My dad always said, “Ceejay, pay attention, read, and react.” I believe he picked up this term from my Pop Warner football practices. This phrase has always served me well because it made me pay attention to my surroundings and act accordingly to what was happening around me. Most of the time, I used the phrase to implement into football or survival, which served me well. However, reading and reacting have served me the most being a dad. By default, I try to figure out how I could serve my family better, and sometimes it’s an easy fix, and other times it’s not. But reading and reacting allow me to think ahead and serve them as I think they need. Although reading and reacting is a great characteristics, sometimes just asking my wife, “what do you need” can be just as good or even better than my own reading and reacting. So, read, react and ask is my new mantra and maybe ill put the ask before the other two going forward. #girldad