Never! Do all the things 🤣

Thanks for sharing this Hank!

So when you see a group of people doing something you see as too risky for yourself - don’t blindly follow just because others are doing it so what the heck.

Make your own calculation and feel good about that. It is much harder to sit with ignoring your own judgement.

We recently moved and were invited to a neighborhood cookout. A storm rolled in and no one had a care in the world and wanted to stay outside. I was not going to risk it with my 3 year old and pregnant wife. I thanked our neighbors but said we were leaving due to lightning. I got my family inside.

Most adults have no clue. They will give you an answer whether they know it or not. You are smart and a tremendous critical thinker. Trust your instinct. It will be uncomfortable to confront your peers but it is more uncomfortable to disregard your own intuition for fear of what other’s think.

Times where I correctly judged a situation that others were not paying any mind but didn’t act on my own instinct out of social fear.

I think about this often now that I am a father. I will pass down my father’s lesson with some added knowledge of my own.

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But I was known as a “goody2shoes” and incessantly teased for my cautious nature. So I kept my mouth shut, because surely the adults/coaches would stop practice if we were truly in danger.

Wrong.

I can recall this scenario in many different situations as a child vividly.

When you’re a child, you inherently look to adults for answers. He helped me realize that adults will give you answers whether they know them or not.

As the thunder rolled, I remember thinking to myself, “This isn’t safe. Why are we still practicing? We need to get off the field”

Easy-going, full of love but quickly calculated and scientific minded - my dad taught me one of my most important childhood lessons:

“Adults can and will be wrong.

You are smart and a tremendous critical thinker. Trust your own judgement and instinct over another’s.

Most adults are clueless.”

But everyone was okay.

He spent the next week in bed but long term would be ok.

He told me it felt like he had been driven into the ground like a stake. Every muscle in his body felt like it had been torn.

I’ll never forget those moments of not knowing if he’d be okay.

He used his car to stand and steady himself. His body was intact and not visibly injured. Yet at the same time he looked like he had been run over by a garbage truck.

His feet were smoking and his eyes were trying to process what had happened.

Other people farther away were also dropped.

I tried to unbuckle and get out of our car as my mom grabbed me. Though our car was hit, we were safely protected inside. She didn’t want me leaving that safety.

I yelled at her to let me go as I tried to free my buckle.

Then I heard my dad yell out, “stay in the car!”

My brain instantly put together what had happened.

My moms car had also been hit, electrical system going haywire. The windows were going up and down on their own as the alarm wailed.

A moment of intense disorder, chaos and uncertainty.

I couldn’t see my dad laid out on the other side of his car

He was looking over the top of his car at me, hand on the door handle as I finished my question.

FLASH - everything went completely white as my ears rang.

My dad was no longer standing on the other side of his car. He had instantly dropped to the ground, faster than I could see in the flash.

I didn’t look to the coaches. I grabbed my stuff and ran with him to our cars. The other kids sensed his urgency and followed.

I got into my mom’s car and rolled down my window to ask my dad something inconsequential as he got into his car parked next to us.

My dad was the first to tell the coaches to get kids off the field. He had run over from my younger brother’s practice a few fields down. I could tell from his tone he was in disbelief the coaches hadn’t gotten us to cars yet. He gave me a look, without saying anything I knew it was time to go.

Wrong decision.

1. Cannabis is legal in Illinois. Raw, unconsumed cannabis legally purchased from a dispensary needs to be transported hime.

2. The “smell of cannabis” is a Trojan Horse for searches that infringe upon personal rights.

What are we doing here? This should be heavily scrutinized.