Many business leaders have work figured out but come home and sit on the sidelines while their kids do their own thing. If you've realized you need to spend more time with your kids but don't know where to start, this is for you.

Lori Beard is a life coach, podcast host, and mother of eight celebrating 32 years of marriage. She shares practical ways to break through when your kids are busy with their own lives, why humility bridges connection, and how service projects carve lasting values into hearts.

The truth: Relationships are the only thing you'll take with you. Not money, houses, or business success.

Redeem Your Business Today by the Following:

How can we honor God in our business?

Value relationships over revenue. Practice active listening—listen to learn, not to judge. Ask your kids: "How can I be a better dad? What makes my questions feel like interrogation?"

One Challenge from Today:

It's never too late for humility. Own up to your mistakes with your children and tell them, "I'm sorry I did this." Then ask for their help as you course correct. Start with one walk-and-talk, one service project, or one book read together.

More About Lori Beard

Website: www.steadfast-forward.com

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@WisdomInThyYouthCoaching

Other: justserve.org

More About David Schmidt

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In Ephesians 4 says, fathers are not to exasperate their children, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. And I feel that one of the challenges of parenting is that you only get one shot at it. And since you only get one shot at it, you would think that we as parents would ask for everybody's advice, but it's interesting that if you criticize somebody for their parenting, that's like a no-no. People get so offended when you criticize their parenting or even talk about, hey, you could do this different or that.

But parenting is very individual, just like every child is different. Parenting is individual and we parent a little bit different and that's okay. But one of the things that is important is our connection with our children and you have to talk to them. You want to have a good relationship with them, connection with them. And so today I brought on Lori Beard, who is a life coach, a podcast host and recently celebrated 32 years of marriage and she has eight children.

And she's gonna talk to us about how to bridge that connection with your children. And sometimes the cause of disconnectedness, because it's needed. It's needed, I think you benefit from that. So Lori, thank you very much for coming on with us today. And to start off, yeah, thank you. ⁓ What is one way that you have found to honor God in your business that other people may not know about?

You're welcome.

Yes, valuing relationships, David, because it's all about the money, right? It's all about how many more clients I have, but for some people, right? ⁓ But for me, it's not. And I usually respond to that question. If anybody asks, said as many as I need right now and I want, and I choose to have right now. And it's sufficient for me because I value relationships and that is with my clients.

Mm.

and is with my children, my husband. And that is something that is first, honoring relationships.

That's very good, because in reality, that's the only thing you're take with you is your relationships and your children. You can't take any money, houses, clothes, anything with you. ⁓ That's what you're gonna take with you, and that is most meaningful part of this world, ⁓

You

That's right.

There's

some things Moni can't buy, right? So.

Yes, and peace

is one of them. Peace is one of those things I've noticed that going through scripture, the bottom line to all these things is who do you want peace? It talks a lot about peace, having peace and what brings peace. ⁓ So Lori, I'd love for you to give us a little background of ⁓ where you've been and how God has led you into business to where you are today and what you're doing today.

Wow, where do I say I was born? Well, born and raised in Puerto Rico is the one thing I need to say is just for you to understand my upbringing, this Latin Caribbean. I love the beach, saltwater, know, may run through my veins and you know, they say tears are saltwater, right? So, ⁓ love that and raised by very strong female. ⁓

Yeah, go all the way back now, wherever.

Okay.

person it is in my life or people in my life, my mother and my grandmother, when my mom was divorced for a few years and then she found a very good man, I consider my father. And biological father's doing great. We still have a connection, but it's just facts, right? And that example of my mother and my grandma being very strong, feminine and female, ⁓

different.

characters in my life was very amazing and influential. So then I wanted to, my mother had to work and then my grandma was like the stay at home figure in my life and then my mom was the bread winner for a while. And then I always wanted to have children and try as possible to stay home and raise them. So I raised them, children, the Heavenly Father,

Okay.

gave us, my husband and I, my husband, love of my life for 32 years. And I was able and blessed to, to raise them, stay at home with them. And then when my number eight went to school, I'm like, okay, what am I going to do? My identity was cemented to being a mother. And then I, went to school and got my certification as a life coach. And because I felt like I had a calling to help, help people in my community. So.

Okay, neat.

That is how everything happened.

Okay,

yeah. And that's a little bit like me too. It's different times in your life you can do different things. Because like when all the kids are little, time's wrapped up taking care of them, but now that they're older you can do different things.

