share in his trouble. His contentment doesn't make their generosity unnecessary. He still accepts that. He still m. It makes room for both trust in Christ and tangible care from other people. So we can be content and still grieve. We can trust God. We can still ask for help. We can appreciate abundance when we have it and still pursue growth. Contentment never requires us to accept some accept abuse, though that is not. I want to make sure that I say that, or leaving a child's need unmet like that. We should never be content if there's a safety situation. We're not saying be content in that circumstance, but we can be content in the circumstances that that life brings us, that the hardships and the trials that we will see. We can bring to God an honest lament and a grateful heart in the same prayer. And so I encourage you to ask yourself, have you been asking God when you're praying to change only your circumstances? Are you. Is that mostly your prayer is just, God, give us the money that we need, give us the house that we need get, grant us the favor that we need, help us get this college application that we did. Are you just asking God to change your circumstances? Are you also being intentional in your prayer to help you be content through whatever he allows to strengthen you within those circumstances? And I'm encouraged by the words that Paul used, especially the word learned, because that means that it doesn't just come naturally. We don't just get it instantaneous, instantaneously. We have to learn it. Contentment grows through practice. And so we can think about how that is in our everyday conversations. And, I've been reading through personally in my own personal Bible study time, the book of Ecclesiastes, and it is really good. I actually Saw a, a scientist, I think it was, who was being interviewed about the rise of AI and what that's to mean for the impact of their contributions, because now a robot can do what they previously were lauded and celebrated for doing. And he was talking about hearing a song by the birds that do everything turn, turn, turn. And he said he got curious about where that came from. And he found out it was in the Bible. It came from Ecclesiastes. And it talks about there's a time to plant, a time to sow, a time to harvest, there's a time to laugh, a time to mourn. That is from Scripture. And he said that he was not a believer, but. But it moved him to tears to see that there is meaning. And. And Solomon talks about how, you know, all of this is meaningless, but at the same time, God gives. It is good. It is good for you to enjoy the toil of your labor. That that is God's good gift to you. And in the end, some of these things in life are meaningless because we're living for a higher goal. We are, We are looking to, We're looking to live eternally in the kingdom. And that is a much higher calling. So how do we model this contentment and recognize that there are seasons for everything. There's a time and a place under heaven for everything. We may tell our children to appreciate what they have. We do that all the time. Right. Like, you know, they're starving kids in another part of the world. And you should be grateful for this dinner that I prepared for you. That's not really probably the most effective way to model it. It. But notice the unintended lessons that we can give in adult conversations if we walk around complaining about our house all the time. I hate this old house. Oh, this. This house is terrible. It's so beat up. That is what our kids are learning. What we can model instead is, okay, this house is where God has us in the moment. There are some things I'd like to improve, but I'm so thankful for the life we share here. Or if we come, our kids come home and we think, why can't you get grades like your sister, like your cousin, like another peer that you have? We can instead model contentment. Hey, let's look at your effort, your strengths, where you need support, and be content with wherever that is. And the struggle and the learning curve that you are doesn't mean we don't strive for more. We don't call our kids to more. But we can be content with where we are. You may look at social media and think everybody else gets to take better vacations than we do. Why can't we ever go on a nice vacation? You know, we're having a staycation and look what everybody else is going to. But instead, inviting your kids to, hey, let's plan something really fun that our family can enjoy together. That's within our budget. Let's learn to be grateful for that. Another one that I talked about, this was back in the tech habits is saying being discontent with how you look in pictures. I see this all the time. I look terrible in every picture. I don't. Oh, I don't want to take a picture. I don't want to be present in light. Oh, oh, I hate that angle. Oh, I hate the way that makes me look. Oh, I don't want to be in the picture. That is something that really shows. We're just content with how we look. We're discontent with how, how our current stage of life and there can be things that we don't like about ourselves, maybe that we're working on. But showing contentment says something like, hey, I treasure these memories. I. I'm really grateful to be in life with you. I'm. I'm grateful. When our kids look back, they're not going to see that, oh, our crow's feet or love handles or anything like that. They're going to see, see us, our presence woven through the fabric of the tapestry of their life. They're going to see our crows feet because we laugh together. They're going to see our love handles because we enjoyed good meals together. We need to be content. We think, we may say, nothing is as good as it used to be. I wish those were the best days, those were the great days. Instead of, hey, I treasure those memories, but I love every stage. Those things are important. We