20:00

Like this event, you know, is clearly

20:02

about me. You know, are

20:04

they saying songs that had stories in

20:06

them for children? And

20:09

so this is a way of like putting

20:11

the ideas into the child's mind in a

20:13

way that, one, they can really understand because

20:16

they don't, young children don't understand logic, but

20:18

also like a way of like, again, they're

20:21

gonna figure it out through these stories. So that's a

20:23

huge one for younger children. Even

20:25

for younger children, there's all these ways of like asking

20:28

questions, telling them consequences,

20:30

kind of these little puzzles that you set

20:32

up for them. Another big

20:34

one is the environment, like just setting up

20:36

the environment so they can't

20:39

get themselves in trouble, or they're less

20:42

likely to, right? I mean,

20:44

the list goes on and on. There's some beautiful

20:46

examples. Like when we were up in the Arctic,

20:48

Rosie was kind of like throwing these rocks up

20:50

in the air like this, and the little nine-year-old,

20:52

Rosie was three at the time, and the little

20:54

nine-year-old comes over and says, "'You're gonna hurt somebody

20:56

with those rocks.'" And

20:59

Rosie kind of sat there and like looked, and

21:01

then dropped the rocks. And the

21:03

nine-year-old walked away. Like it wasn't a... No,

21:06

and that's what the parents do. It's like, I

21:09

mean, I think if Rosie was throwing rocks at kids,

21:11

like then like, it would be different. But it's like,

21:13

if you really stop and look at most of the

21:15

situations, you don't need. And

21:17

one of the stories that would probably resonate

21:19

with people you told in the book is

21:21

how Rosie was keeping the fridge door open.

21:24

Yes, so when I

21:26

first traveled up to the Arctic, the moms would

21:28

tell me these stories, like to get kids to

21:30

wear their hats in the winter,

21:32

because they would get frostbite on their ears, and they

21:34

would tell them that like if they didn't, like that

21:36

their heads would get chopped off, and the

21:39

Northern Lights would use their heads as soccer balls, all

21:41

these very kind of scary stories. And I was like,

21:43

no, I'm never doing that. And so that's one of

21:45

the things readers write into me about like one of

21:48

the things they're like, I could never do this, you

21:50

know? And then when I

21:52

got back, Rosie had the refrigerator

21:54

door open, and I was sitting there, close the

21:56

refrigerator door, just kind of nagging

21:59

her, which is the big. tool we use,

22:01

right? Over and over again. And

22:03

then I was like trying logic. You know, the

22:05

electricity, da-da-da-da. And I was very frustrated with her.

22:07

And then I turned to her and I said,

22:09

there's a monster in that refrigerator. And

22:12

he, when he warms up, he's coming. Oh my gosh, he's coming out.

22:14

And I kind of made it very dramatic and kind of

22:16

fun. And like these stories are often

22:19

kind of a wink in the eye. Like the kid kind

22:21

of knows it's a story. And

22:23

she like slammed the refrigerator door and was like,

22:25

looked at me and she was like, tell

22:28

me more, mama. Tell me more about this

22:30

monster. And it, she was, I think

22:33

three and a half at the time, three. And

22:36

it like changed our whole relationship. We

22:38

just started using stories for everything because

22:41

the way we could communicate with her.

22:43

Like we weren't communicating with her otherwise.

22:46

Oh, we had so many stories. And like

22:48

when she's, now she's eight and like around

22:51

six or seven, she kind of knew the

22:53

stories were fake. And

22:55

she kind of didn't want to hear them for a while. And then she

22:57

wanted to again, like it was like, because even

23:00

as an adult, you like stories. I mean,

23:02

we still use stories as a society, right?

23:04

Absolutely. We use them as warnings.

23:06

We use them as fairy tales. We use

23:09

them as, I mean, we use them as

23:11

entertainment, right? Like one of the scientists I

23:13

talked to, because again, parents are very, like

23:15

I was, like this is too scary, you

23:17

know? But

23:19

then one of the scientists I was talking to said, yeah, but look

23:21

at a Disney movie. Like it's

23:23

way scarier, like, you know, then, you know,

23:25

because also I'm, I'm there. I can see the

23:27

point is not to scare her to death,

23:29

it's to communicate. Parenting is

23:32

about transmitting values. Is

23:34

there a difference between encouraging and

23:36

sort of praising? Because we seem

23:39

really good at praising kids. Yeah, so pretty.

23:41

Oh, wow, you picked the green pen. Like,

23:43

you're amazing. My child's a genius, you know?

23:46

So praising is a really interesting topic

23:48

that's very unique in

23:50

Western society. You don't, in

23:52

my entire travels, I've never seen a parent

23:54

praise a child. Like, it's not necessary. Is

23:57

it more subtle or they just don't do

23:59

it? I think that

24:01

there is some that's more subtle. Like, you think the

24:03

parent's not doing anything, but then you look and there

24:05

is, like, these subtle signals that are

24:07

happening, which also speaks to the fact that we

24:09

could be a lot more subtle with children, you know? Like

24:12

a smile or... Yeah, or like a pat

24:15

on the shoulder or... When

24:17

one of the moms said I would hug the child, you

24:19

know, to thank them. But praise really just came about in the

24:22

last, like, 30 years. Like, I'm 47, and,

24:27

like, my mom was really into praise and my dad wasn't.

24:29

So I'm kind of right at the generation where the praise

24:31

kind of... And there's this whole backstory to it

24:33

about why it happened. But praise is

24:36

a tricky beast. Praise can

24:39

motivate children, but it can also demotivate.

24:41

It's, like, depends on how it's done, what

24:44

context it is, the child. Does

24:47

the praise actually kind of fit with what you're doing?

24:49

And, I mean, we have this sense that

24:52

all praise is good and it's not. I tell parents,

24:54

like, you can just stop. Before

24:56

we get to autonomy, let's double-click on

24:58

that. What's the difference between good praise

25:00

and bad praise? I mean, I don't

25:02

think psychologists know. And I think that's

25:04

one of the problems. I think this

25:06

over-the-top praise that you're talking about, I don't think kids

25:09

know it's fake. And in some ways, it's

25:11

manipulative. I think the problem is we don't

25:13

know. We don't know how much

25:15

praise helps kids because it's

25:17

an experiment. It's brand new. How

25:20

do we get in this experiment? Maybe

25:22

it was the 80s. There

25:24

was this whole push from the

25:26

California government. There was this

25:28

idea that, like, the

25:30

reason why kids started

25:32

to use drugs and misbehaves

25:35

because they had poor self-esteem and

25:37

that the way to help kids was

25:40

to praise them. That

25:42

gives them good self-esteem. But the data don't support

25:44

it at all. There was no data. It's just,

25:46

again, like these myths that kind of bubble up.

25:48

But you don't need to do it. I

25:51

mean, I think I come from a privileged

25:53

position in the sense that, like, I've seen

25:55

many, many families not praise children in, like...

25:59

The kids are, like, amazing. and have

26:01

enormous amounts of confidence and self-esteem. So it's

26:03

like, it's just not required. I

26:06

think what's more important and

26:08

what motivates kids, and there's a

26:10

lot of data to support this, motivates

26:13

kids is having them actually

26:16

contribute to your life. You

26:18

know, having them be part of your life and

26:22

contribute in it. I mean, you know,

26:24

as a person who works, that you

26:26

feel good and motivated when you... help

26:30

and you do something and you accomplish something

26:32

and that... I mean, there's tons of

26:34

data and psychology to support. That's what

26:36

motivates kids. Not when somebody goes

26:38

on and on about, oh my

26:40

God, amazing. So just to

26:42

orient us where we are, you have the

26:45

acronym TEAM togetherness and we've talked about encouraging.

