Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #741 Helping Your Kids Discover Their Identity

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#741 Helping Your Kids Discover Their Identity · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

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  Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families Podcast. It's the podcast for the.
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  Speaker 2: Time poor parent who just wants answers.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Now, it's the Happy Families Podcast.
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  Speaker 2: Hello, this is doctor Justin Colson, the host and pading
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: expert on Channel lines hit TV show Parental Guidance. Season
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: two is getting closer. Finally received word from Channel nine.
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  Speaker 2: It's on the way. I'm not allowed to say more
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  Speaker 2: than that, but it's on the way.
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  Speaker 1: It's nearly here.
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  Speaker 2: Keep your eye out for it. I'm joined today by
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  Speaker 2: Christine Late and she's filling in for Kylie, who's looking
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  Speaker 2: after the kids because the school holidays. The podcast continues,
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  Speaker 2: but with a new co host. Christine is the ABC
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  Speaker 2: Perth and Wa afternoon presenter on ABC Radio and a
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  Speaker 2: mum of a four year old with a new baby
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  Speaker 2: on the way. Hey Christine, when's the baby arrive?
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  Speaker 1: Oh?
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  Speaker 3: When does the baby arrive? So that is a very
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  Speaker 3: good question, Justin. Look technically, and funnily enough, my son
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  Speaker 3: is drew on my daughter's birthday. So my obstetrician thinks
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  Speaker 3: that we bang once a year. That's not case. I
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  Speaker 3: swear it was just a Christmas thing, so probably you know,
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  Speaker 3: mid July. We'll see how we go, but he's pretty big.
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  Speaker 2: Just really, really, are you expecting expecting to push out
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  Speaker 2: a Heffer hero?
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  Speaker 1: I am, yes.
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  Speaker 3: My husband is a Scottish Adonis, very full, very hairy,
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  Speaker 3: very loving and friendly, looks like Woody from Toy Story,
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  Speaker 3: so I'm expecting one of the same.
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  Speaker 2: I hope that when my wife describes me to other people,
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  Speaker 2: she doesn't say very hairy.
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  Speaker 3: I mean, I love his hair and when we started
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  Speaker 3: dating was it was one of the things I love most.
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  Speaker 3: His smell. You know, I just nuzzled into it. Anyway,
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  Speaker 3: that's too much speaking of things that make you special
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  Speaker 3: and discovering your identity. I wanted to ask you today
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  Speaker 3: how to help my children discover their identity and what
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  Speaker 3: makes them special because I remember being at school and
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  Speaker 3: you know, when it was someone's birthday and they were
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  Speaker 3: made a fuss of I was jealous. And you know,
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  Speaker 3: if I saw that somebody was really good at sport
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  Speaker 3: and could hurdle like Shirley, what's said, mate?
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  Speaker 2: Oh no, I was going to say Temple and then
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  Speaker 2: I was going to say McClain, but I don't think
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  Speaker 2: it's either of them.
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  Speaker 1: Thank you.
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  Speaker 3: That's pregnant brain for you. I you know, I really
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  Speaker 3: wanted to find what I was good at, so I
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  Speaker 3: would like to help my daughter and son do the
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  Speaker 3: same thing in a very gentle parenting kind of way.
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  Speaker 3: So how do you start that process?
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  Speaker 2: Justin all right, So before I answer that question, I
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  Speaker 2: think that there's something really really important.
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  Speaker 1: That we need to touch on.
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  Speaker 2: And I picked this up from the wonderful James Anderson
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  Speaker 2: in our recent Raising Resilient Kids summit. He talked about
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  Speaker 2: this extensively. And there's a phrase that you used that
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  Speaker 2: I've got to come back to. You said, I want
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  Speaker 2: to find I want to help them to find what
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  Speaker 2: they're good at. Want to help them find what they're
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  Speaker 2: good at. And James Anderson said.
