Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #128 Self Control Can Be A Learned Behaviour (Featuring Ethan Kross)

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#128 Self Control Can Be A Learned Behaviour (Featuring Ethan Kross) · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

0:03
Speaker 1: We all have our Achilles Hill when it comes to
0:05
Speaker 1: self control. But what we know is that there are
0:07
Speaker 1: different tools we can use to improve our self control.
0:11
Speaker 1: And these different things we can do, they're teachable, their
0:14
Speaker 1: strategies are often easy to implement, and so I talk
0:18
Speaker 1: to my kids about the different ways that they can
0:21
Speaker 1: manage the temptation when it exists.
0:24
Speaker 2: This is the Parenting and Perspective Podcast. It's a Happy
0:27
Speaker 2: Families podcast. Hello, my name is doctor Justin Colson. It's
0:30
Speaker 2: so good of you to join me for today's conversation.
0:33
Speaker 2: This is one that I've been so excited about for a.
0:37
Speaker 3: Long long time.
0:37
Speaker 2: Today's guest has been linked to one of the most
0:40
Speaker 2: famous psychological experiments ever done. Certainly in the last several
0:45
Speaker 2: decades this has become an absolute classic. I'll tell you
0:48
Speaker 2: more about it in just a sect, but let me
0:50
Speaker 2: introduce my guest. Doctor Ethan Cross is a professor in
0:54
Speaker 2: the psychology department the Well Look, I'll just say, at
0:58
Speaker 2: the prestigious Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan.
1:02
Speaker 2: Ethan specializes in the study of self control, and he
1:06
Speaker 2: was mentored in graduate school by Walter Mitchell, who famously
1:10
Speaker 2: studied delayed gratification with what's become known.
1:14
Speaker 3: As the marsh Mellow experiment.
1:17
Speaker 2: Ethan runs the University of Michigan Emotion and Self Control Laboratory,
1:21
Speaker 2: and he's won a number of awards over the course
1:24
Speaker 2: of his career, as well as being featured in publications
1:26
Speaker 2: including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The New.
1:30
Speaker 3: Yorker, and USA Today.
1:31
Speaker 2: And as always, I began by asking Ethan about his
1:34
Speaker 2: work and his family life.
1:36
Speaker 1: Well, I run a lab called the University of Michigan
1:40
Speaker 1: Emotion and Self Control Laboratory, and basically we do lots
1:45
Speaker 1: of experiments to try to figure out how self control
1:48
Speaker 1: works in children and adults. And when I use the
1:53
Speaker 1: term self control, I mean how can people align their thoughts,
1:59
Speaker 1: feel and behaviors with their goals? So it's really broad.
2:03
Speaker 1: It's really like, if you want to act or think
2:06
Speaker 1: or feel a particular way in this world, how can
2:08
Speaker 1: you do that? What are the psychological tools that allow
2:11
Speaker 1: you to fulfill those goals? And so that takes us
2:14
Speaker 1: down a lot of exciting paths that I'm sure we'll
2:16
Speaker 1: talk about today and when I'm not working in a
2:20
Speaker 1: lab with my students and colleagues, I'm both working and
2:24
Speaker 1: relaxing at home. They a lot of work at home too.
2:28
Speaker 1: I've got I'm married to a woman named Lara, and
2:33
Speaker 1: I've got two daughters, My and Danny, age eleven and six,
2:37
Speaker 1: who are a lot of fun and the inspiration for
2:40
Speaker 1: lots of self control experiments.
2:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, I bet do you ever experiment on them?
2:45
Speaker 2: Have you done the marshmallow experiment with your two daughters?
2:49
Speaker 1: I have, in fact, a funny story about the marshmallow
2:52
Speaker 1: experiment with my oldest daughter Maya. So my advisor in
2:56
Speaker 1: graduate school is actually the marshmallow Man, Walter Michelle.
3:00
Speaker 2: Now before you tell me about Maya for people who
3:02
Speaker 2: are not familiar with Walter Michelle and the marshmallow experiment,
3:05
Speaker 2: because that was going to be my next question.
3:06
Speaker 3: Anyway, Okay, when I was cyber was talking, I was like,
3:09
Speaker 3: no way.
3:09
Speaker 2: Ethan Cross was supervised by one of the one of
3:12
Speaker 2: the modern legends of psychology. He did this marshmallow experiment
3:18
Speaker 2: that so many people have heard of and may maybe
3:20
Speaker 2: even have seen in a recent resurgence of it on
3:22
Speaker 2: TikTok in the last few months through the isolation stage.
3:26
Speaker 3: What did he do? And then what did you do
3:30
Speaker 3: with maya as a result of that.
3:32
Speaker 1: Sure. So the marshmallow test in a nutshell is it's
3:37
Speaker 1: a paradigm for studying self control in the lab under
3:41
Speaker 1: control conditions. And what you do is you bring a
3:44
Speaker 1: kid into the lab and then you give them a choice.
3:46
Speaker 1: You say you can have one treat now or and
3:50
Speaker 1: we call it the marshmallow test, but in fact we
3:52
Speaker 1: use whatever treats the kids like. So for some kids
3:55
Speaker 1: it's reasons. Other kids it's pretzels.
3:57
Speaker 2: And you show me one child that's going to pick
3:59
Speaker 2: a raisin a marshmallow.
4:01
Speaker 1: Really, there are some we could talk about the question
4:05
Speaker 1: marks that surround their match. I'm just joking. Some kids
4:08
Speaker 1: like fruit, go figure. So you give them a choice
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Speaker 1: one marshmallow now or if you wait until I come back.
4:16
Speaker 1: I have to leave the room for a little bit.
4:17
Speaker 1: But if you can just sit tight and wait, then
4:19
Speaker 1: you can have two marshmallows. But the only way you
4:22
Speaker 1: can have two is if you wait until I come back.
4:25
Speaker 1: And the experimenter doesn't tell the child how long it's
4:29
Speaker 1: going to take for them to come back. So there's uncertainty,
4:32
Speaker 1: which we know everyone who's living through COVID nineteen right
4:35
Speaker 1: now uncertainty can drive emotional responses, and so this for
4:39
Speaker 1: children is a really difficult choice, right because all the kids,
4:45
Speaker 1: like Walter and the experimenters are running these studies, they
4:47
Speaker 1: make sure that everyone wants the two marshmallows.
4:50
Speaker 2: And then normally only around age four, maybe five or
4:53
Speaker 2: six at the monster. So it's not like self regulation
4:56
Speaker 2: and self control, which is what we're talking about and
4:58
Speaker 2: teaching these kids. It's not like this is intrinsic to
5:02
Speaker 2: them at this point, and self control is hard. They
5:04
Speaker 2: go from zero zero to one hundred emotionally in seconds,
5:08
Speaker 2: don't they.
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Speaker 1: Some kids do and other kids don't, And so that's
5:11
Speaker 1: part of that. That's one of the really interesting findings
5:13
Speaker 1: surrounding this line of work. So you look at so
5:17
Speaker 1: everyone wants the two marshmallows, but they have this dilemma.
5:20
Speaker 1: They're looking at this delectable treat, right, they're drooling over it,
5:24
Speaker 1: So what do they do? So it turns out in
5:27
Speaker 1: one line of studies they find that the kids who
5:29
Speaker 1: are able to wait longer, their delay of gratification ability
5:34
Speaker 1: predicts lots of important life outcomes later on in life.