Absolutely, absolutely. And I was having a conversation like, what do I do? Having the cold feet and talking to two of good friends that I had like eight years ago, nine years ago. wasn't, we've been friends for like over 21 years now. But back then I was like, I don't know how to do it. want to do it. This is the right time because there's always going to be something, even though my youngest is going to kindergarten, the oldest ones need, and even when they were adults, they're always going to need a mom. But, but I don't know when are the

Hmm.

right circumstances is going to happen. And somebody overhearing was like, excuse me, I've been overhearing this conversation and let me just say something. There's never going to be a good time or the right time or the ideal time because life is always going to be, it's going to be happening. And even though we need to be tuned into the spirit and tune in on to when is a good time to do things for sure. I really appreciate it that stranger's advice on, you know, it's always going to be challenging or harder.

There's always going to be a, there's always going to be opposition or challenges or, and I was able to do it when one of my daughters was getting married. I mean, my grandma was sick in Puerto Rico and I went there on a trip for 10, 10 days to kind of release some of other relatives there. mean, and God helped me make it happen. So.

Yes, you can do a lot and yeah, start

and then just keep going and yeah, life happens and things happen. ⁓ So Lori, challenge, business leaders need to lead in their business, but they also need to lead in the home. And ⁓ I guess the question I wanna pose to you and what I want to talk about is, if I wanna make a connection with my kids, but don't know where to start, how do I start that? How do I make the connections with my children or what does that look like?

Thank

Yeah.

Okay, so what does it look like ⁓ as you're trying to lead in your business and wanting to lead your family, your children?

Yeah, I'm

more specifically talking about home, because most of us, most business people got it figured out at business, but then they come home and they don't, they just sit on the sidelines and their kids run off to do this or that. Or sometimes if the father's too busy, the mom runs the home and the dad's just kind of there. So if you come home and you finally make it and say, you know, I need to spend more time with my kids.

Right.

but they're busy with their life, how do you break in? How do you break in and make that connection?

Right. Good question. Thanks. Thanks for going deeper and explaining. So this is very important. I knew a couple that I loved and when I heard it, I'm like, David, my husband's name is David. So I David, listen to this. He is a ⁓ pilot for an airline and crazy schedules, but he always, their philosophy was when he gets home from work, let's pretend wife also got home from work if she's a stay at home mom. And then they

both because that knows she's been working too. She's been working too all day with these kids. Let's both have that mindset of we both arrived of whatever we were doing and let's be proactive and getting involved. Breaking through can also look like if, especially if you have teenagers, if you have a little six year old, seven year old, okay, I haven't done a good job doing this. Daddy's going to try more now. And it's kind of going to feel weird because you're not used to daddy doing this.

but I want to try to do this better. And so help me here as I do my best now being more proactive. So change is very important because once you, if you haven't been doing that as a dad and now you want to take that role, more active role, everybody's gonna go, mm, creatures of habit. And then it's kind of gonna feel awkward or new. And humbleness, being humble.

It's very important for you to understand and own up and let your children know, listen, I haven't been the best at this, but I want to start now and it's going to be even better if you help me.

Okay. So do you have any stories of why this is important to you? Because we've talked about this a bunch.

Yeah, of course this is important to me because I have six boys, two girls. That this dad needed to be active in my boys life and even in my girls life for girls to learn how to, how boys should treat them or for boys learn to how to treat ⁓ girls or for them to grow up to be godly men or for my daughters to grow up knowing there's there are daughter of a king, know, sort of speak.

So absolutely, it was super important for me and these deep conversations without being a nag. And I can't say I'm not, I was not guilty of sometimes being a nag, but helping my husband understand, I need you to step up more in this role. And yes, it was very important for me and the way to do it, was, ⁓ try to accomplish it was with open communication.

Okay. Do you have a specific

story in mind that stood out in your years of parenting?

In the years of parenting, of course, yes, there's rules when they start driving, for example. Okay, so are we going to allow them that privilege of becoming more independent? And then my husband and I would sit down and say, are going to be those rules? What are going to be? And instead of one side being the only one enforcing those rules for both of us to be ⁓

⁓ in agreement of what those rules are going to be and then enforce them together. Or if something happened, come on, come into the room, let's have a conversation with you because you broke this rule or whatever. That was, that was very important. So for both to be the loving parents, the nurturing parents, but also the disciplinarian parents is very important. And in that, in that question you asked, driving was a big thing for us, allowing them to do that.

enforcing the rules around that because it's a serious thing. ⁓

yeah.

Yep, you live up in Alaska. Does it get really snowy on the island where you're at?

in Puerto Rico.

No, up in Alaska.

I'm sorry, stop,

wrong person. I was talking to somebody else just recently who lived in Alaska, I'm sorry, scratch that. No, no, yeah, yeah. So getting back, yes, we need to spend time with our kids. ⁓ But sometimes I've noticed sometimes when I want to, if I've let things go too long, ⁓ they are into their own life.

Yeah.

I'm like, no, it's sand and beach and sun.