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  Speaker 1: I can hear the neuroticism coming out in you. I
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  Speaker 1: know what was it wrong? This is what he said.
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  Speaker 2: He said, you don't discover your abilities, you create them. Now,
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  Speaker 2: it's true that there are some people who are born
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  Speaker 2: with more fast twitch muscle fibers and some with more
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  Speaker 2: slow twitch muscle fibers. And it's true that there are
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  Speaker 2: some people who, because of the environments that they're raised in,
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  Speaker 2: are surrounded with music or art, or maybe they just
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  Speaker 2: have something that other kids don't. But what the research
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  Speaker 2: really clearly shows is that within a pretty short period
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  Speaker 2: of time, if you don't do much with that innate
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  Speaker 2: ability that you're born with, that special talent, gift or
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  Speaker 2: whatever you might want to call it, strength, if you
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  Speaker 2: don't do much with that other than I don't know,
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  Speaker 2: do your thing and gloat in the fact that you're
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  Speaker 2: really good at compared to all.
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  Speaker 1: Of your classmates.
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  Speaker 2: Anyone at school who is going to go and put
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  Speaker 2: the time and effort into creating the ability, they'll probably
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  Speaker 2: catch up to you and overtake you reasonably quickly if
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  Speaker 2: you don't go and do the work yourself. And so
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  Speaker 2: we don't find what we're good at, we create it.
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  Speaker 2: And I really really like that idea.
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  Speaker 3: I should have been teaching her piano from the age
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  Speaker 3: of three, giving.
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  Speaker 1: A right.
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  Speaker 3: I see what she enjoys, you know, And obviously this
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  Speaker 3: is very early days. I'm very much just trying to
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  Speaker 3: think how I can support them like my dad supported me,
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  Speaker 3: you know. I he could see that I loved playing
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  Speaker 3: the recorder, and he was like, this is torturous. We'll
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  Speaker 3: get her a clarinet. And so he got me a clarinet,
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  Speaker 3: and then he would drive me to music rehearsals at
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  Speaker 3: seven am every single day. I was in jazz band,
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  Speaker 3: concert band, quiet clarinet ensemble, sax ensemble, and he obviously
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  Speaker 3: saw that I really loved it, and so he facilitated
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  Speaker 3: that that learning process for me. So I guess I
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  Speaker 3: want to be able to do the same thing for
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  Speaker 3: her without putting my loves and my own hobbies and
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  Speaker 3: and loves on to her.
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  Speaker 1: If that makes sense, Yeah, it does. So let's just
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  Speaker 1: let's unpack that a little bit as well. Though.
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  Speaker 2: There are three reasons that kids are going to be
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  Speaker 2: drawn to and probably more than this, but my big three.
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  Speaker 2: Even if they've got whether they have an innate natural
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  Speaker 2: ability for something or not, kids are going to be
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  Speaker 2: drawn to things that they do well. So just by
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  Speaker 2: virtue of the fact that you can do something well,
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  Speaker 2: whether it's playing Fortnite or playing the recorder or surfing, swimming, running, whatever, kids.
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  Speaker 2: We call this our We call it a performance goal orientation.
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  Speaker 2: And we can have one of two orientations to performance goals. Okay,
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  Speaker 2: the first orientation to a performance goal is an approach orientation.
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  Speaker 2: We approach performance goals when we know we can do
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  Speaker 2: them well, and we avoid The second one is the
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  Speaker 2: avoidant orientation, which is, if I know that I'm going
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  Speaker 2: to look incompetent, I'm not going to do it. You
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  Speaker 2: know that thing where who's going to stand up and
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  Speaker 2: give the talk in school, who's going to do that
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  Speaker 2: thing on assembly? Who's going to be the volunteer in
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  Speaker 2: pe class to do that new skill that we're learning.
