Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #1024 - Mirror, Mirror On The Wall

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#1024 - Mirror, Mirror On The Wall · 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 1: time poor parent who just wants answers.
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Speaker 2: Now, it's not about whether they're beautiful or not. It's
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Speaker 2: not about if they're the fastest guy on the track team.
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Speaker 2: It's actually about who they are, the qualities that they possess,
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Speaker 2: and the way it makes other people feel.
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Speaker 1: And now here's the stars of our show, my mum
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Speaker 1: and dad.
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Speaker 3: Well, hello missus. Happy Families Today, Kylie, we have got
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Speaker 3: a question that has come through two podcasts at Happy
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Speaker 3: families dot com dot A. You can I read it
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Speaker 3: out to you go says, Hey, I have a question
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Speaker 3: for the podcast. This one's from Sarah in Victoria. My
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Speaker 3: husband and I differ on how much we think we
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Speaker 3: should tell our kids they're beautiful and handsome. He thinks
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Speaker 3: that telling them often will help them to feel good
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Speaker 3: and confident about themselves, and maybe even stop our daughters
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Speaker 3: from falling for the first guy that compliments them. He's
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Speaker 3: great with encouraging words, and I have to admit that
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Speaker 3: I appreciate it when he tells me I'm beautiful. However,
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Speaker 3: I don't think we should be encouraging them to dwell
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Speaker 3: on physical beauty I'm worried that they'll think that it's
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Speaker 3: important to be beautiful or handsome, and it may increase
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Speaker 3: how conscious they are about the way they look. So,
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Speaker 3: which is it should we tell our kids they're beautiful?
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Speaker 3: What a great question. We have six daughters. This is
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Speaker 3: something that we have talked about a number of times
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Speaker 3: in our home physical beauty. Do we make comments about it?
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Speaker 3: Do we talk about, wow, you look great? What are
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Speaker 3: your initial reactions before we dive into some research and
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Speaker 3: some thoughts.
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Speaker 2: I don't think there's anything wrong with telling your children
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Speaker 2: that they're beautiful or they're handsome. But if it's the
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Speaker 2: only thing we're focused on, then I think we're setting
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Speaker 2: them up to not to fail, but to have a really,
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Speaker 2: really limited view of themselves.
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Speaker 3: You're so pragmatic. I love that setting them up to
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Speaker 3: have a limited view of themselves if that's what our
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Speaker 3: central focus is. So are you saying that it's okay
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Speaker 3: to tell the kids that they look beautiful?
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Speaker 2: The reality is there's someone out there who's going to
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Speaker 2: tell me that, No, you shouldn't be doing it. It's
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Speaker 2: an evaluation of someone's appearance, right. I wouldn't do that
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Speaker 2: in a childcare setting. With painting. I wouldn't tell them
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Speaker 2: that I thought their painting was beautiful. I would describe
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Speaker 2: the things that I saw about it, that I enjoyed
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Speaker 2: or I loved, but I wouldn't put an evaluation on it.
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Speaker 2: So there's going to be lots of people out there
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Speaker 2: that would say that it would be putting an evaluation
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Speaker 2: on it. Do I think there's any problem with telling
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Speaker 2: your daughter or your son that they look beautiful? No?
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Speaker 2: I don't so when, as she stated, there is something
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Speaker 2: reassuring when the person you love in your life tells
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Speaker 2: you that you're beautiful.
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Speaker 3: How do you feel when I tell you that you live?
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Speaker 2: I feel like the most beautiful woman in the world. Yeah,
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Speaker 2: conquer anything.
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Speaker 3: How about that song by Eric Clapton, you look beautiful tonight, wonderful,
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Speaker 3: wonderful tonight.
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Speaker 2: No, I look beautiful.
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Speaker 3: Love that. So let's talk about some research here. Rene
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Speaker 3: Engeln has written a book called Beauty Sick. I think
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Speaker 3: it is the Bible on this particular topic. Her research
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Speaker 3: is exquisite, so well done in the book is brilliantly written.
