Eps 619: Life Skills for Launching Teens

What does Joyful Courage mean to me?

Today Joyful Courage means trusting that staying focused on bringing joy and creativity to the process will result in all that I want to create.

Reflection questions:

1. How are you holding your teen? Are you seeing them as “this is who they are” or “this is where they are on their journey”? What shifts when you choose the second perspective?
2. Where are you holding on too tight? What does that feel like in your body? What fear or worry is driving that grip?
3. What’s one area where you could create more space for practice? What would it take to step back just a little bit and let your teen try, stumble, and learn?
4. How do you respond when your teen makes a mistake? Are you meeting them with curiosity and problem-solving, or judgment and lectures? What might change if you approached their next mistake as a learning opportunity to celebrate?
5. What belief about your teen might need updating? Is there a story you’re telling yourself about who they are that’s based on who they were at 13, not who they’re becoming now?
6. What’s one life skill you’ve been putting off teaching because it feels scary or overwhelming? What small first step could you take this week?

Transcription

JC Ep 619 (10.23.25) - Final
[00:00:00] Casey O'Roarty: Welcome, welcome, welcome to the Joyful Courage Podcast. This is a place where parents of tweens and teens come to find inspiration, information, and encouragement in the messy terrain of adolescents this season of parenting. Is no joke. And while the details of what we're all moving through might be slightly different, we are indeed having a very collective experience.
[00:00:30] This is a space where we center building, relationship, nurturing life skills, and leaning into our own personal growth and man. The opportunities abound, right. My name is Casey Ody. I am a parent coach, positive discipline lead trainer, and captain of the adolescent ship over at Sprout Bowl. I'm also a speaker and a published author.
[00:00:53] I've been working with parents and families for over 20 years. And continue to navigate my own experience of being a mom with my two young adult kids. I'm so honored that you're here and listening. Please give back to the podcast by sharing it with friends or on social media rate and review us on Apple or Spotify.
[00:01:13] Word of mouth is how we grow. Thank you so, so much. Enjoy the show.
[00:01:25] Hey. Hi. Welcome back to the podcast. Today we're gonna dig into life skills. It's what we all want for our teens, right? And the closer you are to your kids launching, I'm guessing the more stressed you are about. Are they ready? Right. Let me start by celebrating my kids' life skills journey because here's what I want you to know.
[00:01:49] I want you to know that we are in a long game here, my friends, when you think about life skills. I want you to consider the young adult that you are eventually launching in the world, not expecting mastery from your 14-year-old. Okay? This is the long game and temperament matters too. Some kids are wired more independent and go getter esque.
[00:02:15] Some kids are gonna be motivated by certain things and not others. All of this is normal. All of this is normal, and the view from where I'm at. Is so good, right? I've got a 19-year-old, a 22-year-old. You've been here, many of you for the whole journey through adolescence With me, things were not always great.
[00:02:35] Worry and fear. I'm gonna talk about that. Definitely lived in my reality and they're doing it. They are practicing life skills. They're taking care of themselves. They're doing it. They're doing it. So it's important to remember the foundation of life skills, which is practice space and making mistakes, life skills.
[00:03:00] Are all about practice, the space to practice, and then also learning from mistakes. Kids learn from mistakes when the mistakes are met with curiosity and non-judgment. Otherwise, your kids are too busy thinking about how you're making them feel to really consider what they could be learning. So something that often will come up, especially with parents of younger teens, but also with parents of older teens is, but my kids won't reflect on their mistakes.
[00:03:33] They won't talk about their mistakes. So what's going on with that? Well, we all want to avoid the hard stuff, the hard feelings. We want to avoid accountability. It is not a character flaw, it's a survival mechanism we want to avoid. Feeling shame or feeling like a failure. So what I want you to do, parents, is I want you to ask yourself, how is your invitation to reflect creating feelings for your kiddo?
[00:04:09] Right. How is your invitation to take a look at mistakes and what they're learning from their mistakes? How is that being received? What is it creating for your kiddos? How are they experiencing the space that you're holding for reflection? Right. You get to be honest about that. Here's what helps have a conversation about talking about mistakes, right?
[00:04:36] It can sound like I notice that when things come up, you get really uncomfortable when I wanna talk about. Mistakes or even you could slice it even thinner, you could peel back the layer even more. I, I notice that my own experience of talking about mistakes feels like, or I remember when my boss or my parent or my teacher wanted to talk to me about this mistake I made, and I felt.
[00:05:09] A certain way. So start not with looking at your kids' experience and you know, way of showing up when it's time to talk about mistakes, but really talk more about mistakes in general and how powerful mistakes are for learning. This is life experience. This is where we get to put those life experiences into our back pocket and let them help us moving forward.