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  Speaker 2: And the people who step forward, they're the ones who
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  Speaker 2: already know how to do it and they can do
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  Speaker 2: it competently. The rest of us we all used to
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  Speaker 2: hide in the corner and get as far away from
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  Speaker 2: the teacher as we could. We would avoid, like the plague,
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  Speaker 2: anything that would make us look incompetent. So when we're
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  Speaker 2: talking about your little Bonnie at four years old, she
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  Speaker 2: will be Actually, there's something beautiful about four year olds.
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  Speaker 1: They're pretty much more.
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  Speaker 2: They're drawn to anything. They don't care if they're incompetent
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  Speaker 2: or not. They just like, yes, let me add it.
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  Speaker 2: I want to attack the world and figure it all out.
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  Speaker 2: I want to assimilate every bit of knowledge that I
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  Speaker 2: can about everything in my brain. But by the time
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  Speaker 2: they start to get to about I don't know, let's
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  Speaker 2: say six seven, definitely eight or nine, there's this thing,
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  Speaker 2: this social comparison starts to come up. They become aware
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  Speaker 2: that other people are looking at them, making judgments about them,
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  Speaker 2: comparing themselves to others. When that comes in, we see
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  Speaker 2: this ori, this goal orientation shift from approaching to avoiding,
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  Speaker 2: and that that's devastating for our kids. So competence is
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  Speaker 2: a big driver. Once our kids get to about seven
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  Speaker 2: or eight, certainly nine or ten, the confidence is a
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  Speaker 2: big driver of what they'll move towards, what they'll try
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  Speaker 2: and do. The next big driver is relationships. So if
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  Speaker 2: you want your kids to do well, it's something they've
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  Speaker 2: got to be around people they loved, Like how much
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  Speaker 2: did you love your band mates?
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  Speaker 3: Oh? I loved them, Yeah, And we have so much
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  Speaker 3: fun on the bus on the way to concerts. Oh,
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  Speaker 3: you are absolutely right. That was at least fifty percent
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  Speaker 3: of it for me.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, and for a lot of kids it's even more.
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  Speaker 2: For a lot of kids, they only do the thing
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  Speaker 2: that they're doing because of their friends. And there's a
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  Speaker 2: handful of things that I used to do when I
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  Speaker 2: was a kid, and I only did it because my
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  Speaker 2: friends were there. And there were some things that I
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  Speaker 2: did as a kid where I was quite competent, but
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  Speaker 2: I had no relationships, and because the relationships didn't exist,
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  Speaker 2: I pulled out, I backed away, wouldn't be involved in it.
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  Speaker 2: And so there's relationships, but there's also that last bit.
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  Speaker 2: And this taps into what you were talking about before
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  Speaker 2: with trying to push the kids into this thing or that.
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  Speaker 2: And you made that comment where you said that you
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  Speaker 2: really want to make sure that she's doing things that
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  Speaker 2: she wants to do and not the things that you
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  Speaker 2: want her to do. This where autonomy comes in. Now
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  Speaker 2: I'm going to say something really provocative. I don't think
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  Speaker 2: that it matters if you want her to do it
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  Speaker 2: or not. Like, if you want her to do it
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  Speaker 2: and she learns to be competent at it, and her
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  Speaker 2: relationship with you builds and she's feeling like she enjoys
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  Speaker 2: it so much that she doesn't want to stop doing it,
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  Speaker 2: then to me, that's fine because she's internalized the same
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  Speaker 2: love for that thing that you have. I'll give you
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  Speaker 2: a case in point surfing. Surfing.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, I just love surfing, and I have.
