335 | 35 Tips to Establish Brotherhood with a DA+3 Group (Jeff Zaugg)
Episode Description
Intention is meaningless without action. This year, be the man who steps up to create a DA+3 group. It’s as simple as getting three dads to join you. Extend invitations, build friendships, and keep going when it’s tough. Your family’s future depends on it.
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Jeff Zaugg is a loving husband, intentional dad, and passionate advocate for the fatherless. With experience in nonprofit leadership and pastoring, Jeff founded DadAwesome in 2018 and Fathers for the Fatherless shortly thereafter. Jeff and his wife, Michelle, have been married for 17 years and are parents to four daughters, ages 3 through 10.
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· Isolation is deadly.
· Show me your group, and I’ll show you your family’s future.
· 17 Ideas of Groups to Start.
· 6 Benefits of Being the Dad Who Goes First.
· 4 Steps to Take Initiative.
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Podcast Intro: [00:00:01] Being a great father takes a massive amount of courage. Instead of being an amazing leader and a decent dad, I want to be an amazing dad and a decent leader. The oldest dad in the world gave you this assignment, which means you must be ready for it. As a dad, I get on my knees and I fight for my kids. Let us be those dads who stop the generational pass down of trauma. I want encounters with God where He teaches me what to do with my kids. I know I'm going to be an awesome dad because I'm gonna give it my all.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:00:39] Welcome back to DadAwesome. My name is Jeff Zaugg and today's episode, 335, we're on YouTube. We're of course on all the podcast platforms. Today's a solo episode. So let me just start with saying thanks for thanks for listening. Often, by often, about 97% of the time it's me interviewing a guest on DadAwesome. Today, coming off a Father's Day just last weekend, I really felt like this is, this is a week for me to take a solo episode to share my heart around, just a big prayer, a big hope. Really, I mean, my greatest hope for this year ahead for DadAwesome. And here it is, my greatest hope, I shared a little bit of this on DadAwesome day. We had a Zoom gathering. In fact, there's a link in the show notes to the recording of that, kind of, state of DadAwesome. Man, where is God taking this ministry? But I want you to hear this, my my biggest hope going into this year is that the year ahead would be a year filled with more dads taking initiative. Taking the reins and saying no, no, being DadAwesome is more than just me personally being DadAwesome for my kids. I want and I'm praying for this guys that when you listen today, you're not just like, oh, that's a helpful nudge, that's a little encouragement. I want you to hear this. I believe that being DadAwesome is you being a dad who says, I'll go first. I will invite other dads. I will grow friendships with other dads. I will not journey alone. So that's my biggest prayer. My biggest prayer for today on episode 335, for the year ahead, for this ministry into the future, is that more dads are saying, I'll take initiative. I'll go first, I'll launch a dad group, I'll pull guys together. I'm not okay waiting for someone else to invite me in. I'll be the guy who goes first. I'll be the spark. I'll begin inviting other dads to come together, to grow together, to journey together. Isolation kills. Isolation leads to death. Brotherhood, support. Who's the guy, who's the guy that you would call at two in the morning? If something's just like, oh, man, something's going bad. Something in my marriage, something in my dad life, I have to hustle to the hospital to help one of my kids. I need someone to get to my house now. Who's the dad? Who's the guy? Who's the brother? Who's the friend that you're going to call? I pray for that, I just pray into this, guys, that every one of us at DadAwesome, every one of us guys who say, I'm going to man, I'm about leading my family. I'm about pressing in and growing and pursuing the hearts of my kids. It's not enough to do it alone. Guys, it's not enough to do it alone. I want you to hear from a few other voices before you hear kind of my take on DadAwesome groups and being the dad who goes first, I want you to hear from a few others. So here's Jay Vallotton, John Eldredge and Jon Tyson.
Jay Vallotton: [00:03:36] What Jeff did for you guys, in my opinion, grab 2 or 3 guys and start that journey with them. Who are you leading? Who are you growing? Who are you attaching your life to and being responsible for? You can start by building your own group, and you don't have to be miles ahead. You just have to be two driven men deciding to live at the standard that God's called us to, and to grow and to build and, you know, and to change your life. Who are you going to invite to be on this journey with you? So start thinking up some names, start writing them down.
John Eldredge: [00:04:09] You don't need to know anything, and you don't have to be crushing it as a dad. Honestly, get some dudes together in a safe place, like a campfire environment and you just go, how's it going? Maybe let's talk about kids and play this week and just let them go. They will fill the rest of the evening, guys. Like you don't have you don't have to be a therapist.
