[00:00:12.760] – Speaker 1
Well, hey, everyone! I’m Chris Tompkins, and welcome to the Shaping Our World podcast. My goal is to invite you into a conversation that will leave you more confident in understanding and inspiring the young people in your life. Each episode, we talk with leading thinkers and practitioners and offer some relevant resources to help you dive deeper into the world of our youth today. Today we are joined by David Thomas. David is a licenced therapist, bestselling author, and the executive director of Daystar Counselling Ministries in Nashville, Tennessee. For more than 30 years, David has helped children, teens, and families navigate the challenges of growing up with confidence, resilience, and hope through his practical wisdom and relatable stories. He’s the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of 15 books, including his newest release, Capable: How to Teach Your Kids the Strengths, Skills, and Strategies to Build Resilience, co-written with fellow therapist Sissy Goff. David is also the co-host with Sissy of the hugely popular Raising Boys and Girls podcast, which has been downloaded more than 15 million times and helps parents understand the unique emotional and developmental needs of boys and girls. David regularly speaks at conferences, schools, churches, and organizations across North America, and his work has been featured on The Today Show, the Washington Post, and USA Today.
[00:01:47.900] – Speaker 1
David lives in Nashville with his wife Connie. Together they have three adult children, Lily, Baker, and Whit, and a yellow lab named June. I can’t wait for you to listen in on our conversation with David. So many practical and wise insights, and I think you’re just gonna love our conversation today. So let’s dive in with David Thomas. David, it’s great to have you with us. It is so good to be with you.
[00:02:16.480] – Speaker 2
Thanks for the invitation.
[00:02:17.990] – Speaker 1
Really looking forward to getting into our topics today and hearing more from you with your extensive background and the work that you do. Really thrilled that our listeners get to get exposed to you and your work today. So thanks for being here.
[00:02:30.090] – Speaker 2
Thanks for having me.
[00:02:31.480] – Speaker 1
So our listeners know we always kind of have some questions around our topic and our theme for the show, Shaping Our World. So, let’s dive into getting to know you a little bit better before we get into all the content that you have to offer. What shaped your world when you were growing up? What were some of the biggest influences for you?
[00:02:50.540] – Speaker 2
You know, I grew up in a family of readers, passionate readers, and I grew up every summer going to our local public library. And we had this contest where you would read X number of books growing up and then get some kind of prize at the end of the equation. And I love that. That I developed that passion, not just around reading, but I think being curious about the world, about stories, about people, that I look back now and see how much of that was shaped through the experience of reading and that that was something I got to sit front row and watch my parents do on the regular.
[00:03:28.480] – Speaker 1
It’s amazing. Do you have any favourite books from your childhood growing up that you can remember?
[00:03:33.840] – Speaker 2
You know, I was fascinated with— I’d even argue obsessed with— the book Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak when I was little, and ended up decades later writing a book on boy development called Wild Things that’s built around some of those themes, like what can we learn about the way boys are wired through that particular story. So it was clearly a formative experience reading that book.
[00:03:58.510] – Speaker 1
That’s amazing. And I, I know that’s probably weaved into your career right now, but maybe help us get to know you a little bit better. What’s shaping your world today? I’m sure you’re still a reader, but what else do you do in your free time? What are your interests, hobbies? Let’s get to know you a little bit better, David.
[00:04:15.840] – Speaker 2
I’d love to. Well, you know, I would say first and, and foremost, I am a really proud son and brother and father and husband. And so I’m deeply shaped by the people I have the great privilege of being in close relationship with. And my wife and I are officially empty nesters. We have 3 kids, and it’s fun to discover kind of a new way of being in the world as a married couple. We’re 3 decades in and figuring out, learning all kinds of new things about each other in this particular season. And we have been a dog family for a long time. We had a trained therapy dog that we lost at 12, almost 13 years of age. And in a moment of weakness, we got a puppy. And so we are currently parenting a 1-year-old puppy at this point, and we’re learning a lot about ourselves through that experience.
[00:05:08.700] – Speaker 1
Well, you sound very similar, David. We’re empty nesters now too. And a few months after we became empty nesters, we lost our dog of 14 years. But we went the other direction. My wife and I were like, we’re not going to do that again. We are now going to officially launch as being not tied down to anything at home. So good for you for taking up that mantle again and diving in. I hope that goes well for you.
[00:05:34.730] – Speaker 2
Well, in the first year, my wife would have preferred to have lived in your household around that decision. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:05:41.350] – Speaker 1
Well, I would love to visit a new puppy, but anyways, we’ll get into different topics. Tell us a little bit about how the work you’re doing currently, professionally, personally, is shaping the world of young people and families right now.
[00:05:56.670] – Speaker 2
I love thinking about my work within that mission. Thanks for asking in that way. I am the executive director of a nonprofit here in Nashville, Tennessee called Daystar Counselling that has been around for over 40 years. And our entire focus in terms of the work is with the paediatric population. So that’s all we see, kids, adolescents, and families. And out of that work, I’ve been doing that work for over 30 years now, and out of that work, I’ve had the great privilege of writing some books and travelling around the country to some different places and talking with parents about different topics related to child and adolescent development. And then a dear friend and colleague of mine, Sissy Goff, we host a podcast together called Raising Boys and Girls. And all of those offerings from writing to speaking to podcasting are what we hope to be an opportunity to take what we’ve learned in 3 decades of sitting with kids and families in our work as therapists into those different offerings and share with parents and educators and coaches, just anyone who cares about kids. I loved when you were talking about the mission of your organisation a little bit earlier, just the understanding piece, you know, understanding more of the unique way they’re wired and how can we best lean into that and offer support to their growth and development.
