Top 3 Parenting MISTAKES (DO THIS to RAISE Healthy KIDS!: Dr. Becky Kennedy (Transcript)

Like I now ask for a raise. I now can stand up to my partner when they’re mad at me. I now know that it’s okay for me to go away for a weekend with my college friends, even when my partner and my kids are upset, like that’s their feelings. Like I can have empathy and I can still do the things I need to do for myself.

And, and that way I feel like what we’re talking about is a lot of stuff you talk about is actually just, I call it sturdy leadership. And what’s interesting to me is I feel like we have a lot of models for sturdy leadership in the workplace. Like there’s a lot of thoughts now, like you can’t really just yell at people and expect them to get better at work. And I even think that’s like been modernized on the sports field, like the best coaches, like kind of know you got to connect before you correct.

And it was kind of amazing and sad. And yet we’re there, I think hopefully now is like parenting young kids is kind of the last place to modernize where sturdy leadership kind of gets applied and what it really looks like and how it benefits everyone. But that’s really what good inside is.

Connect Before You Correct

LEWIS HOWES: You know, it’s interesting because I don’t think I’ve ever heard that “connect before you correct.” And I just had a flashback to all the coaches that used to scream at me when I would drop a football or miss a basketball shot or just mess something up or I wasn’t paying attention or whatever happened and just screaming at me, belittling me, you know, making me feel less than in front of my peers, my teammates and shaming me to try to get better.

And I remember just feeling like resentful and angry all the time, right? And afraid. Now I would still work hard, but I didn’t come from an emotionally good place. So I didn’t want that to happen again out of fear of shame, as opposed to someone actually sitting down and connecting with me where I did have great coaches also who took the time to connect with me and ask me questions and “Why are you so angry? Why are you reacting like this? What’s going on? Why are you so frustrated? Why did you foul that person that way?” Like, you know, “What is going on?”

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I use sports analogies all the time and “connect before you correct.” There’s a lot of phrases I’ll take credit for. That one’s not mine. I actually can find, I don’t know who said it first, but it’s beautiful. And it gives you an order of operations, right? Where I think about this all the time, like my kid is hitting their brother or my kid lied to my face about something that, you know, was important. Like, I don’t know whether they studied for a test, whatever the behavior is, right?

And I find out and I see them hitting and I just kind of send them to their room or I like take away their iPad or something, which I always say is like the worst thing. Because when you’re a parent, it really is like, now I have to deal with taking away their iPad. I don’t even want to do that. I like when they have iPad time. Nobody wins, like why did I do that, you know?

Ineffective Punishment vs. Connecting and Coaching

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: But I think about a basketball coach and I think about a kid who is missing layups all the time. And I think about watching my kid basketball coach, if that’s my kid. The coach is like, “You go to your room and you come back here when you can make a layup.” And I feel like all the parents would be like, “Why, like why would that even, what’s the theory of why that would be effective?”

Forget like, what is my, you think my kid is now going to their room and Googling how to make a better shot? Like, yes, you might have to pull the kid out of the game, but you probably want to say, “Hey, like this is not your game right now. I believe in you. And like, we’re going to get in the gym tomorrow and get to the bottom of this and figure this out.”

And if that was my kid’s coach, I just don’t know if the parents would say, “That coach is really condoning bad behavior. They’re really encouraging. That coach is making it seem like it’s okay to mislay.” It’s like, it doesn’t make any sense, but we actually have a system of doing that to our kids over and over. And then we wonder why so many teens and adults feel so awful about themselves.

Well, when you reflect back to a kid, that they’re a bad kid, during the stage they’re forming their identity, that will stick with them for a while.

LEWIS HOWES: And it’s hard for them to kind of unwire that, I guess, right, and believe that they’re actually good.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And totally possible. Like, to me, it’s like there’s one thing I ever want someone to take from anything I say is it’s never too late. It is never too late. Repair is amazing. It is never too late. The parent who’s listening now is like, “Oh no, I guess I messed up my kid forever.” You did not. By the way, I sometimes say bad things to my kids too. We’re human. But to me, it’s the starting point of, right, my kid is good inside. That’s why everything we do is called that.

Separating Behavior From Identity

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And to me, that idea isn’t just a phrase that sounds nice. To me, it’s actually a core principle that is very different from a punishment or fear-based approach, which is if I believe my kid is good inside, and I always find visuals helpful. So I look at one hand, I’m like, “This is my kid. This is who they are. That’s their identity. And they are good inside.” And then I look at my other hand very far away and say, “This is their behavior. This is what they did.”

And I would agree with a lot of parents telling me like, oh, they lied to your face. I would agree, like, not great behavior. They hit their sister. Definitely not great behavior. But those things are different. And it’s really important with your hands to keep them separate, because you could then look at one hand and say, “I have a good kid who hit their sister.” And the only reason we want to punish and come down so harshly on our kids is because those hands collapse. But because I see the bad behavior, and I don’t even realize it’s so fast in my brain, I would immediately assume I have a bad kid. That is my kid. It’s collapsed.

And to me, I mean, good inside is more things, but everything else flows from the foundation of like actually separating behavior from identity, which I think you get this, but not everyone does. So it’s important to name, that doesn’t mean condoning the behavior. Like trying to understand behavior, we think means approving of behavior. But trying to understand why my kid is missing a layup, I don’t think anyone thinks means that I think it’s cool that my kid can’t make a layup. They’re different. But that separation is the foundation for everything.

Top Three Things Parents Could Do Differently

LEWIS HOWES: What would you say are the three biggest mistakes of modern parenting today?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Is it okay? I don’t, for some reason, the reason mistakes that when I think about feels very like shame inducing. So it feels like final. So like what are the three things that I want to like miss or things I’d shift?

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah, what are the three things that you think parents could do differently today to have a better connection with their children?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I think that would be number one. Number one is that trying to understand your kid’s bad behavior is the foundation for effectively changing their behavior.

LEWIS HOWES: So understanding it first.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: You can only change what you understand.

LEWIS HOWES: What if you don’t understand it?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s a great thing to acknowledge.

LEWIS HOWES: “I don’t understand why you’re doing this.”

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s exactly right.

LEWIS HOWES: Stop doing it, right?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And if a parent says, I’d be like, “Lewis, that is so beautiful. We know exactly where to start.” And this goes back to not having the skills. Why would you understand a kid’s behavior? It’s very complicated. And so it would be like a certain saying, “I don’t understand how to do this surgery.” And I’d be like, “Yeah, of course. Well, you didn’t go to medical school. Let’s get you into medical school.”

Understand Before Intervening

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: There are places where you can do that, really. So we have to understand before we intervene. Right? I think that’s like a principle of everything.

LEWIS HOWES: So we might have to learn, research, ask questions, feedback from other people, whatever it might be, right?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: A hundred percent. There might be experts. It might be the right community. There’s courses we can take. There’s so many resources right now.

LEWIS HOWES: Good Inside.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: There’s a book. We do a million workshops, right? The reason I do workshops is because I was like, I have this private practice where I see a very limited group of people. And I was like, honestly, at the end of the day, I kind of have some version of the same like 10 to 15 sessions all day long. They’re always about the same topics, right? Slightly different story, but same core things.

And I was like, I would like to democratize access to that. So that’s what my workshops are. They’re just things that would come up in private practice, but to more people. So there’s so many resources. That’s number one.

Our Job is Not to Make Our Kids Happy

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Number two is that our job is not to make our kid happy. That is so important and so counter-cultural.

LEWIS HOWES: Why is our job not to make our kids happy?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Because when we focus on making our kids happy, we actually start to make them fearful and less tolerant of all of the other emotions that will inevitably be part of their life into adulthood. And so when our kid says, I’m going to make this up, like the only one in my class who can’t read. It’s like the most painful moment of the parents. Oh, I feel my kid’s pain, right? And maybe let’s just say it’s true. They really might be.

We have the urge to say, “Everyone reads at their own pace, but you’re amazing at soccer, but you’re so good at math.” I want to make them happy. All that does for my kid is, because during childhood, kids are not just learning about a situation with a parent. They’re taking interactions and they’re making generalizations. Not for one moment, but patterns about what emotions are safe? What emotions can I deal with? What can I tolerate? And what emotions, as soon as I feel them, do I need to turn off right away?

And so when a kid says, “I’m the only one who can’t read,” the truth is, when our kid is adult, they probably won’t say that, but they’ll probably say, “I’m the only one who, whatever it is, didn’t get a job yet. I’m the only one of my friends who didn’t buy them a house.” Whatever it is, we’re always going to feel that way. And so when we make our kid happy, what we actually say to them is, “I am just as scared of this emotion you’re feeling as you are.”

LEWIS HOWES: Wow. And I don’t want to deal with this emotion.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I’m terrified. I want to run away from it. I want to do anything but this. And so what a kid’s circuit is, I feel, let’s say it’s this, I feel less than. Or it could be, I feel jealous. I feel sad. I feel disappointed. And what gets layered next to that in the circuit is my parent’s view, my parent’s avoidance. Those things get put together.

The Goal of Childhood: Resilience over Happiness

The irony is, when you make happiness a goal of childhood, you actually set a kid up for an adulthood of anxiety because they have a range of emotions that they’ve encoded as wrong and fearful. And to me, anxiety actually isn’t a feeling. It’s the experience of wanting to run away from a feeling. And if you-

LEWIS HOWES: Avoiding it, yeah.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: It is, and you can’t really run away from a feeling inside your body. That’s what anxiety is. You’re like, wait, this is not going to win. And so to me, the idea of, we want to help kids become resilient. Resilience over happiness. And resilience comes from being able to tolerate and sit with the widest range of emotions, not constrict ourselves.