Jon Tyson: [00:04:29] Ancient societies, but not primarily just father son society. They were the community of men playing a vital role. It was the tribe that helped form them, not just this psychotic pressure on an individual father. So yeah, the enemy would want you to be on your own, feel terrible, think you can't keep up, think everybody's doing better than you. So you never actually get help from others who are all probably feeling like you. And rather than relying on one another to make the deficits or deal with their struggles, we just sort of sit alone.
Jay Vallotton: [00:05:01] Honestly, it's the secret, it's the cheat code is if you make yourself the leader, then you have to show up and you have to learn and you have to grow. And people are like, bro, how do I get to where you're at? Sign up before you're ever ready. Sign up to be the leader before you're ever ready, and you'll figure out how to make it happen.
Jeff Zaugg: [00:05:21] The common saying that you've heard before is, show me your friends and I'll show you your future. Well, let me say it this way, show me the DadAwesome guys that you have assembled, and I'll show you your family's future. The benefits guys, there are so many benefits to being a dad who says, I'll go first. Let me hit you with six benefits from, from you just being a dad who says, I'll invite others over. I'll invite other dads around a cause, I'll invite other dads around let's grow together, let's learn together. So here's six of them, these are benefits of being a dad who says I'll go first. The first is you get to choose the day, the time, and the frequency. You can choose Monday mornings at 5 a.m., you can choose Thursday evenings at 9 p.m. You can choose the time if you, if you're the guy who assembles the group and says, I'll go first. You can choose the time, the day, the frequency. The second one is you get to choose the activity. If your group is a shooting group, you're gonna go to a shooting range and shoot rifles together, you get to choose that. If your group's a surfing group, you can choose that. If your group is, I'm going to learn about this topic, I'm going to read this book, you get to choose the activity or the theme or the content in the area that you want to grow. You get to initially form the culture as the leader, the guy who says yes first, that assembles the group of dads, you get to choose the culture. You get to actually choose who are the first few guys that you invite and that's going to form some of the culture of your group. So just want to encourage you, it matters how you start and you get to form the culture versus coming to somebody else's group that has its own culture. The fourth one is you have instant accountability to show up. This is so good because I get tired, sometimes. I get grumpy sometimes. By saying, I'm the leader of this group, I've invited people into this group, I never missed the group. I'm the guy who shows up because leaders show up. You can't lead something, invite others into something, and you personally, because you're having a bad day, just choose not to. So, you get instant accountability. The fifth one is, you, you get to decide the commitment levels. You can choose to have kind of a casual group, hey, come, barbecue, once a month in my backyard, casual come when you can, no problem. Or you can choose, this is an all in type group. I'm going to ask you to commit two times a week, we're going to workout at 5 a.m.. And this is a group that's asking for a commitment. So you can choose anywhere in between. High commitment two more of a casual, you get to choose. The sixth one is you get to decide the finish line. You get to decide the finish line. When is this group going to wrap up? Are you going to meet, from January through May, the first Monday of each month? You're going to meet five times, and then the group's done. You get to decide kind of the time frame around your schedule, your availability, your family calendar. You get to kind of decide that. So those are six benefits of being the dad who says, I'll go first. Now let me share some examples of things I've tried. Guys, like I've tried a lot in this area because I need friendships, I need accountability, I need to keep growing. And the best way for all those things to happen is with other men. So these are all things that I've tried with other guys. So I've hosted the large group, the group that you rent a huge smoker and you smoke a whole pig. I've done the one time large group gatherings. You can do that. It actually helps spark and fosters some initial friendships. There's nothing wrong with a one time group, but you just know what it is, it's a one time group. I've done those. I've done the online Zoom groups, especially back 3 or 4 years ago when it was the only option. Online groups have a benefit. They still have a great benefit. You can really learn and grow together. And the, ease of being able to log in after your kids go to bed later in the evening and not have a babysitter, not have to kind of coordinate family schedules because you can log in from home. That helps. I've tried the small group kind of campfire gatherings. I've, I've experienced some incredible conversations, incredible moments of of God breaking through and friendships like, wow, that testimony is exactly what I needed in this moment. I've done the campfire group thing. I've experienced, what we called it, it was like a five week blitz in June. There was five Mondays and in June, and we invited, we had 70 guys say yes. And, they broke up into small groups of seven guys at each table. High commitment. We asked them to