[00:05:37] Model making mistakes and learning from them. Normalize the fact. That this is what we do as humans, right? Share in words and energy, your unconditional love and support for your kiddo. Hey, mistakes are a part of the deal. I'm not disappointed by mistakes. I'm excited about mistakes. 'cause mistakes are an opportunity for you to grow and practice and get clear about what it is that you do want.
[00:06:05] Right. And here's the other thing that I wanna ask you. How are you currently holding your teen when it comes to life skills? Right. Sometimes with some of the parrots that I talk to, it feels like they are treating a lack of life skills or lagging life skills as character flaws. Right. I hear, well, my kids, they're just not grateful.
[00:06:31] They're lazy. They just don't care, and parents don't realize what they're saying when they're saying it. What they're actually saying is, this is who my child is, rather than, this is where my child's at on their developmental journey. Can you feel that difference? There's a difference. This is who my kid is versus.
[00:06:55] You know, this is where my kid is at on their developmental journey. I love to ask parents to consider how they're holding their kids. So I'm gonna ask you, listener, are you holding them as if they're fully baked, done, growing and evolving, stuck as who they are presenting as today? Is that how you're holding them or are you holding them as a version?
[00:07:20] Of who they are today, molded by the relationships and the experiences that they've made sense of so far, and recognizing that they are nowhere near done growing and evolving. Think about it. Think about the conversations you've had recently, the journaling you've done, the thoughts you've spun out about in your mind about your teen.
[00:07:44] How are you holding them? And when you consider how you're holding them, the conclusions you're making about them, how does that make you feel about them? Right. I am gonna ask that again. When you consider how you're holding your teen, the conclusions that you are regularly coming to about them, how does that make you feel about them?
[00:08:09] Listen, I know that the teen years are hard. Okay. My husband and I were just talking about moving through adolescence with our two kids and how one. It seemed to fly by with while the other, it felt so long and treacherous. And of course it was our most challenging kid that made time feel like it was standing still.
[00:08:32] Right. And speaking for myself, I was full of fear and worry for her. I was. You know, full of self-doubt about who I was as her parent. So much thought was spent in wondering if she was gonna be okay, if she was gonna be able to move through the day to day, right? Take care of herself, grow, move out. The other kid, I didn't worry about him.
[00:08:59] I could spend time doing other things, right? I didn't spend all my time worrying about him. So I'm guessing you probably have the same experience if you have more than one kiddo. I'll tell you what got me through the hard time, trusting that my girl was gonna pull through, believing that everything was gonna be okay, having faith in her ability to create the life that she wanted.
[00:09:24] Knowing that she was growing through what she was going through, holding the space in a way that allowed for growth and resources and her timeline to unfold. I believed in her, and that is absolutely what led me through the gauntlet of the tough adolescent years. That was my internal practice and externally.
[00:09:50] I worked to stay authentic. I worked really hard to be neutral and available. I worked to create a space that felt safe for her to talk and stretch and make mistakes, a space for them to try on life skills and BTW. It was not pretty all the time. Sometimes it was really ugly. Sometimes I felt like I was flailing.
[00:10:14] Lots of times I got to go and make things right and try again. Right, own my own mistakes so that I could be modeling that and so that I could clean up the space that we shared together.
[00:10:40] And there were big life skills. There are big life skills and there's little life skills, right? So some of the bigger life skills, driving money, management, cooking, getting a job. These are big life skills. So let's talk a little bit about those. So driving, for example, full disclosure, I had two kids who were highly motivated to learn to drive, and I know there's lots of you out there with kiddos who for whatever reason, aren't.
[00:11:07] Motivated. They don't care about driving. And if you want to dive deeper into a whole episode about driving checkout, episode 5 27, where I talk more about the learning to drive years. But driving is absolutely a life skill. I do think kids should learn to drive before they launch and leave the house. I don't think they all need to get behind the wheel the minute they turn 15.
[00:11:38] You get to be the judge of your child's readiness, of their maturity, of their ability to manage safety and impulse control. You get to decide you're their parent. If you live in a household with two parents, you also get to decide which of you has the right temperament to teach your kids to drive. And guess what?
[00:12:01] It was not me. I was a wreck. I could not turn off my fear and worry. I had other skills as far as being there for my kids teaching, driving, wasn't it for me? But the good news for my kids was this is where my partner could really show up. And if you are a single parent and you're like, yeah, I am terrified of teaching my kids drive or.
