Recorded on Easter Sunday, Episode 36 of We Should Probably Edit This – But We Won't takes a reflective turn as Matthew and Nancy explore the phrases and personal growth mantras that have quietly become part of how they think, talk, and live. These aren't things they would've said when they first got married — but somewhere along the way, words like "honor the struggle," "bring the joy," "what would my better self do?", and "rejection is God's redirection" became part of their vocabulary. And they mean it.

They get into the messy middle of setbacks, what it really means to summon the best of yourself, and why "just one more" can be the hardest — and most important — thing you say to yourself. They also talk about faith, legacy, grandkids, learning to listen to their adult kids without parenting them, and why being present in the moment is something grandparenting finally taught them to actually do.

It's funny, it's honest, it's recorded on Easter — and yes, they will not be editing it.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 People Mentioned:

• Ed Mylett — source of the "just one more" concept
• Nancy's mom — referenced in the context of saying things your parents used to say
• Matthew and Nancy's adult children and grandchildren (unnamed)

🏢 Companies/Organizations Mentioned:

• BlackRock Church
• GrowthDay / Ultra (Brendon Burchard)

Welcome to.

We Should Probably Edit this, But we won't.

This is about our life's messy journey.

It's unscripted talks about growth, real laughs sometimes.

Real laughs sometimes just the chaos and.

And we think there's a little bit of comedy here.

Everything.

It's about our 37 years of marriage and our experience.

I'm Matthew Greger.

And I'm Nancy Greger.

And we're your host of We Should Probably Edit this.

But We Won't.

And we probably should have edited that.

So here's our next episode.

Yes.

And we're on.

Hi.

Hi.

Yay.

We're all right.

This is our next episode.

First, Happy Easter.

Hope you all had a great day today.

But most especially, remember what the day.

Is really all about.

It's not the Easter Bunny.

Okay.

Okay.

Moving along.

Yep.

And no matter what time you're listening to this, we are recording it on Easter.

Yes.

All right, so today's topic's going to kind of be about those things that we've didn't think we would say.

All right?

So we all know that as you grow and as you get older, there are things that you say, especially when you have children, that come to you and they come out of your mouth and you have this automatic throwback to when you heard it, and it more than likely came from your own parent.

But as we continue.

Right.

Those become.

What was one of.

What was one of those things that.

I don't remember that you thought you were.

That your mom came out?

I honestly.

Was it the way you acted, the way you talked, the way you sounded, what you said?

Probably all the above.

But I can't give you a specific.

All I know is that there were moments in time where you would say something that you never thought you would actually say, but when you said it, you heard it because it was said to you when you were a kid, and probably.

It probably said, oh, my God.

I just.

I sound just like, is my mother in the room?

Yeah.

Did my father.

Did my father show up?

Did something happen?

I didn't see it.

But what I found some of those.

Times, those are good things, you know?

And sometimes they're like, oh, my goodness.

I never thought I would say that.

Yeah, I don't think so.

But.

Okay.

If you felt that there was some positive feedback or saying that came out that had a positive connotation.

Okay.

But I don't think so.

But in any case.

So we started talking about those types of things, like things you would have said, you never thought you would be saying.

And I that you said that you never thought you'd be saying.

Yeah, like phrases that you would never.

Thought about things that didn't resonate.

Didn't resonate.

It didn't make any.

There was no.

I mean, the words make sense, but not.

Not for you.

Like, you wouldn't have used that.

I know.

So for an example, I'll give you an.

A great example.

One of the phrases that always comes to mind is honor the struggle.

And that's not necessarily something I could have said to you when I was in my 20s or even in my 30s would have come out honor the struggle.

Did you even know what.

That you wouldn't.

Didn't even know at that time what that was.

Yeah, you wouldn't have.

Like, what's the struggle?

You know, sometimes you might have correlated more with God only gives you as much as you can handle, but sometimes.

You're just frustrated with the struggle.

Yeah.

You know, it's just like.

But there's no word about honoring the struggle.

And I think when I look about that phrase now, what does it mean for me?

It means that life's going to be filled with lots of things that are come out your way, from family to work to whatever, and you're going to also want to be able to figure out how you're going to continue to move in a forward direction, and it's going to be a struggle.

So honor it, because it is what it is, and eventually it's going to make you better.

But you have to really, that word, honoring the struggle kind of gives that ability to say, it's okay, we all struggle.

So don't walk away from it because there's something there.

There's a value there.

Okay, so.

So honor.

Honor it.

Even though you're going through it, you know that you got to get through it to get to the next level, to get.

To move forward, to move to the.

To the next.

To the next area.

So what's a.

