Talking To Teens: Expert Tips for Parenting Teenagers
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Ep 43: How to Stop Yelling at Kids
2 juni 2019 · 30 min
Bonnie Harris, the bestselling author of When Your Kids Push Your Buttons and Confident Parents, Remarkable Kids, reveals why your kids make you so mad sometimes. In this episode, she breaks down her incredible system to stop yelling at kids and start connecting with them instead. Lees meer
Full show notes
It’s a normal Saturday night in your house, and you and your teenager are getting along just fine. All of a sudden, they ask if they can go to a party, and seem very insistent You don’t know who’s going to be there, where the party will be, or what people will be doing. Naturally, you say no. Frustrated by this and emotional, your teenager retaliates, knowing just what to say to push your buttons. You get mad and yell, and both of you leave the conversation feeling worse than when you started.
This cycle is hard to break. It’s not easy to figure out how to stop yelling at kids. As a parent, you want to protect your child and make sure they stay on the right path, and sometimes it feels like there’s no other way to ensure their well being other than to yell at them! On the other hand, your teenager wants freedom, and when you won’t yield to their demands they know just how to frustrate you. Even though they know that their tactics will only lead to more fighting, they antagonize you anyway.
Fortunately, our guest today has some answers for you. She’s here to help you learn how to stop yelling at kids and implement more positive solutions. Her name is Bonnie Harris, and she’s the author of When Kids Push your Buttons and What You Can Do About It. On top of being a mother herself, Bonnie has given talks all over the world and is constantly running workshops for parents. These workshops focus on how to become better at diffusing tension between you and your teen and how to stop yelling at kids.
It was in one of these workshops that Bonnie began to notice this destructive cycle of yelling among her clients. She realized that this was a very common problem among teenagers a…
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Ep 42: Positive Parenting Solutions
26 mei 2019 · 22 min
Jane Nelsen, the author of the Positive Discipline books and founder of the positive discipline movement reveals some positive parenting strategies for rebellious and defiant teenagers. Get your teen under control without punishing and lecturing them with these great tips. Lees meer
Full show notes
Being a parent is busy work.
The amount of household and childcare responsibilities placed on top of a 40 hour work week can seem monstrously overwhelming. You’re doing so much! It’s no wonder that when your kids neglect to do their homework, you might feel like exploding. They had one job!
Obviously, these emotional explosions aren’t healthy for you or your kids. Even if you feel like you can keep your emotions in check, how often do you find yourself lecturing away at your children? I mean, how else are they going to get the message that their homework is important, and they can’t be playing video games all day?
Thankfully, there are ways to take this business and channel it towards some positive parenting techniques that will benefit you and your children. Not just one or two proven techniques, but a whole world of them! With a simple shift in mindset, you can use the collective creativity of your entire family to come up with an endless stream of ideas for getting chores done.
To help provide some tried and tested wisdom on positive parenting techniques, I spoke with the mother of 7, grandmother of 22, and great-grandma of 13, Jane Nelsen!
Jane is an educational psychologist famous for her Positive Discipline books and seminars. She teaches positive parenting techniques for managing children without resorting to punishments, threats, or other negative tactics (such as the old fashioned “timeout”). Her knowledge is very well received across the country, and she’s even appeared on Oprah! I was so excited to get time with her and ask her about these positive parenting techniques.
Being Busy is a Blessing
Being busy as a parent can be a positive thing. Jane tells parents …
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Ep 41: Choosing Great Teen Fiction Books
5 mei 2019 · 22 min
Brandon Mull, author of 15 New York Times Bestsellers, discusses what makes good teen fiction books. He also shares what he's learned about how to get teens reading for fun while giving thousands of free lectures in schools around the country. Lees meer
Full show notes
When we read a book, we allow ourselves and our minds to go on a unique journey. We give ourselves the ability to experience perspectives we’ve never known or thought about before. We form attachments to people and places beyond the scope of our understanding. Overall, we learn more about ourselves and the world just by sitting down and cracking open a paperback.
That’s why helping kids learn to love reading is important. Finding Good teen fiction books to read provides them a chance to expand their imaginations and views without even leaving their homes! Additionally, reading is a great tool to develop creative thinking, literary skills, and focus among young people.
However, in our modern world saturated with visual media, it’s challenging to find good teen fiction books to read. Society doesn’t really encourage teens to explore the written word anymore. Young people are much more likely to spend time on Tik Tok, Youtube and Netflix than browsing the shelves at the library or eBook store. How can we convince them to take the time to enjoy a good novel when there’s millions of hours of content available to stream at any moment?