5:38
Speaker 1: So how well they do in school, how adjusted they
5:40
Speaker 1: are in their relationships and their health. And the idea
5:43
Speaker 1: is that what this task is tapping into is this
5:47
Speaker 1: basic competency, this ability to manage our emotions. The other
5:52
Speaker 1: thing that this line of research tells us, though, is
5:55
Speaker 1: what Walter did lots of experiments to figure out, well,
5:58
Speaker 1: how can you direct kids to think differently about what
6:02
Speaker 1: they're waiting for the two marshmallows versus one? What are
6:05
Speaker 1: the different psychological tricks that you can use, so to speak,
6:09
Speaker 1: to manage your emotions effectively? And so they did lots
6:12
Speaker 1: of experiments and found developed lots of insights that informed
6:17
Speaker 1: us now many decades later about what are the tools
6:21
Speaker 1: that people possess that we can use to control ourselves.
6:24
Speaker 1: So that's the marshmallow test in a nutshell, and the
6:27
Speaker 1: quick to bring it back to my family, the fun
6:30
Speaker 1: anecdote is, I, of course have been waiting like a
6:32
Speaker 1: decade since I started working with Walter to have a
6:35
Speaker 1: kid who I could do this task with. And so
6:37
Speaker 1: I dutifully set up the task and all the parameters
6:40
Speaker 1: and make sure I'm doing it by the book, and
6:43
Speaker 1: then I sit my down and I describe it and
6:46
Speaker 1: I say okay, and before I leave, she goes, Daddy,
6:51
Speaker 1: I want one marshmallow now and I want both later.
6:55
Speaker 1: And so it's a clear violation of a protocol. And so,
6:59
Speaker 1: because I know Walter or passed away recently, but I
7:03
Speaker 1: knew him, I picked up the phone and I called
7:05
Speaker 1: Walter and I said, Walter, you know, have you ever
7:07
Speaker 1: heard of a child doing this in all the years
7:09
Speaker 1: that you've been doing this research? And he pauses, and
7:14
Speaker 1: then very sternly he says, Ethan, it's not too soon
7:18
Speaker 1: to start therapy as as an indicator of what the uh,
7:23
Speaker 1: of course was joking, but the message was delivered well.
7:26
Speaker 2: And so you're going to have a long, long, hard
7:29
Speaker 2: life with with the negotiator.
7:31
Speaker 3: That's what That's what he's saying.
7:33
Speaker 1: Get ready, Buckley, that basically that's right. So and uh,
7:38
Speaker 1: you know, we maybe we'll get into it later. Maya
7:39
Speaker 1: has proven to be quite a dept at negotiations in
7:42
Speaker 1: the six years since we've done that task.
7:44
Speaker 2: So now, now, before I asked the next question, I
7:47
Speaker 2: think it's really important to highlight that as a as
7:51
Speaker 2: a parenting expert or as a psychology researcher, my my
7:55
Speaker 2: suggestion is you probably wouldn't be encouraging parents to do
7:59
Speaker 2: the Marshmallow t start home with their children as a
8:01
Speaker 2: diagnostic tool to determine how self control they'll be throughout
8:05
Speaker 2: their life. Their destiny is not in their decision around Marshmallow.
8:10
Speaker 1: Absolutely not.
8:10
Speaker 3: I mean, it's a fun experiment.
8:13
Speaker 1: It's fun experiment, and you know, the way that the
8:17
Speaker 1: context in which I used to with my kids was
8:19
Speaker 1: to introduce them to a scientific experiment and then to
8:23
Speaker 1: talk about what we've learned. And one of the things
8:25
Speaker 1: that we've learned, which often gets lost in the translation
8:28
Speaker 1: of this work when people talk about it with the world,
8:31
Speaker 1: is that one of the things we know is that
8:35
Speaker 1: you can change your self control. You know, one of
8:37
Speaker 1: my pet peeves is when I hear people saying you
8:39
Speaker 1: have no self control. That's absolutely not true. Everyone possesses
8:43
Speaker 1: self control to some extent. Some of us are better
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Speaker 1: at exerting it in some context as opposed to others.
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Speaker 1: I may be really good at exerting self control regulating
8:52
Speaker 1: myself when I'm working on a problem at work, but
8:54
Speaker 1: maybe I have a little bit more difficulties when I'm
8:56
Speaker 1: coaching soccer. That's not true. I'm pretty good there too,
8:59
Speaker 1: but I have my weaknesses they're associated with the pantry
9:04
Speaker 1: post ten pm at night when I crave some food.
9:07
Speaker 3: Advice.
9:08
Speaker 1: We all have our achilles heel when it comes to
9:11
Speaker 1: self control. But what we know is that there are
9:13
Speaker 1: different tools we can use to improve our self control.
9:17
Speaker 1: And these these these different things we can do, they're teachable,
9:20
Speaker 1: their strategies are often easy to implement, and so I
9:24
Speaker 1: talk to my kids about the different ways that they
9:26
Speaker 1: can manage the temptation when it exists. And so absolutely not.
9:31
Speaker 1: You wouldn't want people to think that scores on that
9:34
Speaker 1: test or their destiny by any means.
9:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I've done at home with my kids as well,
9:38
Speaker 2: purely to have the conversation about self control and how
9:40
Speaker 2: it works. In fact, you've taken me exactly to where
9:44
Speaker 2: I wanted to go next, and that was just to
9:45
Speaker 2: talk about how.
9:46
Speaker 3: We can teach our children's self control.
9:48
Speaker 2: And what I'm especially interested in is how does it
9:51
Speaker 2: affect children who are not developing along with typical pathways,
9:56
Speaker 2: you know, kids that have got ADHD, kids that have
9:58
Speaker 2: got autism. What can your self control research teach us
10:03
Speaker 2: in terms of helping those more narrow, rigid thinking children
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Speaker 2: to manage themselves.
10:09
Speaker 1: Will one disclaimer is we haven't looked at several of
10:12
Speaker 1: those populations, and there's always this tension between wanting to
10:17
Speaker 1: generalize from the studies we've done as far as we
10:22
Speaker 1: can and without having looked at ADHD and autism in particular.
10:27
Speaker 1: It's hard to make that leap because we're dealing with,
10:30
Speaker 1: in some cases, very different kinds of populations with their
10:33
Speaker 1: own unique characteristics. Now what we do know, we can
10:38
Speaker 1: say something though about about populations of children who experience
10:42
Speaker 1: difficulty regulating themselves in general, so not clinical populations, but
10:47
Speaker 1: groups that are just more impulsive, more prone to anger,
10:51
Speaker 1: more prone to experiencing temptation. By and large, what we
10:54
Speaker 1: see is that the more intense the emotional response, the
10:59
Speaker 1: more effective the different self controls tend to be. And
11:03
Speaker 1: the idea there is, look, if you're dealing with a
11:05
Speaker 1: little bit of emotion, there's not a whole lot of
11:09
Speaker 1: room for these tools to help you feel better or
11:11
Speaker 1: help you rein it in. But as the amplitude of
11:14
Speaker 1: the emotions go up, the more intense it is, the
11:17
Speaker 1: more room there is to help bring you down. And
11:19
Speaker 1: so in some of those Batman effect studies, for example,
11:23
Speaker 1: we've seen that the kids who benefit the most from
11:25
Speaker 1: that technique are the ones who have the most difficulty
11:31
Speaker 1: regulating themselves. In general, they're the ones who are benefiting.