What's one that you kind of reflect back on now?

It's.

It's more or less about your setbacks or your setups because a lot of times you get really frustrated because you're trying to make strides and move forward, and then something happens and you feel like, oh, my gosh, why again?

Or why now?

Or what is it?

And a lot of times that setback actually helps you reframe what.

Where you're going or what you should be doing, or maybe.

Maybe what you were trying to go after wasn't meant for you in the first place.

So that setback at that time gives you that opportunity to reframe what it is.

You know, perfect example might be you went for a job interview and you really, really were hoping to get that job, and you didn't.

Yeah.

You thought the interview went great.

You know, that was great.

I kicked it out of the.

Knocked out of the ballpark or whatever the case might be.

And all of a sudden you don't.

Yeah.

And so you kind of sit back and you say to yourself, my, that's a setback.

Right.

Because you.

You anticipated it, you really felt strongly about it, but it didn't work out your way.

Sometimes you don't see the reason right away.

We're just in the mix right then and there.

You're.

You're in that messy middle if.

And so you don't see that until something else comes along.

And then you really.

It really gets you down, though.

It does.

You know, when that setback's there, and sometimes you don't realize that even a year later or something that, you know, whatever that was that you thought was supposed to be there, you know, you really found out later that, wow, I'm glad I didn't continue with what that was.

You didn't move forward with that.

You know, there was a reason.

You don't always see the reason.

You don't always can put words to that reason.

But there's a reason.

Right?

Right.

There's always a reason.

So one that I.

That I look at now is.

Is bring the joy.

And it's a great phrase.

It really truly is bring the joy.

I mean, there are many opportunities that we could go through life just existing.

Right.

Well, I think that.

I think that really I can go back to even today being Easter, you know, and about bringing the joy through what's happened.

I mean, Easter is a joyous time, you know, but you've got to bring it in there.

You can't just expect hope that it's.

Going to come to you.

Right.

You have to be in control of what that is.

That's a tough.

That's.

That's like a daily one that you got to do because, you know, when you're.

When you got to get up and go to work, you know, if you're gonna have a good day at work, you got to bring that joy.

Because you can't expect that work to give you the joy.

Nope.

You know, you've got to want.

Be the one that brings it.

You.

Maybe you inspire somebody else in the office.

Maybe you.

You just.

You just gotta bring that down.

I think it's a sense of when you walk into a room, if you walk into a room feeling very like, in a joyful place, people see that and they react accordingly.

It's very hard for people to get down if they see that you're, you know, you're more happier or you're more content, or you're there to bring the joy.

And.

And I, I always.

I like that saying.

I. I really do, because I think it's a great.

So, dude saying, could you do it more?

You can always do it more.

You can.

There's no harm to not, you know, there's no, like, set.

Sometimes.

Sometimes I forget.

Sometimes you forget that.

That's.

That's always.

Because you're in the middle, right?

You're.

You're in the mix or you're in traffic or.

Or you're just like, man, that morning just didn't turn out as fast as you wanted to.

And so you're just more like the drudgery to it all.

So bringing the joys is really, really hard.

Well, you gotta.

You gotta reach in and.

And do that.

Find it.

Get in there.

You have to find it.

Reach in.

Yeah.

What's another one you could think of that we would have not used?

Especially when we first got married, I don't think we would have used these.

I'm drawing a blank at the moment.

Another one was, what would my.

What would my better self do?

Okay.

Yeah, right.

Yeah.

Well, you got.

You've got to position that one.

When you're in that moment that, you know you should react differently.

You got.

You got to reach inside, say, okay, what.

How would my better self respond?

Whether it's an email, whether it's a confrontation with what you're in, and it's just like, you.

You really want to.

You want.

You.

You.

You want to react right then and there.

You want to say what you want to say and not really have.

Think about the consequences.

That's probably, for me, a really big A challenge.

And why is that?

Because you just want to get it out right there.

Just.

I'm just more vocal that way.

Like, if I'm annoyed, you're gonna know I'm annoyed.

If I get upset, you're gonna know I'm upset.

So it's hard for me to set that back and reframe it after something that's been.

Because I'm very reactive.

I'm not necessarily someone that contemplates a situation.

I'm more like as.

As my.

As my older son would.

Would describe when I was describing mom's always ready for a rumble.

And that's because I have a. I, I'm very reactive.

I'm not somebody who's going to sit back and think about this, unlike me,.

Who will overthink everything.

But that's, that was, that's the good part about it, right?

Because if I do get in that rumble, you're the guy who's going to say hey and slowly tug at me to come back over to another.

Yeah, but if I say what would your better self?

Then I stop and I, and I,.