can tell our children, tell our family stories of ordinary joys, ways that God has been faithful in the past, joys that we have in relationships, even in seasons of struggle. And just use that repair language, hey, you heard me comparing my life with someone else's. I was feeling envious. I want to practice appreciating what we have. There are things that we can be grateful for because maybe the family that, you know, has a beautiful house, but behind closed doors, they have really, really fractured relationships. And you can think of, all right, I don't have the beautiful house, but I also don't have those fractured relationships. And there's a lot of wisdom and proverbs on that. We can acknowledge our emotions and our disappointment before we teach gratitude. So it doesn't mean like when we express discontentment, you say you immediately judge that and shame that you shouldn't feel that. You just say, hey, I get it. That can feel that. That can feel a little overwhelming. Let's, let's sit in that for a moment and then let's pivot, acknowledge their feeling and then move over. And we can do this through small, repeatable practice by just practice being present without wishing you were somewhere else and to let that desire exist without immediately satisfying it. Think, do I really need this? When we come back, I'm going to talk about some Homefront headlines. Some of them have to do with things that are feeding the discontentment in our lives. But I encourage you right now to really think about where in your life are you discontent and what can you learn about that, that you can do all things through Christ who strengthens you. I'll be right back with more help and hope. Friend, we're living in the defining moment today. A woman facing an unexpected pregnancy can order the abortion pill online, often before anyone has the chance to tell her she is loved, that she's alone, or that there is hope. That's why you are needed right now. 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Dr. Jessica Peck your birthday, every day's a good day. Now let me tell you why. If you got air in your love, you got blood in your Body, you are a child of God. Come on and sing it someday. Body.

Dr. Jessica Peck On my best day I'm a child

Dr. Jessica Peck of God on my worst day I'm a child of God. Be in my chest. No, it doesn't matter about the rest if I got you Lord, I'm still Sing it again. M.

Dr. Jessica Peck Welcome back friends. That is I'm so blessed by Cain. Isn't that a great Friday song? Thanks Brent for picking that out. I love that song. It's such a great reminder and a pick me up for me when I am starting to feel discontent in my circumstances, I can remind myself that I I am m so blessed. On my best day I'm a child of God and on my worst day I'm a child of God. And God can help us to be content in whatever circumstance we have. That's this week's habit and my last words of encouragement to you on that are really to be thoughtful about not just being discontent because that's just a negative behavior extinguishment and that's not really very fun or a very effective strategy. Put your energy instead toward actively practicing contentment instead of trying to be so discontent. Find places where you can be content. Choose whose expectations get to to shape your life. So which if if you're looking at a specific influencer, a platform, a TV show, it makes you feel discontent. Choose not to let that influence you choose to cut that influence off and make room to discern. Okay, what, what, what sources do I need to be hearing from to nurture contentment? Let then let someone else's blessing belong to them. Cheer someone on if you're feeling discontent, that's a great way to change that around. Genuinely be happy for other people. Just celebrate the ordinary moments. Don't wait for that social media worthy moment. Just in the everyday, everyday moments where you're just having connection with your spouse, with your kids, with your family. Just, just be content and celebrate that moment. Hold your possessions with an open hand. Just I really love to be open handed before the Lord. I don't want to hold on too tightly to something he's trying to take away for my good. And I don't want to have clenched fists that I can't receive something he's trying to give me. So just pause when you start to feel that discontent. Recognize it. Pause. Name it. I'm feeling jealous, I'm feeling disappointed, I'm feeling envious, I'm worried I don't belong. I want that. I can't have that. And then just identify one real gift. Say like, okay, I'm feeling that way, but this is what I can be thankful for. This is where I can find contentment that is really important to do. Notice when that moment of inspiration becomes inadequacy, like when, okay, I'm supposed to be inspired by, you know, your housekeeping. Your house is so much cleaner than mine. Your truck is so much nicer than mine. Oh, then it starts to become inadequacy. And just notice that. And just notice it, acknowledge it, and practice contentment instead. That is really important. Just name the hard thing, name a good gift and ask Christ for strength in the next step. And nothing is going to make you more discontent than doom scrolling headlines. But I do that a little bit for you. I have curated news feeds so that I can scan what is going on and tell you about home front headlines, things that are impacting your home so that you don't have to read it. I'll tell you what it is and why it matters for families and how we should respond to it. One of the headlines that I'm continuing to follow, that I'm continuing to be really concerned about, is more and more children and teens turning to AI, artificial intelligence or superintelligence for mental health support, for counseling, for advice. So when a child is feeling discontent about something, whether it's their