11:35
Speaker 1: And so there are lots of open questions about whether
11:38
Speaker 1: that'll extend to autistic and other populations, but we do
11:42
Speaker 1: have some inklings that it might. So there are a
11:45
Speaker 1: boatload of different strategies that people can use to exert
11:49
Speaker 1: self control, both children and adults. And to be concrete
11:51
Speaker 1: about what I mean by that, we know, for example,
11:55
Speaker 1: that when people are tempted to act in particular ways,
11:58
Speaker 1: or when they're trying to control their emotions, diverting their
12:02
Speaker 1: attention can be really powerful right as a short term fix,
12:06
Speaker 1: So you might want to have a person if something
12:08
Speaker 1: is bothering us or tempting us, let's focus on something else.
12:12
Speaker 1: And for young children in particular, diverting attention can be
12:15
Speaker 1: a powerful tool if they're looking at a treat. For example,
12:19
Speaker 1: in the Marshmallow studies, like one of the best ways
12:22
Speaker 1: to get kids to wait longer was to put a
12:25
Speaker 1: little box on top of the marshmallow so the kids
12:28
Speaker 1: couldn't see it, or to have the child think about
12:31
Speaker 1: other things, think fun thoughts about being on the playground
12:35
Speaker 1: with Mommy pushing me on the swing. So diverting our
12:37
Speaker 1: attention away from a thing that's tempting or bothering us
12:41
Speaker 1: can be one kind of tool. Another kind of tool
12:45
Speaker 1: deals with the ability of the mind to change the
12:48
Speaker 1: way we think about things. So we did a study
12:51
Speaker 1: several years ago. It was a brain imaging experiment in
12:54
Speaker 1: which we were trying to look at how people can
12:56
Speaker 1: reduce craving responses to things like Peize's or drugs. Right,
13:01
Speaker 1: we see these temptations, we desperately want them, and so
13:05
Speaker 1: in one condition, we've had people just look it up
13:09
Speaker 1: an image of a delicious looking piece of pizza, and
13:13
Speaker 1: in another condition, we had them imagine that a cockerroach
13:17
Speaker 1: to just crawled across the pizzas. And so that's just
13:20
Speaker 1: an example of the power of the mind to transform
13:23
Speaker 1: the way we think about things, and how we change
13:27
Speaker 1: the way we think can change the way we feel.
13:29
Speaker 1: That is the basis of cognitive therapy and cognitive interventions
13:34
Speaker 1: to change our mood.
13:35
Speaker 2: So, in a nutshell, what we want to do without
13:37
Speaker 2: our children is we want to either divert their attention
13:39
Speaker 2: so they're not even thinking about it, or make it invisible,
13:43
Speaker 2: like literally pick it up and move it, or pick
13:44
Speaker 2: your child up and move your child.
13:46
Speaker 3: And this will obviously work a.
13:47
Speaker 2: Lot easier with younger children, but you can still make
13:49
Speaker 2: stuff invisible. They usually look at you and wing and say, oh,
13:52
Speaker 2: a couple believe you're taking that away. But technically that's
13:55
Speaker 2: not self control, that's parent control. Nevertheless, it will reduce
13:59
Speaker 2: the challenge that you're fighting.
14:01
Speaker 1: Well, I think the way you're describing it right is
14:03
Speaker 1: the parent is being the agent of control. This parent control.
14:08
Speaker 1: But what we also can do, and one of the
14:09
Speaker 1: things we're exploring now is teaching kids to do this
14:12
Speaker 1: on their own. And so one of the strike if
14:15
Speaker 1: you look back at some of those early marshmallow studies,
14:17
Speaker 1: what you see is that some kids spontaneously do this.
14:20
Speaker 1: Some kids close their you can't see me now, your
14:23
Speaker 1: listeners can't see me, but I'm mimicking what they do.
14:25
Speaker 1: Some kids put their hand over their eyes. One girl
14:29
Speaker 1: had really long hair and she flipped it so she
14:32
Speaker 1: couldn't see the marshmallow in front of her. Another kid
14:36
Speaker 1: told himself a story, an elaborate story with imaginary friends.
14:40
Speaker 1: And so these are all different tools that kids are
14:43
Speaker 1: doing on their own. And so as parents, we possess
14:46
Speaker 1: the ability to essentially give kids the tools by distracting
14:51
Speaker 1: them or prompting them to think different. Hey, that person's
14:54
Speaker 1: bothering you at the schoolyard, But let's look at the
14:56
Speaker 1: big picture, Maya or Danny. You know what, there's lots
14:59
Speaker 1: of friends. You don't have to talk with that person,
15:01
Speaker 1: So we could shift their perspective. But what we can
15:04
Speaker 1: also do is we can teach children to do this
15:07
Speaker 1: on their own.
15:08
Speaker 2: If you would rattle off, let's say three self control tips,
15:11
Speaker 2: the top three that come to mind for children who
15:13
Speaker 2: are somewhere around four, five, six, seven years of age,
15:16
Speaker 2: you know, those elementary school, those early primary school years.
15:21
Speaker 2: What kind of tips would you give parents if they
15:23
Speaker 2: want to help their kids to develop the self control
15:25
Speaker 2: to not eat the marshmallow or the pretzel or the raisin.
15:29
Speaker 3: Right where do they go?
15:32
Speaker 1: Well? I think one is attention. So teaching them how
15:34
Speaker 1: to divert their attention away from whatever's tempting them and
15:39
Speaker 1: give themselves something to focus on is even more powerful.
15:42
Speaker 1: So really get them to focus in on something that's
15:45
Speaker 1: equally engaging, but not the thing that's tempting them So
15:48
Speaker 1: if you don't want them to watch TV, give them
15:50
Speaker 1: a really fun buzzle to work on or something like that,
15:53
Speaker 1: or problem to work on. Another thing is changing the
15:57
Speaker 1: way they think about something. So if they're looking at
16:00
Speaker 1: the candy and they really want to eat it, asks
16:02
Speaker 1: them to imagine, well, you know, imagine that. I guess
16:06
Speaker 1: kids aren't tempted by bread. Is what is a candy? Basically?
16:10
Speaker 1: Mostly right? I mean, imagine that someone stepped on it,
16:13
Speaker 1: you know, or those kinds of transformations can be powerful, right,
16:19
Speaker 1: So don't think about it as a marshmallow. Think about
16:21
Speaker 1: it as a puffy cloud, right, So play with it
16:24
Speaker 1: in your head, and importantly, when you play with it,
16:28
Speaker 1: don't think about the things that are most Oh my god,
16:31
Speaker 1: I'm going to think about how it's going to taste.
16:33
Speaker 1: If you've talked to your child about the negative health
16:36
Speaker 1: implications of eating too much candy or negative health implications
16:40
Speaker 1: for a child like tummy aches, right, not feeling good after,
16:44
Speaker 1: have them think about that. So, you know, think about
16:46
Speaker 1: the fact that too many marshmallows can make you not
16:50
Speaker 1: so healthy and that's not a good thing. You have
16:51
Speaker 1: to go to the doctor and so forth and so on.
16:54
Speaker 1: A third strategy you can use to give you the
16:57
Speaker 1: last one is you can try something called what we've
17:01
Speaker 1: called the Batman effect. So have a child pretend find
17:06
Speaker 1: their favorite superhero. And as so, superheroes are usually generally
17:11
Speaker 1: really good at at at exercising restraint right and being
17:17
Speaker 1: able to do good things in the world. And so
17:20
Speaker 1: in some studies, what a colleague of Mind Stephanie Carlson
17:23
Speaker 1: has found is that having children use imagine their superhero
17:28
Speaker 1: and use their name, imagine your Batman and say what
17:31
Speaker 1: would Batman do right now? Would Batman be able to
17:33
Speaker 1: not eat the marshmallow? Or Dora the Explorer? What would
17:36
Speaker 1: Dora do? That can be really powerful. It transports them
17:40
Speaker 1: into this other role which gives them some distance from
17:43
Speaker 1: the temptation and also this superpower to restrain it. And
17:48
Speaker 1: so that's been a fun strategy that kids have been
17:51
Speaker 1: able to benefit from in some experiments.