[00:07:20.750] – Speaker 1
Well, that sets the table for our conversation because I kind of want to start off kind of high level. And then we’ll drill into some stuff. Because of your extensive experience listening to and being around young people, you know, children, adolescents, families, I think you have a great perspective to offer us, an insight that not many others do because of the breadth and the time that you spent in it. So I wonder if we could start kind of high level, David. One of the things everyone knows who listens to this show, I say this line all the time, I learned this from a mentor of mine, David, to say that when we come to topics like this, we always want to affirm the virtue and discern the vulnerability. I think too often we may lean one way on that teeter-totter and, you know, like, oh, it’s a disaster, young people, this generation, or we’re a bit naive and think, you know, it’s fine, it’s just the way we’ve grown up. So I know there’s a lot of incredible things about this next generation of young people that are coming through. But I wonder if we could even start with what do you think some of the bigger challenges are that kids and young adolescents and parents are facing today when it comes to child and adolescent development in our current culture?
[00:08:40.300] – Speaker 2
Well, I’d first say I wholeheartedly agree with you that I think there are some extraordinary things to be celebrated and talked around as we think about kids, adolescents, and young adults in the world today. So I love that you started there. And I think one of the unique challenges they face that was incredibly different than what I faced in growing up is the obvious animal of technology and, and the impact of that in so many different ways. You know, when, when Jonathan Haidt wrote The Anxious Generation, I don’t think any of us were surprised about The title of that book, his findings, his recommendations, I was really excited about his recommendations that Jonathan would take, you know, our best data at this point in history, and we’re going to have more data 10 years from now, and just say, based on what we know, how could we begin to make some different and thoughtful decisions as people who care about adolescents in our schools, in our homes? And so that is a unique challenge in the work I do now that I bump up against, not just on a daily basis, but an hourly basis.
[00:09:49.110] – Speaker 2
It’s hands down the thing that I would say most parents feel overwhelmed about. I had a conversation with a family yesterday of a 7-year-old son who had exposure to some scary content through the internet that simply would not have been a possibility when I was 7 years of age, not because my parents were doing anything different or offering better oversight or supervision, but just The internet didn’t exist at that point, so it was just a very different time in history that I think it’s important we acknowledge that without a doubt. But I’d add to that a very different pace. So, you know, think about the famous phrase, “Kindergarten is the new first grade.” It turns out that’s 100% true. Like, if we look back 50 years ago at the way we were doing kindergarten then versus kindergarten now, you know, I encourage parents, ask your parents what their experience was like, and most would say, “I went 3 days a week to school,” or, “I went 5 5 half days, and then we came home and took a nap, and mostly it was about colouring and learning colours. And now, we have accelerated the process where kids are entering kindergarten in what looked like first grade when we were coming along.
[00:10:57.340] – Speaker 2
And so, it’s reflective of, I think, what’s true all throughout a kid’s academic journey. My kids, as 8th graders, took classes I took in high school. As high schoolers, they took classes I took in college, and the athletic experience— when I was in high school, I knew plenty of kids who played 3 to 4 sports a year. That’s almost unheard of now. We’ve just accelerated so many things in the academic space, the ath— the athletic space that I think that pressure is a key ingredient as we think about the rising concerns we carry around youth mental health. So I don’t think it’s just technology. I think it’s pacing. And what is within that is kind of my last thought to your great question is I think Those things have become significant barriers to families just being able to sit around the dinner table, to having long uninterrupted conversations driving in the car from place to place. Like all the different ways that families operate together, that the pacing and technology alone can get in the way, that just simply didn’t get in the way in the same ways in my experience of growing up.
[00:12:04.680] – Speaker 1
Yeah, that’s really good. I probably haven’t given the language to your second idea around pacing, but the concept’s been there in my thinking and discerning about the generation and what they walk through. But I really like that, the pacing of things, which it’s pressure from parents and the world around them, but also technology does play a role in that too because of the access to information and the things that young people get exposed to early on, and you kind of mirror those together, and it, it kind of becomes a concoction that can put a lot of pressure on young people. And as you mentioned, just, you know, is, uh, clearly connected to the mental health stuff that, that we’re observing and that research is telling us about young people today. I wanted to get into just kind of starting in your specific work, even around boys, which I think is fantastic because often these conversations we can default to what young women are working through. And we know a lot of the research on social media and how it impacts young women. But you spend a lot of time with boys as well. And in your book, Capable— I want to get this right— How to Teach Your Kids the Strengths, Skills, and Strategies to Build Resistance, which you co-authored with your colleague Sissy Goff, you discuss the mental health challenges that boys face.
[00:13:27.560] – Speaker 1
And are challenging the stereotype that boys are naturally less emotional. What are we getting wrong about boys and their emotional state and who they are emotionally? Can you give us some insight there?
