Annie Fox's Blog...

Thoughts about teens, tweens, parenting and this adventure of living on Earth in the 21st century.

Annie Fox, M.Ed., is an internationally respected parenting expert, award-winning author, and a trusted online adviser for tweens and teens.

Clearing the clutter to get to the Bigger Picture

March 19, 2014

There's a life lesson in here somewhere

There’s a life lesson in here somewhere

Longer days bring more light to illuminate the doggie nose prints on my living room windows and all the crap I’ve been dumping in my garage and my office for the past year. So I’m into Spring Cleaning. Not just for the sake of clearing clutter and layers of dirt but attempting to gain a fresh perspective on my living space and my life.

When our kids  suffer a setback, they could really use a fresh perspective. By helping them clear their emotional clutter we ease their suffering and encourage  resilience.

To that point, I offer the following excerpt from my book, Teaching Kids to Be Good People

When they posted the cast list for our high school musical, The Music Man, I fully expected to read my name beside the lead role of Marion the Librarian.

I didn’t get the part. My best friend did.

Stunned, suddenly nauseous and disconnected from reality, I attempted to psychically morph the letters of her name into mine. At that critical moment, my magic powers failed. So did my ability to see the Bigger Picture (BP).

A parent’s life experience enables him or her to see beyond the child’s poor grade on the math test, the botched goal attempt, the argument with a friend, the break-up, the rejection letter from college. Teaching kids about the long view of life helps them develop good character traits. It also provides kids with needed encouragement and solace during tough times. But before we bore them with “This too shall pass,” give a kid in the throes of an upset a chance to vent or throw a self-pity party. Expressing emotion is healthy, but long-term dumping is not! What’s the difference?

Expressing feelings is about clearing emotional clutter. Talking helps people understand where we’re coming from, which helps us release pain, which gets us back into the positive place where we are best able to make good choices that respect our values and respect other people. A toddler screams because, without words, adults often don’t “get” what s/he’s upset about. Fourteen-year-olds usually scream less because they words, and if we patiently provide them with a safe place to communicate, the result is better understanding and healthier relationships.

Quit dumping

Quit dumping

Dumping is not about communication or understanding. More often, the goal of dumping is to complain, blame, paint oneself as a victim, and/or avoid responsibility for any part of the “bad stuff” that happened. Dumping reinforces bad habits (including the eternally off-putting “I’m a victim” attitude) and it rarely leads to healthier relationships, which is why it should never be encouraged. On top of that, dumping doesn’t help your child come to terms with what’s really going on.

From the dumpster: Your eighth-grade son comes home from a field trip in a foul mood. “Is something wrong?” you ask. He launches into a rant about: the “jerk” he had to sit next to on the bus, the terrible lunch you made, the tour guide who yelled at him, the fact that his best friend can’t take a joke, and how the girl he likes told everyone she thinks he’s gay. He finishes with “My life sucks!”

This is unadulterated dumping. Kids are in the middle of these storms sound desperate for help, but they don’t really want it. They just want to dump. Try to help them and they’ll turn on you.

Instead, we might respond like this: “Sounds like you’ve had a really bad day. When you’re a little calmer, I’d be happy to help you sort out your feelings so you can resolve some of this. Let me know when you’re ready to talk.”

We teach compassion by showing them compassion. In this case, it’s about truly listening and letting your child know you get it. Be sympathetic. Life’s unfair. That is, if “fair” means everyone gets dealt the same hand and is treated in the same way. Nope. Not fair. Acknowledge that. Be sincere. S/he’ll calm down, and when s/he does share your understanding of the Bigger Picture. Tell your own version of “I didn’t get the lead in Music Man”—everyone has one. Make sure you mention what you learned from yours. From that one, I learned setbacks are often bundled with opportunities. My best friend was shy and benefited from a chance to be a “star.” I’d already starred in several plays. What I needed was a chance to support the success of others, which I did as student chorus director. So it all worked out . . . perfectly.

Life is for learning. If we’re open and willing to study hard, we take what we learn in this moment and use it to move our kids and ourselves forward. That’s the Bigger Picture.

Now excuse me, gotta wash the kitchen floor.