Our guest today, Brandon Mull, is here to talk about how we can get kids reading again. He’s written fifteen--that’s right, fifteen--New York Times bestselling books, and many are suggested books for teens. His most popular book series, Fablehaven, has sold millions and millions of copies all over the world. Also, he’s made it his purpose to teach young people about the value of reading, by touring schools for four months out of every year to hold free assemblies.
“Tipping Point” Books
Brandon talks about how when he was young, he had a big imagination, but didn’t always know wh…
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Ep 40: Learning and Study Strategies
14 april 2019 · 20 min
Ulrich Boser, author of "Learn Better" and "The Leap", discusses the latest research on the science of learning strategies and reveals how you can help your teen to adopt proven study techniques for accelerating academic performance with less effort. Lees meer
Full show notes
When a teenager is constantly getting bad grades or failing to grasp course material, it’s hard to watch as a parent. It’s difficult to see them struggle to learn as well or as fast as their peers. We especially don’t want our kids to fall behind or get discouraged. Poor learning skills in the teen years can negatively impact grades, but failing to improve those skills can lead to greater disadvantages further into adulthood. This is why learning strategies for teens are so important! We want our kids to be happy, well-adjusted members of society, not those struggling to keep up.
Luckily, there are tried and true learning strategies for teens that can guide our kids towards being more effective learners. Our guest today is Ulrich Boser, the author of the book Learn Better: Mastering the Skills for Success in Life, Business, and School, Or, How to Become an Expert in Just About Anything. In the episode, Ulrich shines light on common misconceptions most people have about learning and several great learning strategies for teens we can use today.
Ulrich writes from the heart, as the inspiration for the book came from his own childhood. He struggled a lot in school, as he needed to repeat kindergarten and was placed into special education classes. Due to his difficulty keeping up with class, he always assumed he was going to be less successful than the classmates who excelled beyond him. However, as he began thinking critically about the process of learning itself, he discovered how he could become much more capable of retaining knowledge. He took his ideas about learning strategies for teens and put them into the book.
Ulrich describes a serious problem we have in today’s education system. He says we t…
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Ep 39: Getting Kids to Listen to You
17 maart 2019 · 30 min
Chris Smith, bestselling author of The Conversion Code, reveals a step-by-step formula for how to get kids to listen to you and follow your rules. Learn how to deal with teenagers and use Pattern Interrupt statements. Getting kids to listen to you is easy when you know this. Lees meer
Full show notes
Do you ever have trouble getting kids to listen to you and do what you ask? You’re not alone. Getting kids to listen is the most common problems parents have when they find this website.
The problem is that teenagers stop listening to you because they want a good reason to do something besides “I’m your parent.” According to neuroscience, they want to know how doing their chores or studying hard can benefit them. The “I’m counting to three” method of parenting becomes completely useless unless you back it up with some extremely heavy consequences. But that just backfires and creates resentment from your teen.
That’s why this week’s episode of the podcast is all about getting kids to listen to you and follow through with action. The secret to dealing with teenagers who don’t respect your authority?
Sell them on you want them to do
To discover the secret to getting kids to listen, I spoke with Chris Smith and worked through a step-by-step plan that will teach you all about getting kids to listen. Chris is the bestselling author of The Conversion Code, and the Co-Founder of Curaytor, which is one of the fastest-growing companies in America. He’s an expert at selling products over the phone and he’s trained thousands of salespeople around the world how to adopt his pitch.
In this episode, we go through an in-depth, step-by-step example of how to deal with teenagers who don’t want to clean their room. After tuning in, you’ll be able to use some of Chris’ actual word-for-word dialogue he’s used with his own daughter to taker her responsibilities seriously. But to use his method correctly, you’ll need to know how it works. According to Chris, getting kids to listen breaks down i…
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Ep 38: Giving Advice to Teenagers
17 februari 2019 · 24 min
Annie Fox, an online adviser to thousands of teens and the author of 12 books including "Teaching Kids to be Good People", reveals the best ways to give teens advice when they need some guidance. Learn how to give teens advice they will actually listen to with these great tips from a true master. Lees meer
Full show notes
Why Your Teen Doesn’t Talk to You
Watching your kid become a teenager can be a very awkward and strange experience––their hormones have kicked in, they’ve grown a foot out of nowhere, they’re suddenly so moody. Their social groups are shifting and they’re spending less time with the family. And whether they want to talk to you about it or not, you probably notice their increased interest in boys, girls, or both. What would make this experience slightly less awkward is if they’d just talk to you about all the changes they are going through. But getting them to actually do this can be like pulling teeth.