And I. I. I think it depends at the moment.

You may just get annoyed with me.

Sometimes, but I realize what it is and it's.

And it's something that people that are close to you would probably know it more, right?

Being your better self because they know you.

You know me, you know that I'm going to react and react quickly to, To a situation.

So the tendencies are, is if we're in the same room and you know that you have that ability to either tug or just look at me and say, what would the better self do?

And you whisper it.

You don't say it out loud.

And I think along that line, you know, one of the other ones that I like too, is summon your best.

Summon the best of who you are.

And I think that's something that is in line with, with that what would your better self do, you know, but you really, every day, you know, you gotta summon the best of who you are and you gotta bring that to what you're doing.

Because to me, that's, that's so critical.

Because a lot of times, just like when you think about what would my better self do in that situation, you know, you want to summon the best of who you are.

Um, because that's how you're going to move forward.

That's how you.

To where you want to be.

To where you want to be exactly.

Or, or how you want to handle a situation, you know, so there's what other ones that we.

And, and I would say to you that this has been an evolution for the two of us.

And as much as that we've been doing a lot of personal growth work for ourselves in looking at.

Re looking at things in a different way.

And that's just something that I would say to you within the last, what, four or five years, it's really been one of the things that we've been doing more and more about is more reflection, more about you and what it is that you need to do.

Right.

And looking at what your life has been Composed of up until that point.

So for us, it's that personal growth has been, for me anyway, very eye opening in a lot of different things that I kind of look into.

We talked about it one of our episodes, like what are our strengths are?

And that's probably something that I would have said to you early on.

We never really would have done.

So let me ask you a question.

So we're.

We're going to Blackrock Church now.

If you hadn't have gone through your personal growth journey and we went to that church, do you think you would, you think you would have had the same experience?

You think it took, do you think it took that time to.

The personal growth to get back into an alignment.

With who you want to be and who you are?

No, because I think like everybody else, else, there's always something inside you that's always yearning, that's always looking, that's always wanting to improve upon.

Okay.

And I think finding a.

A church base that you and I would both feel comfortable in, I think that's.

That's a journey that we took.

Because it's not that we never did it.

And suddenly we found Jesus Christ.

No, no.

We were always faith believers.

It's not that we weren't.

It was finding a community that we both felt.

I think the community that we have with Growth Day has helped that shape what kind of community we want.

You know, that, that for me is a little bit different than going to Black Rock Church.

I don't look at that as being the same because to me, being reconnected in a community of fellow believers all striving for the same belief, all looking at the same belief is not the same as what we do when we go to ultra.

Because ultra comes from all types of denominations, all types of people, and their faith bases are what they are, whether they believe in God or Jesus Christ or whomever, Muhammad, whatever, whoever is not the same.

Going to church for us has been an area that we had to figure out, how do we build on this?

We want this community.

We.

We want to be a part of that type of community because we've always been believers.

It's not that we weren't.

So for me, that's.

I would have found it regardless of doing this.

Okay.

You know, but it's good that we.

We have, because I think that gives us a whole.

I think it starts to fill some holes.

Yeah.

And I think it's important to explore what those are.

When you feel that space, that void, what's empty inside of you, maybe what.

Where You're.

You're feeling that you're missing something.

You need to figure out what that is.

You know that you do.

And sometimes you don't know it right away, mainly because of the way life is where you're at in life.

You know, like when the kids were younger and.

And we were dealing with the whole raising of children, it was hard.

It was very, very hard.

And we.

We attempted to find communities, faithful communities that we wanted to bring the kids, too.

But I. I honestly believe that you either find it two ways.

Either you find it as an adult because you realize it's something that's missing, or if you did have a strong faith when you were kids, that your parents were just as strong in that faith as they are now.

And I.

So can I look at my own children?

And I gotta realize I did the best we could.

Right.

And giving them the.

The information about, you know, God and.

And what spirituality is all about and what's Easter about and what's Christmas about.

You know, it's not about Santa sound about the Easter Bunny.

Like, what are the meanings behind it?

And that's what we tried to do, but I think as we got older, everybody's going to follow their own path and figure that out.

Right.

And maybe they will, maybe they won't.

Yep.

So do you have another saying?

I don't know, that maybe you.

You wouldn't say now or that you say now that you wouldn't have said before.

So, you know, how about legacy?

You know, legacy is not something you necessarily leave behind for someone, but what you leave inside them.

You know, I think it's.

You know, we talk about our financial freedom and wanting to leave something with the kids, but I think something that's really just as important is those experiences you have, you know, so that you're leaving memories with them, and that's part of your legacy.