26:47

And the next one is autonomy. Yeah, this

26:49

one's huge. If you could just

26:52

change like one thing in your child's

26:54

life, that would be to give them

26:56

two hours an hour a week of

26:58

autonomy. If you look at hunter-gatherer communities

27:00

around the world, so, you know, humans

27:02

spent 200,000 years as hunter-gatherers. That's

27:05

where our brains evolved, that's where we

27:07

evolved, right, in this context. And

27:10

so looking at hunter-gatherer communities around the world

27:13

offers some clues, kind of, to how

27:15

the conditions in which we're involved in. It doesn't

27:17

say it exactly, but kind of gives you some

27:19

clues. And if you look

27:21

in lots of different continents, children

27:24

have enormous amounts of autonomy

27:26

in these communities, which implies

27:29

that's how the

27:31

child evolved, right? The child's brain evolved. We used

27:33

to have a lot of autonomy. I mean, I

27:35

was walking to school at seven. I was walking

27:38

like two kilometers almost. Exactly, like it

27:40

wasn't that long ago in Western society that we

27:42

had it. The evolutionary perspective kind of says that,

27:44

like, we need it, you know? And

27:47

then there's this data that shows that kids that don't have

27:49

it are more anxious, more prone to depression, like, so, and

27:51

there's just tons of data that's like, we

27:54

need autonomy. Children need autonomy. But

27:57

I think parents don't know what...

28:00

it looks like. So what does autonomy

28:02

look like? The best way to figure

28:04

it out is to put your stopwatch

28:07

on when you're with a child in

28:09

the morning at the grocery store just

28:11

somewhere and give no commands

28:13

to the child, no verbal instruction to

28:16

your child for 20 minutes and

28:19

see if you can do it. I mean, because scientists have

28:22

done this analysis, I did this

28:24

analysis like in different communities and like in

28:26

places where children have autonomy, parents give children

28:29

like two to three verbal

28:31

inputs in an hour. And

28:34

I've done it myself, I've done it with parents in San Francisco

28:36

and we were talking about like 120 verbal inputs per hour,

28:40

just a constant stream. Do

28:42

this, do that. Don't do this, say this,

28:44

say thank you. Like, I mean, you

28:47

can just, you can see it. Like it's

28:49

just a constant praise because it is a

28:51

form of like kind of manipulating their behavior,

28:53

right? Which creates a power struggle in some

28:55

ways. Oh, can create for some children

28:57

are fine. Some children appear fine with it, right?

28:59

They just kind of go, I

29:01

call them like turtles. They kind of go down

29:03

into a little shell and kind of, okay, you

29:05

know, and some children it's horrible. When I was

29:08

writing the book and Rosie and I's relationship was

29:10

really changing. If we were

29:12

in a hard time and we were arguing a lot, I

29:14

would do this. I've put my stopwatch on and my phone

29:16

and I would say, okay, I'm going to be quiet. I'm

29:18

not going to, I can give her

29:22

physical input, right? Like you're talking about

29:25

more subtle, like some eye movement, some,

29:27

I can move her, you know, if

29:29

she's doing something bad, I can take

29:31

something, right? I can do physical things,

29:34

but I can't, no talking to her.

29:36

And it was amazing chain, like how

29:39

quickly that improves our

29:41

relationship. What can I do? I have

29:43

two teenagers for her to encourage autonomy.

29:45

What does that look like? Well,

29:48

it depends on where they're at, how much they're already

29:50

doing on their own. Well, I used to send them

29:52

to grocery stores on their own when they were like

29:54

seven or eight. And, you know, I

29:57

got a lot of pushback for that from

29:59

society. Yes, yes. I used to let them

30:01

walk to school and I get a lot

30:03

of pushback from society. One

30:05

aside from this, it's so cute. My

30:08

youngest came home one day and I had

30:10

asked him to get a red pepper and he got a green

30:12

pepper and I was like, well, go back to the store. That's

30:14

perfect. And he was like, I think eight or

30:16

nine at the time. And he goes

30:19

back to the store and then he comes home and I

30:21

was like, well, what was the difference in price? And he's

30:23

like, huh? And I was like,

30:25

what did you do? He's like, I put the green pepper

30:27

on the shelf. I said, red pepper. Because why

30:29

would it be any different? He's

30:32

like, I paid for it the first time. Right. Just

30:35

a pepper. Exactly. It's a

30:37

funny story. It seems like society,

30:39

I guess, has, maybe

30:41

it's just my feeling. I guess. It's

30:44

pushed back on those things. Oh, it's

30:46

not just your feeling. There's huge data

30:48

on this. And one, David

30:50

Lancy, one of the anthropologists that I cite a lot

30:52

in the book calls it like

30:54

the shrink wrapping of kid children where

30:56

we're just so afraid of their safety.

30:58

I'm not afraid of their safety as

31:00

much as afraid of other parents. Right.

31:03

Right. I mean, you're mean. The police

31:05

showing up at my door and taking away my kids because I

31:07

sent them on an errand. Society

31:10

as a whole is afraid of their safety. And there

31:12

are parents that are. I think

31:14

we're kind of probably in

31:16

the minority right now. So Rosie's eight, she started

31:18

going to the store. We live in that right

31:20

now, a 6,000 person town. I

31:24

don't know about Canada, but I bet it's the same as

31:26

the safest it's ever been like then when we were kids

31:29

and she got she's gotten pulled over by the

31:31

cops twice. One time they brought her

31:33

home in the back of the car. So

31:35

I mean, we've gotten pushed. There's absolutely a

31:37

huge pushback. I've had to just be like,

31:39

this is what we value. You

31:42

know, my husband and I sat down. We like, what do we do? You

31:44

know, we we've thought about going to the police. So

31:47

we dealt with the police and we told them like

31:49

and the police actually admitted like it's she's

31:52

fine. Yeah. But

31:55

it's the other parents. It's

31:57

the neighbors that we're calling, you know. And so

31:59

we've also made a. look better,

32:01

like the optics of it. We've like, she's

32:03

on the bike now and, you

32:05

know, she looks less, she looks

32:07

more like she's in charge. We also, there's a great

32:10

society, there's a great organization called Let Grow. I don't

32:12

know if you know about it, but

32:14

it's, it's all about empowering parents

32:16

and children to give their, to have more

32:18

autonomy. And they have these little licenses that

32:20

you can print out that say like, I'm

32:23

Rosie Dukleff and my parents allow me to

32:25

go to these places. And

32:27

I'm allowed to talk to strangers. I'm talking

32:29

to you right now. And like, so we

32:32

printed that out for her and, but it's

32:34

hard, but it's worth it. Well,

32:36

I don't know. Like, what can I do? Like, So,

32:39

okay. So they're 13, 13, one

32:41

13, one 14. I mean,

32:43

autonomy is also like, what does the child

32:45

want to do that they can't because they

32:47

feel afraid or they feel like they, you

32:51

know, they can't do it because of parents or

32:53

society or whatever, and then helping them kind of achieve

32:55

those goals. So I guess like maybe

32:57

an example, like what comes to mind with,

32:59

uh, with my kids would be like, do

33:02

I give complete autonomy,

33:04

which is they come home, you know,

33:06

this is dinner time. You help out with chores

33:09

and you're, you contribute to the household, but I

33:11

don't talk to them about homework. I don't talk

33:13

to them about schoolwork, or do I provide like

33:15

a structure around this where it's like, let's go

33:17

over what's due tomorrow. And I don't tell them

33:20

what to do, you know, like, how

33:22

do you think about that between structure

33:24

and autonomy? I think at 13

33:26

and 14, I would not help them structure their

33:28

time. But if they have, if they don't have

33:30

the ability, do you see what I'm saying? If

33:33

they're capable of doing it, let them do it.