17:54
Speaker 3: I love the Batman effect.
17:55
Speaker 2: And what I really love about that that piece of
17:57
Speaker 2: research is well, first of all, we're looking at how
18:03
Speaker 2: people who speak to themselves in that sort of alter
18:06
Speaker 2: ego way.
18:08
Speaker 3: You know, what would Batman do, what would Wonder Woman do?
18:10
Speaker 3: What would bother the bill.
18:11
Speaker 2: To do versus. Come on, Ethan, you've got this versus
18:15
Speaker 2: I know what I would do. You know, these three
18:17
Speaker 2: different conditions, and you found in this study that kids
18:20
Speaker 2: persevered longer. They just they had more motivation, they had
18:23
Speaker 2: a greater level of self control and tenacity. So I've
18:27
Speaker 2: been talking to adults about that and saying, when you're
18:29
Speaker 2: up against something where you don't want to exert the
18:31
Speaker 2: kind of control that's necessary, or where you're struggling, or
18:33
Speaker 2: you don't want to persevere, or you're ready to explode
18:36
Speaker 2: your children, and you just need to regulate your emotions.
18:38
Speaker 2: Don't necessarily think about what Batman would do, but think
18:41
Speaker 2: about who your inner mental mentor might be. You know,
18:45
Speaker 2: think of Ethan Cross or many people, unfortunately for me,
18:48
Speaker 2: will say that I just think about what you would
18:50
Speaker 2: do if you or what I would do if you
18:52
Speaker 2: were watching me. I know that ancient and modern traditions
18:56
Speaker 2: have encouraged that. So there's the Christian tradition of wearing
18:59
Speaker 2: the ww ID bracelet what would Jesus do? And I
19:02
Speaker 2: think that that, I mean, that's a kind of a
19:04
Speaker 2: self control strategy, really isn't It's a psychological a self
19:07
Speaker 2: distancing strategy.
19:09
Speaker 1: Absolutely, you know this idea of distance. Really, what it
19:12
Speaker 1: boils down to is the it's almost like giving yourself
19:16
Speaker 1: a time out in the moment. So it's this ability
19:20
Speaker 1: when we experience strong emotions, they often narrow our attention
19:24
Speaker 1: in on exactly what it is that's driving those responses,
19:27
Speaker 1: and that that can that zooming in can make it
19:31
Speaker 1: really difficult to take the broader picture into account. If
19:36
Speaker 1: I am too intolerant with my children, how might that
19:39
Speaker 1: affect them long term? So this ability to just hit
19:42
Speaker 1: stop for a moment and zoom out can be really powerful.
19:45
Speaker 1: And there's lots of research which shows that. And in fact,
19:48
Speaker 1: this is a project that where we've been working on
19:51
Speaker 1: for the past five years. It's called the Toolbox Project.
19:56
Speaker 1: For the past ten years or so, I've been teaching
19:59
Speaker 1: a class here a little bit less than ten years
20:01
Speaker 1: called the Science of Self Control to University Michigan undergrads,
20:04
Speaker 1: And it's essentially science's great as hits when it comes
20:08
Speaker 1: to what we've learned over the past fifty years about
20:10
Speaker 1: how to control our emotions, our thoughts, our behaviors. And
20:13
Speaker 1: it's always a really fun class to teach. The students
20:16
Speaker 1: love the material, they're engaged. And the way it works
20:20
Speaker 1: is every week students come in, they read stuff, and
20:23
Speaker 1: I pepper them with questions, and on the final day
20:27
Speaker 1: we reverse the roles. They come in with questions for me,
20:32
Speaker 1: it's their last day. Here's what's on my mind. Now
20:34
Speaker 1: that I've gone through the whole literature, I've digested it
20:37
Speaker 1: and so forth. And about five years ago, this one
20:40
Speaker 1: girl named Ariel. She raised her hand like really defiantly
20:45
Speaker 1: as soon as the class started to wanting to be
20:49
Speaker 1: called on. And so I called on her, and she says,
20:51
Speaker 1: why are we learning about this now? I go, well,
20:54
Speaker 1: what do you mean? She goes, well, you know, we've
20:58
Speaker 1: gone over all of these different strategies that exist, dozens
21:01
Speaker 1: of strategies that can help us be happier, healthier, get
21:05
Speaker 1: better jobs, and so forth. Why did anyone teach us
21:08
Speaker 1: about this earlier on in life when it could have
21:11
Speaker 1: helped us, like when we were kids or adolescents. And
21:14
Speaker 1: so the first thing I said was, fear not. Life
21:17
Speaker 1: is not over. You will still have opportunities to use
21:20
Speaker 1: these strategies once you leave college. But then I did
21:24
Speaker 1: something I don't want to say it was slightly cowardly.
21:28
Speaker 1: I did what many politicians do when they don't have
21:30
Speaker 1: a good answer to a question. I deflected and I
21:34
Speaker 1: threw it back to the class and I said, well,
21:35
Speaker 1: what other people think, why haven't you learned about this yet?
21:39
Speaker 1: And the reason I did that was because I didn't
21:41
Speaker 1: have a good answer to that question. And so it
21:44
Speaker 1: got me thinking a lot about why aren't we teaching
21:48
Speaker 1: kids about what we know about how the mind works
21:52
Speaker 1: when it comes to self control. We teach children about
21:55
Speaker 1: how the digestive system works. We teach them about geometry,
21:59
Speaker 1: we teach them about social studies. These are just concepts.
22:02
Speaker 1: These are these are topics that we think are important,
22:06
Speaker 1: and so they're in the they're in the kind of
22:08
Speaker 1: canon of what we expose them to in in school. Well,
22:12
Speaker 1: the mind seems kind of important and we've learned about it,
22:16
Speaker 1: so why aren't we also teaching them about this? And
22:18
Speaker 1: so fast forward five years. What we've been doing is
22:23
Speaker 1: a group of scientists like myself have have paired up
22:28
Speaker 1: with educational experts curriculum designers to essentially take the science
22:33
Speaker 1: of self control, what do we know about the different
22:35
Speaker 1: tools that exist, and we've translated that into a curriculum
22:40
Speaker 1: for middle and high school kids a little bit older
22:42
Speaker 1: than the than the ages that you were asking about.
22:46
Speaker 1: But the idea was that this was a good place
22:48
Speaker 1: to start, and so we took the science which can
22:50
Speaker 1: be filled with complicated terms that scientists love to use,
22:53
Speaker 1: but we've we've made it simple and with engaging exercises.
22:57
Speaker 1: And what we're doing now is we are looking at, well,
23:01
Speaker 1: what are the implications of teaching children about these strategies.
23:06
Speaker 1: In some of our early studies, we know we have
23:09
Speaker 1: data to show that the kids who go through this curriculum,
23:13
Speaker 1: they do in fact learn the material. So you do
23:16
Speaker 1: a test at the beginning and at the end of
23:18
Speaker 1: the curriculum their knowledge of the science of self control increases.
23:22
Speaker 1: And what we're getting ready to do with about ten
23:24
Speaker 1: thousand students next year is we're going to test to
23:27
Speaker 1: see what effect does learning about these strategies have on
23:32
Speaker 1: these students' ability to regulate themselves down the road in life.