circumstance, their family, their home, their body, their sports ability, their academic ability, their relationship with somebody, most of this is going to start with some sort of discontentment in those circumstances. And they will turn to AI. They're increasingly turning to AI chat bots for advice. And they're bringing these AI chat bots really emotional questions. Now, AI chatbots are very ubiquitous. They are everywhere. They're very easily accessible. And you'd probably be surprised to know how easily accessible one is for your child. An AI AI emulates, it simulates human emotions, but it doesn't experience emotions like a human, because it's not a human, it's a robot. But yet young people are bringing emotional questions to the AI chatbots. And there are different studies that are coming out, but we are seeing reported about 13 to 20% of young people who have already said, yeah, I regularly use a chatbot for mental health advice. Now this just raises concern about all kinds of things, about getting guidance and privacy. I especially want to talk to you about that because it is really important not to put personal information like that in a chat bot. And I see a lot of people using chats for emotional support. But it can be hacked. It's discoverable in a court of law. It's also just very personal, intimate information that you're trusting to a robot that is, that may be using that information to train other models. Because if you don't know to turn the, at this, the setting off to say that, no, you can't use my information to train other models. It's just in the public domain. So we need to be very careful about details that our kids are putting out there that could really make them very vulnerable in a lot of ways. And us as adults, too, and we don't want them to mistake a responsive program for a trusted caregiver. So that's why we need to really wonder about who our kids are talking to online. And when our kids have discontent, are they coming to us to talk about that in the context of a healthy human relationship, or are they going to a chatbot that's really trained to kind of tell them what they want to hear, that's trained to be pleasing? So this is, this is important for families to know because it is very appealing. I think we underestimate the way that it is appealing. And as I see, you know, as a professor, we are teaching our students more and more to use AI. It is here. It is going away. This is like telling people not to use a smartphone. Like, it's just not going to happen. So where we are is how do we use it responsibly? My students will tell me, oh, the, the chat bot is hyping me up big time. You know, it's like that. It's, it's telling me I'm, I'm doing such a great job and this is such a great paper. And then all of a sudden, maybe they don't get a great grade. And, but that is a reality. That is why it's appealing, because a comforting answer deserves careful evaluation. Chatbots appear to be empathetic and knowledgeable, but the, they very confidently can provide unreliable information. And they say it with a pretty astounding degree of confidence. You should do this. This is absolutely the case. You are right to feel this way, and it could be very, very wrong. So feeling understood does not mean that the advice that was given was safe. So we need to think, does our kid, do our kids have access to chatbots? They probably do. But do they also have access to a trusted adult, even more importantly that they can reach. Do they know how to come to you with uncomfortable feelings and to ask for wise counseling? And so we've got to be available, because that's the appeal of chatbots, too. They are always available. They're never cooking dinner, they're never trying to get the brother to soccer practice, they're never trying to finish up work emails, they're never mopping the floor, working out in the garage garage. They're always available and they always remember everything. That is the advantage that they have. So we've got to respond not with a fear based approach but a faith informed approach. And a faith informed family leads with curiosity and just ask what is your experience with AI chatbots? How are kids around you talking to them if they are at all are they talking to you about that? What makes it easier to have an AI conversation than to have a conversation with your parent or a teacher or a human? Give your kids really clear boundaries because emotional, psychological, medical advice from a chatbot absolutely needs review with a trusted adult and or a qualified professional depending on the circumstance. You want to make sure that there are clear boundaries about when they can use chatbots and what you can use chatbots for. I encourage married couples to have conversations about this because it can be really disconcerting if you find out one spouse has been talking to chat about your problems and like trying to figure it out. And it's just the boundaries are just really strange. And so I encourage you just to talk with your family about what boundaries you have. What are you putting in a chat bot, what are you reserving as sacred and private. Also make human supports very concrete. Cultivate in your life people that kids can trust that they can go to with a problem. Talk about the boundaries with that person and what you're going to know. What might be confidential for them to share. This can be especially important for kids who have are navigating situations like divorce where sometimes it's really hard to talk to one parent about what's going on in the other parent's house because that can be emotionally charged and so some it's important just look at your kids situation and think who can they talk to and just remember that we are called to bear one another's burdens and in so doing fulfill the law of Christ. And we need to make sure we're giving a very open, compelling