33:35

And if they're not, give the structure, but not

33:37

the instruction. Give the encouragement. Right?

33:40

Like go back to the E. So

33:43

what would that look like? I'm happy exposing all

33:45

my poor parenting. I

33:47

mean, I'm just, it's really fascinating, right? Because like,

33:49

we have this sense in our, this is another

33:52

weird thing we do is that like, we think,

33:54

okay, they're at this age, they need to do

33:56

this, you know, and I would ask parents

33:58

like, well, what age can they use a knife? And

34:00

the parent would just be like, it depends on the child. You

34:03

know? And so that's why I'm like, kind of like,

34:05

well, where are they with it? Right? Because one

34:08

of the, one of the publishers said to me, well, I,

34:11

my, my child's 11 and I opened up the back

34:13

door and said, you're free now. You

34:16

have autonomy now. And she just stood there.

34:18

Yes, exactly. I'm telling you, like chickens will

34:21

just stand there too. If they've been inside

34:23

a cage, you know, and she was

34:25

like, but she didn't want autonomy. And I was like, well, she, she's

34:28

11. She's never had that. So she can't just

34:30

like, you can't just tell her

34:32

to go run and play outside after 11 years of not.

34:34

Right? So that's why I'm asking you, like, where are they?

34:37

But I think the idea is like, don't

34:39

do things for them. Like

34:41

ever. Like ever. You don't

34:44

need to, especially 13, 14. It's

34:47

like, like

34:49

if they can't manage their time or

34:51

they can't figure out, okay, what's next?

34:53

Because that's a skill. There's actually a

34:55

study looking at this in Guadalajara. It's

34:58

a fascinating study. It looks at parents

35:00

that are more Westernized who manage the child's

35:03

time. Okay. Now you're doing dinner. Now you're

35:05

doing chores. Now you're doing this. Now you're

35:07

doing that. And then more, a little more

35:09

like teen parenting, like my book, like where

35:12

the, the children manage their own time. And

35:14

the, in the study, they, these are like

35:16

nine, 10 year olds. And the

35:18

study, they show that the kids that are in that

35:20

kind of more flexible environment take initiation.

35:23

They start their homework themselves. They

35:25

like, but it takes time. That's

35:27

a, that's a skill. I mean, that's one of

35:29

the things that I tell parents, like when

35:32

you're managing your child, when you're kind of

35:35

their personal assistant and you're managing their time,

35:37

like block hour by hour, you're kind of

35:39

doing them a disservice because you're, they're

35:42

not able to learn this

35:44

skill of like, what do I do next? And

35:47

you know, like at your job, like my job, I sit

35:49

down in the morning. It's like, well, what do I do?

35:51

That's a big part of the job is like, okay,

35:54

I got to interview this person. I got to set this email.

35:56

I got to read this part. I got to write this part.

35:58

Right. And that's the skill that takes time. So

36:00

I would start, I don't know, I'm not trying to say

36:02

your child doesn't have that, but if if

36:05

I felt like my child didn't have that, I would

36:07

start trying to teach them that. You

36:09

know, like what do you have on

36:11

your plate tonight? Yeah. You know, what would you

36:14

do next? Questions. Questions, exactly. Like, you know. That

36:16

was one of my favorite part, questions on command.

36:18

So we actually now have a little school. And so

36:21

I love it because I get to say, I

36:23

tried these things on lots of kids, you know, like as

36:25

time has gone on, I've gotten more confident because I've tried

36:28

them on all these kids at this little school we have.

36:31

And like the questions work with every kid. And

36:33

the questions are designed to get them to think

36:35

about the next step instead of you giving

36:38

the instruction. And telling them

36:40

what to do. That's right. We have one

36:42

little boy who he's 11.

36:44

He's very smart, great reader, great math,

36:46

but he cannot do anything that I

36:48

don't tell him kind of the next

36:50

step. Like we were just making

36:53

Valentine's Day cards and then hanging them on a tree

36:55

for the teacher. And he was literally standing there with

36:57

the two pieces of yarn and was like, what do

36:59

I do next? And

37:01

I was like, what do you think you do next? And

37:04

it took about five minutes for

37:06

him to figure out that he needs to tie it and put it on

37:08

the tree. And you just let him sort of struggle with

37:10

it. Yeah. Yeah. That's

37:12

really interesting. And that M, I guess we've sort

37:14

of talked about this a little bit. Yeah, it

37:16

kind of puts it all together. The M is like minimal

37:19

interference. That's kind of a little bit

37:21

what we're getting at. It's like we

37:24

think that good parenting, I thought that good parenting

37:26

was maximal interference. Like I was always trying to

37:28

figure out, okay, what do I tell Rosie next?

37:31

Okay. I'm always looking out for like the next

37:33

thing to say. And like one parent even told

37:35

me, I forgot who it was, but she told

37:37

me sometimes I have to really hold myself back

37:40

from interfering to see if they

37:42

can do it. You know, there's this

37:44

like magic moment where you want to jump in. And

37:46

that's when they were like, but

37:49

if they need your help, you jump in. How do we

37:51

learn that as parents? Because you've done

37:53

it for so long. And then the

37:55

temptation is obviously I tell parents, and this is

37:57

kind of how I started it. take

38:00

Rosie to the beach. I would take her to an environment

38:02

where she had a lot of autonomy. I

38:04

know the beach doesn't sound like that to a

38:06

lot of parents, but I had taught

38:08

her not to go into the water. And then

38:10

I would just sit there hours and I would

38:12

read and work and just let her live. And

38:16

that was how I practiced it. You get the

38:18

confidence that, oh, the kid, I

38:21

don't need to interfere so much. And when

38:23

I don't interfere, she's so happy. And I

38:25

can work, I

38:27

can do my life. And I think you just

38:29

have to try it. And she didn't want to play with

38:31

you? Or did you say no? She

38:34

did want to play with me. I mean, especially if there was

38:37

not other kids around or something, I

38:40

would just say, no, I'm reading right now.

38:42

That's another thing is most societies'

38:44

parents don't

38:46

play with children. Like babies a

38:48

little bit. Otherwise,

38:51

figure it out. Use your imagination. Be bored. Yeah.

38:53

Or there's other kids. A lot of times there's other kids

38:56

around. And now we're in a nonstop.

38:58

I feel like I have to entertain you.

39:00

So that is another huge one. Huge,

39:03

huge difference in art. This is one

39:05

of, I think, the most stressful things

39:07

is this feeling of what do you do

39:09

with your time with your kids? Kids

39:11

do not need to be entertained. They

39:14

have not been entertained for like 100,000 years, 200,000

39:18

years. They do not need it. Like I said, you

39:20

can welcome them into your world and teach

39:22

them how to be in your world. But

39:25

when they're in their world, you

39:28

can be there to eat for it together, but

39:30

you don't have to do anything. There's

39:33

a lot of differences between

39:35

the worlds of

39:37

these tribes and our

39:39

world. Yes. Some of those differences

39:41

are food. Technology.

39:45

Well, both of those are changing. Culture.

39:48

Culture. In terms

39:50

of women's roles and whether they work

39:52

or not and how they contribute. How

39:55

do you think that affected how

39:57

they're raising kids? Is that specific?