Building Resilience in Children

LEWIS HOWES: I interviewed a brain surgeon out here who’s also a neuroscientist, a PhD in neuroscience, but also had done 1,000 brain surgeries. And I said, “What’s the number one skill you wish every human being could learn to be better humans?” And he said, “Emotional regulation.”

Like from doing 1,000 brain surgeries and studying neuroscience, the mind, he was like, “Emotional regulation will support us in being healthier, happier human beings.” And it goes back to what you’re saying, which is learning how to navigate all of the emotions and be with them and feel uncomfortable and sad and know how to manage them, not avoid, run away, be distracted by them, right?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. Because I always joke, when I was in private practice, I saw a lot of 20-year-olds, 30-year-olds, 40-year-olds, and not one of them came to my practice saying, “Dr. Becky, I had the best parents, and those emotions other people feel, like jealous and sad and those hard things, I got rid of them. My parents got rid of them. I’ve never felt them again.” Obviously, has never happened.

But what happened over and over, even though no one said it, but their stories and behavior really exemplified it, was “I am now 23, I’m now 45, and I’m literally no better able to regulate frustration and disappointment and sadness than I was when I was a toddler.”

LEWIS HOWES: Wow.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And but the stakes are higher.

LEWIS HOWES: Way higher as an adult.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Way higher. So emotion regulation, that is the goal of childhood. I mean, that’s the goal of adulthood too, by the way, right? That’s still the goal we’re all working on.

The Millennial Parenting Whisperer

LEWIS HOWES: You’ve been called the millennial parenting whisperer, is that right?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I think Time Magazine wrote that one.

LEWIS HOWES: Time Magazine called you the millennial parenting whisperer. I’ve had Cesar Millan, who’s the dog whisperer on, and people come in to say, “Hey, how do you fix my dog?” And he fixes humans, essentially. He teaches humans how to lead themselves better. And it sounds like parents come to you and say, “How do I fix my kid?” And you’re coming to them and saying, “Well, you need to learn how to be a better leader and heal and reprogram yourself and learn how to regulate your emotions so you can manage these situations.” Would that be accurate?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That is completely accurate. And I think I doubled down on that and say, I think when we have kids, we have this unconscious wish that they’re going to heal us and they trigger us. That’s what happens when you have kids.

LEWIS HOWES: Sorry, say that again.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: We have an unconscious wish that our kids will heal us. And in reality, our kids trigger us.

LEWIS HOWES: Why do we think our kids will heal us?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Because I think in general, we all have the wish that something in the external world, something we can gaze out at, will finally give us the comfort and the sense of safety and security that we’ve always been yearning for. And part of adulthood, I think, involves learning to gaze in, not from a place of “it’s my fault,” but from a place of actually, like, I have the power and it’s hard, but I have the power to do that myself.

LEWIS HOWES: Wow. Oh my gosh. Okay, so-

Building Resilience in Children

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Want to get to the third thing?

LEWIS HOWES: Yes, let’s get to the third thing.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: The third thing I want parents to know, and like, to me, this is, I should have said it’s the first thing. I messed up my order.

LEWIS HOWES: Oh, good. Start over.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: The second thing was resilience over happiness.

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah. And I want to ask you, before you get to the third thing, how do we raise resilient children?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Okay, then this is, I’m excited, I’m excited. We can put the third thing out there. We’ll leave everyone with a cliffhanger. What’s the third thing? This one’s important, that one’s even more important. Okay, so I think, first of all, again, and we have to understand before we intervene.

So how do we build resilience? Well, what is resilience, right? And we have to really understand that. And I think that resilience really is our ability to tolerate hard things. And the word tolerate is important because we all think of the ability to get through it. The getting through happens when it happens. And the truth is, the longer you can tolerate something, not something toxic, that is so not what I’m talking about, or abusive, but the longer you can tolerate something hard, the success is going to find itself and it’s going to be more likely because you were able to stay in the hard place.

LEWIS HOWES: Can you give an example of what this would be like for a parent and a child situation?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Sure, I can give you two different examples very concretely, right? So this is something I teach to a lot of parents in one of my favorite frustration tolerance workshop, which is relevant for school, for everything. So let’s say, and let’s say a three-year-old is doing a puzzle. It’s like, “I can’t do it, you do it for me. You do it for me.” It’s a good example, right? As a parent, I get it. You’ve got home, you’re like, it’s like the last thing I want to do.

I was going to have a nice night with my kid, I get it. But I’m really driven by impact. And so I actually get this sick joy when my kid is on the verge of a meltdown.

LEWIS HOWES: Really?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yes, especially when I’ve been working a lot. Because I’m like, if I’m going to spend 20 minutes with my kid, I’m going to make it count. And it’s nice if I’m there for a pleasant 20 minutes, of course, but if I want to have impact, I literally can picture my impact on him.

LEWIS HOWES: So you’re hoping when you come home that you’re having a breakdown and a temper tantrum in your life. That’s when there’s going to be a big breakthrough, right?

Reframing Frustrating Moments as Opportunities for Breakthroughs

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: But in a way, I think that’s a really important reframe. It’s like, especially if you’re a parent who travels a lot or you’re not around a lot to be like, wait, like I can have impact. It’s not easy. It’s certainly not convenient. That’s the one word parents need to know. Having kids is not fun or convenient in most situations. It’s not at all. And this is like your Superbowl right now. I guess this is your opportunity, you know?

Because my kid and how I respond to the puzzle is not going to remember anything about the puzzle. Their body, not from that one time, but from patterns is going to be developing expectations around what can I do when things get hard? Or yeah, and what should I expect? What is my self-talk? A parent’s words become a child’s self-talk.

LEWIS HOWES: A parent’s words become a child’s self-talk, wow. So what your parents say to you over and over again is what you say to yourself.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Especially when paired with an emotional situation. So when I’m frustrated, did I have someone come? And I always say like frustration is now like super bright. Do I expect someone to come and turn off the light? No frustration. Or do I expect someone to come and like by the way they’re present with me, they dim, they dim the light. So it’s just not so blinding.

LEWIS HOWES: Not so attached.

Emotion Regulation is Like a Dimmer Switch

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Like that’s the best it gets. There are drugs that will do that better for you, but that’s not what we recommend for people long-term. Like when we’re talking about true emotion regulation, we’re talking about a dimmer. Because it’s impossible to deal with something when it’s a 10 out of 10. Even nine out of 10 is really hard. Once you get to an eight or a seven, it’s not pleasant, it’s not convenient, but you start to be able to tolerate it. And from there you can get maybe to a six or a five. That’s the goal for our kid.

Modeling Frustration Tolerance with a Puzzle

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: So I’ll model this. My kid is freaking out about the puzzle. Now to be clear, are there some times that I’d be like I’m giving myself permission to do the puzzle because I can’t deal with this? Of course, I’m a normal human. Everybody has to give that permission themselves.

LEWIS HOWES: So Dr. Becky, you’re not a perfect parent?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Like zero. No, no, no, no. Everyone listen to what I’m saying. Don’t think like I actually do this all the time.

LEWIS HOWES: Every day you come home at night after a long day, you’re just like okay, what do you need right now? And you’re stressed out. Okay, I’m going to do this puzzle with you.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And that will eventually get to point three. And I wouldn’t wish Dr. Becky as the real parent on any kid. It’s just like you learn the most. I’m sure you do in life. You learn the most from people who struggle and repair.

LEWIS HOWES: Of course.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: But here’s this like moment. And I can go through an older kid example too because it’s not as obvious. But like my kid is frustrated. My kid’s going to be frustrated for the rest of their life in higher stakes situations. They’re going to be given something from a boss and they’re like “I don’t know how to do this.” And like I actually don’t, first of all, I definitely don’t want my kid when they’re 25 to call me and be like “Can you do my project for me?” I definitely don’t want that. I don’t want them to be indignant. “How could this person?”

I want them to have some type of weight. “I don’t know what I’m going to do, but I have a feeling I can just think this through or get a little further.” So that’s what I want there. That is not unrelated to the pattern of how I interact now.

LEWIS HOWES: Wow.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: So I could say “Here’s the piece.” Once in a while I do that. Not great for long-term resilience. So here’s what I might do, okay? And I’m going to, my kid is starting to have a tantrum. And even he’s saying “Do the piece. I can’t do it.” I’m saying “Sweetie, sweetie, this is so hard. This is so hard.” And I have real kids. It’s not like they are going to say to me, “Oh, that’s so helpful to hear.” That’s not going to happen. They’re going to still freaking out. But their reaction is different than the power of my intervention. Also two separate things.

I might say this. I might say, “Oh, so many pieces. I don’t know where it goes. Does it go here? Does it go here? Does it go here?” And if my kid is like, “Do it for me.” I really, and I’ve said this to my kid. “Listen, sweetie, I’m not going to do it for you. Here’s why. I know you’re capable of figuring this out. And the best feeling in the world is the feeling you get when you think you can do something. And then you wait a little bit and you see that you can do a little bit more and I’m not going to take that feeling away from you. And so I’ll take a deep breath with you. We can take a break. But like, I know you can do this, okay?”

And when I hear people be like, “Does that work?” Yes. I mean, doesn’t that work for adults? Imagine you’re having a hard time at your job and you’re saying to your manager, like “You do this one.” And they’re like, “Listen, I’m not because I know you’re capable. And like, it’s okay if it takes some time. It’s okay if you take a break. I can be here to like kind of think about where could that piece go? Ooh, is that an edge? Ooh, edge is in the middle. Probably not in the puzzle. Where do, oh, you’re right. Edges go on the outside. Look at you.”