Regardless of whether your kid is going through good or bad times, as a parent you always want your advice for youngsters to be helpful and effective. But how will you get the chance to do this? For starters, teenagers don't ask for advice all that often. On one hand because it’s natural for teens to want to forge their own path and find solutions of their own. But on the other hand, you might just be driving them away. Though this is hard to admit, it’s extremely common with parents of teenagers. Maybe they don’t want advice from you because when they ask, you talk way too much. Or your advice isn’t age appropriate. Or because of the time when they asked “Should I break up with my girlfriend?” and you said “No” because of the amazing Christmas gift their girlfriend gave you last year.
Parents need to make the most of these rare occurrences to offer advice for youngsters. If you’re wondering what to say when they finally ask for help, and how to get them to ask more often, you’re listening to the right podcast. On this week’s episode, I got some advice f…
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Ep 37: Teach Lessons Using Stories
24 januari 2019 · 32 min
Paul Smith is the author of three books: Parenting with a Story, Lead with a Story, and Sell with a Story. On this episode, he reveals how to tell teens stories that teach them important lessons about life. He also shares a few of his favorite parenting stories that you can steal and tell to your own kids. Lees meer
Full show notes
Not Another Boring Story...
“Let me tell you how I learned the value of a dollar.” Does this sound like the beginning of a riveting story? No! It sounds like a long, boring charade that your grandfather will go on about for 45 minutes while you pretend to listen. Hopefully you won’t have to remember specific details later because there’s no way you took anything away from this one-sided conversation. Why don’t people realize that their tedious recollections are not an effective way of teaching teens lessons using stories?
Have you considered that your kid might feel this way every time you try teaching teens lessons using stories? Surely this isn’t the case, right? At least some stories from your youth you’ve told to your teen have left an impression on them. They have to know that you lived a full life before they were born and that there’s plenty of wisdom for you to pass on to them. But to be frank, it’s probably only the crazy stories — like the time you drove your mom’s station wagon through your neighbor’s yard — that they actually remember.
Teaching teens lessons using stories can help them learn how to deal with the struggles that come with growing up — should they choose to listen. That being said, what’s the best way to tell stories that’ll have a lasting impression on them and not just be ignored? In this interview, we ask one of Ink Magazine’s “Top 100 Leadership Speakers of 2018.”
Paul Smith is the author of three books on storytelling, Lead with a Story, Parenting with a Story, and most recently, Sell with a Story. He has interviewed hundreds of successful people all over the world and collected the most impactful stories from …
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Ep 36: Sex and Pornography Talks
1 januari 2019 · 23 min
Dina Alexander, the president of Educate Empower Kids and the author of numerous parenting books, explains how to talk to teenagers about porn and sex, including how to start conversations, what to do if you find porn on your family computer, and what topics to cover with every teen. Lees meer
Full show notes
It might be every parent’s worst nightmare.
You finally get some down time, and you want to resume watching the highlights to last night’s game, or your favorite sitcom rerun. You pull up the web browser on the shared, family iPad, and you see it. Right there in the search history. Unmistakable.
“Naked ladies”
The time has come, and there’s no way around it. You must now have “The Talk” with your kid. Tell all your friends to wish you luck.
Talking to teens about sex is one of the most common reasons parents come to us looking for help. But why is this conversation so awkward? Sex is supposed to be a positive thing! You should be free to talk about it with your kid, but the fears are common and understandable.
“What if I put an idea in their head and they begin experimenting on their own?”
“What if they ask questions about my sex life I don’t want to answer?”
“What if talking about it makes them too curious, and gets them in trouble?”
These are valid and important questions, and you are not alone if you are asking them. So to help get some quality answers and learn some best practices when talking to teens about sex, I spoke with the amazing, Dina Alexander.
Dina is the founder and CEO of Educate and Empower Kids (EEK), and she has been teaching in various capacities for over 20 years. She created programs like How to Talk to Your Kids About Pornography and 30 Days of Sex Talks to help parents have positive, informed conversations about sex and pornography with their kids.