[00:13:40.980] – Speaker 2
I’d be happy to. And there has been a longstanding myth, and it is nothing but a myth, there’s no research to back this up, that boys have fewer feelings than girls. There is no science to back that up. They have the same number of feelings, the same experience within their feelings. The difference is boys do have fewer words and often fewer tools in terms of how to navigate and manage those feelings. So what’s important, I think, for parents to note on the front side of development is that paediatricians would say at paediatric well visits with an 18-month-old, girls on average are saying about 100 words. Boys are saying 30. So think on that. If her general vocabulary is 3 times what his is, it makes sense that her emotional vocabulary would often be more expansive. So we’re just simply going to need to labour longer with the boys we love, with the adolescent young men in our care, to help them develop an expansive enough emotional vocabulary. And then girls intuitively can develop instinctively some of the more— what we call healthy coping strategies in life. Now, that’s not to say they wake up with those, like they have to be learned and taught.
[00:14:55.490] – Speaker 2
But there’s something a bit more intuitive at times for girls where we’re going to have to labour longer in that space with boys. Because what we know to be true, this has been true for quite some time, is that adult males lead the stats around internet pornography, infidelity, substance abuse, and suicide. And the common denominator in all four of those being that it’s a male’s attempt to try to numb out or shut down. His experience in some way, as opposed to figuring out how do I name and navigate my experience. So the good news in that being when we labour longer, we get to push against those statistics. I love the words of Frederick Douglass who said, “It’s easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.” And I believe wholeheartedly in that. So it’s a part of why decades ago, I wrote a book called Wild Things: The Art of Nurturing Boys just to look at what is happening with boys in 5 different stages of development and then what do they need uniquely from the moms and dads in their lives, educators, coaches, the roles we all play in caring for them.
[00:16:00.810] – Speaker 2
And then I wrote a follow-up book about 5 years ago called Raising Emotionally Strong Boys that was picking up where I left off in, in that first book to say, how could we really lean into this thread of his his emotional development, seeing some of the scary stats that are out there and pushing against those within those words of just raising strong kids and not just repairing broken men. I appreciate the words of, you know, when Desmond Tutu talked about there comes a time where we stop just pulling people out of the river and we need to walk upstream and figure out why are they falling in in the first place. And that book was my attempt at saying, how could we Walk Upstream.
[00:16:41.700] – Speaker 1
So good. And we’re going to give, um, our listeners, you know, links and all the information to pick up your books and to hear some of this for themselves. But I wonder, just before we move on, maybe you could take some highlights from that and from your perspective to, to maybe give some encouragement or some tips for parents of boys.
[00:17:05.030] – Speaker 2
Yeah, it’s a great question. And I’d first say this: boys left to their own devices— we’ve got an overwhelming amount of research to confirm this. You know, we’ll swing between what I call suppression, which is just holding it in, and eruption, which is blowing up. And, and the healthy middle ground between suppression and eruption is expression— just naming and navigating. And to your question, I think the easiest, most efficient, effective way for boys to develop that healthy middle ground of expression is through us as parents just narrating our experience in the everyday. It’s not any extra work, but it’s just when we’re driving in the car, drop-off and pick-up, when we’re headed to a sports practice, when we’re sitting around the dinner table at night, look for opportunities where you can narrate your experience, where within the reporting of your day, you aren’t just talking about the facts or the activities, but we’re talking about our emotional experience. Research has also told us that when we sit around the dinner table as families, We will intuitively ask girls more about how they felt about the events of their day, and we will intuitively ask boys, “What did you do today?” And if we get past “What did you do?” the more intuitive next question is, “What did you think about that?” But we rarely get to, “What’d you feel about that?” So we talk a lot in our work about how kids learn more from observation than information.
[00:18:32.590] – Speaker 2
They learn way more from watching and observing than anything else. So if they’re just sitting around the dinner table hearing their parents, the two adults they trust most in this world, and then also grandparents. I want this challenge to exist for teachers and coaches and youth pastors where they’re hearing us talk about the human experience. You know what? I felt really overwhelmed today at work. I had to give a presentation to the board of directors and I didn’t feel prepared. Or I felt really nervous when I pulled in for this meeting. And can I tell you what I did in the car for 1 minute before I walked in the door? Like, just the everyday of our emotional experience— what did we feel, what did we do— is hands down the best offering we could give to the boys in our lives.
[00:19:17.590] – Speaker 1
That’s really good. And I wonder, you know, specifically speaking to older males, you know, dads and, you know, coaches and teachers and youth workers and people that care for young kids, I think part of, you know, growing up a male myself and looking to my dad as a role model, And, you know, we all kind of want to be brave and strong. And we look at the male figures in our lives that we look up to. And if they’re not expressing emotions, you know, if they’ve got it all sorted out and together and appearing strong and, you know, navigating it, it’s a lot harder for us to think that that’s normal and that’s okay to be emotional and to share it. So that’s one of the things I’ve learned as I’ve I don’t have a son myself, but spend a lot of time with younger guys, is to be able to model that. And like you said, to share some of those things, hey, this is what I felt and this is where I went through it. And even one of the things that I’ve done recently for young guys is talk about my own experience with therapy and counselling.