40:00

specific to that environment. How

40:02

does it affect our environment? What's the same?

40:04

What's different? In the Maya community, in the

40:06

Inuit community, which is, you know, just north

40:08

of us right now in Canada, there

40:11

was lots of technology. Okay. And

40:14

lots of processed foods. Interesting.

40:16

Yeah. I mean, the Maya

40:18

community less, but... Like they're eating Froot Loops for breakfast sort

40:20

of thing? Inuit, yes. A lot of

40:22

them, yes. A lot of them. But I mean,

40:25

the Maya, the more there were more traditional foods

40:27

kind of made every day and every day, but

40:29

they had, you know, the Hadzabe,

40:31

it was no technology, very

40:35

little westernized

40:37

processed food. So it was very different.

40:39

So I think the food is an

40:41

interesting question because like these really control

40:43

children and control us kind of in

40:46

ways. What do you mean by that?

40:49

Like I think technology is probably easier to

40:51

talk about. I mean, it's designed to make

40:53

the child use it. Right? It's

40:55

a secret, right? To shape the

40:58

child's behavior and their activities.

41:00

And so it's hard to be as

41:03

a parent to just let that go. So

41:05

how is it impacting these kids though? Like

41:07

kids today, I mean, my

41:09

kids are maybe an exception, but

41:11

most kids long before they hit

41:13

13, 14 have iPhones or iPads.

41:16

Yeah. Right. Right.

41:18

So the Maya is very fascinating. The

41:20

Maya, many of the parents told

41:22

me that they don't get a phone until they can pay

41:25

for it. But you can do that

41:27

when everybody's in that camp. When it's collective. When you're

41:29

the only grade, you know, when my grade seven is

41:31

coming home, you know, well, I

41:33

just did what my parents did. I was like, I

41:35

don't care about Johnny down the street. Yes. Yes.

41:39

I care about you. But like, I feel that pressure. And in

41:41

grade seven, you know, that he was the, there's two kids in

41:43

his class who didn't have a phone. In grade

41:45

eight, he was the only one who didn't have a phone.

41:47

And he feels it because he feels sort

41:50

of like left out. Right.

41:52

Right. And he's, you

41:54

know, my classmates are doing something and I'm not,

41:56

I can't be a part of it. The way

41:58

that we've talked about this in. our houses like,

42:00

okay, going into grade nine, you can have a

42:02

phone, but you can't take your phone to school

42:04

with you. Uh, and

42:06

you have to wait at least a year before

42:08

you have to show me that you can be

42:10

responsible with it before you can have other

42:13

apps on your phone that aren't sort of

42:15

like games, right? Like so, uh,

42:17

before you can have Instagram, my whole path

42:20

with this is like, I'm hoping schools banned

42:22

phones by the time that like, by the

42:24

time they might, they probably

42:26

will, well, Ontario came out yesterday and said

42:28

they banned phones in, in all, um, schools

42:31

up until the end of grade 12, which

42:33

I think is a great idea personally. Um,

42:36

and I'm hoping we get to this place with

42:38

sort of like Snapchat and social media and some

42:40

of that stuff before he gets there. So I'm

42:42

like all about delaying, right? Like, right. I mean,

42:44

yeah, I think that is the word also like

42:47

they're growing up in a world where they have

42:49

to coexist with technology and we know how addictive

42:51

it is. So, you know, all of a sudden

42:53

you're 18 and giving them a

42:55

phone is also probably not the best strategy.

42:57

It's interesting because all the data show that

42:59

when they get the phone, it makes them

43:01

more lonely. It makes them

43:04

more isolated. It's my conversation with Jonathan

43:06

that actually totally, I was like adamant,

43:08

no phone. Uh, I don't

43:10

care what the pushback is. Like I'm, I'm going to

43:12

slow roll this as long as I can. And

43:15

he told me every year you can delay it

43:17

makes a huge difference. Absolutely. Because they have like

43:19

a prefrontal cortex, right? The Inuit

43:21

were really interesting because they have tons

43:23

of video games, tons

43:25

of TV, like the grandmother

43:27

we were with was like, she spent like

43:29

a week out in the land

43:31

hunting caribou. And then she comes back. She's like,

43:34

I got so much CSI to catch up on.

43:36

Like there's this like very like the

43:38

technology and never like completely

43:40

squeezed out the other life.

43:44

Right. How, how is that possible? Because

43:46

it's designed and I say this as,

43:48

you know, it's designed to make it.

43:50

It is. It's designed to squeeze it

43:52

out. There's, there's no doubt. But 16

43:54

year old boy or girl

43:56

and they're on technology. Like, how do you

43:58

limit, how do they. limit that as parents.

44:01

I mean, I think some of it is

44:03

like, and I'm not saying that you wouldn't

44:05

know how to do this at all, because

44:07

I don't want to give that impression. But

44:09

I think delay is absolutely the right word

44:12

for many reasons. But also it's about

44:14

making sure that it is

44:16

like you're talking about it is not the

44:19

way it works in the brain is

44:21

is it narrows your desires and wants

44:23

to this to this one thing. That's

44:25

that's what happens over time. I mean,

44:27

you see it with kids, right? It's

44:29

like all they do is be or

44:31

is on their phone, right? They do

44:33

nothing else. And I think that to

44:35

me is like the key

44:38

and it's what you're talking about. It's like having

44:41

these spaces and time in

44:44

valuing of other things and in and we

44:46

could talk about this for like an hour.

44:49

We can like go on and on about this.

44:51

And I feel like we've kind of got

44:53

it's hand it but no, let's double click

44:55

on this. What are sort

44:57

of the big points here because this is

44:59

something when I talk to other parents. It's

45:01

a hot topic to talk about when I

45:03

talk to schools. It's a hot topic. People

45:05

want to know more about

45:08

it. They also want to know sort

45:10

of like where where they

45:12

can take strides, right? So if if parents

45:14

are listening to this and have a 16

45:16

year old addicted to their phone. Yeah, what

45:18

are the tangible things they can do in

45:20

the next one month or you know, today

45:23

the next month, the next three months to

45:25

sort of like help. Okay, so here's how

45:27

it works. And this is what I'm just

45:29

writing about right now. Our brains are these

45:31

little prediction devices, right? And when I walk

45:33

into an environment, my brain does this quick

45:36

calculation of where am I going to get

45:38

my rewards in this environment. I'm going to

45:40

maximize the rewards and kids are even more

45:42

this way because their brains are the

45:45

prefrontal cortex less law or less developed. If

45:47

a child walks into the living room and

45:49

every time they walked into that living room

45:51

for the last like five years of their

45:53

life, they've played on the video game, they've

45:55

looked at their phone, their brain is just

45:58

lighting up Lego. Firecrackers,

46:01

they're going to use the phone. It's going to exclude

46:04

everything else. They're never going to pick up a book

46:07

because the phone is designed to do that. So

46:10

the only way you can bring

46:13

back these other things into their life is to

46:15

create environments where their brain knows they

46:17

can't have it. You

46:19

have to. So does that mean

46:22

like a technology-free weekend? Does it mean

46:24

like flip it around? So that's

46:26

like the kind of the desire, like the

46:28

way we talk about now, like sabbathism and

46:30

hours where we're not. It's the other way

46:32

around. Life is without it

46:34

and these are the times we have it. Oh,

46:36

interesting. Okay. Because then your brain

46:38

relaxes. I can't because again, your

46:40

brain is just a prediction device. It

46:43

just is predicting where do I get these things?