Thank

You know, some of older kids are into doing their own thing. And so when dad comes around and is like, hey, I want to do something. What do you do? I mean, to me, there's not a whole lot of things to do. I'm not, I don't have money to throw at them to go out to the movies or go bowling or this or that. So do you have any ideas of what you can do to spend time with kids? mean, to me, it's like, I can watch a movie, play a game or talk. What do they want to do? Read a book.

Yeah. ⁓

yes. Yes. And read a book together. I mean, to discuss it. I don't know if you remember the Twilight series. My husband wanted to read them before he allowed this older daughter to read them. And she went and then we would hear all kinds of feedback about it. And yes, it's been important to protect them from information and according to our values.

Yes, it's important to just say no if we felt like it at the moment. But then my husband decided to read them and then they decided to read them together, my husband and her. And then that way it was kind of monitored and if she had questions then it was the most adorable thing for me to see them reading that together. And in your case, David, for example, it's just like impersonating the voices of the characters can be a whole amazing experience.

And you said talk, but then how about a walk and talk, you know, walking across to the mailbox, you know, walk to the, to the end of the street, walk in a very good safe spot in nature and observe nature or talk about life. And again, it can't, if it's not a habit yet, or it's not something that is very natural yet, you can start a little bit instead of whole hike of a mile.

then just check it out in like a track in a city park or, you know, or if you have a pet or if you want to walk somebody's pet, you know, hey, can we walk your dog as a service project? Service is also amazing. My kids would get annoyed, but they secretly love it. I hope, I think, to go caroling during Christmas time and sing for that senior sister or brother in our church congregation.

Yes.

And then they would go like kind of mad. then at the end, deep down, they really treasured it to a point that my son organized other friends from a community youth choir to go sing at a senior center. called the senior center and I'm like youth led, meaning you lead it, you want to do this, I will be there, I'll drive you, et cetera. But he called and made the arrangements and his friends. ⁓

Fang for the senior center. Service projects, JustServe.org is a great place to go for the nation and even the whole world. JustServe.org has, know, according to your zip code, age range of your family. And then you can just go there and it doesn't cost you anything except for gas to get to a point to, you know, for a pet rescue, you know, animal rescue center or just

putting together kits and a meal or an emergency kit or whatever, know, kid friendly, depending on your age group, you submit those filters and you can go to service, break the leaves of your neighbor. It is so important to instill loving your neighbor through service with your kids and your example and your willingness to do that as an adult. They will treasure that and it will be carved in their hearts.

and will carry it through when they get older.

Those are good examples.

What's the name of that? SirGod.org.

JustServe.org. JustServe.org. JustServe. Yeah.

serve.org. Okay, very

good. No, that's a great idea. It's nice to have a place where you can go to get ideas of what to do, because that serving other people is what God's called us to do. And that's actually what gives us enjoyment too, even though at first we don't like it. ⁓ When we look at parents and business owners and children and all that, do you see any root causes of what causes disconnectedness between

us.

That's Yes.

parents and children that we should be aware of and avoid.

A lot of time is the upbringing. If we weren't nurtured, if we weren't taught what is to love, to give a hug, to show that affection and that interest and to offer that emotional support, it's like a foreign language because then you didn't grow up with somebody modeling it. That's a big one. Another one is imposter syndrome. I don't know that I could be that dad that the father of my child needs.

and unresolved issues too. Unresolved issues. I always say that I grew up in it. So I think I'm harder on myself than you because you said that parenting we get at one shot. I think Heavenly Father knew I needed eight shots. Meaning, needs more than one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight because she needs this many opportunities to refine herself. Because I...

Ha ha ha.

My oldest, he's 31 now, I have apologized to him so many times. It's like, mom, I get it. And I tell him, remember when you were five, I was five years old ⁓ also as a mom. So you, you know, I was growing up with you. My 16 year old now, it's a little bit more blessed or lucky because I have learned the hard way. I, but I have so many gaps or unresolved issues myself from my upbringing and things that I went through in life.

that I was sometimes projecting those unresolved issues on them. So I want to encourage parents out there, team leaders, because you like to plug this with the businesses and professional aspect too. You have to see yourself, look at yourself in the mirror and see what is it that you're struggling with so that you can let go of that and resolve it so that

that your scars won't affect or you don't cause more scars or scars on your own kids because of own scars. So I encourage you to look at yourself in the mirror, own up what is it that you need to deal with and resolve so that then that doesn't get in the way of your relationship with your own children.

I find that interesting

because I see that as well. I love my parents and they did a great job, but I'm like, if I to do it, I've done things different. Now have my kids who are growing up and they're critiquing me. so it's like, none of us are perfect, you but I tried to give my children what I didn't have and I'm sure they're going to give, try to give their children what we didn't have. And, but yes, it's a growing learning thing. ⁓ But yes, you're upbringing. If you don't see that example, you have to learn that example before you can give it. So.