[00:20:19.860] – Speaker 1
And yes, you know, that I see a therapist regularly. I was just talking to a young man yesterday about this and saying I look at therapy because I asked if he had a therapist and to talk through some stuff. And he said, no, no, I went, I went to one for a small season. I said, well, I look at therapy like I do taking care of my car. Like, I can wait until the engine blows and try to fix it, or I can, you know, do regular maintenance along the way. So I, I just take that approach myself to be more open to talk about it, to maybe model to younger guys. Can you, can you maybe speak to that a little bit for, for males that are listening? Listening to this as an encouragement there?
[00:20:59.820] – Speaker 2
Well, I want to first just applaud you. Please don’t stop talking about that. And my hope is it’s inspiring to every adult listening. I wish we did more of that. And in doing so, what I think we’re communicating to kids in general and boys in particular is that seeking help is wisdom, not weakness. You know, it’s interesting, when I did the research for my last book, Just looking at the statistics around adult men who go for a well visit with their primary care person as opposed to women is shocking. It’s actually not shocking, probably, for most women. This reality that we as males just aren’t great in attending to our health, our physical health, our emotional health, our spiritual health. And so what does it look like, to your great wisdom, to model for the boys we love This is something I have as a practice. I remember even coming home. I have a daughter and two sons. And when I would even just go on a walk with one of my best friends, I have a best friend who’s 10 years older. And so he’s always been a decade ahead in the events of life, you know, in terms of marriage and raising kids and sending kids to college.
[00:22:17.910] – Speaker 2
Having young adult kids. And so I am constantly learning from him, and I would come home and report that to my kids, like, can I tell you something Carter said to me today that has stayed with me? Can I tell you a question he asked me that I’m still thinking about? And, and so I want two things to have happen there. I want our kids to get to see us availing ourselves to friendships and relationships where we’re learning, we’re being challenged, we’re being held accountable, we’re asking good questions and being asked good questions. And also, we are modelling the importance of male friendships. I read a statistic recently that was heartbreaking. That is, 1 in 4 men can’t name a best friend. 1 in 7 men can’t name a close friend. I mean, how heartbreaking is that? And, and think about how the U.S. Surgeon General, you know, defined the crisis of isolation for us not long ago that, you know, we were quick, I think, to point the finger solely at the global pandemic, and certainly that contributed to isolation. But I would argue, I don’t know that men were doing a spectacular job around friendships pre-pandemic, and I don’t know that we have learned as much as I would hope we’d learn on the other side of the pandemic about the importance of relationships, and that that is one more form of a availing myself to help.
[00:23:39.690] – Speaker 2
So I want you to keep talking about what you’re talking about. I wish more boys could hear that. And I, I want to even challenge parents out of the wisdom of what you just reported, that if you are currently in marital counselling as a couple, any married couples listening, I want you to talk about that too. Many of us grew up with the belief that if my parents had told me they were in marriage counselling, I would have been super worried about their marriage. Well, it turns out the opposite is true. We sit with kids every day who sometimes will ask us in our office, “Will you tell my mom and dad to go meet with someone?” Or if they’ve known their parents have been in therapy, they’ll say, “Will you tell my parents to go meet with their person again?” Because what’s happening within that request is this sense of, “I feel responsible when they have conflict. I either feel responsible to make it stop or to make it better or to figure out the cause.” And if I know my parents are meeting with someone, then I know there’s a third party involved.
[00:24:38.220] – Speaker 2
Somebody else is quarterbacking that process. I don’t need to worry about that. I don’t need to carry that. I don’t need to feel responsible. So I want to challenge parents, talk about your experience to your great wisdom if you’re doing individual work, if you’re doing marital work, and certainly if kids have bumped up against conflict that felt overwhelming at times, to know there’s another person involved is an incredible gift we can give to the kids we love.
[00:25:02.940] – Speaker 1
That’s great. Maybe, maybe two thoughts for me before we move on quickly here. Number one, when you were talking about your friendships and relationships, I remember listening to a podcast that was talking about the Surgeon General’s warning about mental health and social media, and which it’s now a warning. I don’t know if our listeners know that, same as cigarette use and all that. And they were talking about it and they went around to university students David, you might be more familiar with the study. I can’t remember who did it at the time to quote it, but I just remember listening to say, when they were talking to university students, what were the differentials, the main reasons that separated university students that would describe positive mental health versus struggling with their mental health? And they pinpointed one word, which was connections. The university students had greater or deeper connections with other young people on the university campuses, and that was a major differentiator there. And so just to affirm, there’s, there’s a tonne of research, which you would have more access to me on, on how important that is. I do also want to just say one thing that we recommend.
[00:26:13.810] – Speaker 1
So we have a one-to-one program, David, where all of our staff, all 380 of them, are matched up for the summer with someone a little older, a little further in their journey. And they’re just meant to be like friends, accompaniers through their summer here to make sure they have someone to talk to, to process the challenges that come up, celebrate the joys. Sometimes they’re about spiritual formation. Sometimes they’re about where they’re going with their life. Sometimes they’re just a friend to listen to. And one of the things we recommend here is that for, for males, who are in that journey is like, hey, if you’re having a hard time kind of getting into conversation, go do something together. Like, go shoot hoops, you know, just the two of you. And as you’re doing that activity, you’ll find the conversation kind of more naturally opens up than if you’re kind of— I think females, young girls, young adults, teenagers have no problem kind of sitting with a coffee and talking about it based on all the stuff that you’ve said. Guys, it takes a little, maybe a little longer to get there, less familiar. And I think activity helps them do that, you know, do something active together.
