2 ways parents can help teens cope with pressure to achieve?
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The obsession with success is a topic that piqued the interest of journalist Jennifer Breheny Wallace, mom to kids ages 19, 17, and 14. She published her findings in a book published last year,?Never Enough: When Achievement Culture Becomes Toxic—And What We Can Do About It.
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“Achievement is not the problem,” Wallace tells?Fortune. “It’s the way that we’ve come to talk about achievement.”
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After doing two national surveys of over 6,000 parents and 500 young adults as part of her research, Wallace uncovered patterns crucial to ensuring kids can be successful, both academically and mentally, and on the path to becoming well-adjusted adults. Below, some of Wallace’s advice about how parents can provide shelter from the storm of toxic teenage pressures.?
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Show your kids the joy you feel from being their parent
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Wallace says one of the first things parents can do is make home a “haven” from the pressures they feel at school and on social media to constantly achieve.
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To do that, minimize criticism and prioritize affection, Wallace says. She uses the phrase “Greet them like the family dog greets you” when they get home: In other words, show them the pure joy you get just from being their parent. Instead of immediately asking them how they performed on a test the moment they walk through the door, she says, ask them how they’re doing.
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Help them see that they matter outside of achievement
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One of the biggest takeaways Wallace found in her research was the importance of “mattering.” This is when children feel like they are valued and that they add value to the world around them, she explains.
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But how do you help your kids feel like they matter? By getting to know them, Wallace says. Show them that they add value to the world because of who they are at their core. She says even by noticing the little things about them—how funny they can be; little quirks about them that you love—you show them you value their whole person, not just their measurable achievements.
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“Through mattering…we give our kids a kind of healthy fuel that propels them to achieve, and to achieve for things that mean more than just individual success and resume building,” Wallace says. “It sets our kids up to find purpose.”
You matter to us at Event Minds Matter Empowered by Club Ichi and that is why we are gifting you this story to all the working parents in this industry.
We know its tough out there. We hear you, we see you, and we support you.
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