And doing this podcast is probably going to be a big part of our legacy.

Obviously, when our grandchildren get older and we're no longer around, it'd be a great tool for them to be able to connect or learn a little bit more about their GMO and Jeepa.

Yeah, because that's the.

That's the funny part about a legacy.

You know, when you really start thinking about.

You really start thinking about it.

You're like, the clock might be ticking.

How much time you have left, nobody knows.

Right.

We don't know.

We could be gone tomorrow.

And so we're having to really.

You start thinking about that when you get older.

I don't think if you had asked me when I was in my twenties what I thought my legacy was going to be, I would not have had any.

I would have looked at you and said, what do you mean, Legacy?

I'm only 20 years old.

Right, Right.

So I think that's okay.

So it's your turn.

Anything else on your list?

No, you can jump in.

I didn't realize we had a list, but these are just off the top.

Well, I mean, what's on your head?

I know we've been talking list today again.

Yeah, man.

I know.

It's just.

It's part of my.

Part of who he is.

Yep.

Part of who I am.

A learner and achiever.

Top two.

Just saying.

Okay.

So I guess one that comes to my mind is, you know, it's the moments that matter, because we're.

We're in that moment.

Or if you.

You.

When you're in that moment, you've got to realize that you got to take time to appreciate what moment you're in at that time.

And I think that's really hard when you're raising kids because you just want that moment to be over sometimes.

Well, you're in the messy middle.

Yeah.

And it's like.

But you look back and it's hard to remember some of those moments.

You know, you don't take them and soak them in.

That's there.

You don't appreciate them.

Well, that's also one reason you take photos, too.

Right.

I'll help you stimulate your memory on those occasions when you did something with your kids and with your family.

Those moments that you did.

It wasn't always the bad things.

There were lots of good things that was in there.

I think one of the other ones that I.

That always comes to mind is the one more.

Just one more.

It's that ability to understand that you can always continue to push, and you can always continue to keep pushing.

Just one more.

Just one more.

And that's really hard sometimes because you just want to say, I'm done.

I'm finished.

Timing.

Yeah.

That came from Ed, my left.

Yeah, that came from.

He had a book called More, called One More and One More.

And just like, you never know.

You're that close.

And maybe you've already gone through going back to the job interviews.

You've gone through many.

You've almost got them.

You know, you were set.

You're.

Then another setback happened, you know, but it's just that one more, and you finally get it until you.

Because you just.

You just always got to keep yourself trying to Move in a forward motion.

Because there's lots of things, like we talked back.

Your setbacks are your setups.

And rejection is God's redirection.

Correct.

Rejection is God's redirection.

That's always been a good one.

Because it's very hard for you.

You.

You get rejected and you feel so.

It's like a personal hit.

And it's hard to get over those rejection moments.

And so you have to just say, okay, there's a reason beyond what I can see, and you have to let it go into that realm.

There's a reason why I may not understand it, but I gotta let it go.

And I've got to be able to continue to move forward.

That's the thing.

That's definitely easier said than done.

I didn't say it was easy.

Especially when that rejection happens.

You want to sulk.

Yeah, you do.

You want us, you want to be in there.

And I'm not saying that that's not.

Sometimes, you know, you can have.

You don't want a pity party, but you don't need to have a, a three week pretty party.

Yeah, you.

You got to be able to, to say it happened, sulk a little bit.

On it, and then move on.

Move on.

Get up, get up the next day and just say, okay, dig deep and.

Figure out how you're going to bring the joy after that one.

Yeah.

That's when you know.

That's.

That's when you know you really are.

You've conquered it.

And I'm not saying we've conquered anything.

Right.

It's.

It's a work in progress.

And I think that's important to everybody to understand that life is a work in progress.

That if you live long enough, there's going to be a lot of ups and downs.

The, the objective is to.

How do you manage those ups and downs and riding the waves as best as you can.

Because it's gotta be a challenge.

No matter what we do, there's always a challenge.

We still challenge.

Now we are a challenge, the two of us.

I know I'm a challenge for her.

When I've just had enough.

Yep.

And I can usually tell.

Sometimes I need to figure out how to reframe it, you know, or redirect.

You know, sometimes it's a rejection, you know, and it hurts.

Yeah.

And I gotta, I gotta redirect what.

I'm doing, you know, after, you know, you've spent eight hours or whatever figuring something out and you show it.

And I'm like, okay, but what if we did it?

This way,.

It's a blow.

But the flip side is just as true, because I'd be like, no, let's just go.

No, let's just do it.

No, let's just go.

And he'd be like, no.

And then I would be annoyed.

Like, I think this is great.

Let's just do it.