My kid experiences the win. And what their body learns is when I get frustrated, I don’t look for the answer for someone to take that away from me and give me immediate success.

Defining Entitlement

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: By the way, if we really want to get into it, you want to know what entitlement is. Entitlement is the accumulated experience of feeling frustrated and then having someone else give you immediate success.

LEWIS HOWES: Wow. Without you having to do it.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And I’ll never forget seeing this family of 16-year-olds who was like horrified their kid had a full-on tantrum at 16 because they weren’t flying first class. And they were like, every parent’s nightmare. And they’re like, “How do we get entitled kids?” The most well-meaning parents. But this is a kid, every time something didn’t go his way. And I think money makes this more complicated because you can buy kind of your way out of kids’ frustration. You can. So it’s almost hard to resist that if that’s an option.

But every time, it was like frustration, success. Frustration, a new option. Frustration, “I figured it out because someone else does something for me.” Well, when you finally get to the point at 16, if that’s your circuit, and then you’re frustrated because something’s surprising, it’s not really about first class, your body actually is like, “WTF? I literally was not built to tolerate this.” And then it ends up looking awful, but really, it’s really vulnerable, right?

LEWIS HOWES: Super vulnerable.

Three Lines Every Parent Needs to Know

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: So I want to give you one more example of resilience. There’s three lines I think every parent needs to know. And I honestly can almost reframe that thing. I think every person in a relationship needs to know. Whether you’re in a romantic relationship, a work relationship, it’s the same stuff. Because another resilience-building moment I can imagine, it’s kind of like what I said to you earlier, let’s say your kid’s a little older. “I’m the only kid who doesn’t know how to read chapter books or I’m the only one of my friends who didn’t get into honors math.”

LEWIS HOWES: So teenagers.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yeah, let’s say that. “I’m the only kid who didn’t get into honors math.” Or “I tried out for the lacrosse team, all my friends made it, and I’m the only one.”

And I didn’t make it, yeah. Everyone, me included. Okay, my first instinct is to, quote, make my kids feel better. “Oh, you’re going to make it next year. Or you made varsity soccer and none of them made soccer.” Right, whatever the thing is. Or we say, “You’re going to see it’s not a big deal.” Okay, so here’s the image, I’m big on images.

LEWIS HOWES: The image is going to matter in 20 years or whatever year you’re in.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: We say, right? The truth is we kind of say it because we’re uncomfortable. And we’re just kind of making a kid a pawn in our game. But if you picture your kid on a bench, and if you picture them kind of in a garden, that’s what I like to say. That’s like the parable for life, the garden. And there’s a bench. And essentially when your kid says, “I’m the only one who didn’t make the lacrosse team,” let’s say they’re sitting on the bench of, what is it, disappointment, or maybe it’s embarrassment, or boasts, or feeling surprised and let down. I don’t know, it’s something like that. That’s the bench.

And as parents, we tend to have two instincts when our kid is on the bench of some type of distress. We either want to tell them that their bench isn’t their bench. “That’s not a big deal.” Even though they’re like, “But I’m-“

LEWIS HOWES: “But that’s how I feel.”

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: “But I’m on it. Like I’m nervous.” Or we kind of see a sunnier bench, and we’re like, “Just come with me,” right? “But you’re the best at soccer.” And so we’re like, right? And both of those reduce resilience. Because resilience is kind of like your ability in that garden of life to like, whatever bench you find yourself on, you’re able to sit in it. Not drown in it, but sit in it. Like, because when you’re there, you inevitably will be. Like, you’re not terrified of it.

You’re not spending all your energy like running away from a bench. Like, if you saw that, you’d be like, “Dude, like, what? Just a bench,” you know? And so how do we help our kid feel like, essentially like, it’s okay to be them, no matter what bench they’re on. Or it’s really, it’s okay to be you, even when you don’t make the lacrosse team. Because that’s really the essence. That’s the core thing that resilience is about.

LEWIS HOWES: So how long should they sit on that bench of emotion?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Great. So to me, these three lines will play that out. So to me, as soon as your kid says something distressing to you, we have those two urges. We have to recognize them. We’re not bad people. Just, I always say, say hi to them. Hello, urge to make it better. And here’s to me is the first line every parent needs in their toolbox. I’m so glad you’re talking to me about this.

LEWIS HOWES: To the child. Say that to the child right away. When they’re stressed out, when they’re angry, upset, shameful, any unsettling emotion that you don’t enjoy yourself, say back, “I’m so glad you’re telling me this right now.”

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. I’m so glad we’re talking about this. Because, and again, if we think about it in an adult context, if I was like, “I’m so mad at my husband, he never, whatever it is, he never is home for bedtime. And he forgot the one thing I said.” And if I was like, “Hey, you’re never doing anything around the house, then I’m really frustrated.” If he said to me, “You know what, Becky, well, you’re upset, but I’m so glad you’re telling me about this.”

You know relationships, I’d be like, I think we’re good now. I don’t even know what was I upset about. Because what someone’s really saying to you when they say that is this feeling in you that you’re feeling is real. And I still want to be in a relationship with you when you’re feeling that way.

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah, I still love and accept you.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. And so our kids need to absorb from us, from a resilience perspective, my parent can tolerate this part of me before I learn to tolerate this part of me. So that’s line one.

Line two, I believe you. I always say like, if there’s one line that would be probably the most healing in people’s childhoods and the most confidence building from childhood, it’s that. And it’s so simple. Like, because when you say to someone.

LEWIS HOWES: What if you really don’t believe them though?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Well, there’s always something you should believe, right? Because like, they’re like, “I didn’t make the lacrosse team and I’m never going to be able to go to school again or something like that. It’s so embarrassing,” right? I’m not saying, “I guess you can never go to school again.” That’s not what I’m believing.

LEWIS HOWES: Right, I believe that’s how you feel.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. And you don’t have to say that because underneath our kids’ extreme verbalizations, we get very caught up in their words. They represent a world. We believe the world. And so even though “I’m never going to school again,” I would say, “I believe it feels that bad.” And because I do.

LEWIS HOWES: It does.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And it’s like, it is. It’s like, he’s on that bench, right?

LEWIS HOWES: Especially if it’s someone at that age who doesn’t have the skills of emotional resilience or they’re building it still and they haven’t figured out how to manage those emotions. It seems horrifying.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. And if my kid says, “I’m the only one who didn’t get a chapter book. You know, I got this picture book and everyone else was reading chapter books.” It’s so easy to say, “Oh, we can’t be the only one.” We actually say to our kids all the time, which terrifies me. I don’t believe you. And if we wonder why people don’t trust their emotions, it’s because when they felt emotions that were strong, they received, not one time, over and over, a message of, “I know your feelings better than you know.”

LEWIS HOWES: Or “Just suck it up,” or “It’s not that big a deal,” or just kind of undermining their emotions.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. And so when I think about, “I believe you,” I do. Like, I have a daughter, I have three kids, I have a daughter and like, I don’t know how I always picture like, she’s at some like, college party and some like, kind of uncomfortable situation, let’s just say.

LEWIS HOWES: How old is she now?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: How old is she now? She’s nine, but let’s just say she’s now.

LEWIS HOWES: Okay, yeah, yeah, in the future, yeah, yeah.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: She’s 20 and someone’s like, I don’t know, “Come back with me,” unless, if she wants to, great. But let’s say she doesn’t.

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: You know in those situations, it’d be like, “It’s not a big deal,” you know? Do I want her self-talk to be, “I do have a history of other people knowing what I’m feeling better than I know what I’m feeling?” Or do I want her to be like, “Like, I know I don’t want to go, I like, I’m going to cry, like, I believe myself. And I, this person is telling me I want something else, but like, how could this person know? Because I know what I’m feeling.” And those things are completely related. And so, that’s the second line.

LEWIS HOWES: Wow.

“Tell Me More”

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And then the third line is equally simple. It’s just, “Tell me more.” Tell me more. Oh, and then, “Oh, so they posted the list on the pin, wait, so everyone was there. Oh my goodness, everyone was there.” And let’s say I knew my son had a crush on someone. “Oh, that person was there too.” And you were like so excited. You were going to like be on the lacrosse team. And that person saw it.

LEWIS HOWES: Saw that you failed and.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Exactly, so I’m just like fleshing out the story. And now at all these moments that my kid was in pain, which by the way, part of the pain is probably that they were alone. Kind of infusing myself in every moment. I’m adding connection, I’m adding believing. And here’s the thing about the bench. My experience, when you kind of go through this, your kid gets off the bench before you do, every time.

LEWIS HOWES: Really?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And then you’re like, “Oh, I guess, where are they going next?” And when they need you.

LEWIS HOWES: They come back.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yeah, you find them on that next bench.

LEWIS HOWES: Interesting. So they’ll get off this bench faster of emotions if you go through one or all three of these questions or these phrases, right?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: They really do. And look, we can’t just like say them. Like if I’m sitting at my kid, I’m like, “I believe you. Tell me more.” Like they’re going to be like, “What are you doing? Did you hear that on some podcast,” you know? So that won’t help, right?

We process intention and tone before language. So that has to be there. And like, I don’t want to say it’s some magic. And to me, when do kids get off it? Like, I don’t know, we don’t feel feelings for whatever amount of time, you know? But if like, I get it. Like parents are sometimes worried, like, “Am I going to stick them there?” Like, feelings don’t give us problems as much as feeling alone in our feelings give us problems.

LEWIS HOWES: Feeling alone in our feelings give us problems.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s what makes us stuck.