23:36
Speaker 1: And the hypothesis the prediction is that knowing about these
23:41
Speaker 1: strategies should provide these kids with resources that they could
23:47
Speaker 1: draw upon when they need them, in the same way
23:49
Speaker 1: that knowing how to compute a percentage allows us to
23:54
Speaker 1: determine the tip when we go to a restaurant. The
23:56
Speaker 1: idea is that when a kid is angry or tempted,
24:00
Speaker 1: if they're motivated to control those urges or emotions, they
24:04
Speaker 1: should have a knowledge base to fall back on in
24:06
Speaker 1: those instances.
24:08
Speaker 2: Earlier, you defined self control. I'd like to now define
24:12
Speaker 2: emotional regulation. But I'm not sure that there's got to
24:15
Speaker 2: be an enormous difference in what you said previously. You know,
24:17
Speaker 2: that idea of harnessing your your faculties and characteristics and
24:21
Speaker 2: directing them towards a goal effectively was my summary of
24:25
Speaker 2: your your definition. Would you would you be switching that
24:28
Speaker 2: up at all for emotional regulation?
24:30
Speaker 1: You know?
24:30
Speaker 3: I don't.
24:31
Speaker 1: And a disclaimer, you know, for all of all the
24:34
Speaker 1: people listening, is that scientists are really good at coming
24:38
Speaker 1: up with different terms that differ in ever so slight ways,
24:43
Speaker 1: and that could be useful when we do experiments. But
24:47
Speaker 1: I think the self includes emotions, it includes behaviors, and
24:52
Speaker 1: includes thoughts and cognitions, and so when you're talking about
24:55
Speaker 1: controlling the self control, to me, it's a whole kit
24:59
Speaker 1: and kaboodle. So I use the broadest definition of self control.
25:04
Speaker 1: It's aligning thoughts, feelings, and behaviors with goals. Now, now
25:08
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean that self control is always a good thing,
25:11
Speaker 1: because it means that if you have bad goals right,
25:16
Speaker 1: the better you are at. Self control means that you
25:19
Speaker 1: can do bad things right. So, for example, let's say
25:23
Speaker 1: I have the goal of of of of of committing
25:27
Speaker 1: a crime right, which might be very challenging for me
25:30
Speaker 1: to emotionally, it might be hard to hurt someone else.
25:33
Speaker 1: If I have good self control, that might help me
25:36
Speaker 1: do that. So so self control in my world is
25:39
Speaker 1: not always good, right.
25:41
Speaker 2: And our kids aren't necessarily planning on committing the any
25:44
Speaker 2: any grievous and we hope not.
25:49
Speaker 1: That's right, And so in all of our studies we're
25:51
Speaker 1: giving them goals that are healthy goals. Of course, I
25:54
Speaker 1: think that's in most of cases. That's where self control
25:57
Speaker 1: is being hardness towards.
25:58
Speaker 2: I'm fascinated though, by this idea that self control can
26:02
Speaker 2: sometimes be a bad thing, and it's not necessarily just
26:04
Speaker 2: in pursuit of negative goals. Sometimes that self control can
26:08
Speaker 2: also become counterproductive when our children become so rigid and
26:12
Speaker 2: so focused, and we do as adults as well, we
26:14
Speaker 2: become so focused on something that is good and worthy
26:19
Speaker 2: and useful, but it's actually going to come at such
26:23
Speaker 2: an extraordinary cost and our life gets out of balance.
26:26
Speaker 2: You know, there's all this Angela Duckworth, who I know
26:29
Speaker 2: you've worked with her work around being gritty and persevering
26:33
Speaker 2: through tough times. Paul Tough wrote a book called How
26:36
Speaker 2: Children Succeed. It was all about teaching kids grit, making
26:39
Speaker 2: sure that they do the hard yards. And there's obviously
26:42
Speaker 2: a very strong argument for having that gritty determination and perseverance,
26:46
Speaker 2: having the self control, but there's also a pretty strong
26:49
Speaker 2: argument about having the wisdom to know when to step
26:52
Speaker 2: back and just let go. Can you talk a little
26:55
Speaker 2: bit about why self control isn't always the most important thing,
26:59
Speaker 2: or is and always going to be functional and optimal
27:01
Speaker 2: for our children all for ourselves.
27:03
Speaker 1: So many things are interesting about what you said. I mean,
27:06
Speaker 1: this idea of wisdom as stepping back right is another
27:09
Speaker 1: illustration of the value of distance, disability to step back
27:12
Speaker 1: and take stock of what you're going through and then
27:15
Speaker 1: decide how to behave I think your question speaks to
27:18
Speaker 1: this issue of that human beings are complicated. We are
27:23
Speaker 1: not driven to achieve one goal we live in a
27:26
Speaker 1: world filled with multiple goals, right, so goals to succeed
27:30
Speaker 1: at work but also to succeed in our personal lives.
27:33
Speaker 1: And those goals don't always conflict, as many people know
27:37
Speaker 1: who are trudging away at work at eight pm when
27:40
Speaker 1: they might want to be home with their family, and
27:42
Speaker 1: so there are trade offs that we are constantly trying
27:45
Speaker 1: to maintain. It. It keeps take stock of and balance and
27:51
Speaker 1: so forth, and it gets complicated. So, you know, although
27:55
Speaker 1: most of our experiments focus on one goal, that's not
27:58
Speaker 1: the world in which we live. And I think people
28:01
Speaker 1: who are better able to balance all of the different
28:04
Speaker 1: goals that are on their plates and manage them accordingly
28:11
Speaker 1: are more likely to be in a position to be
28:13
Speaker 1: living the kind of life they ultimately want.
28:16
Speaker 3: Who are these perfect people? Where are they? How do
28:18
Speaker 3: we study them? They're in Australia, of course, of course,
28:22
Speaker 3: so I.
28:23
Speaker 1: Think this is you know, this is unfortunately where a
28:25
Speaker 1: lot of the science stops right now, because most of
28:30
Speaker 1: the work we do and thus far has been studying
28:34
Speaker 1: specific goals under tightly controlled conditions. And the reason for
28:38
Speaker 1: that is it's much harder conceptually and practically to do
28:42
Speaker 1: experiments when there are seventeen goals that are all conflicting,
28:46
Speaker 1: so I wish I could tell you who these people are.
28:48
Speaker 1: There are likely exemplars that we could find and then
28:52
Speaker 1: try to study in the same way that we sometimes.
28:55
Speaker 1: You know, one approach to science is finding people who
28:57
Speaker 1: are really good at something, you know, Michael Jordan's of
29:01
Speaker 1: their industries, and then trying to figure out what makes
29:04
Speaker 1: them tick, and then you run experiments on them. But
29:08
Speaker 1: in my mind, we haven't yet done that on the
29:11
Speaker 1: exemplars of self control.
29:13
Speaker 2: I think that it's a really interesting conversation though, and
29:16
Speaker 2: I know we're kind of going off script a little
29:17
Speaker 2: bit here, but to me, this idea that some parents
29:21
Speaker 2: will will take a conversation about self control and say, Okay,
29:24
Speaker 2: well I want my child to get into this university
29:28
Speaker 2: course or have this opportunity in life, or just you've
29:31
Speaker 2: got to learn self control. Because the dun Eden study
29:34
Speaker 2: showed the children who learn self control do better at school,
29:36
Speaker 2: and they're less likely ended up in prison, and they're
29:38
Speaker 2: going to have more successful marriages. You know, this was
29:40
Speaker 2: this thirty plus year study of how self control is
29:44
Speaker 2: associated with all these positive outcomes. So we've got to
29:47
Speaker 2: teach your self control, and all of a sudden life
29:50
Speaker 2: becomes too controlled, whether it's pursuing academics or whether it's
29:56
Speaker 2: pursuing the extracurricular things like piano or or whatever that
30:02
Speaker 2: thing is that our children are doing outside, you know,
30:04
Speaker 2: becoming an Olympian swimmer, whatever it may.