commit to be at least four of the five Mondays. And we did a five week blitz in one month, but we were all together on those Mondays for like 2.5 hours each week. So that was just a format thing that we try with with mentors in each group. I've done the rent a camp and do a retreat where you rent a camp or you rent a certain number of spots, and you take a bunch of guys to a retreat. I've done that. I've done book studies around various books. We, we did, The Bait of Satan by John Bevere. Just recently, I did a study, and I didn't start that one, but I was a part of it and learned and grew with a group of men on Friday mornings. I've done challenge groups. We did one around the Murph workout, where we invited dads to workout with the weight of their kids instead of the classic of the 20 pound weight vest that most people do with the Murph workout, we use the weight of our kids. My daughter on my shoulders, my, baby strapped to me in the Baby Bjorn while I was doing pull ups. So we did a Murph challenge group with a clear end date. Let's train together. Let's do this thing. I've done, I did a group focused on businessmen, where we took over two Panera Bread restaurants. We had so many guys wanted to come out early in the morning that we actually took over two restaurants and every booth was taken, and it was wild to see the momentum of just someone had the idea group came around it, and we had mentors at every table, and guys grew through this format of taking over Panera Breads. I've been a part of 100 mile bike ride groups around the cause, Fathers for the Fatherless, sprint triathlons, 70.3 half Ironman teams. I've been a part of the classic Saturday morning breakfast, church breakfast. That's another format that I've, I've seen work. It's, I've been a part of that format. I've been a part of one time meetups, on front porches, in restaurants, on boats, around campfires and breweries, at coffee shops, in farmhouses and many other locations as well. These one time meetups around, let's talk about how's the dad life going? Those meetups have actually been, in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Florida, New York, Texas, Arizona, Colorado, Montana, California and Nebraska. Those are all just meetups of dads who came together and said, let's just meet around this theme of how's the dad life going? And we just saw where conversation went from there. At one point, we started a fitness group on the roof, the top floor of a parking ramp. So the top floor of this parking ramp, we called it Wisdom and Strength. We brought tractor tires, sledgehammers, ladders, and we just kind of always hoped that the the owner of the parking ramp didn't know what was going on because it was epic sunset view from the top of this parking ramp. Where we were doing this kind of, intense workout with flipping tires and sprints and pull ups off of ladders. And, we set the stage and the men came out and my goodness, guys loved that group, and I grew, I wanted to grow, so that's what we did. We did something crazy on the roof parking ramp. Currently, the two groups that I'm leading are a 5:55 a.m., before the sunrise, Beach Workout group, a pursuit group here in northeast Florida, every Friday morning. That's one of the groups I'm currently leading, and I lead a once a month dad group. It's the first Monday of each month down in the hometown where I'm living now, and those are the two groups I'm currently leading. Now, the reason that I mentioned 17 types of groups that I've led in the past is this is not a one size fits all. Being a a leader, being Dadwesome, taking initiative to form a group is not a one size fits all by any means. So why is this such a big deal? Why should we do something in this category of being DadAwesome? Why should we step into being the activator, being the spark, being the guy who rallies and gathers other dads? Isolation is deadly. We know this, it's so true. When we're alone, we're vulnerable. Second, dads without friendships will at some point cause deep pain to their kids. The pain of isolation and a dad being a dad that doesn't have friends looking out for them, encouraging them, challenging them to grow. You will pass on pain to your kids. Your kids are worth it. You may have things in your past. They're like, man, it was hard. I was a part of this men's group. It dissolved. This happened, that happened. It got awkward. Your kids are worth trying again. Your marriage is worth trying again to form deep friendships. Finding a group of dads and forming these friendships is a huge deal. So what holds us back? Guys, what holds us back from forming these deep friendships? Forming and pulling together guys, dads to grow together as dads, to grow in our fatherhood journey, to grow as men after God's heart. What holds us back? One is, I think, hidden struggles. If we have stuff going on in our life that's kind of hidden, that guys don't know about, that will keep us from saying yes to joining or starting a group of men. Because, man, when there's stuff hidden, bringing it to light is painful. So that could, that could be the thing holding us back. Our time, busyness, scheduling that could certainly hold us back. We're to overcommitted when this is something that matters more than almost any other commitment is having these deep friendships. But yet we let the other things crowd out. The thing that's most important. Awkwardness, it might be awkward. The guys that come might not be the guys that you really want to hang out with, or be long time friends with, the guys who come to the group that you started. Baggage from previous friendships. I mentioned