46:45

And if it knows like I never

46:47

get it. If it's variable reinforcement,

46:49

then you're always looking for it. Oh,

46:51

there's variable reinforcement. It's just the tip of

46:54

the iceberg of the tools they use to

46:56

create this. No, but I mean like if

46:58

you're like, oh, I can get video games some days at

47:00

four. I can get it at some days at six. Oh,

47:03

if you move it around. If you move it

47:05

around as a parent, you create this sort of

47:07

like... I don't know. It's interesting because

47:10

you could think of the moving it better. That's a very interesting question

47:12

to me. I've read both

47:14

in these books. Like you should do

47:16

it at the same time. So if you do it at the same time,

47:18

the brain will know. The brain will know. And

47:20

if you don't do it at that time, you'll get like... So this

47:22

is what we currently do and like give

47:25

me the best practices here because I'm making this shit up

47:27

as I go. But it's like, okay, we

47:29

do video games. It's like seven, eight. Every day.

47:32

If you have your homework done. I

47:34

would cut out every day. Oh, I can't. Yeah.

47:37

They learn a lot from video games. I mean, I would argue they actually

47:40

learn a lot from video games. Well, I mean, that's another thing.

47:42

It's like screens are not screens,

47:44

right? It depends on what they're actually playing,

47:47

right? But they don't need it. I don't. I

47:50

don't know. Well, you know, there's

47:52

an element of you're right. They don't need

47:55

it. There's an element of all

47:58

their friends are doing it. Playing those videos.

48:00

But I mean, they don't need every day.

48:03

Oh, God. I think, you know,

48:05

if you were to survey parents, the fact

48:07

that I give them like eight hours of

48:09

screen time a week is probably on the

48:11

extremely low end. Is eight hours of screen

48:13

time going to like hurt them in the

48:15

long run? Probably. This is

48:17

what I worry about. I

48:20

mean, I think again, it depends on what they're

48:22

doing. Depends on the kid, depends on their reward

48:24

center. There's all these genetics involved in like,

48:27

I have this incredibly addictive personality. Like I

48:29

can get I'm basically addicted

48:31

to Gmail. I mean, like me interest

48:33

on her. Like I can get

48:35

like, we'll play Hey man, and I'll be like,

48:37

play it again. You know, like so like for

48:40

me, an hour a day playing videos wouldn't be

48:42

good. Okay. You know, I think for

48:44

some kids, it wouldn't be good. Well, I do change

48:46

what they play. So if they're mean to each other

48:48

after. Yeah, there you go. Consistently. So we've talked about

48:50

this, right? Like we took away a

48:53

certain video game a while ago because

48:55

I was like, Hey, and I warned them, right?

48:58

I'll tell you guys in Iraq after you play this, I

49:00

don't like it. Right. That's not

49:02

what we do. And that's not how we treat anybody, let alone

49:04

our family. And then it kept going. And

49:06

I was like, Hey, you just can't play this video

49:08

game anymore. So I think that two years later, the

49:11

game. Yeah. I was like, do you

49:13

want to try again? Like, you know, they're like, we want to play it.

49:15

And I'm like, okay, but you know why we lost it. Right? Like,

49:18

so if it has the same impact, we're going

49:20

to have the same results. So I think you

49:22

said like the key thing here, we always talk

49:24

about time, hours of whatever screen. That

49:27

like, I think we need new

49:29

recommendations from AAP, from all the

49:31

societies, because an hour of

49:33

screen time today can be so different.

49:35

First of all, what you're doing. Oh,

49:38

surely. Yeah. And then it's so different than

49:40

like an hour screen time when I was a kid. Yeah. Right.

49:43

It's just not the same. You have

49:45

to like, what happens during that hour

49:47

screen time? How is the kid behave? What is

49:49

the, what do they behave like afterwards? Right? Like,

49:51

how does it make them feel? Like, why do

49:53

we need to do things? Why

49:55

do kids need to do things where they feel worse

49:57

afterwards? Right? Tell me more about

50:00

this feeling worse. Is that like when I try

50:02

to end it and they won't let me end

50:04

it? Is it how they treat people? Like what

50:06

does it mean to feel worse? I think it's

50:08

a lot. I mean, I think you're doing exactly

50:10

what I'm saying. It's like assessing

50:12

like... I'm really just making this stuff up.

50:15

Like this is... I have no idea what

50:17

I'm doing. I'm just trying to think like,

50:20

okay, maybe let's figure this out. One thing

50:22

is that just because the child wants it,

50:25

doesn't mean it's actually like pleasurable. Of course.

50:27

Right. And so I think a lot of

50:29

parents think that they... Oh, they want it

50:31

so much that they like it. Right?

50:35

And that's just wrong. That's based off like 50

50:37

year old neuroscience. So I'm

50:41

going to push back on this slightly because

50:43

when I intuitively hear that, I

50:45

think in a different way, which is

50:47

probably completely wrong, but I think, ah,

50:51

something they care about. A currency that

50:53

I can use to manipulate

50:55

at worst behavior. Yes. Yes. And I think

50:57

lots of parents think that. For positively reward

50:59

behavior at best, maybe. And so it's like

51:02

the one thing in their lives where I'm

51:04

like, okay, I have something that I know

51:06

they want. Yes. I think that's the common.

51:08

That's very common. And I think I felt

51:10

that way too about it at first. But

51:13

then I was like, is it worth

51:15

it? Go deeper on that. Like, okay. So

51:18

we had like Rosie, maybe like when she

51:20

was six, it was

51:22

like starting like with Netflix, right?

51:25

Which is insane, right? And if you

51:27

watch it, like it makes

51:30

me feel insane to watch some of it.

51:32

It's like so fast and it's so psychedelic

51:34

and it's just like, ah. And

51:37

we would every night she would get some time

51:39

and it was like, you say it was like

51:41

this currency, right? This like, oh, reward, this like

51:43

manipulative device. But then at

51:45

the end of it, she'd be so crazy. And

51:48

every night would be like a struggle and a fight

51:50

and like, she'd like a different child.

51:52

And it was just like, I don't

51:54

think this is worth it. I don't need this. I can, I

51:57

don't, first of all, I can motivate her in

51:59

other ways. ways that don't make her scream at

52:01

me, and ways that don't feel like this struggle,

52:03

and don't make her hyper, and don't... And

52:06

it just feels like a waste of her time.

52:08

I think I come at it more from the

52:11

perspective of it's not hurting her, but actually, she's

52:13

gonna feel better and have... If

52:15

she does something, huh? Yeah. And

52:17

it, like, lifelong better, you know? Because

52:19

what you're doing is you're building habits.

52:22

Oh, totally. Like, when I'm bored, when

52:24

I wanna relax, and I would even

52:26

question whether it's relaxing for kids a

52:28

lot, especially video games, I do this.

52:31

Mm-hmm. Right? I can build that

52:33

habit. I build that habit in Rosie like that. But

52:36

maybe better in her

52:38

life would be like, when I'm bored,

52:41

I play the piano. Mm-hmm.

52:43

I read a book, and she's never gonna

52:45

pick those things if she knows the others

52:48

available. I have one kid who probably reads

52:50

too much. So, but...

52:52

If that's even possible. I think most kids are

52:54

not like that. Yeah. I

52:56

take away books as, like, a consequence. He's

53:00

like, you know... Books, like paper

53:02

books? And Kindle. Like, he's on

53:04

the Kindle all the time. It's attached to

53:06

my account. So, hey, I get these crazy

53:08

Amazon recommendations. It's like based on your reader.