The Dangers of Silence
Dina founded EEK after reading an article about teenage porn consumption. The numbers in the article seemed too overwhelming to be true. But sure enough, when she d…
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Ep 35: Parenting Like a Badass
15 december 2018 · 23 min
Biz Ellis, the host of the "One Bad Mother", reveals how she found her inner badass as a parent and learned how to be cool again through her kids' eyes. She also points out a number of ways in which you are probably already doing a great job and should give yourself a pat on the back. Lees meer
Full show notes
The “Uncool” Parent
Teens are really good at letting parents know how completely and utterly uncool we are at every chance they get. And if that’s not enough, the media does a great job at exaggerating our uncoolness. Pretty much all the characters we see in movies and TV, like Phil Dunphy on Modern Family and Amy Polar in Mean Girls, are stereotyped as out of touch with their teenagers and clueless about popular culture and modern technology. While these stereotypes are largely exaggerated, it’s not a stretch to say that most parents wouldn’t put coolness at the top of their skills list.
As a parent it can be easy to feel beat down and exhausted when your teen scoffs at every out of date reference you make. But what your teen doesn’t realize is that unlike them, parents simply don’t have time to keep up with the latest trends. You’re the one picking them up and driving them from place to place, preparing their meals, keeping the house clean, making sure they stay on top of their homework — all while trying to have some sense of what’s going on in their social life. It can be near impossible to simultaneously figure out the ever-changing world of technology and listen to the music they think is cool. The list of requirements for maintaining coolness and mastering the art of parenting like a badass is something you don’t seem to have time for — there’s already an endless to-do list many parents have barely scratched the surface of.
Maybe you’ve accepted that your teen is never going to think you’re cool. In the grand scheme of things, you know “coolness” is not so important, yet you’re sick of hearing, “You don’t know who [insert popular singer/actor here] is?” It’…
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Ep 34: Drug and Alcohol Conversations
1 december 2018 · 23 min
Robert J. Meyers, the author of "Getting Your Loved One Sober", explores strategies that parents can use to get teenagers to stop using drugs and alcohol. Instead of blaming and shaming teenagers, Meyers' research-based approach involves loving and accepting your teen. Lees meer
Full show notes
When our teenagers develop bad habits, it can feel like they’re slipping out of our control. You might worry about your teen getting into trouble, hanging out with the wrong crowd, and doing something or don’t approve of. All of a sudden, you’re hearing them come home late at night, having no idea where they went or who they were with.
It seems as though even if we beg, scream, and plead, kids won’t let up on potentially dangerous behavior. Repeatedly, we punish them, try strategies to prevent underage drinking, give ultimatums, and say that we don’t like what they’re doing—but none of it seems to work. It’s easy to get frustrated and confused when your child just won’t listen, won’t change, won’t accept help.
That’s why we need a new method of addressing our teenager’s upsetting habits. Luckily, today’s episode is jam packed with information about better ways to talk to your teenager and strategies to prevent underage drinking. Today’s guest is Dr. Robert J. Meyers, author of Get Your Loved One Sober: Alternatives to Nagging, Pleading, and Threatening. His book shines light on effective techniques to help your loved ones develop healthy habits that go beyond simple scolding.
Dr. Meyers has been working since 1976 on developing a set of principles known as CRAFT- Community Reinforcement Approach Family Therapy. CRAFT coaches individuals how to help their spouses, children, or friends who struggle with addiction accept treatment and make lasting progress.
However, his ideas have applications far beyond helping those with serious addiction problems and it is so relevant for parents of teenagers, especially those looking for strategies to prevent underage drinking.
CRAFT’s central…
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Ep 33: Does Your Teen Bully You?
15 november 2018 · 27 min
Sean Grover, author of "When Kids Call the Shots", discusses the hidden psychology that leads teenagers to bully their parents and reals simple strategies you can use to regain control from your teenager if you find yourself getting bullied. Sean has identified three main reasons parents get bullied. Lees meer
Full show notes
Teen Guilt Trips
Ever completely forgotten something that you promised your teen you’d be there for? Maybe you were so busy at work that your kid’s soccer game totally slipped your mind. When you finally get a call from your kid, or realize out of the blue that, “Wait a minute, I’m supposed to be somewhere else right now!” you’ve already missed the whole thing entirely and feel awful. You’ve taught your kid to be accountable and to always follow through when they say they’re going to do something, yet how can you expect this from them if you can’t even do it yourself?