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Talking about talking trash

January 30, 2014

It seems like we’re always swimming in social garbage – everything from the “just kidding” remarks from so-called friends to the snarky comments from people who hate you (online and off). When it comes to social garbage all of us have had it dumped on us. And all of us have dumped it on others. Weird thing, though, when I talk to students they all wish their school was a place where they could  be accepted for who they are… without all that other crap.

So how do we get there from where we are now? How do we get everyone (including ourselves) to wake up and smell the garbage? This excerpt from my book, Teaching Kids to Be Good People, gives you some new ways to think about gossip, rumors and what it takes to clean up your act.

Don’t Add to the Garbage

Hey, this is our park!

Hey, this is our park!

Up our street lies Faudé Park. Undeveloped except for some narrow trails carved into the hill, this 13.5 acre community treasure offers a mini-retreat to everyone wandering through. When David and I first ventured up to Faudé’s highest point, we were delighted by the knockout view of Mt. Tamalpais. We were also depressed by the thick carpet of broken beer bottles tossed by partygoers who obviously enjoyed the “natural” environment. (A trashcan sits 20 feet from the peak. But hey, the ground’s handier, right?)

David and I aren’t neat freaks. Far from it. But we hated seeing all that glass in such a beautiful setting, so we started cleaning it up. The first day we spent 30 minutes picking up the biggest chunks of glass. When we returned a week later, new chunks replaced some of what we removed. But we weren’t deterred. Over the next several months, we kept picking up glass.

At some point things began to change. Weekend revelers stopped tossing bottles on the ground. Maybe because they could now see the ground! Or maybe the beauty of the park became apparent and now they decided it wasn’t cool to mess it up. Can’t say for sure, but whatever the reason, David and I were happy with the change and didn’t mind taking a little credit for getting things rolling in the right direction.

Turns out the trends we observed at the park reflect a bona fide sociological phenomenon called the broken windows theory. Apparently, the more rundown a neighborhood becomes, the more likely people will break windows in abandoned buildings, graffiti walls, and litter. The crime rate increases too. Conversely, when a neighborhood gets cleaned up, everything improves.

The turnaround at Faudé Park happened years ago, but I’m pleased to report that as of my walk this morning, the overlook is still totally free of garbage. Of course, not all garbage is equal, and the kind infecting most schools, aka social garbage, is of the invisible yet more toxic variety.

I frequently ask students: “If you walk into a room already littered with trash, is it OK to toss your candy wrapper on the floor?” Some kids will say, “Sure, it’s OK.” Why? Because “everyone else is doing it and you won’t get in trouble.”

Then I ask, “If the floor is clean, is it still OK to toss your trash?” Now most kids will say no. But a few kids are likely to let me know it’s never OK to add to the garbage. Which is when I switch the discussion from candy wrappers to rude comments, rumors, and the rest of the social garbage many kids slog through every day.

A school’s mission statement typically mentions something about respect and social responsibility. But how are schools teaching these values to their students? How are we, as parents, teaching them to our kids? We want them to grow into thoughtful, compassionate young adults who take time to think about their choices before they act, hopefully reflecting: “If I really want less garbage at school and at home, what can I do? Am I willing to watch my mouth and keep more hurtful comments to myself? Am I willing to stand up for someone being teased? Am I willing to speak out against demeaning ‘jokes’? Willing to sincerely apologize when I mess up and hurt someone? Willing to reach out to someone who needs a friend?”

As I see it, the goal of effective parenting (aside from keeping your kid alive and well), is to help him develop a code of ethics. If you want your child to become a good person whose actions demonstrate a high level of personal integrity, if you want her to help promote more friendship, peace, and justice in the world, you need a plan.

Character development is an ongoing process for each of us. We have to consistently work through all these issues with our kids and our students, our colleagues and our partners. Talk about ethical behavior where you see it and where you don’t. Model it in your own life. Help children evaluate their choices and learn from their mistakes. Help them deal with intense emotions in appropriate and responsible ways so they don’t intentionally hurt other people.

There are no easy answers here, but one thing is for sure, the world desperately needs less garbage.

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I want what she’s got!

November 21, 2013

The following post is an excerpt from my latest parenting book, Teaching Kids to Be Good People. You can read all of Chapter 1 right here.