53:11

I'm like, man, you don't know me. I'm not worried

53:13

about AI taking over at all, right? Then I open

53:16

the Kindle, and I'm like, now I know where to

53:18

get it from. But, like, it's a currency coming back

53:20

to technology. It's like, I know something

53:22

that motivates him. I know

53:24

that, hey, I'm gonna, you know, this

53:26

is a natural consequence to your behavior.

53:29

And then he's like, oh, you're the dad

53:31

that takes away reading from this child, right?

53:33

But that currency, to me, is more valuable

53:35

than, like, watching Netflix. Does it

53:37

matter if it's sort of like the same thing?

53:39

If they're reading a book about the same show

53:41

they'd be watching, do you think? I

53:44

mean, I think it just, again, it depends on what

53:46

you value. What do you think? For a while, Rizzi

53:48

was kind of addicted to audiobooks.

53:50

Okay. Like, hours and hours and hours, like,

53:53

six, seven hours on the weekends, you know,

53:55

of just listening. And to some parents, that

53:57

would be, like, amazing. And I mean, I

53:59

think it's a good thing. I think that's

54:02

better than watching cartoons in the sense that

54:04

she learned narrative structure. She learned an incredible

54:06

vocabulary. That's what I'm saying. I

54:08

had to figure out. But then I could

54:11

see it was squeezing out other things and

54:13

it was creating conflict. It's

54:15

like, what do I value? That's what it

54:17

takes over. This value thing is super

54:19

interesting because it makes

54:21

me wonder if a lot of our parenting

54:24

is driven by we're trying to succeed through

54:26

our children instead of putting our children in

54:28

a position where they can succeed. I think

54:30

that we don't. It's like, oh, you get

54:32

into Yale. That's my success as much as

54:35

your success. And you're transmitting the value of

54:37

that. I don't

54:39

think we stop and think enough

54:41

about how our actions and what

54:43

we say and what we the

54:45

currency we use with children transmits

54:49

values. So for instance,

54:52

I'm sitting there talking to one of my friends

54:54

about Jonathan's book literally

54:56

about this topic with the mom of

54:59

two children. And

55:02

the 13 year old comes over and shows us, look

55:04

mom, look at this video of this gerbil like while

55:06

we're talking about this topic. And what does the mom

55:08

do? Stops looks at

55:10

the video. Stops our face

55:12

to face conversation to look

55:14

at this like TikTok video and

55:17

like engage with it. And

55:19

I just left there and I was like, what

55:21

is that transmitting to the children in the room?

55:24

They're the VIP, right? You're the

55:27

in this TikTok video is more

55:29

important than a face

55:31

to face conversation with a friend. And it's

55:33

not something you're actively communicating, but it's something

55:35

they're receiving through. Oh, I think

55:37

it is active. I mean, yes, in the

55:39

sense that like not directive. I'm not saying,

55:41

oh, the TikTok video is more, but that's

55:44

not how kids learn. Kids don't learn from

55:46

what you say is important. Kids learn through

55:48

practice and modeling. That is how kids learn

55:51

everything. What would be an alternative way

55:53

to handle that situation? I would say I'm

55:56

talking. I'm talking to this is important. I'm having

55:58

a competition with Mike Lean right now. now, you

56:01

know, let's discuss this later. And then I would tell

56:03

the child later, you know,

56:05

number one, that's really rude to, you

56:08

know, it's a 13 year old kid, like

56:10

they should know at that point, that's

56:12

rude to interrupt in the middle of a

56:14

conversation. Like I would tell Rosie that nicely,

56:17

not moving as mean as I just said it. Do

56:20

that after not in the moment. I wouldn't do

56:22

it in the moment. You would embarrass the child,

56:25

you'd make a big scene. In the moment, it's

56:27

more of a performative parenting device,

56:30

which is again, what do you value? They're

56:34

less likely to learn, but you feel better. That's

56:36

right. You're basically shaming them. And right.

56:39

But I would tell them in the moment, like

56:42

I'm, this conversation is important and there

56:44

I'm transmitting the value of I value a

56:46

face to face interaction more than some Gerbo

56:49

video on TikTok. Right. But if you look

56:51

around and you will see this everywhere, you

56:53

will see parents actively valuing

56:56

and modeling the

56:58

love of technology. The reward system is

57:00

really a value system. Yeah. The

57:03

reward system in the brain is

57:05

made in animals. So to,

57:08

you know, make sure they get food,

57:10

sex, water, safety, right. But in humans,

57:12

it can be, it can be hooked

57:14

up to anything that seems valuable. And

57:16

that's what children are learning. They're learning

57:19

that the screen, these videos, this video

57:21

game, this is

57:23

what our society, this is what my

57:25

family values. It's so hard. Like

57:28

I, I leave my phone in a different room

57:30

when we eat dinner. Yeah. Yeah.

57:32

We have it. We have one phone and

57:36

it's in a drawer. And I feel it.

57:38

Right. And you want to go over there. I

57:41

definitely feel a pull towards it. Right.

57:43

They call it motivational magnets. Well, it's like,

57:45

where's my phone? You know, like you don't

57:47

have this thing on me, but it's interesting because

57:49

a couple of weeks ago, my youngest came up

57:52

to me and he's like, I like that you

57:54

never have your phone at dinner.

57:56

I love that. And

57:59

I was like, I didn't. even think you noticed. It

58:01

was like, yeah. And like, it was just this moment

58:04

of like, oh, I

58:06

was like, I, so I was doing it

58:08

because I wanted to pay attention to them.

58:10

And my motivation was like less of a,

58:12

you know, it's sort of communicating values, which

58:14

is like, we need to chat face to

58:16

face, but it was also about avoiding regret.

58:18

I didn't want them. I always think about

58:20

like, well, they're going to move out one

58:22

day. Yeah. I hope eventually. And

58:25

when they move out, I'm going

58:27

to wish I was having dinner with

58:29

them. And what was more important, checking your email

58:31

for that in your time or like, and so

58:33

all of these thoughts lead to like, I'm just

58:36

going to leave and I'm not, uh, I usually

58:38

am, but like, uh, I'm not a hundred percent

58:40

confident that I can just like leave it in

58:42

my pocket. And then you can't,

58:44

but the other thing that I've started doing recently, so

58:46

I just, when I'm with them, I put it on

58:48

silent mode for sure. And the only people that can

58:51

get through silent mode are them. Right.

58:53

I mean, all these

58:55

things that you're doing are transmitting the

58:57

value of like, you care about interacting

58:59

with them more

59:01

than the phone. Yeah. I, I didn't think they paid

59:04

attention. Oh, at least one of them pays attention. I

59:06

think it's a fascinating observation. I've been, I'm

59:08

writing a chapter now about how actually kids don't like

59:10

technology as much as you think they do. Oh,

59:13

tell me more about this. Because

59:15

I just asked them. But can they answer that?

59:17

Well, I mean, I mean, I'm not talking about,

59:19

you end up with Homer Simpson's car, right? I'm

59:22

not, it's not that blatant and

59:24

you can actually find it in,

59:26

in these, um, like

59:28

in conversations or in the books, people will

59:31

say these, people will like say

59:33

what you just said. Like kids will say things like,

59:35

Oh, I really like this night because we're not on

59:37

the screens. You know, so kids, that's what I'm saying.

59:39

Like, but you can ask them, you can say like,

59:41

well, what do you do on the iPad after school?