It’s possible that your teen will be forgiving and say that it’s not a big deal—but probably not. If you’re dealing with a dramatic, hormonal teenager there’ll probably be some level of guilt and frustration placed on you. Aren’t teenagers supposed to be the irresponsible ones, not adults? Aren’t you always supposed to be there for them no matter what? In the moment, you might be willing to do anything to make it up to your teen—giving them a boost in their allowance, letting them have a later curfew, buying them a new phone. Sometimes bribery can be the easiest road to forgiveness. But maybe not the wisest.
Feeling overwhelmed by guilt can cause you to give up your control. Furthermore, allowing your teen to make you feel inferior because of a mistake you’ve made can enable your teen to bully you. If you’re looking for the best way to deal with bullies, this episode is for you.
This week on the podcast, we speak with Sean Grover to discuss the best way to deal with bullies who victimize their parents. He is the author of the award-winning book When Kids Call the Shots: How to Seize …
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Ep 32: Productivity for Teenagers
1 oktober 2018 · 25 min
David Allen, the author of "Getting Things Done", one of the best-selling business books of all time, explains how to get teens excited and motivated about their goals and productive as they pursue those goals. If you have a "lazy" teenager, you won't want to miss this one. Lees meer
Full show notes
If your child isn’t living up to their full potential because they waste too much time on distractions, just imagine how much harder life will be when they have to manage adult responsibilities! Teens today must content with YouTube, Facebook, and other social media platforms that constantly vie for their attention. Activities like sports practice, club meetings, school applications, study time, and more can really add up. Fortunately, though, having a busy schedule prevent you from dealing with lazy teenagers if your teens learn how to manage their schedules effectively.
Teens with an abundance of hobbies and responsibilities have more opportunities to explore their interests. However, it can be difficult to distinguish distractions from tasks that are worth pursuing. When teens get confused by this distinction, they may neglect their responsibilities and are often written off as being immature or lazy. And stress and distress for teenagers is on the rise, which can take away their motivation to complete even basic tasks.
Without the right approach to balancing their workload, kids become easily overwhelmed in their developmental years and leave their parents dealing with lazy teenagers. First, they start staying up late at night doing work and might skip a few homework assignments to get some sleep. But poor time-management practices can easily snowball into a reoccurring bad habit. Without a dependable initiative to reach their goals, your child could resort to shutting down. They might even lose their vocation.
To better understand dealing with lazy teenagers and boost their productivity, I spoke with David Allen, founder of the Getting Things Done (GTD) methodology and …
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Ep 31: Eating Disorders and Exercise
16 september 2018 · 20 min
Dana Suchow, founder of Do The Hotpants, discusses what parents need to know to discuss eating disorders with a teenager. She also explains how to connect with teenagers about exercise in a positive way, words you should absolutely avoid when talking about food, and a lesson in where negative body image comes from. Lees meer
Full show notes
If no one takes care to combat eating disorders in teenagers, unhealthy dieting can lead to damaging long term health problems. In serious cases, malnutrition can lead to death.
Does your teen seem uncomfortable about what they eat? Does your teen struggle to keep weight on? Do you even know what your teenager thinks about his or her body? These can be unfamiliar and uncomfortable questions, but it’s so important to ask them.
The secretive nature of eating disorders in teenagers can make unhealthy dieting a deceptively difficult problem to identify and address.
To be clear, having a teenager who struggles with body image or food consumption does not mean you are a bad parent! Billions of advertisement dollars have gone into convincing all of us that our bodies are ugly. Advertising companies know we buy more stuff when we feel bad about ourselves, so they use billboards and TV ads to train us to hate our own bodies. In this way, eating disorders in teenagers are the natural product of emotional marketing. While these ads primarily target girls, boys are affected, too.
My special guest today believes that in just 10 to 20 years, advertising will put just as many boys at risk of developing eating disorders as girls. If this is true, then eating disorders in teenagers will soon be a more relevant issue for all parents, not just parents of girls. So what can parents do to combat a thriving industry that’s invested in teens hating their own bodies? I spoke with Dana Suchow to get an idea, and it turns out there is a lot that parents can do.