Life, bring on the lemons!

Ever been up close and personal with a lemon tree and noticed how cool they are? I never had until I moved to California. Now I’ve got my own dwarf Meyer lemon and I can tell you that tree is an underrated miracle of nature. Right now, November 21st, it’s got teeny flower buds, heavenly smelling blossoms, baby green fruit, and ripe golden orbs, all at the same time. On a cosmic level, the lemon tree is constantly manifesting its entire life cycle, simultaneous living its past, present, and future! How cool is that?

One might assume straddling the time-space continuum causes internal conflict for the tree. Like maybe an undeveloped puny green guy eyes a juicy yellow beauty and gripes, “Damn! How come I’m not more mature?” Or some blossom whose petals flap in the wind, whines about how unfair it is that she’s no longer taut and firm like that sweet young bud over there. But noooo. The tree has evolved to a point where no phase of life is any better or worse than another. In the realm of lemon trees, there are no complaints, only total acceptance. What is, is. Lemon embraces all of it with equal acceptance and grace.

We humans on the other hand are hardwired for complaining. Even (maybe especially) those of us who have pretty soft lives compared to most folks on the planet. Adults often evaluate things in terms of what’s “wrong.” So how surprising is it that our kids frequently complain? The older they get, the more likely we are to find fault in what they do or fail to do! In addition to what we’re teaching them through negative modeling, teens are already incredibly judgmental. After all, they’re grappling with some key questions of their own:

Am I cool enough? Am I hot enough? Am I good enough?

The less confident they feel (from their own self-doubt and from the feedback piled on by their “friends” and parents), the more likely they are to complain. The more they complain, the more we complain about their complaining. Ugh.

Now I’m not advocating an all- Zen-all-the-time approach to living, where we make damn sure we never find fault with anything. That’s too tough to be practical. Besides there are certain situations that are inherently faulty. Like when the cottage cheese has gone off. No amount of Ohmmming is going to make me smile when I lift that lid and get a whiff. So yeah, life serves up plenty of unacceptable tidbits. When you’ve got one, just do something about it. Complaining is never a prerequisite for action. Nor is it a substitute.

When a family member presents us with something unacceptable, rather than exploding and losing control of mind and mouth, try this instead: “This cell phone bill of $1,000 is unacceptable. You will pay this, not me.” That’s not a complaint. That’s a simple directive. When we whine less and fill our sentences with more verbs (calls to action), we might get more cooperation and less complaining from our kids. At the same time, we are teaching them that a positive attitude helps us deal with life’s inconveniences more effectively than complaints.

On that positive note, I want to report that last week I picked all the ripe lemons from the tree and made lemon marmalade. Not to complain or anything, either the recipe was wrong or I misread it. Either way, the results were . . . uh . . . not edible. Fortunately the tree’s still got plenty of green babies. In another month or so, I’ll take another shot at it.

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You were “bored?!” Geez…

August 21, 2013

Updated February 6, 2014

One of the three Oklahoma teens charged in the murder of Christopher Lane said “We were were bored. So we decided to kill someone.” There’s so much that’s crazy scary about that statement, I don’t know where to start.

I’ll start here: I know nothing about those bored kids, but they’re clearly suffering from acute empathy deficit. That speaks to the current state of parenting and teaching. It also speaks to the violence and cruelty that passes for entertainment and online “bonding,” but I’m going to keep this short and to the point.

Not all teachers are parents watching out for the well-being of their own offspring. But an educator’s job description includes teaching your students to be ethical people, who are respectful to others. It used to go without saying that ethics and social responsibility (we called it Good Citizenship) were part of every every class, every grade level, every day. People became teachers not only because they loved chemistry or English literature or geometry, but because they found purpose and pride in their ability to connect with students, mind-to-mind and heart-to-heart. Teachers took their role as mentors very seriously.

As for parents who are raising children and guiding them into adulthood, all of us are teachers and mentors and influencers. If we’re not consistently teaching our kids to be good people who can responsibly manage their emotions (and their boredom) then we’re failing our kids. And in so doing, we’re making our families, schools and communities much less safe for all of us.

UPDATE: The three teens who allegedly shot Chris Lane are due in court on Tuesday, February 11th.

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