59:43

I do this, I do that. And then one little

59:45

girl said, without even me saying

59:47

anything was like, but you know, I

59:50

would do something more fun and more better if my

59:52

parents let me. Oh, you don't

59:54

want to actually be on that bed. No, I don't really want to

59:56

be on that bed. Actually, and Rosie one day said to me like

59:58

not that long ago, she said, I thought you wanted to. me on

1:00:00

the Netflix. Oh, interesting. Because I

1:00:02

kind of did in the sense that like

1:00:04

what you're talking about using it as currency,

1:00:07

right? So I was like pushing it at

1:00:09

her, right? You need to find something. You

1:00:13

don't need it. It was really

1:00:15

weird. Again, it's this question of

1:00:18

wanting it, wanting to

1:00:20

pick up your phone and actually

1:00:22

enjoying it and actually

1:00:24

valuing it and actually like, I think

1:00:27

most kids would rather do something else.

1:00:29

But they are like, especially teenagers that

1:00:31

have been on technology for so long.

1:00:33

I mean, their brains are so wired

1:00:35

to want it. They call

1:00:37

them motivational magnets. The cues turn

1:00:39

into these like magnets that pull

1:00:42

you there, not the actual software,

1:00:44

the cues. Yeah. And you actually transfer

1:00:46

the value onto the cues. And it's

1:00:48

this very, very, very strong pull. To

1:00:50

get away from that, you have to

1:00:53

protect the child from the cues. What

1:00:55

do you tell your, I don't know,

1:00:57

like I'm picking random ages here, but

1:00:59

like your 16 year old

1:01:01

or your 12 year old that

1:01:03

they can't watch a show on Netflix

1:01:05

or that's not what our family does

1:01:07

or values, but then they go to

1:01:09

school and everybody's talking about it. Now

1:01:12

they feel left out. They feel like

1:01:14

they're not a part of something. Right.

1:01:16

Right. And isn't it interesting how it's

1:01:18

all about fear because we think it's

1:01:20

about reward, but it's actually about fear

1:01:22

and the fear and the reward system

1:01:24

are all enmeshed. Yeah. So I think

1:01:26

at the teenage years, you start, you

1:01:28

really think they really need to start

1:01:30

to understand how it affects their brain,

1:01:33

you know, and how it's manipulating their

1:01:35

brain, kind of wiring up their reward

1:01:37

system to prioritize it over everything else.

1:01:39

Teenagers don't like to be manipulated. So

1:01:41

I think you start there, you start

1:01:43

with this conversation of how this actually

1:01:46

works. One of the neuroscientists said to

1:01:48

me, he is a 12 year old

1:01:50

boy. Just gave him a phone. He

1:01:53

gave him this like hour long PowerPoint on what

1:01:55

the phone does to his brain and how it

1:01:57

works and how this thing called sign tracking

1:01:59

and all this stuff. And then they had,

1:02:01

they sat down and they said, okay, he said, how much of your day

1:02:03

do you want the phone to take up? Let's

1:02:06

write it down. How much do you want? And

1:02:08

I think the kids is only like 45 minutes a day, which

1:02:11

sounds about

1:02:13

what you're doing, right? Yeah. And

1:02:15

he said, okay. And they wrote it out and he

1:02:17

said, now it's my job as the parent to hold

1:02:20

him to that. It becomes more of this cooperation

1:02:23

thing where they're like,

1:02:25

well, that's what it is. Right. Like you're effectively

1:02:28

trying to come up with something with them, but

1:02:30

you're still the parental authority. Oh,

1:02:32

I think absolutely. You move from parents to

1:02:34

coaching. Yeah. It's more,

1:02:36

it's more guidance. But then there, I

1:02:38

think that there's these rules that make

1:02:40

sense just neuro neurologically, you know, like

1:02:42

no, no screens in the bedroom. Yeah.

1:02:46

I mean, like we got rid of right

1:02:48

now, we have no screens after seven and

1:02:51

I try to hold it to myself. I

1:02:53

can't do that just because of homework too. Like

1:02:55

they do all their homework on technology. Sure. I

1:02:57

mean, like, yeah, yeah. Not like

1:02:59

they leave their phones in the living room. They're

1:03:01

not allowed their phones in their bedroom at this

1:03:03

point. You know, this all changes. But try, try

1:03:06

it in the sense that like, if

1:03:08

you can, one of the neuroscientists who

1:03:10

studies dopamine in the eyes told me

1:03:12

three hours before bedtime. Yeah.

1:03:15

And so I started doing, I mean, it's crazy, right? That's like seven

1:03:17

o'clock. Right. Yeah. Um, and I started

1:03:20

doing it like maybe November and I, Shane,

1:03:22

I sleep like I've never slept before. I

1:03:24

mean, I'm not kidding you. I'm like, I mean,

1:03:27

I think, I think kids have, I think kids

1:03:29

will feel the same. I mean, it really affects

1:03:31

the sleep. There's no doubt. Is there a book

1:03:33

you came across in your research that like parents

1:03:35

of teens, you know, started 12, 13 can be

1:03:37

like, Hey, before you get a phone, before we

1:03:39

talk about technology, I want you to read this

1:03:42

and let's have a conversation about it. I

1:03:44

would recommend watching social dilemma. Okay. Have you watched

1:03:46

that? Have you guys watched that? No, definitely watch

1:03:48

that. I've heard of some teen years tell me

1:03:50

they've had to watch it in school. Like it's,

1:03:53

yeah, it's good. The same schools that

1:03:55

don't ban phones. I'm not sure.

1:03:57

I haven't done the cross correlation detail on that, but

1:03:59

the The problem is that parents

1:04:01

don't know these things. Like parents, it's not

1:04:03

like I say, like it's not

1:04:05

an even playing field right now. The

1:04:07

tech industry has all this knowledge and tools

1:04:10

and goals about technology and how

1:04:12

it affects your brain and it

1:04:14

affects children's brain more that way

1:04:16

because of, you know,

1:04:19

they're not as developed. And

1:04:21

parents have none of it right now. It's

1:04:23

a really, really uneven playing field. And

1:04:26

we're playing with these old rules of two hours of

1:04:28

screen time a night. I

1:04:31

mean, personally, I just try it. Like

1:04:33

the rules are interesting. We're trying to

1:04:35

get away from rules into more autonomy,

1:04:38

if you will, within certain limits of

1:04:40

how that goes. But

1:04:43

I mean, it's just a nonstop struggle. And

1:04:45

I have great kids, so I can imagine

1:04:47

like, if you had

1:04:49

more difficult children, I can like, sometimes I

1:04:51

go to bed and I'm like, man, I

1:04:53

just won the Olympics, right? Nobody died today.

1:04:55

Everybody ate food. This is a win.

1:04:57

And they were on the screen for an hour. And

1:05:00

you know, like some days I'm like, oh, I

1:05:02

just don't care. I need a break, right? Like

1:05:04

I need a... I mean, it really

1:05:06

is about setting up your environment. I

1:05:08

mean, I said that earlier. I said

1:05:10

like, you set up an environment where

1:05:12

the child can be autonomous and it's

1:05:14

about doing that with the screens. It's

1:05:16

just gonna be hard. It's just gonna

1:05:18

be harder because they are magnets. I

1:05:21

wanna come back to this just before we end,

1:05:23

but like, what have you learned about in not

1:05:27

these tribes, but in sort

1:05:29

of Western culture, what can we do for our

1:05:31

environment that sort of at

1:05:34

least adds friction to things, if

1:05:36

not removes them as a possibility?

1:05:39

You mean for technology? Well, for technology or

1:05:41

anything. Like what can we do to encourage

1:05:43

autonomy in our kids through

1:05:46

the environment? I'm a big fan of the

1:05:48

environment is like the hidden hand. It is.