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Speaker 3: It is absolutely one of my top ten books of
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Speaker 3: all time and absolutely one of the best books I've
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Speaker 3: ever read. About about girls and the issues around beauty.
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Speaker 3: What we know is that whether we say this stuff
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Speaker 3: or not, from around about the age of five, our daughters, specifically,
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Speaker 3: much more than our sons are worried about how they
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Speaker 3: look and want to change things about their appearance. Now
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Speaker 3: I can't remember the exact stats they're in Renee Elgen's
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Speaker 3: Beauty Sick Book, but something like one third of our
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Speaker 3: five year olds are already wanting to change something about
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Speaker 3: their appearance. They're already worried about how they look. One
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Speaker 3: of the challenges that you have when you start giving
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Speaker 3: praise and talking about how somebody looks is you increase
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Speaker 3: the focus on how they look, and so we've got
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Speaker 3: to be really careful that we don't overdo it. And
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Speaker 3: something that did stand out to me in Sarah's email
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Speaker 3: was her husband thinks that telling them often will help
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Speaker 3: them feel good and confident about themselves. And he's right,
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Speaker 3: but if we tell them too often, it can do
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Speaker 3: the opposite. It can lead them to start to become
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Speaker 3: reliant on the external evaluation of somebody else to help
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Speaker 3: them to feel that they are enough.
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Speaker 2: That's right, and his hope that doing it on his
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Speaker 2: end will actually stop her from falling for the first
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Speaker 2: guy that compliments them is actually not the case. It's
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Speaker 2: actually going to create that desire and need. It has told.
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Speaker 3: It has the potential too. I don't want to say
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Speaker 3: that it will, but it has the potential to, because
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Speaker 3: if this girl, for example, if his daughter keeps on
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Speaker 3: hearing and hearing and hearing, Oh, my dad thinks that
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Speaker 3: I'm beautiful, I'm so beautiful, and then she's with a
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Speaker 3: guy who says the same thing, Oh, you're so beautiful.
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Speaker 3: She said. Oh, now I feel reassured. I'm feeling those
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Speaker 3: same feelings now that I feel when my dad tells me,
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Speaker 3: except they're even better because they're coming from this boy
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Speaker 3: that I like. And so we know story after story
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Speaker 3: of girls who have fallen for boys who have whispered
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Speaker 3: sweet and nothing's in their ears and told them how
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Speaker 3: beautiful they are. So for me, I just look.
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Speaker 2: At the fact that beauty is number one. It's so
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Speaker 2: subt active, and it's also so changing as a five
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Speaker 2: year old what beautiful looks like, to what it looks
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Speaker 2: like as a fifteen year old, and then as a
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Speaker 2: twenty five year old, and then as a fifty year old.
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Speaker 2: Our beauty changes. Our physical appearance is constantly changing, and
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Speaker 2: if our focus is so honed in on the physical,
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Speaker 2: it's hard to accept the changes for what they are.
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Speaker 3: After the break, I'm going to share a handful of
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Speaker 3: ways that we can offer encouraging words to our children
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Speaker 3: and help them to feel like they are enough, regardless
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Speaker 3: of whether they feel beautiful on Your daughter just walked by,
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Speaker 3: eyes glued to her phone, expression unreadable. You ask her
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Speaker 3: to put it down, but she balks. You know it's
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Speaker 3: not good for her, but you're not sure why or
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Speaker 3: how to support better choices. In the webinar pixel Perfect,
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Speaker 3: I joined with psychologist and Team tech expert Joscelyn Brewer
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Speaker 3: to discuss how to set screen boundary that work for
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Speaker 3: you and your daughter. Check out pixel Perfect now on
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Speaker 3: the Happy Families webshop.
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Speaker 2: It's the Happy Families podcast, the podcast for the time
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Speaker 2: poor parent who just wants answers. Now. It's interesting this
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Speaker 2: whole conversation around beauty, and you've obviously mentioned your book
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Speaker 2: Beauty Sick that you read.