Dana is the founder of DoTheHotpants.com, a website that she initially started as a fashion blog.…
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Ep 30: Puberty and Body Changes
5 september 2018 · 25 min
Suanne Kowal Connelly, author of Parenting Through Puberty, reveals when to start talking about puberty, how to start the conversation, and the important topics to discuss. Suanne also explains how to use techniques from Motivational Interviewing to improve your effectiveness during these talks. Lees meer
Full show notes
Watching teenagers going through puberty can feel like a serious loss of control. Not only are you seeing your teen go through intense physical changes, but you’re bearing witness as their personality evolves every single day. One day you wake up and they’re not only taller than you, but hanging out with kids you’ve never met and using slang you don’t understand! The social and emotional changes going on inside them are like nothing they’ve ever felt before—and like nothing you’ve ever had to deal with as a parent.
These changes are occurring because teenagers going through puberty are preparing themselves for independent adult life. You want your teenager to ride this evolutionary wave and become a functional, autonomous adult—but allowing them to have independence is terrifying! What do you do when your teen begins staying out late with their friends, driving, forming romantic relationships, and making their own decisions?
As our teenagers are going through puberty, it’s important to talk to them about values and behavior so they can become strong, happy adults. It can be hard to have these talks, but they are so valuable when it comes to protecting teens’ well-being! We want teenagers going through puberty to be independent and make their own choices, but without guidance, they might end up making choices they regret.
Today’s guest is Dr. Suanne Kowal Connelly, author of Parenting Through Puberty: Mood Swings, Acne, and Growing Pains. She’s helped kids and parents as a pediatrician for over 30 years, and sits on several counsels for the American Academy of Pediatrics. She’s not only an academic professional in the field of child development, but has …
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Ep 29: Finding Your Identity
31 augustus 2018 · 22 min
Paul Angone, author of 101 Questions You Need to Ask In Your Twenties, discusses the process of finding your identity and your unique "secret sauce" to bring to the world. The key is to push teens to take on increasingly more responsibility in their lives while also taking the right kinds of risks. Lees meer
Full show notes
Similarities between Adolescence and Your 20s
While at times we feel freed from the teenage identity issues that held us back in our youth, there are moments in our adult life when we feel just as small and humiliated as we did at 16. It’s undeniable that recovering from hardship can gradually make you more resilient and able to face challenges. If dealt with healthily, lessons learned from hardship can inspire creative and professional pursuits later in life. However, you must first develop the maturity and introspective skills to be able to look back and laugh, knowing that you’re wiser because of the mistakes you’ve made.
A variety of pressures can contribute to teenage identity issues. While it’s not necessary for a teen to decide what they want to do with their lives at 14, it’s at this age teens begin thinking about how their grades, extracurricular activities, and hobbies can determine what they do with their future. Comparing your teen's successes to those of peers can further complicate this issue.
Is it bad that your teen is only focusing on soccer while their friend plays two sports while also putting in volunteer hours? It can be damaging to a teen’s self esteem to give in to comparing themself to their peers. While healthy competition between teens can be used as a motivational tool, comparing often gives way to feelings of inferiority. Instead of motivating a teen to work harder, it might cause them to have a “why should I even try?” attitude.
As a parent, you should avoid telling your teen what to do with their life because they might directly rebel against you or feel like their choices belong to you, not to them. It’s a tricky line …
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Ep 28: Connect then Redirect
15 augustus 2018 · 21 min
Todd Cartmell, author of 8 Simple Tools for Raising Great Kids, explains how to get a strong bond with a teenager and then use this as a home base to redirect them to a better way. He says you need to start by fixing your relationship with the teen, then their behavior will follow. Lees meer
Full show notes
Connect Then Redirect
Parents of teens are all too familiar with this scenario: You want to find ways to build a strong bond with your teen but you’re often met with indifference. You try to think of simple, non-invasive questions that might get them to engage with you. “How’s school?” “Who’s that girl you’ve been hanging out with?” “What did you and Jason see at the movies?” And you’re met with one word responses: “good,” “no one,” “I don’t know.” Maybe all you get is silence because they don’t even bother to take out their headphones.
It’s understandable; your kids do not want to talk to you about who they have a crush on or why they’re fighting with their best friend. We can all remember feeling embarrassed by our parents. Thinking every little thing they say is annoying, believing that everything they do is an attempt to completely control our lives. But now that you’re a parent, you probably feel differently.
This constant battle to find ways to build a strong bond with your teenage kids can feel frustrating and even hurtful at times. You try so hard to not just be their protector but their confidant, to show them how much you care and want to be there for them. You want your teens to come to you with their problems, but your eagerness to help might make them run the other way.