LEWIS HOWES: Interesting.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: We’re literally stuck because we’re alone. Like humans are, we’re beings of connection and attachment. Attachment’s what’s driving us. So we’re always attachment seeking. And when we’re not getting the attachment we need, we will get stuck and frozen. Like you were kind of referring to, you’re frozen. And so it’s interesting, we have such a fear of if I connect, I’ll keep them there longer. It’s actually aloneness that keeps them when they’re longer and actually makes them intensify things.

Because when we don’t get our emotions taken seriously by someone, everyone, forget being a kid, adult too, you escalate the expression because you’re that much more desperate to be taken seriously. Which usually makes you go, “I can’t, you’re so dramatic.” Okay, you know, now they have to escalate.

LEWIS HOWES: Even more.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Oh yeah, exactly.

LEWIS HOWES: Until you pay attention to me.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Exactly, which is why the, “I believe you.” And it can be healing too and repair. Like, “Hey, you know, like you’re still stuck on this lacrosse thing.” Because I get it from my parents. They’re like, “They didn’t make lacrosse four months ago.”

LEWIS HOWES: Dr. Becky and yourself. They’re still talking about it.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Right, but if you just assume, and it’s not right, but it’s, it might be effective, right? Like there’s a million ways to interpret things. I always say, like, you can be right or you can be effective. Like I urge the effective, you know?

So just say like, “You know what? I don’t feel like I ever fully understand how awful that day was. I’m just going to sit in your bed. And the idea of sitting on a bench, like I think that’s usual. It’s like, sit on the bed with your peen or,” you know, “and I’m just going to listen.” And I would say to your kid, “Not listen to judge or give you an idea.” Because actually that’s not listening. “Listen to understand.” And that just means “I want to hear you. I may ask things to clarify. But what I’ve never said to you, and I should have said is, I believe you that that day felt as bad as you said it did. And like, not like normal bad, not like I went to my favorite ice cream store and got an ice cream and it dropped off my cone. Not like a billion times worse than that.”

And I just, how parents, I feel like a parent’s going to be like, “My kid really, my kid started crying. Or my kid, like something released and they softened.” When you know this, like at our core, we are desperate to be believed. That’s like our most core need.

LEWIS HOWES: It’s true.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Just believed and seen. And like, so many of these times when a parent feels like, “My kid is stuck in that.” The thing that we need to shift is actually taking the opposite approach. We’re just like, “You don’t need to feel like that anymore. That was four months.” It’s actually sticking them more. It’s just like, wait.

LEWIS HOWES: Staying in the emotion more. Say, “Let’s talk about it more. Tell me more about this.”

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yeah, just tell me more. I must not have understood something. And then of course it’s helpful to have language. Look, this is super, super helpful. Like kind of, I wouldn’t say this to my kid, we’re going to time box this. You know, like things that, you know, and you know.

LEWIS HOWES: Talk about it for what, 30 minutes?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Sure, I always like talk about, when I used to work with adults, like who are really kind of looping in their anxiety. Like we’re going to have a worry window for like the top of an hour, for 10 minutes. You’re going to literally just focus on everything you’re worried about. And like, if you ever have a productive, hopeful thought, you’re actually not, you’re going to say, “Sorry, no, worry time. No, no, I’m only negative. Too stressed, only right now. I’m going to write it all down.”

And then during the other 50 minutes, you’re going to say, “Hi, worries.” And don’t worry, like kind of like when you have multiple kids, like “You don’t even want my attention. You don’t have my full attention. Like you’re going to get my full attention at two, we’re 15 minutes away.” And our feelings actually, they kind of do respect that. And I think kids would too. So “I want to talk to you about lacrosse.

And I want to be honest, I want to talk about it. I haven’t been the best listener. I really haven’t. I’m going to do that differently. You’re going to see, it’s not going to be perfect, but you’ll see a difference. At 110, that’s what I’m going to call it. Not because you’re not allowed to have feelings after that, but feelings are tricky. Like it’s super helpful to know them. And it’s helpful for feelings to know they even have a boundary.”

And so at that point, you know, like we’re going to do something else, or at least I’m going to do something else. Yeah, we can do that.

LEWIS HOWES: Now, everything you say here makes a lot of sense to me. And I fully believe and understand that this is a great approach to building relationship with anyone, right? A partner, a child, anyone. But I think about, you know, our grandparents’ generation, or our great-grandparents’ generation that didn’t have the conveniences, the ease, the speed of things that we do, the flexibility, the just pay for something and you have a solution done in seconds, the distractions.

And I could see them saying, you know, “What are you guys talking about? This is, what do you mean? Have all these loving conversations and really sit down for 30 minutes and let them talk about nonsense or whatever.” You know, I could just think about our grandparents’ generation, some of them, thinking, “What does this even mean? Because we don’t have that luxury to do that. We’ve got to work hard. You know, there’s wars happening. We’ve got child, all this stuff we’re dealing with than trying to deal with a simple little emotion.”

I’m all for not being that way. I’m all for having loving, vulnerable conversations. But again, what I’m hearing you say is learning how to prepare individuals to be resilient is going to be one of the greatest skills that they can learn. But it seems like it’s really tough these days to build resilient children into young adults and adults with all the ease, flexibility, and distractions we have.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I mean, I think you’re absolutely right. It is really hard and I think it doubles down on the reason why parents are like, “Okay, where’s my school, where’s my resources?” Because this is a hard world. So there’s a couple things I say. If someone ever said to me, like, “Becky, this does not make sense. This is like, oh, you’re talking about lacrosse feelings forever,” I really mean this. If they were in the room saying that to me, 0% of me would even want to be like, here’s my argument back.

I really, I’m a deeply curious person. I really am, I’d be like, “Oh, and what would that lead to? What would you be worried would happen? What would we be missing there? Oh, that’s a good point. Oh, I see it this way.” There’s nothing I love more than engaging in people with very different opinions for me, not because I see it as a match, like I actually learn a ton. So I have deep respect for people who don’t think that way and would say that’s the way the conversation would go.

Feelings Are Not Soft

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: One thing I’ll say though is we have this idea and some passed on to us generation after generation that like feelings are soft. It’s just like bananas to me, like no part of me, like when I think about my style, my approach, like the word softer, people actually say to me often because there’s a whole field of gentle parenting, like “Tell me about gentle parenting.”

I don’t even know exactly how you define gentle parenting. Gentle is like one of the lowest on the list of adjectives I’d use to describe myself. That doesn’t mean mean, there’s a lot between, but gentle, soft, like that is so not me, right? That’s just not my style, it’s not my approach.

LEWIS HOWES: What is your style of parenting?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I call, I mean, if I had to put a name to it and I hate boxing myself in, but it would be like the word “sturdy” is it. And to me, sturdiness is your ability to both be connected to someone else and stay connected to yourself at the same time.

And the irony, and this is what I think is so interesting, we feel before we think. Our feelings are what give us basic information about survival, about danger, and about what we need. That’s what our feeling is. Like anger is a feeling, most of us haven’t learned to manage it, that’s a different topic, but anger is a feeling that tells you what you need. That’s useful information to live a life in line with your values.

Like feelings being soft, like I feel like someone said that thousands of years ago, and for some reason, like it doesn’t, it just doesn’t make any sense to me. It’s the first thing. What first thing in a circuit is soft? It’s primary, it’s literally primary. Now, most of us were not raised to manage our emotions, but the way I see it from the start is kids are born with all of the emotions and none of the skills to manage emotions. And for generations, we’ve said, the emotions are the problem. The lack of skills are the problem.

Because the emotions, they’re going to beat us every day. They’re inside of us, you can’t get rid of them. You can’t beat them, join them, like that’s soft. It’s like something we’ve justified to ourselves so we don’t feel weak.

LEWIS HOWES: Well, the funny thing is parents, they don’t like the emotions of the child, but they can’t manage their own emotions a lot of times.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Well, that’s actually what it is. Like when we say, let’s say my kid is melting down because classic, let’s say, toddler, I cut their grilled cheeses.

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: You know, where I cut it in a triangle instead of directly.

LEWIS HOWES: Or you’re going to cut the edges off.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Exactly, that’s easier, at least I can now do that. Or I did cut the crust off, now I’m trying to like tape it back together or something, you know?

Right, so my kid’s having a tantrum. And we say to ourselves, and it sounds convincing, “My kid is so difficult.” We’re not reacting to our kid’s tantrum. We are reacting to what happens inside of us when our kid has a tantrum. And the only reason we want to shut down the tantrum is because we want to shut down the feeling we don’t have the skill to manage.

LEWIS HOWES: Oh.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And so again, like.

LEWIS HOWES: That we’re inferior.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yeah, like we actually like, we’re like, you have to stop because our body actually is like, “I don’t know how to tolerate the feeling in me.”

LEWIS HOWES: Oh my goodness.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: In me, which kind of why it all goes back to our, not our fault, but our skill building.

LEWIS HOWES: And our ability to heal.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Our ability to heal. And kind of this reframing, like, I would love someone to come out and someone like more, you know, stereotypically masculine to be like, maybe emotions aren’t soft. Maybe they’re pretty, pretty tough, those. You know, like, maybe that’s like our core.

It is our core, you know? Like, and the other thing about being soft, and I always have to say this, like, I think about the situation where we like, dole out random punishments to our kids. Like my kid is having this tantrum, and I’m like, “Go to your room! No iPads for the week,” or “No dessert!” That is, that is freaking soft to me. Like, that is desperate. No parent is doing that from a place of groundedness.

Like, I’m the CEO of my company. Like, if one of my employees was like acting out in some way, and I was like, “Go to your room and no lunch for a week!” Do you think everyone around me would be like, “Becky is kicking ass. Like, what an amazing,” they’d be like, “Wow.”

LEWIS HOWES: She’s breaking down in front of us, yeah.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: She’s breaking down. Literally.