And so it works both ways, you know?

Yeah, but I. I know.

I def.

I def.

I have to summon the best of who I am when those times come and she rejects and she gives me the rejection.

It's not always God's redirections.

I'm not just Nancy's direction.

It's it.

Or sometimes it's just your frame of mind, you know, how you want to live in those moments.

And I would say to you, what are you doing?

You're not paying attention, or you need to be focused, or you need to see what's going on right here, right now, because this is it.

Sometimes I just can't see it.

No, I understand.

It's hard.

It really some.

It's really, really hard.

But I think for us, it's.

For me, anyways, let me say refer.

For me, it's knowing what's important and knowing that if it's important, I'm gonna do it.

And whether that means I'm going down to Florida to see my grandchildren.

Because I miss them desperately.

I miss the craziness, the chaoticness, the smelly stinkiness, the colds.

I miss all of that.

I miss when I'm not around.

You mean the colds?

Yeah, when they get sick, you know, runny nose.

I don't miss that.

The runny noses, that kind of stuff.

You know, those.

The time goes by so.

So, so fast.

That's.

That's definitely living in the moment.

That is definitely.

And you've got to appreciate the moment.

I think that's what my grandchildren have.

Taught me, to be in that moment,.

To be in that moment.

Because our kids didn't teach us that, because we weren't in the moment we were in it with.

Yeah.

So that's the difference.

I think that's the difference with being grandparents and having grandchildren and kids is that you can appreciate the moment more better than when you were in that messy middle.

Because.

Because we're not in that messy middle.

No, we're just.

There we go for two days.

We're just there to enjoy the moment.

We're there to enjoy the moment.

To enjoy.

That's what I'm saying.

We enjoy the chaos, right?

It is.

There's so much going on there's so much activity.

There's lots of things happen, but only.

For four days, then we're out, and.

Then we're like, okay, we gotta go now, but we love you, but we gotta go.

But you can be present for that short period of time and be right there and appreciate what it is.

And I thought, I'd like to have more of those moments with my own children, too.

Yeah, that's really hard because they're just adults and they're in that adult phase and they're all going through their own situations.

It's really hard to have.

Yeah.

But it's.

But you do have them.

They're fewer and farther.

They're few and far between.

They are.

When you do.

When you do have.

When you do, you have to be intentional about the moments with them.

Yeah.

And finding those times that it takes, whether it's a conversation or whether you get to go out to dinner with them or you go on a car ride or you meet up with them at some time or you're on a call with them, it's taking that moment in to listen to them, to hear what's happening in their life and just to say.

And you have to be intentional.

Yeah.

And you can't.

You can't put yourself into what they're about.

You have to just listen, you know, and that's been a real hard thing for me not to interject, you know, and just let it.

Just let it be what it is.

Let them tell you about it without any judgment, without any thoughts in your head about what you think about it.

Well, that's hard because when they were little, you're a parent.

Right.

And as a parent, it's sometimes really tricky on being able to allow them to experience certain things, but not do parenting things.

And sometimes that can come across as being judgmental.

You don't want it to be that way, but that's sometimes how it is.

So when your kids grow up, I think that's how they look at it.

Like, I'm not going to tell mom or dad this, because they're going to be.

They don't want to hear about it.

Listen, I'm in my 60s, and I probably.

And I will still tell you there are certain things I just don't tell my mom because it's not going to help our relationship move forward.

1.

Number two, her opinion or her ideas on it is not something that I share.

I know what they are.

I appreciate who she is for it.

But it's not a topic of conversation.

Like, I gotta bypass that, that topic because she was raised one way that's hard to do.

Sometimes you get caught in that.

You've get pulled back in.

You don't want to get pulled back.

No.

And, and most likely maybe our kids think the same about, you know, and they don't.

And sometimes I don't want to know.

That means don't tell me whether it's,.

Whether it's our parents or our children.

I just, I just don't want to know.

Yeah, you, you, you kind of just want to go along with it because knowing then as that extra burden on you that you kind of just like.

Sometimes, sometimes it adds a extra anxiety that you don't need or extra things.

To think about that you, you're not prepared for or, or you, you know, it's just not something you want to do at that moment.

So.

Yeah, I, I just think everybody has their moments and I think so.

So start when you say these things, when something comes out, think about where it came from.

Think about how you evolved in what you say now, what you think, what you, what you're believing at the time.

And see if, see if along the journey it changes.

Yeah.

As you go forward.

So on that note, we should probably edit this, but we won't.

So until next time, have a great one.

Make sure to like us.

Bring the joy.

Bring the joy.

Share this episode with someone that you know needs the joy.

Bye.

Bye.