1:05:51

I think James Clear said that. The hidden hand

1:05:53

that shapes your... Yeah. I

1:05:55

mean, like you said, like a prediction machine. I

1:05:57

come into an environment and it's like, I know, like

1:06:00

I'm predicting. everything that I've done here in the past,

1:06:02

especially with younger children, I mean, older

1:06:04

children too, it's about empowering them

1:06:07

so you don't have to say anything

1:06:09

to them, right? It's teaching them the

1:06:12

skills they need so that they can be autonomous in

1:06:14

your environment. So you can either change the environment and

1:06:16

get rid of everything, which is what we kind of

1:06:19

tend to do with kids, but

1:06:21

then you just leave them unempowered, right?

1:06:23

Or you slowly teach them, you

1:06:26

know? So does that make sense?

1:06:28

A little bit, yeah. I think it's just,

1:06:30

I'm trying to make it practical for... Right, so give me

1:06:33

an example of something that you've... Like

1:06:35

a house environment, like what are the things?

1:06:37

So like one thing that you mentioned that

1:06:39

I picked up on, which I mean, we

1:06:41

don't do, other people may or may not,

1:06:43

and I really try not to judge other

1:06:45

people. Everybody's doing their best. I really

1:06:48

do. And every kid is different. That's the thing

1:06:50

too. So but like having a TV in your

1:06:52

room or having something like that, so that's an

1:06:54

environmental choice, right? Where you put the TV. That's

1:06:56

a parental choice. And so if

1:06:58

you put the TV in sort of the

1:07:00

main floor, you end up with one sort

1:07:02

of, you're exemplifying one thing. Right. And if

1:07:04

you put it in the basement, you're sort

1:07:06

of like putting it out of the way.

1:07:08

It's not a show piece. And

1:07:11

then the kids get more autonomy in a way

1:07:13

because they have to go downstairs and like figure

1:07:15

it out themselves and hang out with their friends

1:07:17

if they want to watch TV. And so, like

1:07:20

I'm just thinking, are there any other environmental? I

1:07:22

would love to learn some. I'm sure everybody else

1:07:24

listening would. I think one of the things that

1:07:26

maybe we haven't said explicitly that should be said

1:07:28

is like, I don't think

1:07:30

children can be autonomous with technology, some

1:07:32

technology. Oh, that's interesting. Okay. Right. I

1:07:35

don't think that they're capable. I don't

1:07:37

even think adults are capable. I mean,

1:07:39

I'm not. So use the environment to

1:07:41

shape the technology. So it's like screen

1:07:43

time limits or app limits or something.

1:07:46

That's right. So like, let's take like

1:07:48

Inuit hunting. A lot of one of

1:07:50

the big goals in is

1:07:52

to teach boys, but now girls too.

1:07:55

It's very mixed to

1:07:57

seal hunt. Okay. They have to

1:07:59

do many. families have to do it and like,

1:08:01

you know, this is a skill you have to learn,

1:08:03

right? Well, the seal hunt is crazy. It

1:08:07

is a crazy skill. You have to go out

1:08:09

on the ice, poke a hole in

1:08:11

the middle of nowhere and stay, and then

1:08:13

they put a little tiny like feather

1:08:15

in the hole and you sit

1:08:17

there and you stare at it for six hours until

1:08:19

the feather moves and then

1:08:22

you step the ice. Okay. This is

1:08:24

a very difficult task.

1:08:26

Well, you can't just take a six year old and

1:08:28

tell him to go seal hunt. Yeah. Right. What do

1:08:30

they do? The dad explained it

1:08:32

to me. He's like, when the kid can stay

1:08:34

outside for six hours, then we'll take them with

1:08:36

us, but we'll park them like way out because

1:08:39

if they make noise, you're going to mess it

1:08:41

all up and then the kid still wants to

1:08:43

do it. Then we'll slowly bring them closer. And

1:08:45

it's like, I mean, I think that's how we

1:08:47

think of technology is a little bit like seal

1:08:49

hunting. A little bit at a

1:08:51

time, demonstrate responsibility and then... Yeah. You delay it

1:08:54

until they show a lot of interest and really

1:08:56

want it. And then it's like, okay, where can

1:08:58

you go in the seal hunt? You're going to

1:09:00

be way out there. Right. And then you show

1:09:02

me you can do that and then I'll pull

1:09:04

you in a little bit closer. I guess that's

1:09:06

kind of like what I've done intuitively personally, which

1:09:08

is like, okay, well, show me you can be

1:09:11

responsible before we start adding more things

1:09:13

to your phone. Right. It's exactly what you like

1:09:15

and delaying it, you know, because the kid's not

1:09:17

capable of standing over the hole. I'm not capable.

1:09:20

Except six hours. Right. And it's like the parents

1:09:22

not going to stick them in that situation and

1:09:24

have them fail. Well, I think if you put

1:09:26

a phone, give the child a

1:09:28

phone and stick them in their bedroom or the video

1:09:30

game, you're putting them at the seal hole to fail.

1:09:33

Right. And so it's not new

1:09:36

that this idea, I just think that we have

1:09:38

to treat this thing as this tool that's like

1:09:41

kids can't learn yet.

1:09:43

They don't have the mental capacity to

1:09:45

sit over the hole for six hours. They don't have

1:09:47

mental capacity to carry a phone into their room and

1:09:50

not go to bed. It's a slow process. Oh

1:09:52

yeah. And like everybody's doing the best

1:09:54

they can. Every child is different. Every

1:09:56

sort of like environment's different, but then

1:09:58

like every broader environment. different and two,

1:10:00

like a lot of schools are all technology now. There's

1:10:05

iPads and computers and laptops. And

1:10:09

the school is crazy, which I think actually

1:10:12

means at home, it's more important. Oh,

1:10:15

to go the other way. They need

1:10:17

to build these other skills. I mean, like I'm

1:10:19

a big fan of Cal Newport and he talks

1:10:21

a lot about how like concentrating in these, in

1:10:24

doing this kind of deep thinking and

1:10:26

stuff, it takes practice. We always

1:10:28

end with the same question, but I'm going to use

1:10:30

a slightly different version of it for you, which is

1:10:33

what is success as a parent for

1:10:36

you? So when I first, before I wrote

1:10:38

the book, it was like, well, you're talking about like Yale, you

1:10:40

know, it's like Rosie speaking Mandarin

1:10:42

and going to Yale was, you know, like,

1:10:45

and it, I don't, I don't even, but

1:10:48

then when I wrote the book, I was like,

1:10:51

success for me is Rosie feeling, growing

1:10:53

up mentally healthy. What

1:10:56

does that mean? Mentally healthy? Not having

1:10:58

tons of anxiety and depression

1:11:00

and like healing suicidal and like, you

1:11:02

know, like, like enjoying life,

1:11:06

you know, like really enjoying life and

1:11:08

enjoying our relationship, enjoying being part of

1:11:10

the family, which I think is important

1:11:12

for like mentally healthy kids. You know,

1:11:15

that means working, having a job, that

1:11:17

means having a family, that means whatever

1:11:19

that means for her. Like, you know,

1:11:22

waking up and being excited about the

1:11:25

things she's doing in that day. It's

1:11:27

a beautiful way to end this conversation. Thank you

1:11:29

so much for taking the time. Recently,

1:11:51

I've started to record my reflections

1:11:53

and thoughts about the interview after

1:11:55

the interview. I sit down, highlight

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1:12:07

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