LEWIS HOWES: She’s kind of like a leader, yeah. Literally.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: She’s desperate.

LEWIS HOWES: Wow, is that what they said to you last week, or?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: No, but like, when people ask me that, it’s like, guess what I lead with? The same principles. Like, my job as a leader in that situation is I might have to set a boundary, which is something we could talk about, because I love talking about boundaries, and I think most people get them wrong.

And I might have to connect with that employee after. Maybe the employee’s always interrupting me or something. But, like, sending someone away, or like, taking away something random. Like, it’s just, I don’t know why that’s a sign of, like, awesome leadership. It’s a sign of desperation, and in that way, I think that way of parenting is super soft.

The Best Way to Teach Lessons

LEWIS HOWES: So what’s the best way to, I don’t know if you want to call it punish your children, but what is the best way to create a lesson within them through either punishment or something else?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Great. And I want to ask your first question, because it’s what I get. So my kid is just saying, “What’s a good punishment? Or how do I give a good punishment? Or I don’t do punishments, but I do do consequences.” Whatever they say, right?

LEWIS HOWES: Right, right, right. Boundaries, whatever it is.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. And to me, this actually gets to the core of why I started writing, right? Because I was trained in a very different way of working with parents. It was all punishments, timeouts, rewards, sticker charts, ignoring, praise. It’s kind of like, praise the good to get more of the good. Punish or ignore the bad to get less of the bad. And when I went through this very esteemed program, to be honest, my first reaction, I was like, “This is amazing.”

LEWIS HOWES: The program taught you these strategies.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yes, yes. This is probably still the gold standard out there to teach psychologists for how to work with parents who work with kids, 100%. And what happens is it lights up the left part of your brain, because it’s so linear, and it’s so seemingly logical.

I don’t think it’s logical when you break it down, but you’re like, “That’s right. I’m going to get more of the good behavior. I’m going to get less of the bad behavior.” And so it all kind of made sense at the time. But then I think what happened in my private practice is I would, I was teaching parents these ways. They’d come to me and “My kid is doing something that would deserve a punishment.” I’d say, “Okay, I’m going to teach you how to give a timeout. Here’s exactly what you’re doing.

There’s a protocol, and here’s the sticker chart program. You’re going to put them on, and when they do this, I want you to give them praise in this way, and when they do this, I just want you to kind of ignore them like they’re not there.” It’s this whole, it’s like raising kids through behavioral control. People don’t say that, but it’s kind of what it is. But I taught this, and while I was teaching it, I started having my own kids.

LEWIS HOWES: It sounds like it’s kind of like training animals.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Except what’s really interesting is I started to, I said that a couple times, and actually, some of the more modern people who do animal training are like, “Please don’t say that. We actually don’t, we don’t train dogs that way anymore.” And I was like, “Wow, we’ve elevated dogs.”

LEWIS HOWES: Dogs are beyond that now. Isn’t that crazy? They’re like, “That’s beneath our dogs.”

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yeah, because our kids are our most, like least respected citizens, right? We don’t realize that they actually have the same needs as us, I guess dogs do too.

But so I was in session one day, and honestly, for probably the last six months, like the way I would say it is I was saying this, and my brain was like, “Yes, I know, yes, it makes so much sense. I’m helping these people, and it’s so clear. It’s just so clear,” and when kids do something bad, I’m just going to say it. It feels, it does feel good to give a punishment or a time out, because you’re like, “I just did something,” and you kind of get to like vomit your frustration onto them, like that’s all it really is. You’re like, “Now I don’t have to feel bad, I’m just going to put it on you.”

So I get it, and I was teaching it, and this feeling, I just couldn’t describe it, it’s like my body was just like rising. Like it was first like, “I don’t know about this,” and I was like, “Okay,” and like, “I really don’t know about this.” And I was like, “Well, what else is there?” And I remember having, I was like, “I don’t know. I don’t know what else is there.” So I kept having these sessions, and then one day, these parents came, and I was teaching them how to give a time out, and like, it truly was one of those, I would say out of body, but it was a massively in body experience that like that feeling got so loud in me, that’s the only way I can describe what actually happened, that I couldn’t finish the teaching.

And I just said to them, “This is going to sound really weird, but I don’t believe what I’m telling you,” literally. And I’ll never forget their look. And they were just like, “Seriously, like you came very highly recommended.”

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah, we paid you a lot of money for this session.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: We paid you a lot of money. And I was like, “I will give you back your money.” And they’re like, “Yes, you will.” And I was like, “Of course.” And I was like, “And come back in like a couple of weeks, I’d have to figure something out.” And they were like, “We will not be coming back.” I was like, “And I do not blame you. Like, this is a very weird experience, I’m sorry.”

It’s actually funny, like with everything I’ve done now, I keep being like, I think they’re going to reach out to me one day. I don’t know, I’ll let you know. But it just was like, I didn’t feel right. And there’s all of this evidence for it. I’m a believer in evidence, and I love science, but I’m always thinking like it works.

Like works, what does work mean? I think this gets to the core of your question. Like, does work mean like it is an intense reaction? Does work mean that if I happen to have a people pleasing kid who is very attentive to my gaze and hates to disappoint me, that they’ll change their behavior for that reason? By the way, they will have a whole host of other problems by the time they’re adults.

LEWIS HOWES: Really? What would those problems be for kids like that who just want to please their parents constantly?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s the form of an attachment they formed. And so they end up going to adulthood, not only being with, but actually seeking out and being attracted to people who are like, “Tell me I’m good. Tell me I’m good for you.” And what I want, what’s going on for me doesn’t matter. My safety comes from making sure you are pleased with me.

LEWIS HOWES: Wow.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I don’t have to tell you the type of relationships, right? But that, and it’s not so like, and that’s what’s going to happen, never too late. But like, that’s not something I think every, I’m going to say, especially like mom I know and woman I know is trying to like undo a lot of that. So, you know, I’ll never forget a clinical supervisor saying like, “You know what else would work for kids?” Because I remember he earlier than me was skeptical about all these like timeouts. He’s like, “Every time my kid did something bad, I made them sleep on the New York City street. Like, but I don’t know if I had evidence to show that that worked, if that’s evidence to brag about.”

I’ll never forget. I’m like, “That’s a good point. Like, what do we mean? Why do we have to like be a little more critical,” right? And I just remember in the session being like, I know there’s evidence and I don’t discount all of it. And it’s not like all so bad. I’m not a rigid thinker, but musicians sound so cheesy. But like, what about the evidence in my body that this is wrong?

I don’t know if they have superior evidence. It’s not, but like, what about that? And what about the evidence I have from my private practice with adults where I watch them change their lives based on an approach I use with them that is a 180 degree difference from what I’ve been telling parents to do with their kids. Like, what about that?

And like, and then what ended up happening is I was like, I’m going to take this very like first principles approach to parenting, like where you strip back every assumption, anything that could be assumption. You’re like, “No, no.” And what are you left with? And I was left with one thing. One, because there’s all these assumptions. If you don’t punish a behavior, it’s like you’re saying it’s okay.

LEWIS HOWES: You’re going to continue, yeah, yeah.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Exactly. When kids do bad things, you have to punish. Like, and I was like, “I think that’s an assumption. Like, that’s an assumption.” Again, because like, if I wasn’t my nicest to my husband, and he’s like, “I have to punish you.” I’d be like, I don’t think anyone would be like that.

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah, I’m not going to speak to you for a week.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yeah, I don’t think anyone would be like, “You have a wonderful husband.” Like, no one would think that. It’d be concern for me. And so I was left with one thing. It was just like, kids are good inside. And there is a difference between good inside identity and bad behavior. And I’ve always been very attracted to gaps that don’t make sense because it’s where you can like think and wonder.

And I just started asking questions. “Why would good kids do bad things? Why would good people, why do good people do bad things?” And then I came up with this phrase like, “Well, what would be my most generous interpretation?” And to me, this is like a massive skill an adult would do. Like, what is my most generous interpretation of why my employee is coming in late? What is my most generous interpretation of why my kid is jumping on the couch even though I looked at them? And I said, “Please stop jumping on the couch.” And they looked at me and they smiled.

I know my least generous interpretation because we come up with that fast. Because we’re like, “Well, my kid’s a sociopath.” And it’s like so fast. And every parent’s like, “I think that all the time” because we go there. And then we of course interact with our kid based on that interpretation, which of course you then send your kid to their room.

So what is my most generous interpretation? Everyone came back to the same thing. I have a good kid who doesn’t have the skills. They don’t have the skills. They’re struggling. I have a kid who’s having a hard time, not giving me a hard time. And the pathway you take from having a hard time versus giving me a hard time could not be more different. And you ask different questions.

When parents say to me, “What’s the punishment?” It’s like, to me, a question is like a road you’re asking someone to walk down with you in life. That’s how I think about questions. For me, when parents ask me that question, I’m like, “That’s not a road I’m going to walk down. It’s not going to lead us to a productive place. There’s a different road I can walk down with you, whether it’s like, I wonder why we think punishment is the right thing.”

But even more practically, let’s say it’s the jumping on the couch. What’s the most generous interpretation here? And I’m not a softy. Again, I’m very practical. I want change for kids’ behavior. I have a little window that I can be tolerant. I get it. I’m all for these wins that last. But then I would just ask a different question, not what punishment, but what skill, literally, would my kid need so that the next time this happens, they actually have a new skill to use as opposed to being punished for not having had that skill?

Same thing with a football player. Your quarterback is, I don’t know, constantly throwing interceptions. I guess you could punish the quarterback.