[00:12:27] I know this isn't skills in my wheelhouse. I bet you have a friend or a family member that could step in. Driving is one of those life skills like many others, where the only way to develop it is by doing it, right. I know they have to learn to drive, they have to get pulled over to know what to do. When they get pulled over, they have to have a fender bender to know what to do when they have a fender bender.
[00:12:59] You can't talk or lecture these skills into being, they have to experience them to know how to do them. And that is not to say that we want our kids to get tickets or to get into recs. But they won't know what to do really until they have to do it. This is the hard thing about life skills. They're learned through experience and practice.
[00:13:25] Right. And I'm not saying like, so encourage your kids to speed or have them gently nudge the person in front of them. No, I'm not saying that. But remember that that is the gift of those experiences is now they've got it in their back pocket. And even if they flail, I'm gonna talk about this in a moment, and don't do the right thing the first time, they have that in their back pocket and they can reflect and they can learn from that and they can show up differently when and if.
[00:13:55] They have that experience. Again, money management is another life skill that takes teaching and experience. So we did do allowance from a very young age. It was not tied to chores. It was all about having money to save or spend, and it wasn't very much right. It was about thinking about long-term planning and giving them the opportunity to do that.
[00:14:19] And experiencing buyer's remorse. Ian had to learn this lesson so many times. Again, these things are only learned through experience. Their allowance grew over time, and eventually they got jobs and their allowance actually diminished as they learned to manage their own money. Yay. And my kids are. Pretty decent with money.
[00:14:43] As far as I know. They're young adults and making mistakes and learning and moving on. One thing that I would do differently, if I could go back in time, is to really use a system for their allowance and create some kind of basic budget with them so that this was more normalized and more practiced. I would do that if I could go back in time.
[00:15:07] And another big life skill that I think would be valuable to highlight here is for your teens to get jobs, get jobs. The whole process is so rich in learning, figuring out who needs help. Applying for the job, interviewing for the job, and then all the things that come with having your first part-time job, showing up on time, being a team player, asking questions, learning new things, feeling that experience, that wobble of, I don't really know what I'm doing, but I'm figuring it out.
[00:15:45] Right. And self-advocacy, all of this. Gets to show up when our kids have jobs outside the house. There can be so much development that comes out of this experience. So much value. I think it can be super supportive. For you to be helpful. When it comes to things like first resumes and practicing or role playing for interviews, I think it can be useful to talk about fears and worries before they get a job.
[00:16:15] There's a lot of unknown. It makes sense if you've got kids that are like, eh, I don't know. I don't want to. I feel worried or afraid or I don't know what to expect. Yeah, that makes sense. And it's also really exciting. You don't know what to expect. Right. You're gonna get paid, you're gonna get your own money, right?
[00:16:35] And you're gonna get to figure new things out and practice life skills. So leading up to 15 or 16, you get to be really excited about them getting a job. When you come at it from, oh my gosh, this is so exciting. You're finally old enough that things really open up for you and we can start looking for jobs.
[00:16:55] You get to work now. You get to think about what you like and explore what you can do. This is the energy that you wanna bring. Not, well, you're 15 now. You need to get a job. Or, I'm tired of giving you money for X, Y, Z. You need to learn some life skills and get a job, right? You get to pay attention. You as the parent, get to pay attention to the energy that you bring to this, right?
[00:17:19] Because your kids are going to respond to your energy. And keep in mind, life skill development is messy, right? I remember when Ian got into a little fender bender, and when he came home to tell us about it, he said, yeah, I, I didn't see, I pulled over and the other person pulled over and I didn't see any damage, so I didn't get their information.
[00:17:43] Yikes, without having an experienced eye on his car, he was less informed about what damage could be and didn't get the info in case we needed to reach out to the people. Right. I'm sure that we responded with a little bit of frustration when he told us the story. If I remember correctly, I was probably like, uh, you always get their information right, but ultimately, this was the perfect experience for him to learn.
[00:18:13] Always exchange information. You just never know if you're going to need it. So always, always get it. And there are lots of those opportunities when our kids make mistakes and we get to say, wow, well now you know what to do for next time, or now you know how to avoid this next time. Not in an accusational way, but instead in the spirit of awesome.
[00:18:38] You're learning something here. You're learning life skills. Woo, right? Yes. I think another life skill that. I mean, I wish I would've done better, I guess, but the kids are doing all right. Is cooking, feeding themselves, right, taking care of themselves in how they are eating and preparing food. I think it's a super useful life skill.
[00:19:02] I've had many visions of my kids in the kitchen cooking with me, laughing, bonding, connecting. That rarely happens because. Well, my, it's my own fault. I'm a little controlling, and that would definitely get in the way to the point where my kids are like, you know what? This isn't that fun. I'm not gonna do it.