30:07
Speaker 1: Right, Well, I think I think a big part of
30:11
Speaker 1: that equation has to do with number one, what you
30:15
Speaker 1: as a parent and the child the value right, because
30:19
Speaker 1: our goals, right, Like, so, what are the goals that
30:22
Speaker 1: we have and which are most important to us? There
30:26
Speaker 1: are going to be people out there who, for them,
30:29
Speaker 1: the most important thing is getting into that desired college
30:33
Speaker 1: or getting that job. And if that's the case, you
30:37
Speaker 1: can make an argument that helping that child fulfill that
30:41
Speaker 1: goal is really important. But let's say people have multiple
30:44
Speaker 1: goals like that are important them not just getting into
30:47
Speaker 1: the best school, but also having great relationships and enjoying
30:50
Speaker 1: the moment. Well, that would suggests a different course of action.
30:54
Speaker 1: I mean, look, I study this stuff. I'm a I'm
30:56
Speaker 1: a presumed expert on this topic, and I'd be lying
31:00
Speaker 1: if I told you that my wife and I are
31:02
Speaker 1: constantly doing a kind of self and family evaluation of
31:09
Speaker 1: our kids, their goals, our goals, and how we can
31:13
Speaker 1: give them the best possibility of leading living a happy life,
31:17
Speaker 1: like we want them to be successful more than that,
31:19
Speaker 1: we want them to be happy. And you know, I
31:22
Speaker 1: think we are stumbling our way through like many parents
31:27
Speaker 1: with forward progress. Of course, if we invite my and
31:30
Speaker 1: Danny on the podcast, they might say something different. The
31:34
Speaker 1: first step is being mindful of this. Simply being aware
31:39
Speaker 1: that life isn't driven much of the time by one goal,
31:43
Speaker 1: but by many is an important insight that can be
31:47
Speaker 1: useful for helping parents think about how they want to
31:51
Speaker 1: structure their kids' activities and lives, given these multiple goals
31:55
Speaker 1: that they may have for their kids and that their
31:58
Speaker 1: kids may have for themselves.
32:00
Speaker 2: Ethan, I appreciate the vulnerability and you, I guess confessing
32:04
Speaker 2: owning up to the fact that you're kind of making
32:06
Speaker 2: it up as you go along, even if you've got
32:08
Speaker 2: the professorship in psychology, because I feel the same way.
32:13
Speaker 2: You know, I've written six books, I've got the PhD
32:15
Speaker 2: in positive psychology, I've run a bajillion seminars on this stuff.
32:19
Speaker 2: And there are days where I look at my wife
32:21
Speaker 2: and say I don't have a clue how we're supposed
32:25
Speaker 2: to manage it.
32:26
Speaker 3: You tell me, and she'll look at me and say, well,
32:27
Speaker 3: you're the expert. You told me. I'm like, but I
32:29
Speaker 3: don't know.
32:30
Speaker 2: Anyway, let's move towards a conclusion. There's a couple of
32:34
Speaker 2: other questions that I want to ask you before we
32:35
Speaker 2: get to my five questions that always wrap up every podcast.
32:40
Speaker 2: Something that strikes me as vitally important is that.
32:44
Speaker 3: Emotions are contagious.
32:45
Speaker 2: Kids catch their parents cranky, they catch our chaos, they
32:48
Speaker 2: catch our crazy, but they also catch how calm. The
32:52
Speaker 2: same strategies that we've discussed for younger children, I'm sure
32:55
Speaker 2: that they work for adults as well for parents. But
32:58
Speaker 2: I'm curious if there's anything else that you would add here.
33:01
Speaker 2: How else can parents stay calm and appropriately regulated? What
33:06
Speaker 2: strategies would you share for parents who are just over
33:10
Speaker 2: it some afternoons or evenings or mornings.
33:12
Speaker 1: Well, let me tell you about the strategies that some
33:15
Speaker 1: of the ones, some of my favorites that I rely on.
33:17
Speaker 1: Because there's a boltload of strategies there at least a
33:19
Speaker 1: dozen two dozen out there that have science behind it.
33:22
Speaker 1: We don't have time to get into them all. But
33:25
Speaker 1: let me tell you what I do. One thing I
33:27
Speaker 1: do is I will rely on that linguistic distancing. So
33:30
Speaker 1: when I'm in the heat of the moment, I'm anxious
33:32
Speaker 1: or I'm angry, I will use my name silently to
33:36
Speaker 1: think about what I'm going through.
33:37
Speaker 2: Ethan k Dad, Why are you talking to yourself in
33:41
Speaker 2: the first person?
33:42
Speaker 3: What's going on here?
33:43
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, definitely, you definitely want to do that silently.
33:46
Speaker 1: That's an infortant caveat, and that's helpful. Another thing I'll
33:50
Speaker 1: do is something that we call temporal distancing jargon. Again,
33:55
Speaker 1: think of it as mental time travel. This can be
33:57
Speaker 1: a very powerful tool. I'll imagine in about how am
34:01
Speaker 1: I going to feel about this thing, not right now,
34:04
Speaker 1: but a week from now, or a month from now,
34:06
Speaker 1: or a year from now as you age. One of
34:09
Speaker 1: the things I think many people learn is that many
34:12
Speaker 1: times time does heal Right. Our emotions go up, but
34:17
Speaker 1: inevitably they do come down. Right. Our own personal news
34:21
Speaker 1: cycle is constantly running, just like it is out there
34:24
Speaker 1: in the media. New things come in to our lives, right,
34:28
Speaker 1: and our emotions abside. So I'll remind myself about the
34:31
Speaker 1: fact that you know what, I'll probably feel fine about
34:33
Speaker 1: this argument network a week later, and then the last
34:37
Speaker 1: thing I'll do is I'll take a walk out in nature.
34:41
Speaker 1: There's some gorgeous data showing how simple exposures to green
34:45
Speaker 1: space can be remarkably powerful for calming us down and
34:50
Speaker 1: restoring the psychological resources that we often need to remain
34:55
Speaker 1: in control. And so that's my trio of strategies that
34:58
Speaker 1: I rely on.
35:00
Speaker 2: Ethan so many questions that I want to ask you,
35:03
Speaker 2: but time's going to get the better of us. So
35:04
Speaker 2: I'm going to completely switch gears for one final question,
35:09
Speaker 2: and this relates to your work that you've done around social.
35:12
Speaker 3: Media and well being.
35:13
Speaker 2: We alluded earlier that we might get to this, and
35:16
Speaker 2: I really want to bring this up. So recently I
35:18
Speaker 2: spoke with Sarah Coyn at Brigham Young University. Had a
35:22
Speaker 2: fascinating conversation with her around what she's been discovering in
35:26
Speaker 2: her research to do with the lack of control that
35:30
Speaker 2: both parents and children often feel in relation to their
35:33
Speaker 2: media being consumed. But also she highlighted something that Andy
35:38
Speaker 2: Shobulski at Oxford has highlighted, and that is that there
35:41
Speaker 2: doesn't seem to be any tremendous wellbeing downsides from reasonable
35:45
Speaker 2: amounts of device and technology usage. What I'd love to
35:49
Speaker 2: know is what does your research say about social media
35:53
Speaker 2: wellbeing and in particularly what does it say for young people?