LEWIS HOWES: Or teach him new skills.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: But why, then, would the quarterback do anything differently the next time they were under that condition? Like, why? That’s where the logic breaks down. Or I can, in practice, be like, “Every time, I don’t know, whatever it is, this happens, we’ve noticed your pattern. And so, actually, in practice, we’re going to practice that. We’re going to pause you. And we’re going to have you notice what you’re about to do. And I’m going to teach you something else.”

LEWIS HOWES: You just trigger something in me. It’s like, when I would get screamed at by the coaches that I felt like were less effective, when I would drop the ball. They were like, “Why did you do that? Catch the ball.” It’s like, you think I’m trying to drop the ball? I’m not trying to drop the ball.

But now, I’m going to go out there the next time and “Don’t drop the ball this time.” It’s like, now I’m anxious. Now I’m nervous. Now everyone’s watching. Now there’s higher stakes. There’s pressure. And I’m going to try to do my best. And if I drop it again, it’s just like, now I’m a failure. It’s not empowering me to be better. It’s not teaching me a skill. It’s not saying, “Okay, the goal is for you to catch the ball. Let’s talk about what might’ve happened for you. What were you thinking? What were you feeling? Do you need more,” whatever skills you need. So I like this approach to addressing the skill or the lesson or something to be taught as opposed to blaming, shaming, or punishing.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yeah, and again, to me, it’s this 0% soft. It’s just like how people change. And to me, the phrase “same team.” It’s leadership. And I think same team is a helpful phrase to get in that mindset. Like, I feel like if a coach said to you, like, “Lewis, we’re on the same team. And Lewis, like, I know you know you’re supposed to catch the ball. You do not need me to tell you that. Like, we don’t say that.”

Like, our kids know that they shouldn’t be hitting. So, but if you think about that, that can anger parents. “They know better.” And frankly, I know better than to scroll my phone before bed.

LEWIS HOWES: Sure, sure. They’ll do it, right?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: So you approach them and like, “Hey, Lewis, we’re on the same team. And I know you know this.” I mean, this is like a helpful phrase even to think. “There’s something that’s getting in your way, this game. I don’t really know what it is, but I do know we’re going to break it down together and figure it out.” How are you going to feel? I mean, like.

LEWIS HOWES: I feel a lot better. Oh, he’s on my side or she’s on my side. They see what I’m up to. You know, they’re with me in the pain, whatever it might be.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. And I don’t think you think, I think my coach thinks it’s fine if I drop the next ball. Like, no one thinks that. You’re just like, now you have an opportunity to change. So if we get this jumping on the couch example, because I think it’s like a.

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah, it’s a good one. It’s a good one.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And it actually brings us to boundaries, which is one of my favorite life topics. Okay, because as much as I like feelings, I like boundaries. Because this is where we’ve gone a little too far, some people. People are like, “Okay, I’m not punishing my kid. Their feelings matter.” But then it’s like, can feelings like drive decision making? And that is.

LEWIS HOWES: It drives decisions for parents and the whole family, right?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Equally as bad for kids as sending them to their room. So validating feelings is an incomplete parenting strategy. I will go on the record and say that. Validating feelings is an incomplete parenting strategy. It’s part of the strategy. Yes, but it cannot be the whole thing.

LEWIS HOWES: And also to pause there, because I want to hear the final there. But when parents allow the children to dictate how the family is run, what happens then?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Terrifying for kids. So like to me, this is how I describe it, okay? So imagine you’re on a plane and you’re a passenger, okay? Are you actually a pilot?

LEWIS HOWES: Are you a pilot?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I’m not a pilot. Well, then I’m like, I’m going to have to pick a different metaphor. Okay, so you’re a passenger and I’m the pilot and it’s very turbulent. And you’re looking around like all the passengers are like freaking out, right? So pilot one would be like classic punishment parent. And they’d get on, it’s not called a loudspeaker.

LEWIS HOWES: The intercom?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: The intercom, thank you. And they’d say like, “Everyone back there, stop. You’re so dramatic. You’re making a big deal of nothing and you’re ruining my flight.” Something like that, right? That’s what we said, okay? It’s like, “You’re ruining my dinner out.” Whatever we said.

Meanwhile, if I’m thinking about you passenger, you’re like, “First of all, like does this person know it’s pretty turbulent? Like they didn’t even mention that, cause it is. Second, like all it takes is passengers being upset to kind of make my pilot like go off the deep end. That’s scary.” You’re more scared.

Okay. But pilot two is the opposite extreme. Everyone back there is scared and you know what? It is scary. And I’m just going to open the cockpit door. If anyone wants to come in here and take over, be my guest.

Terrifying. Where we’re like, your feelings were just contagious. And that’s what happens, right? Where someone’s like, “I don’t want, I don’t want it. I don’t, I want to watch one more show. I want to watch one more show.” Now, if as a parent, you think, “You know what? I don’t care about having to watch another show. I thought about it. I am changing my decision because I made that shift.” Kids can smell and they know whether it’s that or I was like, “Oh, okay. I guess you can go to bed late because tomorrow we’ll go. Oh, okay. Fine.” And a kid feels like you open the cockpit door.

LEWIS HOWES: You influence, yeah, yeah.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And now they can make big decisions. That is actually terrifying for a kid because they feel like they don’t have a leader. They don’t have a pilot.

LEWIS HOWES: Kids love boundaries, don’t they?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: They love boundaries. It would be like if your pilot was like, “We have to make an emergency landing” and everyone’s like, “No, I don’t want to land in Denver.” And if I was like, “Okay, we’ll get it.”

LEWIS HOWES: “We’ll just crash.”

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Exactly. You’re like, just race. So the third pilot to me is the essence of sturdy leadership which to me are those pillars, validating other people’s feelings and staying connected to your own role through your boundaries. And to me, the pilot you want to hear there is, “I hear that everyone’s freaking out. You’re right. I hear you. It’s very turbulent. Stay calm.” And even if it’s a pilot, you don’t think it’s that turbulent. You can still say, “I recognize it’s turbulent. Everyone’s upset. You know, you guys do your thing. If you need to scream, it’s fine. I’m about to get off and go do my job. I’ve done this a million times and I’m going to land us in Los Angeles. I’ll see you on the ground.”

LEWIS HOWES: Let’s go.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Let’s freaking go, right? And you’re like, “Why am I calm?” Nothing around me changed, but I am calm. And to me, like, you want a leader who sees that your feelings are real and is not infected by them. And the only thing that stops that infection or contagion is a boundary.

And the ability to know, I am not my kid. Those are their feelings. And empathy for feelings requires boundaries. Because if you’re not having up a boundary, you’re not empathizing with your kid, you’re actually kind of what we’re talking about. You’re kind of responding to the way that feeling came into your body. That’s not empathy, right?

Boundaries are actually what allow you to say to a kid who’s upset about the cockerel cheese, even though, by the way, you’re not making a new one. Or say to the kid when the TV time is over, “I know you really wish you could watch another show. It’s so hard to stop.” And when they say, “So I can,” you say, “Oh, sweetie, no. No, no, no. My number one job is to keep you safe. Part of keeping you safe is making key decisions, like bedtime. Bedtime is absolutely now. You can tell me the show you want to watch tomorrow. I’ll write it down. I get it. This isn’t what you wanted.”

Do you see? There’s like this boundary. I’m validating. I would say my kid’s feelings don’t dictate my boundaries, and my boundaries don’t dictate my kid’s feelings. They just kind of, they coexist.

Violating Boundaries

LEWIS HOWES: Wow. Why is it so hard for parents to create boundaries with their kids?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: So first of all, we don’t define what boundaries are, and we get it wrong. So boundaries are what we tell someone we will do, and they require the other person to do nothing. This is true in adulthood too, all the time. So like with my kid in the couch, this is a good example. And I have a kid like this, because my three kids are totally different, and one of them is 0% people pleasing. And he’s just like, I delight in him because he’s my third. He’s like, he likes to test things out. He’s going to be a leader one day. I get it, you know?

But I would look at him, and I’d be like, “Hey, stop jumping.” Let’s say it had stopped. In my house, people jump on the couch. I don’t really care, but let’s say it was that, or it was dangerous. There was a glass table. “Sweetie, I need you to stop jumping on the couch. You can jump on the floor.” And then he looks at me, and he starts jumping. And I say, “You violated my boundaries. He doesn’t respect my boundaries. He doesn’t respect me.” We always like center ourselves, right?

Now, if I have a kid who I know is kind of like a pushing the limit kid, not because they’re bad, because that’s how they’re learning about their world, their temperament.

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah, their personality.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: This is not a boundary. It’s not a boundary. That’s a request. Because the success of what I said is dependent on someone else. When we make a request of someone, which we have to do, we can’t always set a boundary, right? We have to be in a relationship with them. We have to understand they have the right coping abilities. We have to know that they might-

LEWIS HOWES: Decline?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: They might decline. They might decline. Probably not because they don’t respect me, you know? Like, it’s just for other reasons. This is a boundary. And again, this is where good inside is anything but soft. After he doesn’t listen, “Hey, sweetie, it looks like you’re having a hard time getting down off the couch. I’m going to walk over to you. And if by the time I get there, you’re not off, I’m going to put my hands around you, I’m going to pick you up, and I’m going to put you on the floor, and you can jump over there.”

That is a boundary. And I can even test it. Did I tell my kid what I will do? I did. Does it require my kid to do nothing? It does. And just to get real, like when I do that with my son, he does not say to me, like, “Thank you for your sturdy leadership.” Like, he does not-

LEWIS HOWES: You get no praise, no gratitude. Zero!

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I get a tantrum. And on some level, I think, again, we wish as parents that when we, like, have these amazing interventions, our kids are going to, like, clap it out for us.

