Channing Tatum Shares Lesson He Learned About Boundaries While Raising Daughter Everly

While Channing Tatum is still navigating fatherhood, he does have some advice on how to step up to the parenting plate.

In fact, the 43-year-old recently reflected on his journey raising 10-year-old Everly, whom he shares with ex-wife Jenna Dewan.

While on Today With Hoda & Jenna May 30, Channing was asked whether he has a philosophy as a parent. He laughed, answering, "I have no idea. I'm just trying to get by, I think just like every other parent, you're just kind of trying not to mess kids up, but you know you're going to on some level."

And—despite joking that he expected himself to be the kind of father who got his kid into more trouble than kept her out of—he's learned a lot about maintaining boundaries and setting rules for children. 

"Even though they don't want boundaries, they do want boundaries," he explained. "Her anxiety goes down, her stress level goes down when she just understands the rules."

Much of what Channing has learned about fatherhood stemmed from his own nerves about raising a girl and his upbringing in the south. 

"I was raised very, very different," the Magic Mike star noted. "South — dad just, ‘Touch that again, you're going to get a whipping' sort of situation and we don't spank Evy, so it's one of those gentle kind of things, but having to learn where to be strong, where to be firm, but not in the way I was."

Channing's experiences navigating fatherhood also led him to a new role—being an author. 

The 21 Jump Street actor's third children's book in the Sparkella series was just released on May 30, and is titled The One and Only Sparkella and the Big Lie. 

"I was looking up YouTube on how to braid hair," he explained regarding the series' origin. "Like, I didn't want to be the dad that was just delivering a kid to school looking like she had just slept on the street."

"This series of books kind of came from that," he continued. "It was really trying to figure out how to talk to a little girl."

And when it comes to his daughter's hobbies? It looks as if Everly is taking a page out of both her parents' books. 

"Evie is into Irish dance," mom Jenna explained on The Kelly Clarkson Show in January. "So this is her biggest, hugest passion."

And although Irish dancing is not the kind of dancing one might expect from the daughter of the leads from the hip-hop classic Step Up, Channing explained where he thinks his daughter's passion originated. 

"She loves anything magical, fairies, elves," he said during his chat on Today. "And when you look on YouTube or whatever, all the clip art to Celtic music are fairies. So I think that's how we started it. And then she became obsessed with Celtic music. Now we're doing Celtic Irish dancing."

And look below to check out Channing and Everly on an adorable father-daughter outing in Las Vegas:

Everly has fun in the arcade.

Channing is impressed by his daughter's racing skills.

Everly plays one of her dad's favorite video games.

Channing and Everly catch a show.

The actor gets into the Vegas spirit.

Everly is crushing it at Whac-A-Mole.

...and beats dad!

What indeed.

Everly walks and dances with Channing.

Everly is mesmerized by the fountain show at the Bellagio hotel.

Truly a memorable experience.

Everly has a blast dancing in the hotel room.

Good night!