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We're here for another episode of The YouSchool podcast. I'm Scott Schimmel the host and today what we're going to talk about is your kid struggling. Now, I would love for you to think back on your life, especially growing up and think about the struggles that you had. And whether those were struggles in school, struggles
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in your family, struggles- physical struggles that you went through, I know I had nine broken bones.
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Many friends of mine moved a lot growing up. So there's like struggles of fitting in and finding new friends. Some people had struggles, just out of the gates in terms of like, their academic challenges, I just want to share quickly for me, the struggle, yeah, it's I've had a lot of struggles. But the struggle that I think has had the most profound impact on changing me and who I am today. So I was, I don't know at what age essentially diagnosed with this learning disability on language processing, the phrase that I remember that was used growing up was a word finding problem. The way it came out, and manifests itself was when I found myself in a in a setting like, class, or around other kids that I admired or looked up to, if I was around adults, I would find myself feeling tongue tied, that's the best way I could probably describe it. And as a result, I hardly ever, ever participate in class unless I had to. No raising my hand. For all the teachers who said on the first day, your syllabus "20% of your grade is on class participation"- You lied. It wasn't true, because I got A's.
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But effectively, I felt extremely, like at threat of being rejected. That's I think, in hindsight, the threat of humiliation, being made fun of, starting a sentence not being able to finish it. Essentially, it just my, my brain would kind of go blank. And what. So here was the struggle-
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years and years of speech therapy, and I would, I would probably say relentless pursuit of figuring out how to overcome that. And I would give most of the credit, let's say half, I get half the credit, the other half of the credit I give to my mom. I don't know what sort of magic she did. But I grew up always knowing that given enough time, and energy,
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and effort, I would overcome that.
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And as I grew up, especially the end of high school and into college, what became apparent to me is that the, the kind of life that I was most drawn to, was a life that would include communication. Communicating out loud in front of others, so leadership, influencing others, ultimately, to do what I do today, which is I am a professional communicator, public communicator, not only in large group settings, but in facilitation and highly risky scenario, situations,
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conflict resolution and management training. And I don't say that to brag, I say that to highlight the fact that my struggle that I went through, and I think my mom and speech therapists and good teachers guided me through, not to avoid, not to give me necessarily really uniquely special accommodations to avoid it. But the point and the goal, the bullseye was always to overcome it. To go through the struggle, that struggle shaped my life more than anything, and I look through the lens of that to everything else. Any other struggle that I've ever had since then, and even now I look through the same lens, giving me enough time and energy and effort, I will overcome that.
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It's true for me, I know it's true for you. So then the question is, why do we- I'm talking to myself as well. Why do we collectively
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protect and prevent our kids from going through their own struggles?
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Now on some level, obviously, I get it. We don't want our kids to suffer. And there's a real fine line between struggling and suffering. And for every,
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the fine line that we tried to navigate.
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It's oftentimes a little bit ambiguous- what which one is which? Now we don't want our kids to be I don't want my kids to be bullied, harmed, hurt. And again, that's the fine line in hindsight, even the ways in which you probably agree, the ways in which I was hurt, has been transformed and redeemed. It is something that's become a strength. Many of us who have been wounded, become a source of healing to others. And again, it's not for everybody, and there's no... So hopefully you understand what I'm saying, we're not talking today about traumatizing kids, we're not talking about kids with special needs not being given the accommodation they need. I'm not saying that at all. What I'm talking about as the ordinary, everyday struggles that kids need. They need necessary resistance. They need to come and confront their limits. They need to it's through struggling, that I think kids will learn what matters most to them. It's through struggling that kids recognize what they don't have yet. Struggling can strengthen a kid's resolve. It can help a kid find an internal drive and motivation. A struggle can also be a real clear litmus test, to mirror, to help a kid know that that's not my struggle. I don't that might be someone else's struggle. But it's not mine. It can be clarifying. It can build self awareness, humility, and a healthy interdependence.
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It can help a kid understand where to go in life. Oftentimes, one of the exercises we do is to help a kid recognize and go back and reflect on the problems that kind of agitate and irritate them. The struggles that they've had, are oftentimes clues to clarity for their future, particularly a future career, vocation. Passion, find something that you've struggled with and struggled through, and the root, kind of the definition of passion- it's clearly evident that that's something that you're willing to struggle through, to suffer for. Because it matters to you. That's, that's a clue, evidence that there's something else coming for you. So what we're looking at, I just want to kind of encourage you to reflect on that I'm doing as well, kind of a knee-jerk reaction culturally to protect our kids from struggling.
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So what is that? And what does that do? What are the stakes- if we don't allow kids to go through struggles? By removing obstacles, by blaming others, teaching them that it's not your struggle, It's someone else's fault, that you're struggling and they need to fix it. What does that do to a kid as they transition to adulthood? Because I know, because I've been listening and asking questions for a long time, that what we care about- parents, educators, coaches- what we care about is for our kids to become
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strong, resilient, kind, generous, emotionally intelligent, self-aware, people who know how to bring value, solve problems, build friendships, lead lives well. And I don't think that's ever going to happen until and unless we learn to remove some of the protection from our kids, and allow them to struggle.
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So let's look at your kids. What are their struggles? If you look at their life, what are their struggles? And what would it look like for you to encourage them or let them struggle a little bit more? Love the quote, she's an author, speaker Shefali Saberi I'm not sure how to pronounce that. I should know because I quote her often.
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In books, she's written on conscious parenting and awakened parenting. She has this quote where she says, We need to allow kids to feel, fail and fall. Feel things, fail at things and fall down in order for them to grow to the resilience and compassion for themselves that they need. I couldn't agree more. So last, kind of wrapping this quick episode up-, what struggles have you faced that have shaped your life for the better? What does it look like for you to reflect on those, remember, we call them and tell them to the kids in your life, the struggles that have shaped you for the better?
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And as you do that, to ask yourself and be honest with yourself and maybe with a friend or a spouse or another parent, what might keep you from allowing your kids or your students or your players to struggle? What what is it that you want to rescue them? Is that you don't want them to get mad? Is it you don't want them to be harmed? Like what is it get honest with that with yourself and with that, and then figure out what to do with it. And then finally to reflect on, have a conversation about what's at stake? What lessons might your kid miss out on if you don't let them struggle, if you remove the obstacles?
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I continue to recognize in some of these episodes like this is it can feel like a negative, Debbie Downer but I don't think it is struggling is where it's at.
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Every kid needs a struggle. We'll be back next week with another episode of The YouSchool podcast.
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Hey, thanks for joining in on The YouSchool podcast. We'd love to share with you the resources available on our website at theyouschool.com not just articles, ebooks, worksheets and other podcasts episodes, but specifically you should know about a free course we have available called The Real Me course. It's digital, it's interactive, and it'll guide you to get clear about who you are in a great story you can tell with your life. So go register for free account and get started on The Real Me course today at theyouschool.com. That's the you school dot com.