[00:19:22] So what I did do is I stopped cooking every meal and my kids had to figure it out. I'm not a whiz in the kitchen or anything. I follow recipes. They've experienced all sorts of random trial meals from me. They've also heard me talk about meal prepping and planning. They've seen me frustrated at five because I have to cook again.
[00:19:47] They've experienced me really excited about cooking new things. Just like your kids experience you, they were aware that meals didn't magically happen and. They got the message that I believed they were capable too. Like I said, when I stopped doing so much, they learned to do it for themselves. They got to be in charge of dinner.
[00:20:09] Sometimes they were able to make their own breakfast. When my son got more into working out and fitness, he also got more into food and eating differently based on what he was doing with his body. It all worked out. Both my kids send me pictures of the meals they prepare. If they're doing much better at 19 and 22 than I was at that age.
[00:20:30] So invite your kids in to make the fun stuff and create a little tension. So that they are needed in the kitchen. Give them room to explore and try new things. Ask their opinions on recipes and meals. Talk about your experience. And remember, just because you want them to learn something doesn't mean they're gonna be receptive to learning it, and that's okay too.
[00:20:57] That's okay too.
[00:21:07] I am a systems girl, right? I'm a systems girl and I have systems. They're not perfect, but I do have systems for keeping track of money. And deadlines and bills, and I love my paper planner. I actually make my own planner. I'm such a weirdo. I love my digital calendar. I love setting alerts and alarms. I love these systems and they're what works for me, right?
[00:21:34] Systems and organization are also life skills. You have systems that work for you. Creating supportive systems is. Really useful, no doubt. And my guess is like me, your systems have been developed over time through experience. So the same is true for your kids. You may think you know the best way for them to stay organized.
[00:21:59] You don't, they do, right? Systems are developed over time through experience missing assignments, showing up late to something. I could talk to my kids till I was blue in the face about what worked for me, and I basically did. They very much didn't care. They heard my words as that Charlie Brown adult voice telling them they were doing it all wrong.
[00:22:24] They resisted my ideas because they heard me saying, you are wrong. I'm right. Do it my way. It's the only way. I didn't use those exact words, but that's kind of what they heard. This is one of the places that has shown me again and again, how useful and powerful curiosity is, connection and curiosity.
[00:22:47] Sounds like, oh man, you missed that deadline. I hear that that's really frustrating for you. How do you typically keep track of stuff like that? What might you do differently to stay on top of it for next time and then zip it? Remember, the life skill I love the most is critical thinking, right? Asking questions nurtures that critical thinking brain, especially when we keep it short.
[00:23:16] And sweet and judgment free. Trust that your kids want to have systems that are useful to them and believe that your curiosity, your non-judgmental curiosity is gonna help them get there. And. I get it. It is a dance of stepping in, right, leaning in and letting go. Life skill development requires much less of us than we think.
[00:23:43] And it's a dance, isn't it? When we step in, when we stay out of it. When do we do those things? I am all for less stepping in, right? I think what our kids need most is for us to believe in them. Believe they can figure it out, believe they can learn through their mistakes, believe they can do better, that they want to do better.
[00:24:06] Believe that they are doing the best they can with the tools they have. Believe in the lessons that come with failing. Right. And of course, if they're totally floundering, ask how you can help. Ask what they need. Share what you notice. Be available, step in. If they are drowning, of course, but don't be afraid for your kids to fail.
[00:24:32] Google quotes about failing and you will see endless statements about the gifts of failing from amazing, smart, creative, successful people. It's nothing to save our kids from. It's something to celebrate and get curious about and learn from. And it requires letting go. And man, I know I love to talk about this, but isn't it true that we need to hear it again and again and again?
[00:24:58] It is. It is. I know because I have clients and we're having the same conversation all the time about this, I am working really hard to pay attention to how I am feeling these days, so I can recognize the choice points I have to shift my experience. And I think this fits in with letting go. When you're hanging on really tight, what does it feel like?
[00:25:23] What emotions and thoughts are riding shotgun when you are in full micromanagement mode? Right. For me, it's definitely a feeling of tightness and fear. Like I'm spinning out of control, grasping. I'm annoyed. I feel like, ugh, this person can't get their shit together. Right? So if I pause in that moment and look at myself, I will see, oh yeah, there I am.
[00:25:54] I'm tight, I'm agitated. What is this about? Okay. Yeah. I'm trying to control this situation. Is this useful? What's getting in the way? How can I let go a little bit? Letting go is a practice of learning yourself. It's a practice of learning to be a better observer of yourself so that you can make thoughtful, intentional choices rather than that.