that already, but, man, when you transition AND a group is formed for years and years, and then that group ends or something goes wrong, like, that's hard when you have that baggage forward. The other thing that might keep us from forming a group is believing a lie, that we are strong enough on our own. A lot of us, culture says you're strong enough on your own. You don't need, you don't need guys in your corner. You're strong enough alone. BE the man who picks himself up, right. That's a lie. That's a Lie. So what are the steps? So say, by now you're talked into, I want to do something. I want to do something in this category of being a spark, being a change maker, being the dad who will go first. Few of the steps, first is you have to decide. Decide that you're going to be DadAwesome. I had a buddy that early on in DadAwesome, he'd look at me after he heard about something that I had done with like, girls, and he'd say, dude, that's so DA. He's like, that's so DA, man. So guys, I want you to be DadAwesome, so DA, right. I want you to be DA. Well, being DA, being DadAwesome is more than just pursuing the hearts of your kids. Being DadAwesome, this is part of who we are is we need to all be dads who are activating growth for other dads. If we help other dads grow, we will grow more. If we help other dads grow, we'll be stronger together. So, if you want to be DA, as my buddy said, you've got to be a dad who decides. The first thing is to do is just decide. And by deciding, it doesn't mean that you're running a huge dad ministry. By deciding, just means you're going to do something in every chapter, something intentional to grow friendships. That could be a once a month gathering. That could be very simple, intentionality with the other dads who were already at soccer practice for your kids. We're going to pull together, we're going to talk about a question of the week, a dad question of the week. We're going to pull together during soccer practice. This, this can be so simple. So, the second step is a simple goal. So you're going to start with decide, deciding. You're going to move into a simple goal I call it DadAwesome +3, DA+3. And this is, this is how easy it is, your goal is just to get three dads, three dads to join you. Just get three, DA+3. It might take inviting nine to get three to show up, so it might take nine. Right now, my beach workout group on Friday mornings, every Thursday I send 20 text messages, every Thursday. My once a month group, I send about 35 text messages, the week beforehand, remind guys. And I send a calendar invite and I send an email, and I send a follow up email with the save the date for the next month. Guys, it takes invite, invite, invite. DA+3 is a simple goal, but it takes inviting. It takes initiative. If you want to gather guys together, you've got to be the one who goes first. You've got to send the message, you got to decide, and then you've got to go after the simple goal of DA+3. Be a dad who gathers three other dads, very simple. Then you have to start. You decide, you, you have a simple goal of just get the first few guys together, DA+3. Then you start, do something. This could be a, a weekend to a cabin to go fishing. This could be a book study, it's got eight chapters in the book, let's go through it for eight weeks. This could be a workout group, you start with one day a week. Don't start with three days a week for a workout group. This could be a Father's for the Fatherless team. You're like, let's let's all bike 100 miles. Hey, let's all do this obstacle course race. Let's all do this 5K run. You can create, in that case, you're rallying guys to to train, to work out, to fundraise for a mission of helping the fatherless. It could be that. It could be a campfire group once a month. It could be a prayer group where you pray for your kids. You find out ahead time, hey, how can we be praying for each, your kids pray for them by name. You throw some note cards down on the table, you all pick up the card of each other's kids names, and you pray for them, like it could be so many different. DadAwesome has a five week video series, it was recorded two years ago, but it's ready for you to use, anyone who wants the DadAwesome small group series, it's linked right in the show notes here. You could just do five weeks. Each video is like seven minutes long. Simple. It's the DadAwesome four part framework with an intro week. Also the next seven podcasts from DadAwesome, the next seven weeks are all geared towards this, this content and discussion questions for you and being DadAwesome. Rallying, inviting, taking initiative, being the dad who goes first to gather in three other dads. Every episode, the next seven episodes is geared towards a small group series, a campfire series. This is all geared towards taking conversations we've had in the past, and packaging them for you to have conversations about with other dads. Another just opportunity because the deadline's like five days from now, or maybe it's one week from now and June 26th is the DadAwesome Accelerator. Guys have been sharing about this opportunity. This is an example of jump in and be equipped to go lead a group, because the DadAwesome Accelerator is not you leading group, it's you joining a coaching cohort for six weeks. But all the guys who graduated from the first round of the DadAwesome Accelerator, they all were like, I want to start this for somebody else. They were all inspired for I want to create this for somebody else. I want to actually go form a group with what I learned here and take these six themes and take them forward. So, so that's