[00:27:23.390] – Speaker 1
And I would probably suggest that it’s a great thing for parents to think about if they’re looking to kind of tap into their boys on this emotional level and have a conversation. Like, to your point, it does not work to me. I can remember me coming home from school, and if my mom was like, tell me about your day, you’re just like, It was fine. You know, I don’t need to talk about my day. But if, you know, we were doing something, running errands, going out to grab an ice cream, a project, cutting the grass in the backyard together, doing something, it just would kind of come up more naturally. So, that’s a piece of advice. I don’t know if you want to comment on that at all or we can move on, but I think that’s a piece of advice that I would offer to parents or adults who are looking to kind of press in a little more. On those conversations with younger men or, or boys in their lives?
[00:28:12.090] – Speaker 2
Yes, yes, and yes. Like, it is everything I talk about with parents as well. I talk about with boys being shoulder to shoulder rather than eye to eye. And I read a fascinating study years ago that spoke to when females are eye to eye for an extended period of time, it can actually strengthen the connection and the experience of intimacy. And when males are eye to eye for too long, they actually can register at times an experience of shame. So it has the opposite effect, whereas to all of your wisdom, if I’m shoulder to shoulder, the shame stuff’s not going to get in the way in the same way. And it’s acknowledging we’re action-oriented creatures as male. One of the first things I talk about within my book on boy development is that boys are active and moving. When we can be active and moving with them in any stage of life, I think it creates more openness. I’ve had some of the most thoughtful conversations with my young adult son still in this stage of life when we’re on walks together. It’s amazing what comes out. So, I wholeheartedly agree. That’s wisdom.
[00:29:23.860] – Speaker 1
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[00:31:00.090] – Speaker 1
She does a lot of work with parents on raising brave girls in an anxious generation. I wonder if there’s just something across the genders for young people today. And I think particularly we’re going to get into resilience in some of these topics, but I think even around anxiety, what are you seeing? What would you want parents to know? I just, maybe if you could speak into the perceived, and I think probably statistically accurate, rise in anxiety levels in kids and what do you want parents to know around that based on what you’re seeing in your work with young boys and girls?
[00:31:38.320] – Speaker 2
I would first say, and I appreciate the way you asked the question because I would first say it is both/and, and by that I mean this, We talk in our new book, Capable, about this idea of what we call language inflation. And this is not just true for children and adolescents. I think it’s true for us adults. You know, I rarely anymore sit with adolescents who would say to me, “I feel sad.” They’ll jump straight to, “I feel depressed.” Now, although the stats are higher for adolescents and depression than any other time in history, a percentage of those who might report that don’t meet the criteria for what we understand to be a depressive disorder. And, you know, I think about how often we overuse the word. In fact, I’ll tell you a funny storey that is an example of overusing this particular word. I was touring a little 6-year-old girl around our office in an initial assessment. When families come, we take kids on a tour. We’re in a house rather than an office, and we have 6 therapy dogs on staff. We have really great snacks. So we get kids a snack and they meet some dogs, and then After the tour, we sit down for a minute to talk about why they’re there.
[00:32:51.120] – Speaker 2
And this 6-year-old girl, when I said, “Tell me more about why you and your family came today. What did you talk about before you got here?” And she said, “I have a lot of toxic relationships.” 6 years old. And I had to fight laughing when I heard that word coming out of her mouth, but I also felt really sad because I thought, you shouldn’t even know that word. I feel certain you don’t even know really what it means, but you’ve heard it said a lot around you and you have tied that word to any experience of conflict that you have experienced. And, you know, I’m here to tell you after meeting with her and with her parents, she didn’t have any toxic relationships. She did have some frustrating relationships as every 6-year-old will, but this language inflation piece is spilling out over all of us. And the other concern I have about us not accurately naming our experience is I think it takes away from the individuals who have a true experience there as well. I don’t like the way we joke about PTSD or overuse the initials OCD. You know, I think that takes away from the experience of people who have genuinely experienced the unbelievable complexities of being diagnosed with PTSD and OCD.
[00:34:06.080] – Speaker 2
So I want us to start there and acknowledge that, yes, I think it’s too much spoken about. And I would also say we do have higher statistics than any other time in history. The current stats are 1 in 5 kids struggle with anxiety, 1 in 3 adolescents. Girls are twice as likely, but there are plenty of boys who experience it. One thing I would say to note about boys is that, you know, when any of us think about even the word anxiety, our first thought is excessive fears and worry, and that’s always in the mix, but the two primary presentations of anxiety with males of all ages— this is true for adult males as well— is often anger and control. And those don’t tend to be the first two words we think about when we think about anxiety, but I would watch for that to be true with the boys, adolescent young men, and adult men in your life. If you see excessive anger and high degrees of control, that are often indicator lights of anxiety. But To your question, it is across the board. And I think it even connects back to the two things we talked about in the beginning of our conversation.