35:56
Speaker 2: And how does this all weave back into the self
35:59
Speaker 2: control conversation?
36:01
Speaker 1: Easy question. So this is a you know, I've been
36:07
Speaker 1: doing research in the space for about ten years and
36:09
Speaker 1: it's been really interesting to see it evolve. It is
36:11
Speaker 1: very contentious right now. Number one, I think we need
36:16
Speaker 1: to not talk about social media or digital screen time
36:21
Speaker 1: as this monolithic activity, right that's either good or bad.
36:26
Speaker 1: There are countless ways that people can use social media,
36:30
Speaker 1: and if you break down different ways of using it,
36:34
Speaker 1: what you see is just like in everyday life, there
36:37
Speaker 1: are helpful versus harmful ways of interacting with other people.
36:41
Speaker 1: The same is true of social media, and so a
36:44
Speaker 1: lot of the things that we do on social media
36:46
Speaker 1: can be good for us, help build social capital and
36:49
Speaker 1: social connections. A lot of the things can be totally benign,
36:52
Speaker 1: have no implications on how we feel, and yet there
36:55
Speaker 1: can be other ways that we interact with social media
36:57
Speaker 1: that tank our emotions. For example, think about things like
37:01
Speaker 1: cyber bullying, and trolling, which are really quite significant phenomena
37:08
Speaker 1: that have a ton of data behind them. Right, the
37:10
Speaker 1: consequences of being cyberbullied can be extreme, the kinds of
37:14
Speaker 1: fomo experiences and envy that we experience when we look
37:18
Speaker 1: at people's curated lives online. So there are many different
37:22
Speaker 1: ways that we connect with the technology, and I think
37:24
Speaker 1: you can ask questions about well, does time on screen
37:28
Speaker 1: lead people to feel good or bad? And I think
37:32
Speaker 1: Sarah's right that on the whole that data show well,
37:36
Speaker 1: overall usage small negative effect on well being, but it's
37:39
Speaker 1: a really small effect. But if you break things down
37:43
Speaker 1: into different ways of using the technology, what you find
37:48
Speaker 1: is that they're healthy and harmful ways of using it.
37:51
Speaker 1: And I think the challenge for parents is to figure
37:54
Speaker 1: out what those are so that they can teach their
37:57
Speaker 1: kids how to navigate social media optimally. In the same
38:01
Speaker 1: way that we spend much of our parenting life teaching
38:05
Speaker 1: our children how to navigate the offline world optimally, the
38:09
Speaker 1: same is true, I would argue for social media.
38:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, so we've got the way I talk to parents
38:13
Speaker 2: about this is I'll describe three c's. There's connection, there's consumption,
38:17
Speaker 2: there's creation when we're online. And my read of it,
38:20
Speaker 2: and certainly your conversation just now underscores and reemphasizes this,
38:24
Speaker 2: is that when we're using it for consumption or for
38:28
Speaker 2: other negative purposes, which is certainly not effective for connection
38:33
Speaker 2: or creation, we can actually end up with the strong downside.
38:38
Speaker 2: But if we're using it for connection, we're using it
38:40
Speaker 2: for creation, we're probably going to have positive experiences online.
38:43
Speaker 2: And then it just comes down to regulation. Am I
38:45
Speaker 2: able to get off so that I can get enough sleep?
38:47
Speaker 2: Am I able to get off so that there's no
38:50
Speaker 2: impact on my physical well being? I can still go
38:52
Speaker 2: and be a human? It sounds so sensible when you
38:55
Speaker 2: say it like that, Ethan.
38:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, no, no, I totally agree. And what I
39:01
Speaker 1: tell people is that, look, social media, it's a new
39:04
Speaker 1: ecosystem that we interact in. It's a new environment, and
39:08
Speaker 1: environments aren't good or bad, right, It depends on how
39:11
Speaker 1: you engage with the environment that determines the implications it
39:15
Speaker 1: has for your emotional life. And I think if you
39:17
Speaker 1: look at the evidence, you find evidence to support that
39:20
Speaker 1: idea as well.
39:22
Speaker 2: So yeah, right, well, thank you so much. Let's move
39:25
Speaker 2: towards the conclusion you've got a book coming out soon.
39:28
Speaker 2: Would you like to tell us a bit about that book.
39:31
Speaker 1: Yes, the book coming out. It's called Chatter, The Voice
39:34
Speaker 1: in Our Head, Why it matters and how to harness it,
39:37
Speaker 1: And it's coming out next January, and it talks about
39:40
Speaker 1: a lot of the work that we've talked about on
39:43
Speaker 1: this podcast, but goes deeper, namely, why is it that
39:48
Speaker 1: our ability to think about our lives sometimes can be
39:51
Speaker 1: an incredible superpower, but at other times tank our mood
39:56
Speaker 1: and our relationships And importantly, what are the tools that
39:59
Speaker 1: we possessed to master that ability to introspect?
40:04
Speaker 3: That sounds amazing. Available for pre order or soon.
40:07
Speaker 1: It's available for pre order. It's on Amazon and all
40:10
Speaker 1: of well, it's on Amazon. I don't know about all
40:13
Speaker 1: the other sites yet because I'm a first time author,
40:15
Speaker 1: but I know you can find it on Amazon, and yeah,
40:19
Speaker 1: pre order is available.
40:20
Speaker 3: Congratulations, Chatter Chatter. I love the sound of that. It
40:23
Speaker 3: sounds brilliant.
40:24
Speaker 2: To wrap up the podcast, I always ask five questions
40:27
Speaker 2: of all of my guests. Everyone gets the same ones,
40:30
Speaker 2: and they're supposed to be reasonably rapid fire, but if
40:33
Speaker 2: you want to expand on any sometimes we hear some
40:35
Speaker 2: of our most compelling and delightful stories.
40:38
Speaker 3: So question number one, Ethan Cross.
40:40
Speaker 2: If we asked your two daughters what their favorite thing
40:43
Speaker 2: to do with you is, what would they tell.
40:45
Speaker 1: Us Take all time before bed, cooking dinner together, and
40:51
Speaker 1: traveling to exciting places which don't mean exotic, but exciting beautiful.
40:57
Speaker 2: What's been your trickiest ing moment? And don't tell me
41:02
Speaker 2: that it was that marshmallow experiment where your daughter wanted bonuses.
41:06
Speaker 1: Now, my trickiest moment has been seeing my children deal
41:13
Speaker 1: with emotional hardship that the source of which is out
41:16
Speaker 1: of my control, So when other kids are being mean
41:18
Speaker 1: to them, and just knowing that inevitably there's going to
41:23
Speaker 1: be more of that in store for them as they
41:25
Speaker 1: live their lives, and just trying to help them as
41:30
Speaker 1: I experience their pain, which is not pleasant but probably
41:35
Speaker 1: a good thing.
41:36
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's interesting how many people will offer some kind
41:39
Speaker 2: of a response along those lines. Watching our children struggle
41:42
Speaker 2: seems to be an almost universally agreed upon challenge that
41:46
Speaker 2: no parent wants, and yet every parent knows how important
41:49
Speaker 2: that is. It seems to teach them everything that they
41:52
Speaker 2: need to know about being a great human ongoingly. Question
41:55
Speaker 2: number three, Ethan, if you could spend an hour with
41:58
Speaker 2: your two daughters at any age at all, so you know,
42:00
Speaker 2: tomorrow afternoon they walk in the door and they're waiting
42:03
Speaker 2: for you in the living room at that age, what
42:06
Speaker 2: age would you pick them?