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  Speaker 2: Some children who are just frankly not that enthusiastic about surfing,
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  Speaker 2: and it pains me because I want to go surfing
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  Speaker 2: with my daughters. I want to get them out of
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  Speaker 2: the water. But something has happened. As I have forced
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  Speaker 2: them into situations that they don't necessarily want to be in,
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  Speaker 2: They've started to actually really love number one, being with me,
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  Speaker 2: But number two, they've started to develop competence in the
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  Speaker 2: water on that surfboard, and they've started to enjoy surfing
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  Speaker 2: for its own sake, to the point now where a
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  Speaker 2: couple of the kids will grab the boards and go
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  Speaker 2: to the beach without me and oh, I mean, they're
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  Speaker 2: still terribly incompetent, but they've found a love of the
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  Speaker 2: water and a love of surfing independent of me. Now,
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  Speaker 2: the central thing here is you've got to be careful
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  Speaker 2: how long you pull out the whip and crack it
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  Speaker 2: and drive the kids into the water, or drive the
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  Speaker 2: kids to that musical instrument or that thing that you
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  Speaker 2: care about so much. You've got to really listen to
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  Speaker 2: the kids as well. Cycling was my other passion, and
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  Speaker 2: one of my kids came along with the velodrome and
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  Speaker 2: we bought her a bike and spent all the money
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  Speaker 2: and after four weeks she was like, yeah, I actually
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  Speaker 2: hate this.
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  Speaker 1: That was an expensive.
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  Speaker 2: It was a really costly exercise for us. But again
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  Speaker 2: we didn't want to drive because she had no relationships there.
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  Speaker 2: She felt completely incompetent, like she was. They were wiping
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  Speaker 2: the floor with her. It was terrible and mostly I
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  Speaker 2: was every Friday night for track night at the Veldroma
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  Speaker 2: was like, you need to come down here. I've spent
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  Speaker 2: all this money. I'm demanding that you do it. And
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  Speaker 2: she had no autonomy, so those needs weren't being there.
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  Speaker 3: You know, it's really interesting justin three interviews spring to
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  Speaker 3: mind from recently. I interviewed the Doobie Brothers, I interviewed
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  Speaker 3: Sting's son, Joe Sumner, and I interviewed James Morrison, the
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  Speaker 3: famous jazz trumpeter. Wow, and this came up. This came
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  Speaker 3: up with each of them, and I didn't actually bring
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  Speaker 3: it up. Now. Obviously with Sting's son, he is a musician,
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  Speaker 3: but he's doing it differently, right, He's taken the music,
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  Speaker 3: he loves the music. He's got that from his dad.
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  Speaker 3: But he's going to be a present father. James Morrison's sons,
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  Speaker 3: two of them, William and Harry, are in his court
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  Speaker 3: hit right. But he said to me that he very
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  Speaker 3: much played good music around the house, but left them
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  Speaker 3: to it. He'd hear them in the garage making mistakes,
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  Speaker 3: you know, screwing up chords and it killed him. But
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  Speaker 3: he didn't go in, and he waited for them to
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  Speaker 3: come to him, and he said that worked. But when
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  Speaker 3: it came to putting them in the quartet travel around
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  Speaker 3: the country, he waited until they were more than ready.
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  Speaker 3: So I found it really interesting just from a musical
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  Speaker 3: point of view, the different stars I guess they are,
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  Speaker 3: and how they broached this. And similarly with the Doobie brothers,
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  Speaker 3: Pat Simmons, his son Pat Simmons Junior also went into
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  Speaker 3: music is recording, but is very much more about the family.
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  Speaker 3: So isn't that an interesting thing?
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  Speaker 2: I love the alignment and there's such great, great examples.
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  Speaker 2: I just really really love that, especially the masterful James
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  Speaker 2: Morrison saying I didn't go and correct them. I waited
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  Speaker 2: for them to come to me. Oh like just perfect, perfect,
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  Speaker 2: perfect perfect. Now I've got one more question for you,
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  Speaker 2: because this is this is ultimately what are my kids
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  Speaker 2: going to be good at? How do I help them
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  Speaker 2: to establish an identity? I think the first word that
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  Speaker 2: you used when we started this conversation was identity, and
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  Speaker 2: I just want to make one, I guess one last
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  Speaker 2: point by asking you a question, how old were you
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  Speaker 2: before you feel like you had your identity dialed in,
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  Speaker 2: like you felt like you knew who you were?