[00:35:10.580] – Speaker 2
I think the animal of technology has invited a lot of anxiety. We could talk all day about the whys of that, but I also believe the pacing, which leads to another great word that you use that I want to circle back to, and that is pressure. You know, this acceleration and pacing in all these environments has created this excessive pressure. You know, when I think back on three decades of this work, I don’t have a single memory in the first decade of my work of sitting with a high school student who was maybe a junior or senior who was panicked or overwhelmed about applying to college. I sat with plenty who were what I call the normal nervous or worried or concerned, but nothing that felt excessive. I sit with kids today. Who could feel debilitated by that process. And, and it’s tragic because I laugh and say, when I was applying to college— and I’m going to date myself— back in the ’80s, the only two things you needed at that point in time were a pulse and a chequebook. And nowadays it’s as if you need a perfect GPA and to have started a nonprofit by your 18th birthday and a perfect ACT or SAT score.
[00:36:27.560] – Speaker 2
So I hate the pressure that kids carry into not just that environment or that significant chapter of their lives, but every next chapter. They feel anxious about, “Am I going to get an internship? Will I get into graduate school? Am I employable?” Like all the different ways that I think it’s showing up and translating and spilling out that I don’t think we could be thinking enough about ways to support them. As we name this reality.
[00:36:58.710] – Speaker 1
You’ve tapped into a topic. Last summer, I read the book Never Enough by Jennifer Braheny Wallace about the toxic culture of academic success. And she talked about the antidote to that being helping kids matter, being seen, being known for who they are, not what they do. Again, I’m not supposing this would be your answer to this, but I do think that that really struck me is, you know, how do we help kids build this identity in who they are rather than what they’re accomplishing? Can you maybe speak to that a little bit? Like for parents, youth workers, how do we work against this? How do we release the pressure valve? How do we still help kids kind of navigate the academic world around them, you know, moving forward without it being this weight or burden that causes anxiety to maybe be accentuated?
[00:38:00.070] – Speaker 2
You know, interestingly enough, I think it’s the same answer to the question you asked me earlier about a boy’s emotional development. I think it’s narrating our experience is the best starting place. So think about that as it connects anxiety within the context first of of technology, I want parents to be saying, rather than just saying, “You’re on your phone too much. Why do you have your phone out again?” I want parents to be saying, “Hey, can I tell you something? I got my screen time report yesterday from Apple and I was shocked. I had no idea I’d gone up this week. I was 100% convinced I’d gone down. And here’s what I’m going to do in this next week to work within that.” So, I’m owning my own struggle with being on tech too much. I’m making a plan of action. So, I’m narrating my experience and talking I’m talking about that first before I’m going to offer correction or information to my kids. And I want us to do that same thing with pacing. So, you know, I invite parents to talk about where do you feel yourself stepping into the trap of comparison?
[00:39:04.340] – Speaker 2
We can’t talk enough about the wisdom of comparison being the thief of joy. And for parents to say, “Could I tell you where I felt it robbing me of joy today?” comparison or pacing where I felt myself trying to keep up. So I want us to circle right back to that being the beginning place, because I think when we narrate our experience, we’re offering understanding, we’re onboarding empathy, we’re being with our kids and for our kids and alongside our kids. You know, we’re modelling this reality that you and I both know that I would love comparison to go away by your 40th birthday or your 50th birthday or 60th birthday. It just won’t. And I would love to figure out how to just be exempt from all pressure around me, but I just am going to bump up against it in different moments. So how can I narrate my experience of this is how it felt when I bumped up against it? Here are the practises or habits I’m embodying this week to try to push against it.
[00:40:02.420] – Speaker 1
You spend a lot of your time and work on resilience, and I wonder if there’s something about resilience you’ve picked up along the way that might surprise us, that might encourage us, that maybe just need to share because the general public doesn’t know about resilience because it’s a word that we throw around a lot. But I think understanding what it is and what it means for kids to develop resilience, I think, is really important for us as adults. So, yeah, can you speak to that a little bit?
[00:40:34.800] – Speaker 2
Two things I’d, I’d say to that. The, the first, I think, is more known, but a great reminder. The, The second may be a little lesser known. The first would be the reminder that resilience is like a muscle. It is more developed in some people and lesser developed in others, but it can grow stronger in all of us. But like a muscle, it has to be flexed. And to stay with that analogy one more step, you know, anytime I exercise, I usually, particularly in this decade of my life, experience some pain and soreness, and that is my reminder that I’m doing something right. Wrong. So when I experience the hard, that’s not evidence of it was wrong or I should not have activated that. Like, it’s the reminder of those are growing pains. Secondly, I would say, as we connect resilience even with our conversation around anxiety, the anxiety research has long told us that the two most intuitive moves for parents when it comes to anxious kids are escape and avoidance. We see the kids we love struggling in some capacity and we want to extract them from it. I see you overwhelmed by basketball practice.
[00:41:45.610] – Speaker 2
Let’s just stop playing basketball. And to tie that first idea to the second idea, you know, if I want to build resilience and capability into the kids I love, I’ve got to figure out how I can navigate my own discomfort so that I can allow the kids I love to navigate theirs. So that I’m not moving toward escape and avoidance that again are a default setting, I think, for us. How do I move against those default settings? And I can develop new habits, new practices, first and foremost for me to navigate my discomfort so I can allow my kids to experience it, so I don’t just let escape and avoidance be the only actions I engage.