attention to our family members to come and share their burden so that they don't share it with a chatbot. Another headline that I'm watching is as we have all of the elections approaching I know so many of you are so ready for the commercials to be over, for the text messages to be over. I want to remind you about I voter guide. This is a voting guide that is put out by American family Association. You can go to ivoterguide.com and I did that just the other day. I actually have already voted and but I'm still, still getting the messages. But I did go out and vote. It's very easy. You can just go to ivoterguide.com you put in your address and it will give you a ranking of it will tell you everything that is on your ballot and it will give you a ranking of on the issues of all of those candidates. And it is really, really helpful to know. I especially encourage you to use it with your kids as if you have kids who. I say kids. Technically I guess they're adults, they would say they're adults. But if you have, you know, new, new kids who are 18, 20 years old, it's the first time voting, help them out by going to ivoterguide.com and go out and vote. So if you're thinking, oh I was going to go vote today, go vote today, go vote. Your voice is important. But one of the headlines that I'm watching in all of these political debates is the normalization of vulgarity, profanity. Just how it's just become so routine and in entertainment and everyday conversation and, and you used to never hear those kinds of things in political arenas or political speeches broadly or widely. And there is a lot of debate going on about this. And I think that it's something for us to talk about because familiarity, if it's happening all the time, it just makes us stop noticing it just something that's heard repeatedly just starts to feel normal and acceptable before we have consciously considered it. It just, we just accept that as normal. And so children need a reason behind rules. So if we say we don't say that, we don't say the, those words that establishes a boundary and we can explain having dignity and respect and self control. And that is really important. And we need to listen beyond the vocabulary because sometimes our kids can come home with those kinds of words and they're just copying friends, they're trying to be funny. They don't know what's the appropriate use or not. We've got to have conversations about that and examine your whole family speech. Because to me it's not just about vulgarity or profanity community. It's also about Ephesians tells us don't let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth, but only what is helpful to build others up according to their needs. And there are some normal conversational tones in today's culture that really are not very, that I don't do that. So being constantly sarcastic at the, at the risk of hurting somebody else, trying to humiliate someone, getting get in a burn, a comeback, a clap back, gossiping, just cruel teasing. These kinds of patterns of speech deserve attention right alongside talking about profanity. We need to give our children better words. We need to help them to use words that are edifying that, that clearly express how they feel without letting unwholesome talk come out of our mouths. And so we can respond by, by just correcting calmly. We can say, hey, it's okay to be angry. I see that you feel angry. Tell me m. But give them positive instruction and saying, don't you dare use that word. Say, I need you to use words that help me understand what is happening. I need you to use words that are acceptable, you know, that are not on our family's list of unacceptable. But explain your family standard. Hey, in our home, we want our words to honor God and respect. Respect people. And those are the words we're going to choose. Model that repair. That was a hurtful way for me to speak. Let me try again and really practice discernment. Discuss the language that's in shows and songs and online content and then make some really thoughtful choices about what deserves repeated attention. And again, Ephesians 4:29, great verse to be there. Last headline I wanted to tell you about is a really thought, thoughtful, commentary ah, that I saw written by a college student worried about lose their generation, losing their identity to an algorithm. And this particular young woman, she reflected on growing up with social media and how that is really changing her life. And, and that is really encouraging for me to see young people having conversation about how social media is impacting the way that they see the world. And some of the things that they're talking about is just belonging can become really expensive really quickly and it's okay to leave room for awkward discoveries. You can try something and not like it and change your mind and enjoy things that your other friends don't share. You know, that's okay if you're an old soul. All of those things are really helpful and so many good things from that. I'll come back to that next one week and talk a little bit more about that. But I'll leave you with the fact that I am very encouraged by the conversation that is happening in younger generations. Talking about things like contentment and recognizing discontentment and normalizing social media fast. Just saying. Yep, I deactivated that app. I need to be off of it for a while. And I need to be grounded in real life. I'm telling you, Gen Z does that way better than Millennials, Gen X, or Bo Boomers. We can learn from them. And in the meantime, wherever you are, whatever you're doing, I pray the Lord will bless you, keep you, make his face shine upon you, and give you peace and contentment. I'll see you on Monday. The views and opinions expressed in this broadcast may not necessarily reflect those of the American Family association or American Family Radio.