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Speaker 3: Yeah Yeah by doctor Renee Engeln, highly recommended. I actually
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Speaker 3: wrote a few things in Misconnection about our daughters who
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Speaker 3: want to be pixel perfect and this desire to look amazing,
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Speaker 3: And I thought I might share a couple of those ideas.
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Speaker 3: As we go through this, something that comes up all
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Speaker 3: the time is we just need to teach your kids
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Speaker 3: to be critical of what they see in the media.
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Speaker 3: We need to teach them about photoshop. We need to
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Speaker 3: teach them that every picture that you see on screen ap.
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Speaker 2: But they know they know that. And you know why
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Speaker 2: they know that because ninety percent of what they post
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Speaker 2: of themselves is filtered.
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Speaker 3: That's exactly right. And what I was going to say
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Speaker 3: is they know it, but it doesn't stop them aspiring
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Speaker 3: to it.
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Speaker 2: No, they filter because they're trying.
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Speaker 3: To be precisely. But more than that, while ever we're
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Speaker 3: doing that, we are still focused on looks. We're still
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Speaker 3: focused on appearance. I actually think the best thing that
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Speaker 3: we can do when we are having conversations with people,
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Speaker 3: when we see someone that we haven't bumped into for ages,
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Speaker 3: is to not say anything about how they look like.
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Speaker 3: Just try it. Next time you see someone you haven't
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Speaker 3: seen for ages, try and not say, oh, you look great,
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Speaker 3: or you look like you've lost weight, or wow, you
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Speaker 3: look fantastic, or like it's one of those natural things
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Speaker 3: that we say, we see someone and one of the
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Speaker 3: first things we do is comment on their appearance.
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Speaker 2: I reckon, you've just lost half the mums right now,
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Speaker 2: because everyone loves hearing that.
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Speaker 3: Well, they do, I know. But the thing is, we
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Speaker 3: wonder why our kids are so worried about their appearance.
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Speaker 3: But every time we bump into somebody, we talk about
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Speaker 3: their appearance. It's one of the first things that we say.
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Speaker 3: And it's an unhealthy obsession with appearance. Why can't we
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Speaker 3: just say it is so great to see you, or
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Speaker 3: it's been so long since we've caught up. This is
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Speaker 3: going to be such a great chance to talk like
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Speaker 3: why do we have to focus on appearance?
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Speaker 2: I think that, you know, if we could counter Like
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Speaker 2: I said from the very beginning, I don't. I don't
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Speaker 2: see any problems telling your child that you know, they're beautiful.
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Speaker 2: But one of the things that you and I are
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Speaker 2: very specific about is your beautiful insight and out right,
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Speaker 2: what are the things about your child? What is there
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Speaker 2: you know, like their personality, make up their value system,
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Speaker 2: what is it their strengths help them to recognize and
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Speaker 2: see those things because those things actually improve with age
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Speaker 2: and just get better and better there where they will
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Speaker 2: find their sense of worth.
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Speaker 3: I'm going to I'm probably going to butcher this, but
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Speaker 3: in her book Beauty Sick, Renee and Geln actually says
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Speaker 3: something that her grandfather used to say to her. It
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Speaker 3: was to do with her youth and her beauty.
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Speaker 2: Yes, and she'mbre you telling me.
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Speaker 3: She basically said her grandpa would would say, don't ever
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Speaker 3: think that there's anything special about your youth or your beauty,
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Speaker 3: because you did nothing to deserve it and you can
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Speaker 3: do nothing to keep it. Yeah, it's really about who
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Speaker 3: are you becoming? And I think that if we go
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Speaker 3: back to Sarah's email, is it okay to tell your
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Speaker 3: daughter that she's beautiful or tell your son that he's handsome?
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Speaker 3: From a practical point of view, as you said, Kylie
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Speaker 3: at the very beginning of this conversation, yeah, like it
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Speaker 3: feels nice to be appreciated and to go to some
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Speaker 3: effort on your appearance and have somebody notice it. It
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Speaker 3: does feel nice, But we can't make that the focus.