[00:42:29.960] – Speaker 1
I wonder, we’ve talked a little bit about social media and screens and and just the, the role they play in our lives today. I wonder if you can help our parents and listeners get some insight in what we can do to work against that culture, to maybe provide more genuine connection one-to-one. What do you find you’re sharing often with parents in your work when it comes to the screens that young people are encountering today?
[00:43:01.690] – Speaker 2
I’m such a believer in the wisdom of learning to ask good open-ended questions when it comes to adolescence in particular. And so I think if we are attempting to move toward that target in all aspects of our relationship, and I think there’s, again, just a lot of wisdom in doing so, I think we can allow conversations around technology to just be one more category of that so that I’m giving less instruction and making fewer declarations. And I’m asking more questions like, what do you notice when you are on Instagram for an extended period of time? How long do you notice you have to be on it before your brain starts to feel a little bit different, before you feel comparison rise up? What do you do when that happens? How tempted are you to believe that’s what’s most true about a person’s life as opposed to remembering that’s the highlight reel? So asking those kinds of questions, I think, A, invite kids into critical thinking and good problem solving, which are foundational to building resilience and capability in kids. Two, that again reminder, I’m in this with you. So I’m not just asking those questions, but I’m offering my— can I tell you about how long it takes me before my brain starts to turn to mush?
[00:44:19.940] – Speaker 2
Can I tell you how quickly I notice comparison creeping in? Can I tell you what I do in those moments? So watch for where, again, One, we can begin with good open-ended questions that are mostly about curiosity. Questions, not declarations. And two, we narrate our experience in the midst of it too. We keep circling back to the wisdom of that practise in the everyday.
[00:44:40.880] – Speaker 1
It’s really good. I’m definitely going to come away from this conversation with the words, you know, narrate our experience as a powerful tool that we have as adults to help kids navigate the things that they’re going through in their lives. That’s been really insightful. And I think, as you said, it’s woven into kind of all of our topics. And so I think that that’s really something to take away from this. So yeah, I really appreciate that, David. I wonder, I know for parents, you know, we talked about the language we use around mental health. And I wonder sometimes with parents, you know, we’re trying to discern is like, is this just our kid expressing the things they’re going through? Is this a difficult decision, a season in their life Or do I need to kind of get some help here? What advice would you give to a parent who’s walking alongside, or, or anyone who cares about a kid? When do you move from just good coming alongside to trying to get them into some professional help for maybe the mental health stuff that they’re working through in their lives?
[00:45:44.980] – Speaker 2
I will always be an advocate of too much support rather than too little. So if we’re going to err on one side, I’d rather err on that side. And then we do discover not as much as needed along the way. But I don’t want that to be interpreted as if I hear any statement of concern, I’m going to immediately set a counselling appointment. That’s not ex— that’s not at all what I’m communicating. But what it might warrant, what I think is a great first step for any parent, is do a consultation with your paediatrician or developmental specialist. We do a lot of what we call parent consultations where Parents come in or parents call or Zoom in and kids aren’t a part of that appointment and they’re just asking questions, just good questions like, “Does this sound normal? Should I be concerned? Does this sound like a pattern that’s worth folding in extra support around?” So I think it’s always a great practise when in doubt to consult, put another set of eyes on the equation with you, and maybe that even starts with a youth pastor or a trusted friend and then moves toward dialoguing with a professional.
[00:46:49.830] – Speaker 2
But I think that’s a good and helpful and healthy practise as a starting point. And then it may lead to folding in some extra support. Now, to your question, I’d also say this: what we’re watching for with the kids and adolescents we’re concerned about are ongoing patterns. So I’m not concerned about a kid who has an anxious event. I’m concerned about a kid who has an ongoing pattern of distortions and looping thoughts. And we sometimes will say to parents, ask yourself this question: is it problematic or is it debilitating? So I’m not even necessarily worried about a kid who in the month of August, driving an elementary school kid to school, might be a little teary and talks a lot about feeling nervous, as long as they get in the door. I’m worried about a kid who you have to engage an administrator at the school to pry them out of the car and get them in the building. They can’t even walk in on their own. So you see that difference between problematic versus debilitating. Like, it’s interrupting life in certain moments, but we can still move forward in life. They can still engage the experiences— the academic, the athletic, the extracurricular experiences that are part of everyday life.
[00:48:04.030] – Speaker 2
So ask that question: is it problematic? Is it debilitating?
[00:48:08.500] – Speaker 1
I wonder, as we’re kind of wrapping up our conversation, maybe we could start with you pointing our listeners in the right direction to your resources as well. Like, if they want to pick up a book, which one should they start with? Obviously, uh, where can we find you online and the resources that you have accessed? And maybe talk a little bit about your podcast so our listeners can kind of move from this conversation into all the great stuff you’re doing and the resources you have available.
[00:48:35.960] – Speaker 2
I’ll be glad to. Thank you. Everything is housed under Raising Boys and Girls. Com. So, if you just go to our website, it would take you to all our books, all of the events where we’re speaking in different parts of the country, and our podcast as well. And if I were going to recommend a starting point for the podcast, we did an entire season called Ages and Stages. And it’s an easy listen because you can just pick out the age your child is and just listen to the 2 episodes around that. Age and Stage because we talk about what’s going on and then what do kids need. And we travel through 5 different stages from birth all the way into young adulthood. So, I’d say that would be a good starting point and you could listen to Where They Are and maybe the next episode of Where They’re Headed to kind of feel prepared of what’s coming next. And they’re short listens, you know, 20 to 30 minutes. I appreciated when in your introduction talking about just an opportunity if a parent’s in the pickup line or commuting and picking a kid up from this point to this point.