LEWIS HOWES: I love you, Mommy. Thank you so much.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Right. No, we have to validate ourselves. Hard for people. Definitely hard for women. I know I’m doing my role.

Why It’s Hard for Women to Self-Validate

LEWIS HOWES: Why is it hard for women to validate themselves, and not want validation from their children?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Well, we do want validation. Why is it hard?

LEWIS HOWES: Why is it hard for them to, I mean, validate themselves when they don’t ever get validation from their kids?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. So, I think women and many people, so it’s not just women, but let’s just say especially little girls, we are taught in families, they’re taught by society, to gaze out before we gaze in. To me, the essence of confidence is, like, your ability to gaze in before you gaze out. Like, what is going on for me? At least, what do I need? Right, but we are taught to gaze out, and we are taught-

LEWIS HOWES: To seek validation for the outside?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: To say, like, I can fill myself up outside. Who am I? How do you look at me? Are you happy with me? Are you telling me I’m doing a good job, and I’m making you happy? Even just, like, classic, and, like, I always think about people, I used to see teens in my practice. I’d be like, “Does he like me? I want him to like me. I hope he likes me.” And it was like, “What do you like about this dude?” Like, by the way, he sounds like a douchebag. And they were like, “What?” And literally, I remember one being like, “What do I like?” It was-

LEWIS HOWES: They didn’t know.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: A foreign question. Especially now, I’m brought up, like, what do I like? I mean, I guess I like the things on Instagram that got the most likes, because they told me those would, that’s not what you like. That’s not what you liked about the picture. The gazing out culture is just massive now, but especially women, and we don’t realize that by the time they become parents. No one says, “I need my kid’s approval.” Everyone’s like, “Of course I don’t.” But we get sucked back into the same circuits. So when we set a boundary in our kid protests, unconsciously what happens in our body is, “See, I’ve done it wrong.”

And then we look for our kid’s approval. We look for our, right? And we say things like this. “Don’t you think it’s time to go to bed? Come on, you’ve been up so late.”

LEWIS HOWES: It’s like asking for, you know, permission or approval from them.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: It’s like the pilot’s being like, “Don’t you think we should make an emergency landing?” Like, right? And you’re like, “Oh my God.” Right? And then that’s, of course, it actually leads to kind of quote, worse behavior in kids. Not because kids are trying to manipulate us at all. Imagine being on the plane and hearing that from your pilot. There’d be worse behavior from passengers because they feel so much more unsafe.

LEWIS HOWES: They feel out of control. They want to try to control some situation. I’m like, I have so many extra questions I want to ask you, but I’m-

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: We didn’t even get to number three.

LEWIS HOWES: Okay, let’s get to three. Let’s get to three because-

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: We don’t have to ever get there.

LEWIS HOWES: So we shouldn’t punish.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: So yes, to me-

LEWIS HOWES: And is there ever a time to punish?

Understanding The Mindset Behind Punishment

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I mean, I really am not so rigid. I try not to be so rigid. So is there, but to me, it’s like the question of should we punish, to me brings you back for another key framework, the same team framework. And to me, again, same thing at work, same thing in romantic relationships. When you’re mad at someone or when you’re in a conflict or when you feel like someone did something to you, assuming it’s a person that you want to be in a relationship with. If it’s not, this doesn’t apply. They’re toxic.

But if it’s someone you’re like, in general, we have a good relationship, there’s two ways approaching it. One is, and it’s kind of like how we’re sitting, it’s me against you and Lewis is the problem. So let’s say I arrived to your podcast studio and you were like 30 minutes late. And I’m like so pissed and I want to tell you like how could he be late? I flew in for this podcast. By the way, it didn’t happen for everyone.

LEWIS HOWES: All right, well, let’s say it did. You did fly in, but you didn’t.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: No, no, I’m not, I’m simulating the same thing. So I could either talk to you like I’m looking at you like you are the problem. And you know what that would sound like. “That was so rude and it can’t happen again.” Or we can talk to someone like me and that person are sitting on the same side of the table and together we are looking at a problem.

And then we’d say, “Hey, what went on there?” And by the way, I know I’m coming back next week and I just, I’m sure together, like neither of us want this to happen. Did I not understand the time? Let’s just figure this out. So when you say, when I hear parents say, “When is time to punish?” To me, punishment is a me against you framework. I never want to punish someone I like. I just don’t like them in that moment. Like I’ve never had the thought. I never want to quote, give someone a consequence.

Now that doesn’t mean there aren’t boundaries, I’m going to say. But when I hear that question, it makes me think about the mindset they’re in. And so to me, the answer is that mindset isn’t going to be effective for the goal I think you’re trying to achieve, which is change. So we only pull interventions from the mindset bucket we’re in. And so when I notice parents speaking in a way that I really feel like is in an unhelpful, ineffective mindset bucket, I don’t think, “What can we do in that bucket?” I think, “We’re in the wrong bucket. Let’s get you do a different one.”

I’m happy to walk through what we do instead because it’s not just like kumbaya. So let’s say it’s like my kid jumping on the couch and I’m like, okay, let’s say something more egregious. Like-

LEWIS HOWES: Let’s say they punched someone or they bullied someone or they’re whatever, something of the sort.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Right, let’s say they bullied someone. And I was like, I really had evidence that my kid was like going up to this kid and they’re like, “You’re a loser and nobody likes you.” I don’t know, something like that.

LEWIS HOWES: Someone filmed it, who knows, yeah.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Exactly, sure. Like, I guess this happened, okay. First I have to be like, how could this even be me and my kid against a problem? And some, I think the best way I do that, if I’m realistic with myself, is just like, we’re all capable of all the things.

And I’ll be like, what does this all mean to someone? And I’ll say it, what? And I may be like, well, maybe I felt really insecure. Maybe I felt slighted by them. Maybe I’ve developed this role in a group where I feel like I have to be this tough guy. I don’t know, but like, I guess that could happen.

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah.

Reflecting Back a Good Identity, Not Bad Behavior

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And if I punish my kid and I’m like, “I can’t believe you did that. It’s not within the values of our family. And like, here’s your punishment.” First of all, our kids respond to the version of themselves. We reflect back. So I’m mirroring back to my kid, like, “You’re a bad kid.”

LEWIS HOWES: Wow.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And then I’m asking them to have behavior that would come from feeling like a good kid. Like, you have to feel good inside before you act good on the outside.

LEWIS HOWES: Come on.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Come on.

LEWIS HOWES: Come on now.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Right? You do.

LEWIS HOWES: So again, just counterproductive. You have to feel good inside. Before you can act good on the outside.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I know “act good” isn’t like good English, but it’s just like-

LEWIS HOWES: No, it is. That’s great. So if we feel bad inside, it’s really hard to act good on the outside.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. Like, think about your boss, always being like, “You’re late and you’re the worst and you don’t do good presentations.” You come to work the next thing, like, “I’m going to crush it.” Like, you’re paralyzed by the, because by the way, they’re reflecting back who you are. If they’re an important person in your life, right?

So what would I say to my kid? Let me just be clear. I’m not saying, I would never say, “Oh, that probably was a hard day and there were reasons why you did that.”

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah, you wouldn’t validate the behavior.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I wouldn’t end there and say, “Now let’s go out to dinner.” Okay? I wouldn’t. Like, I wouldn’t be like, “You know, cool.” Here’s what I’d probably say. “I heard about what happened at school.” I’m going to start there. “Something happened at school today.” Never ask a question to any human being that you know the answer to because they know it’s not a question. It’s a criticism veiled with a question mark and that is infuriating. So a question is only a question when you don’t know the answer.

So I would never start with that. I mean, I would try not to. It’s like, “I heard what happened at school and I heard this thing, I saw this video and like, look, before you go further, I would say this, you might push back. You’re a good kid.” I’d like, if I can’t hold that I have a good kid who did a bad thing, why in heck would my kid be able to do that? Because in order to reflect about bad behavior and understand it and change, you have to hold on to good identity.

If those two things are collapsed, there’s no good centered self to do the reflecting about the behavior. The bad behavior became “I’m a bad person.” You literally can’t learn.

LEWIS HOWES: If someone doesn’t believe they’re a good person, how do you build a good identity?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: But I think you have to start by noticing all the ways you use your behavior to define who you are. It’s what you did. And it’s very important data to be like, “What’s going on for me? What am I seeking? What am I missing?”

But if you can’t separate good identity, which does not justify bad behavior, it just creates a framework to understand and change bad behavior, you can’t change. So I would, “I know you’re a good kid. I know that’s not a theory the way you want to talk to other kids. I know that, which lets me know also there’s a whole situation going on. I haven’t seen that kid.”

“I realize you’ve had a bad week. I don’t know if,” I’m just making this up. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, I’ve been saying some nasty words to your dads in our arguments and you’ve maybe been kind of stressed about that and picked up on that.” Let’s be honest, they pick up on everything. “I don’t know, but I know there’s a reason. And let me be clear, that doesn’t mean it’s okay. And I don’t even think I’ve decided, I know you know it’s not okay, but we’re going to work together to actually figure this out because I know you’re capable of being in a tricky situation with a kid and acting in a way you’re proud of.” Yeah, that’s what I would say.

And then I would actually do it. And then I would, when we miss out, I would simulate it. Why would a kid say that? Maybe this kid is a new kid. Let’s say my son was always best kid in basketball and kind of head of the group and all of a sudden this kid came in. There are reasons why we do the things we do. It doesn’t make them okay, but there are reasons.