Obviously, it’s important to help steer your teen in the right direction when they are facing the many challenges, peer pressures, and awkward situations that come with adolescence. You want them to make responsible choices and be respectful towards others but how can you find ways to build a strong bond with your teen if they won’t open up to you?
Todd Cartmell has some solutions for t…
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Ep 27: Awkward Talks with Teens
10 augustus 2018 · 22 min
David McGlynn, author of "One Day You'll Thank Me" along with two other books, gets candid about tough talks. By stepping up and doing the awkward talks with his own kids, McGlynn developed some important insights about how to approach the toughest parenting conversations. Lees meer
Full show notes
How do you keep a straight face when your 12-year-old son calls his younger brother a “humongous dick weed?” Of course it’s not okay, but it can be a little hard not to laugh.
Starting difficult conversation with teens in moments like this can prevent small problems from turning into bigger ones. If you fail to do so, you might find yourself called into the principal’s office from work because your son got in trouble for swearing at his classmates.
This is what happened with David McGlynn and his boys. David is an associate professor of English at Lawrence University, and an award-winning author of three books: The End of the Straight and Narrow, A Door in the Ocean, and One Day You’ll Thank Me: Lessons From an Unexpected Fatherhood. He has written for Men’s Health, Real Simple, Parents, The New York Times, Swimmer, Best American Sports Writing, and numerous other literary journals. He has amazing stories to share, especially when it comes to starting difficult conversation with teens.
Honest Relationships
David’s third book, One Day You’ll Thank Me, shares many humorous anecdotes from his life raising two boys. What all of these stories boil down to, though, is one relatable struggle of a father trying to connect with his sons. When starting difficult conversation with teens, he found that it was important to have a strong connection first. Creating a strong connection with teenagers, though, is easier said than done.
Teenagers will do almost anything to avoid trouble with parents. They are especially well-versed in lying to get out of trouble. Research on teenage truthfulness shows that most teens lie to their parents. David was no exception, and he relates his experience…
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Ep 26: The Teenage Achievement Trap
23 juli 2018 · 21 min
Brandilyn Tebo, bestselling author of The Achievement Trap and a retreat leader and life coach, says it's important for parents to help teens develop a practice of unconditional self love. This episode is full of word-for-word scripts you can use to make it happen with your own teenager. Lees meer
Full show notes
A fear of shame can be pretty darn motivating. We can place our teens’ worth in their accomplishments, like a carrot in front of a bunny rabbit, and get some impressive results from them. However, if they stumble and mess up, our teens will experience shame.
If our teenager’s sense of self-worth tied directly to their achievements, they might feel unworthy of love after falling short. When teens feel this shame, they can sometimes try to cope with dangerously self-destructive behavior. But if we don’t motivate our teens with an innate fear of shame, how can we be sure they’re inspired enough to achieve success on their own? Are there ways to help teens build a sense of self-worth that will inspire them to be successful?
I’m here with the amazing transformational coach, Brandilyn Tebo, to provide the answer!
I was definitely eager to hear if she knew some ways to help teens build a sense of self-worth. Brandilyn is the author of The Achievement Trap: The Overachiever, People-Pleaser, and Perfectionist’s Guide to Freedom and True Success. She believes everything we do should be a joyful form of self-expression, and not a fearful form of self-justification. She travels the world teaching empowerment workshops to high schools, prisons, colleges, and Fortune 500 companies. Her website features a blog, and a podcast, and all of her knowledge is backed by research!
The Achievement Trap
The idea that you’re only good enough by virtue of your accomplishments is what Brandilyn calls The Achievement Trap.
The Achievement Trap tells us that being worthy of love is not our birthright. It’s a belief that Brandilyn finds highly objectionable, because as social creatures, h…
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Ep 25: Mental Strength for Teens
11 juli 2018 · 22 min
Amy Morin, bestselling author of 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do, and a leading expert on how to instill grit and emotional strength in children, discusses lessons she learned from her years as a foster parent to dozens of children and as a psychologist who helps families through difficult transitions. Lees meer
Full show notes
At some point your child may have to deal with the sudden loss of a job, or a friend, or even you or your spouse. If your kid isn’t prepared to deal with fear and other hard emotions in life, these big events can be devastating. Being unable to deal with hardship can lead to addictive and self-destructive behaviors. How do you prepare your kids for the hardest moments in life?