42:07
Speaker 3: Why?
42:08
Speaker 1: I would take their current age, And the reason for
42:10
Speaker 1: that is I found every age to be equally awe
42:14
Speaker 1: inspiring and fun and so and I'm sure that'll continue,
42:19
Speaker 1: so their current age.
42:22
Speaker 2: No matter how wonderful their current age is, and how
42:25
Speaker 2: glad you are to be in the moment, what are
42:27
Speaker 2: you looking forward to most as a dad?
42:30
Speaker 1: Seeing them succeed at whatever they choose to devote themselves to,
42:36
Speaker 1: seeing them make a mark on the world in some way,
42:40
Speaker 1: you know. Seeing my oldest daughter, she recently did community
42:43
Speaker 1: theater and it was important to her, and I've never
42:46
Speaker 1: done any kind of theater, but seeing her get up
42:48
Speaker 1: on the stage and sing and dance, it was just
42:50
Speaker 1: remarkable to see how she had achieved what was important
42:54
Speaker 1: for her. And so just watching them both pursue their
42:57
Speaker 1: goals and hopefully accomplish them on if not learning from
43:01
Speaker 1: them and finding new ones something I look forward.
43:04
Speaker 3: To brilliant and the last question.
43:06
Speaker 2: If you could go back to Ethan Cross as a
43:08
Speaker 2: very young dad having one of those terribly tough moments,
43:12
Speaker 2: with no experience at all as a parenting expert, and
43:14
Speaker 2: maybe even without the PhD in Self control and psychology,
43:19
Speaker 2: what advice would you give yourself.
43:22
Speaker 1: I would to be less hard on myself and to
43:26
Speaker 1: likewise remember that incredible mental time travel machine that we
43:30
Speaker 1: all possess. I think when my kids were young and
43:34
Speaker 1: parenting was new to me, you can get carried away
43:38
Speaker 1: with what's happening and not knowing when, when will the
43:42
Speaker 1: sleepless nights end and so forth, and so just knowing
43:46
Speaker 1: that things will get better as time goes on would
43:51
Speaker 1: have been powerful to have a reminder of back then.
43:54
Speaker 2: Well, Ethan, it's just been an absolute pleasure to talk
43:58
Speaker 2: with you. So grateful for your generous and your wisdom.
44:01
Speaker 2: Thank you for being a part of the Parenting in
44:03
Speaker 2: Perspective podcast.
44:06
Speaker 1: Wonderful. Thank you so much. As what a fine conversation,
44:11
Speaker 1: so I hope we can do it again.
44:13
Speaker 3: Well, what a fascinating discussion.
44:15
Speaker 2: I hope you've gotten some insight into Professor Ethan Cross
44:18
Speaker 2: as a result of this Parenting.
44:19
Speaker 3: In Perspective podcast.
44:21
Speaker 2: As I said at the beginning of the podcast, I
44:23
Speaker 2: just love the fact that he's linked to this all
44:25
Speaker 2: time classic marshmallow experiment and the work of Walter Mitchell,
44:29
Speaker 2: one of the most important psychologists of the modern era.
44:32
Speaker 3: Just a quick reminder as well. I can't emphasize this enough.
44:35
Speaker 2: And Ethan also made the point if you're going to
44:37
Speaker 2: try that experiment on your own children, their destiny is
44:41
Speaker 2: not linked directly to the decision that they make about
44:44
Speaker 2: the marsh mellow.
44:45
Speaker 3: What we want to do is make.
44:46
Speaker 2: Sure that they learn how to self control better, because
44:49
Speaker 2: the more self control they have in healthy doses.
44:52
Speaker 3: The better it will be in their lives.
44:54
Speaker 2: Okay, coming up next on the Parenting in Perspective podcast,
44:58
Speaker 2: we're going to be talking about triumphing over adversity. So
45:03
Speaker 2: join me doctor Justin Coulson as I talk with one
45:05
Speaker 2: of the most remarkable men that I've ever had the
45:08
Speaker 2: opportunity to speak with and his wife John and Amanda
45:12
Speaker 2: McLain as we discuss their life experiences.
45:15
Speaker 4: So as an incomplete para pleagerer, I vividly remember waking
45:19
Speaker 4: up after coming out of the coma and being in
45:22
Speaker 4: a world of pain. It's a bit about initially, why
45:25
Speaker 4: me there? It's my life literally as gone. There's always
45:29
Speaker 4: this internal dialogue around what am I going to do
45:31
Speaker 4: with my life? My job? Wanted to be a fireman.
45:34
Speaker 4: I mean, all these kind of reoccurring dark thoughts. Having
45:38
Speaker 4: encouraging words from my father, from my brother, from my
45:41
Speaker 4: doctor started to create shades of light to give me
45:45
Speaker 4: hope moving forward.
45:46
Speaker 2: That's former triathlete and Australian Paralympic representative John McLean and
45:50
Speaker 2: his wife Amanda, my next guests on the Parenting in
45:53
Speaker 2: Perspective podcast, and.
45:55
Speaker 3: It was always just before we wrap this up. Thank
45:57
Speaker 3: you so very very.
45:58
Speaker 2: Much to a person who is known as doctor and
46:03
Speaker 2: Mum of three who left a five star review on
46:06
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts.
46:07
Speaker 3: She said, cyscinct relevant and doable.
46:11
Speaker 2: Enjoying these longer parenting and perspective conversations with relevant, educated
46:15
Speaker 2: experts or personalities. The short happy Families podcasts are brilliant
46:18
Speaker 2: for quick car trips to work or for the reluctant,
46:21
Speaker 2: often male partners in your life who would eat a
46:22
Speaker 2: parenting book before reading one complete game changer justin thanks
46:26
Speaker 2: and doctor and Mum of three, thank you so very
46:29
Speaker 2: much for your five star rating. If you're enjoying the
46:32
Speaker 2: podcast and you reckon it's worth sharing with other people,
46:35
Speaker 2: could you help out by doing what Doctor and Mum
46:37
Speaker 2: of three has done and leave us that five star
46:39
Speaker 2: review and a comment. Please the comments and the reviews
46:42
Speaker 2: and the five star ratings they help other people to
46:44
Speaker 2: find out about the podcast and find ways that they
46:47
Speaker 2: can be more informed and make their families happier and
46:49
Speaker 2: more flourishing. And please tell your friends about the podcast.
46:52
Speaker 2: Just share the link, get the word out.
46:53
Speaker 3: We want to tell.
46:54
Speaker 2: Everybody that we can about how cool the conversations are
46:57
Speaker 2: that we're having.
46:57
Speaker 3: Okay, let's wrap this up.
46:59
Speaker 2: If you like more info on how I can help
47:00
Speaker 2: your family flourish, particularly if you would like to have
47:03
Speaker 2: ongoing monthly support via our amazing Happy Families memberships, you
47:07
Speaker 2: can get all the info at Happyfamilies dot com dot
47:09
Speaker 2: au or visit my Facebook page, Doctor Justin Colson's Happy Families.
47:13
Speaker 2: And as always, thank you very much to Justin Roland
47:16
Speaker 2: for his work in producing the podcast and making it
47:18
Speaker 2: sound just great. And thank you for listening to the
47:22
Speaker 2: Parenting in Perspective podcast, a Happy Families podcast