Practicing Responding to Tough Situations

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: So I might say, “Look, we’re going to do something.” And then I would get a little like, not harsh, but firm. And if my son’s like, “I don’t know, can I just play Fortnite? I don’t want to do this.” I’d be like, “I’m just going to say this one time, you literally have to go through this with me before you play Fortnite. Like, that’s not a threat. My most important job is helping you in life and I know this is going to help. And so even if you roll your eyes, we will do this.” That’s your decision. It’s firm, but it’s not mean.

It’s some place of help. And then I say, “We’re going to do something. This is going to sound really weird, sweetie. We’re going to go to basketball court. And I’m going to heckle you.”

LEWIS HOWES: And say something mean.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Wow.

LEWIS HOWES: Put them through the experience.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Sure. Isn’t that what we do?

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah, you need to.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Like, right, right. And so I’m going to go.

LEWIS HOWES: You need to prepare for these challenges.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: That’s right. And what I say to him is, “I don’t expect you in that situation to go like this.”

LEWIS HOWES: Because he’s most unrealistic. “Oh, I’m happy.”

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yeah, exactly. And I want you to say to this kid, “No.” But we might, I would prompt him and what I want you to do, and I would get out this, is “Instead of moving toward me, when I say that, you’re going to turn your body and you’re going to walk away.” Because if you teach kids when they’re mad to give space, they’re going to literally have more time to make better decisions.

LEWIS HOWES: Yes. Okay? They’re not going to react as quickly.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And then if we want to get to the heart of why kids say mean things to bullies or something, they’re having a hard time regulating something themselves. I might give my kid a mantra, too, when they’re walking away. Maybe, and I always give mantras that get to the core.

LEWIS HOWES: “Stay calm,” or “Yeah, I got this,” or whatever.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Maybe even like, “Write that,” or “I’m valuable even when I’m not the best basketball player.”

LEWIS HOWES: That’s good. Get to the core.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: And we’re going to practice that. I’m going to make him practice it with me.

LEWIS HOWES: I’m so glad you’re saying this, Dr. Becky, because I truly believe life is beautiful and wonderful and there’s so much magic and awe and so much to be grateful for. There’s so much beauty in the world and I think life is an incredible gift.

But I also know life is so tough and there’s a lot of tough moments, tough situations, tough seasons that we all go through, from childhood, adolescence, to adulthood, and it can feel daunting. It can feel so heavy, so much pressure, so much confusion at times, that I truly believe what you just said is the key to living a beautiful life, is putting ourselves in the most uncomfortable, challenging scenarios and situations and preparing for tough moments so that when tough moments come, they’re not so tough.

I truly believe that. And I think a lot of people, if parents heard what you just said right now and actually did that, they would raise incredible human beings who are prepared for the sadness and the suffering that happens in the world frequently so that they could see things as a gift and beautiful and not suffer in the sadness.

And I think sports gave me that opportunity, that gift. You know, you hear about Navy SEALs, like they have a game plan but they prepare for all the worst scenarios. They don’t just say, “We’re going to prepare for the best, that the best outcome’s going to happen. This is exactly what we’re going to plan for and it’s going to happen.”

They got a plan for, “What if I lose my weapon? What if I’m trapped? What if this? What if I’m upside down hanging and I can’t, I’m unconscious? How do I get out of a situation calmly?” Or with enough where I can not freak out but I can make a decision and act. And I think we’ve lost the ability, most people have lost the ability on how to handle challenging situations and play more of a victim, unfortunately, than a victor in their own life.

And the way you just said right there, I hope parents listen to that and try it with their kid. Probably the worst thing to hear, like “I’m going to take you to the basketball court and heckle you.” But coaches would create scenarios where they would put loudspeakers on the fields and be like, “We’re going to go into a tough road game and these fans are not going to be cheering you on. They’re going to be screaming at you, booing at you, throwing stuff in the field, calling you names, trying to get under your skin. They’re going to punch you in bad places. They’re going to do bad things to you.”

And you can play victim and say “Ref” and all these people, “Why are they doing this to me?” Or you can rise above it and be prepared for it. And it’s doing it in a loving context, I think is what we need to do. Not like just putting them down and diminishing kids, but by saying, “This is what we’re going to create. I love you, but I want to create this scenario for you.”

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Yeah, and I wouldn’t like to be the heckling, it’s going to be humorous, because my son’s going to be like, “My mom’s saying random stuff she doesn’t even know how to.” But someone said this to me, and I think it’s so powerful, I talk about a lot of pilot metaphors and you were talking about the Navy SEALs, that in moments of challenge, we don’t rise to the occasion, we fall to the level of our training. And this goes back to parents needing resources so that in those moments of challenge, their level of training has rhythm.

LEWIS HOWES: Man, I’m so excited about this. One of the reasons why I wanted to have you on is because I want to be a parent one day, right? I want to have kids, I want to be a parent. I actually feel like I’m at a season of life where I feel like I’ve done enough healing work for myself where I don’t think I will repeat certain patterns that my parents unconsciously did, right?

And my parents did a lot of good, but there’s also things that I’m like, I don’t know if that was the right way to build identity in myself and my siblings, right? They built great identity in other ways, but in other ways, maybe it was more challenging and I had to learn how to unwind some of those things, integrate and heal maybe that inner child that was still sad, suffering, or insecure.

And so I’m trying to have as many conversations to prepare myself not to be the perfect parent because I don’t think there is a perfect parent, but to be the best potential parent that I can be, knowing I’m going to be flawed, knowing I’m going to make mistakes, and knowing I’m going to do something probably that is going to hurt my child at some point.

But I think what you talked about in the beginning, having the resources and the tools is the first step for parents developing certain skills. And that might mean you have to get your book and read it 10 times until you start to pick up one or two skills that you’ve never learned before. So I’m just really grateful that you’re here and I’m grateful that four years ago you decided to put your content online and bring this message to the masses because I think parents, I’m not a parent, but I think parents are scared to raise bad kids.

I think parents feel insecure, they don’t feel well-equipped, especially with social media and drugs in schools and shootings in schools and just insecurity, all the different stuff that’s happening in schools that we don’t have time to get into today. But I want people to get your book, Good Inside: A Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want to Be. And I think a lot of people in general never felt like they’re a good person growing up. I speak for myself, but I feel like there’s so many people that are craving to feel good.

And so again, I know that you’re a teacher for parents to help their kids, but really you’re a teacher for humans to heal and become better leaders in their life. So I want to acknowledge you for the gift you bring, the consistency you bring to add value to people with your content, with your book. I know you have an app that also helps parents learn these skills and tools with a lot of different AI and all these different things you guys are bringing into it. So I want people to follow you on social media. Your Instagram is amazing, I love it.

Again, I’m not a parent, but I love watching your content because I feel like it’s relevant for becoming a better human being and a better leader in your life. I want people to get your book, Good Inside. I think it’s required reading for every parent or wannabe parent, so get Good Inside. And how else can we be of support to you besides going to goodinside.com, getting a book, and checking out your app?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I mean, to me, conversations like this are just fantastic. I appreciate this, thank you for helping ideas get spread because other people also help spread them. So I love the excitement you bring to these ideas and it’s been amazing, so I have no ask. I appreciate it.

LEWIS HOWES: I feel like we’re going to have to have you back on at some point because I have so many other questions I wanted to ask you, but this has been really powerful. Even just those three things you talked about, “I’m so glad we’re talking about this. I believe you, tell me more.” It’s really powerful. And that’s also something you could do in an intimate relationship.

You know, when you don’t want to have challenging conversations, if you actually did that with your partner, man, you’re going to feel a sense of peace and relief on the other side because you went through the challenging conversation together as opposed to avoiding it or being distracted or whatever it might be. And that’s hard when your attachment style is insecure or avoidant, so you’ve got to learn to heal so you can have a more secure attachment style in all your relationships, with intimacy and with your kids. So much to always learn, but again, we’ll have to have you back on to talk about more.

The Three Truths

LEWIS HOWES: Couple final questions for you to finish the conversation. This is a rapid fire, no, I’m just kidding. I do pushups, get ready. Here’s a question I ask everyone at the end. It’s called the three truths.

So imagine you get to live as long as you want to live, Dr. Becky, but it’s your last day on Earth, many years away. And for whatever reason, in this hypothetical scenario, you have to take all of your content with you. All of your Instagram content, whatever content you create in the future, your books, this interview is gone. So no one has access to anything you’ve ever put out in the world. But on the last day, you get to leave three things behind, three things you know to be true that you would leave behind for us to have access to. What would be those three truths or three lessons that you would share?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Okay, I have two, so let’s see how I get to the third. One is that we are good inside and our good identity is separate from any bad behavior.

LEWIS HOWES: Mm-hmm.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Number two is it is never too late. And the single most important relationship strategy in the world is repair. And three is that the only real strategy you have with your kid is connection.

LEWIS HOWES: Yeah, we didn’t even get into how to repair, which you talk about in your book, so that’s another reason for people to get your book and to have you back on to really dive into it.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I’m supposed to be my TED Talk, so that’s what it’s about.

LEWIS HOWES: Exactly, it’s about really how to repair when there’s a breakdown or when there’s an upset, when you scream at your kid, when you yell at them.

Definition of Greatness

LEWIS HOWES: Final question, what’s your definition of greatness?

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: I think it’s a combination of internal accomplishment and external impact. So if I think about greatness, I think a lot about this concept or feeling of being lit up inside. It’s how I feel talking to you and talking about these ideas, putting them out there, but I think greatness is when you feel so lit up inside by something that it drives you in so much that you can’t contain it. And so it kind of explodes out of you with joy and authenticity and belief so much that it ends up igniting something that is in someone else and lights them up. And it has this kind of generative movement. I don’t know, that’s pretty cool.

LEWIS HOWES: Dr. Becky, thanks so much. Appreciate you.

DR. BECKY KENNEDY: Thank you so much.

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