Some hardships in life you just can’t predict, but there are still steps you can take to prepare. Your teen doesn’t know when a grandparent is going to be diagnosed with an illness, but you can teach your teen about resilience through a mental toughness activity. More often than not, teaching your kid mental toughness is knowing when to role model, and when to step back and let them learn on their own. It’s a fine line!
To help understand what actions parents can take to help their child with mental toughness, I spoke with Amy Morin. Amy is one of the world’s leading experts on mental strength, and she is all about practical advice. Her TED Talk has over 13 million views and is one of the 30 most popular talks of all time. It sheds light on what a true mental toughness activity looks like. She is a foster parent with incredible stories about resilience, and the author of the international bestseller, 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don’t Do.
On this episode I got to talk to her about her new book, 13 Things Mentally Strong Parents Don’t Do. (Yes, Parents, specifically.)
At this point, some of you might be asking, “Wait, I thought this was about mental strength for kids?”
Teenage Resistance to Behavior Modification
It’s true, Amy wrote this book because one of …
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Ep 24: Adolescent Neuroscience
29 juni 2018 · 23 min
Lucy Maddox, author of Blueprint: How Childhood Makes Us Who We Are, discusses the fascinating science of why social experiences are also heightened during the teenage years. In this episode she reveals what you should teach your teen about friendships and relationships. Lees meer
Full show notes
After all these years, you think you’d know your kid, but there seems to be no end to the surprises, bombshells, and blind turns! Just when you assume your teenager will behave one way, they start doing what you’d never expect. As a parent, you know that teens make often make irresponsible decisions, change their opinions like T-shirts, and behave in ways that generally don’t seem to make any sense at all.
So. what the heck is going on inside the adolescent brain?! Without knowing what’s going on under the hood, we never know if our will listen to our conversations or discount them as “uncool” before embarking on their own program. It can feel impossible to decode the adolescent brain and understand teenagers’ motivations.
However, there is a way to help the adolescent brain develop the right decision-making tools, so our teens are prepared for a life good choices. The answer comes down to having the right approach. If we can educate ourselves on the right way to talk to a teenager, we can avoid pursuing strategies that simply fail in the end.
My guest in this episode is Lucy Maddox, author of Blueprint: How Childhood Makes Us Who We Are. She also has her own psychology practice in Bristol, England, where she works one-on-one with kids and teens every day. As a writer, university lecturer, and expert in cognitive behavioral therapy, she is a great source of knowledge for how we can understand the adolescent brain and use that understanding to become better parents.
Molding the Adolescent Brain for Success
The first thing parents need to know about molding the adolescent brain is how flexible it is. For example, Lucy’s book examines how we experience a phenomenon called an “ad…
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Ep 23: The Terror of Teenage Rebellion
16 juni 2018 · 22 min
Neal Thompson, author of Kickflip Boys, discusses the drama of raising rebellious and defiant teenagers. He reveals some of the strategies he found that worked for getting through to his kids in the end and talks about how he coped with the rebellious years. Lees meer
Full show notes
Are your boundary lines being crossed like hopscotch? Maybe this problem goes beyond the house, too. Your teen could harbor a greater rebellion towards authority than you know…
Without knowing how to deal with teenage defiance, these behaviors can spiral out of control. They might be skipping classes, dissenting coaches and teachers, and even experimenting with drugs and alcohol in risky ways.
Whatever the cause of this behavior, the stress can leave you understandably wondering how to deal with teenage defiance.
This can feel like a lonely situation for a parent. However, the guest I’m here to speak with today insists you are in fact NOT alone, and there ARE things you as a parent can do. You can learn how to deal with teenage defiance!
Neal Thompson is a father of two wonderful and rebellious boys, and he captures his inspiring story in his book Kickflip Boys: A Memoir of Freedom, Rebellion, and the Chaos of Fatherhood. Neal has learned some valuable lessons on how to deal with teenage defiance in a positive way. A lot of the lessons he credits to his wife.
It’s easy to think within the constructs of societal roles that Neal would be the “bad guy” dad, and his wife would be the “comforting” mom, but it wasn’t really like that for him. He explains that he and his wife are equal partners, and they each have a different style of parenting their two boys. Still, it was his wife who found a lot more success in getting their boys to open up.
Patience
Here’s a lesson about patience from a skateboarder. Neal loves skateboarding, and was thrilled when his boys got into skateboarding, too. His wife was interested because the boys were interested, but she kept her distance from the skateboarding…