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  Speaker 3: Thirty? Yeah, Dean serious, thirty.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, So I would actually say forty for me, Yeah,
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  Speaker 2: I mean we're growing. Our identity is becoming increasingly firm
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  Speaker 2: and consolidated over time, and I'm even finding in my
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  Speaker 2: last decade of life that I'm seeing my identity shift
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  Speaker 2: further and grow more and develop in ways that for
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  Speaker 2: the most part, I'm really thrilled about every now and
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  Speaker 2: again in ways that I don't love as well. But
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  Speaker 2: identity is not set and it takes a long time
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  Speaker 2: to develop. So when you ask that first question, how
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  Speaker 2: do I help my daughter to develop her identity? I
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  Speaker 2: think it's super important that we emphasize the developmental nature
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  Speaker 2: of identity and that children who are under about the
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  Speaker 2: age of I'm going to say, eleven, twelve, thirteen, don't
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  Speaker 2: tend to be thinking very much at all. Certainly under
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  Speaker 2: the age of ten, they're not thinking wh am, I like,
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  Speaker 2: they don't have an existential crisis as a ten year
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  Speaker 2: old or an eight year old going oh, I'm not
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  Speaker 2: sure that this is consistent with who I am and
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  Speaker 2: my value is. They don't even think about it. We
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  Speaker 2: know from good research that it's during the adolescent years
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  Speaker 2: that identity development really really takes off. That's when it
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  Speaker 2: all kind of kicks off and we start to get
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  Speaker 2: a really strong sense of who we are. If we've
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  Speaker 2: had healthy identity development by the time we're in our
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  Speaker 2: late teens to early twenties, but by no means that
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  Speaker 2: we have finished product. It's not until, as you said,
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  Speaker 2: our late twenties, sometimes our thirties, sometimes even our forties
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  Speaker 2: where we finally say, Okay, I know who I am,
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  Speaker 2: I know my voice, I know what I'm about. Oh.
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  Speaker 2: This interview just recently with Harrison Ford, he's in that
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  Speaker 2: new Apple TV show Shrinking Yes, and he, with a
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  Speaker 2: number of expletives thrown in, Harrison Ford basically said I'm
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  Speaker 2: eighty years old, I know who I am.
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  Speaker 1: And I just remember the.
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  Speaker 2: Power of the statement as he said it, I know
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  Speaker 2: who I am. You don't get too many teenagers looking
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  Speaker 2: you in the eye and saying I know who I am.
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  Speaker 3: Oh.
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  Speaker 2: That's something that comes later in life.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, it does much later, hence my very long pause.
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  Speaker 3: That is such a good point, and so I suppose
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  Speaker 3: I will just support her as best I can and
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  Speaker 3: have fun in the meantime.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, don't don't rush it.
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  Speaker 2: And remember you don't discover your abilities or your identity,
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  Speaker 2: you create them.
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  Speaker 1: Boom. How's that?
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  Speaker 3: Oh deep?
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  Speaker 1: It's so deep.
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  Speaker 2: Well, we tackle the big stuff on the Happy Families podcast.
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  Speaker 1: Hey, Christine, thanks for joining me.
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  Speaker 2: Let's do one more tomorrow if you're up for another chat,
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  Speaker 2: because these have been there's been really delightful.
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  Speaker 1: It's been so much fun to have you on.
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  Speaker 3: I would love it. Justin see you tomorrow, Okay.
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  Speaker 2: The Happy Family's podcast is produced by Justin Rawan for
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: Bridge Media. Craig Bruce is our executive producer and yeah,
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  Speaker 2: back tomorrow with more.
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  Speaker 1: If you'd like more.
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: Information about making your family happy, please visit us at
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: happy families dot com dot a you.
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  Speaker 1: He knows the