[00:49:37.340] – Speaker 2
It’s a great easy listen. So, that’d be a good starting point, Wading Into the Waters. To go deeper into this topic of resilience, our newest book, Capable, I think could be a really great resource. And what I want to say about that is two things. We are committed in all of our offerings to making sure it’s action-oriented. We don’t want to just talk about a problem or an idea. We want to give the nuts and bolts of how to move forward with that. And so we put 100 different what we call capability-building exercises into this book, and they’re broken down by littles, middles, olders, all throughout development. And then every chapter ends with 5 to 10 practical things parents could do to execute the ideas within that chapter. And we also, secondly, wrote a workbook for kids. 6- to 12-year-old kids could engage a workbook called I Am Capable, and it tracks with all the strengths, skills, and strategies that we introduce in the parenting book. There’s a chapter, and they’re really fun exercises. I had a grandparent yesterday send me a video of she and her grandson are working through the workbook this summer, and they were both doing these hilarious activities together in one of the chapters of the book.
[00:50:50.300] – Speaker 2
So our hope was that the learning could also be fun. It’s not a workbook of just filling in answers. Like, it’s a lot of asking questions back and forth with a safe grown-up in your life and doing a lot of fun things. There’s a great scavenger hunt. There’s a water balloon toss. You’re going to get wet doing the workbook. So it’s hopefully an interactive, experiential, really fun learning experience.
[00:51:12.120] – Speaker 1
Well, the work you and Sissy do is amazing, and your resources have been really helpful. And so I’d encourage all parents to go cheque them out. You’ve obviously spent so much time in this field, and today you’ve offered some really great insight and perspectives and things that, you know, as we all do, jot them down as we go, that have been really helpful. And I wonder, just as our final question as we’re wrapping up, a final piece of advice or a strategy for parents that want to raise emotionally strong, resilient kids. What would you kind of leave with us today?
[00:51:48.800] – Speaker 2
I would say play the long game. We know that and we lose sight of the importance of that, particularly if you are parenting a kid who’s in a challenging season of development right now. It’s really easy in my experience to make long-term determinations about a short-term observation. And we’re just catching a glimpse of what’s true about their growth and development. I was with a mom last week of a 14-year-old boy, and she was like, “David, he is never going to—” And I went, “Okay, timeout.” I’m not even gonna let you finish that sentence because whatever you’re about to say, we don’t know that to be completely true. Like, we’re catching a glimpse and we’re actually catching a glimpse at the most complicated stretch of development. 13 to 15 is defined as the worst episode of a boy’s life. There’s not a more complicated stretch of development. So let’s not make any long-term determinations. I laughed with this mom and said, you know, I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to go down in history as who I was as a 14-year-old boy. No one who knew me at 14 thought, “I think that guy’s going to go on to be a therapist.” No one.
[00:52:52.000] – Speaker 2
No one. Now, plenty probably thought, “He needs a therapist.” No one thought I’d be one because I wasn’t done developing. I was at the most complicated stretch. And parents are just catching a glimpse. So play the long game. And if it’s difficult to do that, I’d go back to that moment in our conversation where we talked about the benefit, the beauty of of being in relationship with a trusted voice who’s a little farther down the road than you are, who could preview for you what could come, who could cast a vision for you of what’s possible that maybe doesn’t seem possible in this moment of development. Have that kind of friend in your life.
[00:53:30.640] – Speaker 1
As empty nesters, my wife and I always find ourselves with younger couples due to the nature of our work here, and I think they’re a bit shocked when we kind of, as you say, narrate our experience and go, “Oh yeah, look out, this is what you’re going to walk through. It’s a disaster.” You know, but then we made it and here’s how we made it. And through all our mistakes and successes along the way, I think that’s a great piece of advice at the end. And I consider it a privilege every time we get to do that with younger families. And so I think that that’s— and we had that too. We had people who were ahead of us in that. So I love that piece of advice. And David, today was incredible. I wish we could keep going and have longer conversations. Maybe we’ll have to pick it back up in another episode down the road. But thank you so much for all the incredible work you do and for your time today. Thank you so much, David. Really appreciate it.
[00:54:24.820] – Speaker 2
Thank you. Thank you for incredibly thoughtful questions. I’ve loved our conversation. Just grateful you invited me into this. Thank you.
[00:54:35.570] – Speaker 1
Well, that’s it for today’s episode. If hearing from David Thomas encouraged you to think differently about raising resilient kids and helping them grow into capable, confident adults, head over to muskokawoods.com. There you’ll find a blog post with key takeaways from today’s episode and a link for you to listen again. Don’t forget to subscribe. To Shaping Our World and share this episode with a parent, grandparent, educator, coach, or youth worker who wants to better understand the kids in their lives and equip them with the strengths, skills, and resilience they need to thrive. Thanks for listening, and we’ll see you next time on Shaping Our World.