an invite. The link to apply is in the show notes here. And then the last step, guys, is keep it going. I have been discouraged so many times in the first five months of living in Northeast Florida. The amount of inviting, inviting. I'm always inviting guys and it feels sometimes like my word, 20 text messages to get four guys to show up on the beach at 5:55 in the morning for a workout. That's a lot of outbound to get four guys to show up, but I'm just going to keep going. We've got to be a golden retriever in this area of, of brotherhood, forming communit, it takes time and it takes reps and it takes the more you invite in, eventually you're going to find your inner circle. The brothers you journey with for a long time. The guys who know the names of your kids, the guys who know, man, this is where you're most vulnerable. This is, they're the guys you call at 2 am, but it takes reps and it takes time and the best way to form, don't be a dad who says, I'm going to go look for friends. I'm going to go look for friends. Will you be my friend? Will you be my friend? Will you be my mentor? Will you be my friend? What we want here is we want to create a group that is a chance to try out friendships, to try out, to invest in others, they're investing in you. But you're trying to find the inner circle. The guys who you can journey with for a long ways. And the way we do that is being DA, being DadAwesome is we're always creating opportunities, we're being the spark, we're inviting guys in to grow together towards being DadAwesome. It's so simple. But that's how by reps and text messages and invites and just stick with it and be a golden retriever. Eventually you're going to find the inner circle of guys who know your story and you know theirs. So this is, this is the the week after Father's Day, kicking into a theme, a hope, a prayer that being DadAwesome is way more than just pursuing the hearts of our kids. Being DadAwesome is being a spark, being a change maker, being a dad who says, I'll go first. I'm going to create a brotherhood community. I'm going to create growth opportunities in the area of fatherhood. I'm going to create, man, we're men going after the same goal. We're going after Jesus. We're going after more of God, more of hearing His voice, more of stepping into freedom from sin struggles, more of living in the Light. There are so many Bible verses, I actually asked ChatGPT for, to get a few rounds of like, what are the verses that really rally guys? Are like, and you guys can look those verses up on your own. I'm not going to walk through a whole bunch of Bible verses. You know, this is at the center of God's heart. Guys, you know it. You know it. So my prayer for you right now is this Heavenly Father, for each dad that's listening, would You fill them with courage? It takes courageous dads to, to go first. Will You fill them with hope. God, would they be hopeful as I am filled with so much hope right now that this will be common. It's going to be common that DadAwesome dads are gathering others to grow together, are gathering others around campfires, are gathering others in fishing boats, are gathering others at coffee shops. That it would just become normal. It's part of being an intentional dad is you're a dad who wants to see others grow alongside of you. Who wants to grow friendships. Heavenly father, I pray against lies that lead towards isolation, lies, shame, baggage. Lies that are seeping in that says I can't lead a group. We believe in Jesus name, that You've called us sons of God and that we can step in and be change makers, imperfectly. So I pray in Jesus name that those lies be washed away and that You would renew every single dad listening with hope that I can invite. I can invite nine guys over to a campfire. I can be the, I can be the spark even though I have baggage in my past, even though I have struggles right now in my life, I can invite others into this journey of growing together, of seeking You, of sharing our stories with one another, of growing together, of taking action towards causes that You care about. So I pray in Jesus name for freedom, for joy, and for a community, a movement of being DadAwesome dads who are, who are activating and inviting and rallying and saying, man, join me on this mission. Join me as I grow. Join me, as I imperfectly, try to step in with my whole heart to fatherhood. So, thank you for hearing this prayer and thank you for the listeners. We love You and we pray this in Jesus name. Amen. [
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· 13:08 - "Why should we step into being the activator, being the spark, being the guy who rallies and gathers other dads? Isolation is deadly. We know this, it's so true. When we're alone, we're vulnerable. Second, dads without friendships will at some point cause deep pain to their kids. The pain of isolation and a dad being a dad that doesn't have friends looking out for them, encouraging them, challenging them to grow. You will pass on pain to your kids."
· 16:51 - "You're going to move into a simple goal, I call it DadAwesome +3, DA+3. This is how easy it is, your goal is just to get three dads, three dads to join you. It might take inviting nine to get three to show up. Guys, it takes invite, invite, invite. DA+3 is a simple goal, but it takes inviting. It takes initiative. If you want to gather guys together, you've got to be the one who goes first. You've got to send the message, you got to decide, and then you've got to go after the simple goal of DA+3. Be a dad who gathers three other dads."
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