And that's

Yeah.

Yeah, are there some simple, I know we kind of talked about before, but to draw it in, are there some simple practical steps we can take to build a healthy relationship with our children?

Yes, absolutely. This is a whole webinar that, but to me, communication is key and that active listening, active listening, like listen, listen to learn. my goodness. If the listeners, if the listeners of this podcast, right. Take away this concept. will change your life. I promise you put it in prayer.

communication.

listening to learn. I have told many adults you are accusing, you're attacking and you're judging. And this is adult with adult. Some people have done this with me. Imagine with their own children. And I've done this with my children too, where we already have a preconceived notion. We have a judgment and assumption of what we think is happening. And we need to listen to learn and be very active listeners.

And I say this and I am in the middle of me also fine tuning this skill. But if you come from a place of curiosity and you ask insightful questions and that can change a lot for good in your relationships. And don't misinterpret it as an interrogation session. If you know what I mean.

Yes, yep, yep. know

Stephen Covey said, ⁓ seek first to understand, then to be understood. And that's that whole listen and listen to understand, ask questions. It is difficult sometimes, because I think my curiosity has sounded like interrogation sometimes to my kids. I'm like, I'm just trying to have relationship with you, but they look at it as interrogation. I know for me, I need to be careful.

in how I ask questions.

But David, here's another question put forthought. Have you asked them, how can I be a better dad? What is it about my questions that you're resisting or what that makes you think that? And how could I approach you in a different and a better way? so there's data there. There's information that you can leverage.

Yep, no, those are great questions.

It's great questions. ⁓ I know some of your kids are older, some of your are still in the home. Is there a difference or what is the difference between adult children who are moved out of the home and connecting with them versus children who are still in the home?

that the children that are not at home and are adults is just amazing and beautiful to know that even at some point where you were, you know, what is this? How do you say this in English? Butting heads, fighting butting heads, their principles, the principles that you taught them will be with them.

Fighting, butting heads, yeah.

And our voices will be as echo in their mind. And that can be for good or for bad. So there's a son, I just came back from a trip. And as we were working together in a project, he was quoting a scripture that he knew verbatim. And I'm like, you remember that scripture? mom, that's my favorite scripture. And that was like payday, meaning ⁓ all our efforts. We had

⁓ Neat, neat. yeah.

four years and still do family night, family home evening or family night. People go for, you know, and we had a little lesson and refreshments at the end and singing hymns and all that. And they loved it. And we had a little family chant. So to see them grow and to see how they're blossoming or just growing into that men that I wanted, you know, godly men or, or that women and the mom that

Mm-hmm.

I have a daughter with five children now. And just to see how great of a job they're doing. And like you said about our previous generations, ourselves and our future generation, we want the rising generation to be better. Of course, because we don't want to make the mistakes our parents did and they don't want to make the mistakes that we did either. So hopefully each generation will become better and better and we'll heal.

And they'll have their own struggles to deal with according to society and how the world is evolving. But it's just so amazing to see how they're growing and how they're evolving. And I don't even know if that was the answer to the question. So those are the differences between the adult children. And then the children that are home learn also, and they have taken mental note from the mistakes or some decisions the older kids made that weren't.

Yep.

favorable and and then the younger children have learned from them and also is also so amazing to see the older ⁓ children give counsel and advice to the younger ones and I'm like, I don't need to work on that one because you know, older sibling, older sister, older brother is being a good guide or example or giving good advice to the younger siblings. So

Yep, and it's all, they all mature at different levels and that's interesting to see as well. So, Laurie, ⁓ final thoughts. Do you have any final parting words of inspiration or challenge to my audience today?

pretty good.

I have something and I because I knew this moment was coming. kind of wrote it down. I have some notes here. It's it's it's basically going back to humility. It's never too late for humility. I have seen lots of in hearts years later when when us as parents finally lead our children in repentance and in owning up to our mistakes and telling our children, I'm sorry I did this. ⁓

And that makes a big deal also in your business as a boss, as a manager, as a CEO, business owner, listen team. I've been doing this this way and I want to course correct and I'm going to do my best to course correct. And I need your help and reminders from time to time. So that humility needs to be so important. And it's what builds, builds those bridges ⁓ of connection and communication.

Absolutely, humility is huge, huge, huge. God is supposed to probably give us grace to the humble. Laurie, thank you so much for your time. Encouragement today, talk about children and how to connect with them, because that's something that we as leaders need to do, not just connect with people at work, but especially in the home, because that's what's going to last in our life. so friends, if you're looking to go deeper, want to learn more about Laurie and her work, check the show notes for links and sites to get more connected with her and see what she does. And remember.

Your business represents the great God you serve. So build a business worthy of God's name and in a way that honors Him.

Amen.