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Speaker 3: I don't know where we get this horrible idea from,
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Speaker 3: and our daughters carry it more than anyone else, this
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Speaker 3: sense that my value as a person is inextricably linked
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Speaker 3: to my physical appearance and my worth. I'm only worthy
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Speaker 3: if I look a certain way.
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Speaker 2: I had a conversation with a friend the other day,
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Speaker 2: and it wasn't about her physical appearance. She's just started
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Speaker 2: a new job and she's feeling the pressure because her
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Speaker 2: new boss feels like my friend is her living savior.
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Speaker 2: She's come in and swept her off her feet and
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Speaker 2: is doing things that no other person in her position
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Speaker 2: has ever done for her before, and she can't believe
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Speaker 2: her eyes. And so my friend's kind of feeling the
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Speaker 2: weight of that. And I just said to her, this
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Speaker 2: actually hasn't got any to do with what you're doing.
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Speaker 2: This actually has everything to do with who you are.
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Speaker 2: She doesn't have to do anything extreme. It's because of
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Speaker 2: who she is, the way she thinks, the way she
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Speaker 2: just goes out of her way to do little things
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Speaker 2: that lighten her boss's load. She's not doing anything massive.
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Speaker 2: It's just because of the way she is. It's who
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Speaker 2: she is, and that's what we need our children to understand.
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Speaker 2: It's not about whether they're beautiful or not. It's not
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Speaker 2: about if they're the fastest guy on the track team.
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Speaker 2: It's actually about who they are, the qualities that they possess,
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Speaker 2: and the way it makes other people feel.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's not about the dress. It's about the girl
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Speaker 3: in the dress. Yeah. A few years ago, I was
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Speaker 3: on the Today Show and we were having this conversation
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Speaker 3: about whether or not we should tell our kids if
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Speaker 3: they're a bit chunky, if they're of a weight, if
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Speaker 3: they're fat, and I'm made the comment no, actually we shouldn't,
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Speaker 3: and the person who was hosting that day, who will
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Speaker 3: remain nameless, said but surely if your kids are fat,
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Speaker 3: you need to let them know. And my response to
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Speaker 3: that person was, they already know their fat, you don't
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Speaker 3: need to tell them. The conversation was, we need to
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Speaker 3: watch what's going into our kids' mouths. We need to
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Speaker 3: be in charge of the pantry. We need to help
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Speaker 3: our children to be beautiful because that's the expectation in society.
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Speaker 3: They need to be healthy and beautiful. And I think
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Speaker 3: my final advice in this conversation it comes from James Corden,
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Speaker 3: the British comedian.
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Speaker 2: Okay, I'm not sure where you're going with this.
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Speaker 3: He had a viral video a couple of years ago
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Speaker 3: from his late night talk show and I can't remember
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Speaker 3: the full context, but it was about weight issues and appearance,
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Speaker 3: and he just said, instead of watching what goes into
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Speaker 3: our daughter's mouths, we need to watch what comes out
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Speaker 3: of ours.
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Speaker 2: How good is that?
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Speaker 3: So, Sarah, in relation to your question, what comes out
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Speaker 3: of your mouth should be uplifting and positive. It should
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Speaker 3: help your kids to feel good about themselves. But more
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Speaker 3: than anything, it should help them to not be really
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Speaker 3: on you for evaluations of their value and worth as
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Speaker 3: a human. If they look beautiful, that's great, let them know,
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Speaker 3: but focus on other things more.
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Speaker 2: As they come to recognize what their strengths are, that's
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Speaker 2: actually where they get their fulfillment and their sense of
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Speaker 2: purpose as they tap into those strengths and they.
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Speaker 3: Use them to help other people.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, and they don't need the constant affirmation from outside
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Speaker 2: sources to help them feel a sense of worth.
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Speaker 1: Well.
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Speaker 3: We really hope that this conversation has been helpful for you, Sarah.
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Speaker 3: The Happy Famili's podcast is produced by Justin Ruland from
12:33
Speaker 3: Bridge Media, with Craig Bruce as our executive producer. For
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Speaker 3: more information about making your family happier, please join us
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Speaker 3: at Happy families dot com. Do you