[00:26:21] Autopilot shoot from the hip mode that we spend. So much of our time in life skills are developed. When there is room to practice, let go and get out of the driver's seat. Move over, mama. Move over. Dad. Let your teen get a feel for what it's like. To drive the metaphorical car of life, right, and be open to being surprised by how your teen handles it.
[00:26:53] You know what I like to say? Having faith in them and believing they are capable encourages them to have faith in themselves and believe they are capable. I love talking to my kids and hearing about their plans and their hopes and their dreams. I love sitting on the sidelines and watching them take care of themselves and get stuff done.
[00:27:13] Does that mean it is easy to keep my mouth shut? No, but I do it anyway. And of course there's plenty that we may be secretly dreading to teach them or have them learn, right? Bouncing back from a heartbreak, standing up for themselves because someone is being a jerk, getting physically ill or hurt and handling it.
[00:27:37] I mean, if we don't want our kids to have to deal with pain, disappointment being hurt or being hurt by others, how are they gonna learn to do it? I get it that we don't want them to have to experience it, but it's in the experience that they learn that they can handle it. What a gift it is for them to know that they can move through hard things.
[00:28:01] Our kids get to accrue life experiences that will guide them through their future life. Experience and relationship are what show them who they are and what they can handle. So here's the invitation. Take your own look at where you might be holding on too tight. How do you know? Well, is there an area of severe pushback or power struggle that's going on with your teen?
[00:28:32] This could be an indicator that you're holding on too tight. How can you share power? How can you collaborate? How can you problem solve in a way that allows the space your teen needs to develop life skills? And of course this is scaffolded. The space that we give a 13-year-old looks different than the space that we give our 15 or our 18 year olds.
[00:28:56] It's gradual, and it depends on your kid. You are the expert on your child, but even then. Even as the expert challenge yourself and the beliefs that you're holding about them, like I mentioned at the top, take an honest look at how you're holding your teen. Are you saying, well, this is who they are, so I better lay down the law or control the situation?
[00:29:23] And if so, what would it take to shift into, all right, this is where my kiddo is at on their developmental journey. How can I support them in continuing to grow? You're playing the long game, as you've heard me say before. You aren't launching fully baked young people, but you want them to know enough as they leave the house and make their way in the world.
[00:29:49] Check yourself if you're expecting mastery now, and remember that life skills are developed over time with space to practice. If I could go back, this is what I would tell myself. We're playing the long game case and life skills are developed over time with space to practice. Believe in them, believe that they're capable, believe that they're growing through what they're going through.
[00:30:20] So before I wrap this up, I wanna leave you with some questions to sit with this week, and I'm gonna put them in the show notes as well. How are you holding your team? Are you seeing them as this is who they are, or this is where they are on their journey today? What shifts when you choose the second perspective?
[00:30:41] Where are you holding too tight? What does that feel like in your body? What fear or worry is driving that grip? What's one area where you could create more space for practice? What would it take to step back just a little bit and let your teen try and stumble and learn? How do you respond when your team makes mistakes?
[00:31:06] Are you meeting them with curiosity and problem solving? Or judgment in lectures. What might change if you approach their next mistake as a learning opportunity to celebrate? What belief about your teen might need updating? Is there a story you're telling yourself about who they are that's based on who they were at 13 and not who they're becoming now?
[00:31:33] What's one life skill you've been putting off teaching because it feels scary or overwhelming. What's a small first step you could take this week? Sit with these questions, journal about them, talk about them with your partner or with a friend. The answers will guide you towards the kind of parent you wanna be as your teen grows towards independence.
[00:31:59] And that's what I got for you today, friends, that's what I got for you. I hope that you found this episode useful, and if you did, feel free to jump into. Apple Podcasts and leave a review or copy and paste the link to this show and send it to a friend or post it on your social media. This is how the show grows.
[00:32:20] This is how you can be a part of making an impact on the world because so many of us are growing teenagers and it is a tough, tough season. So let's support each other by sharing what's useful. All right. I will be back on Monday with a brand new interview show. I so appreciate you. I'm so glad that you're here and listening.
[00:32:45] Let me know what's helpful and how I can continue to be of service. Remember, if you listen to all of this and you're like, yes, yes, yes, but I need help. I'm a coach, hire. Go to be sprout.com/explore and we can jump on a 15 minute call, see if coaching is the right fit for you. All right. That's it. That's what I got.
[00:33:06] Have a beautiful, beautiful day and I'll see you soon. Bye.
[00:33:14] Thank you so much for listening. Thank you to my Sprout partners, Julietta and Alana. Thank you Danielle, for supporting with the show notes as well as Chris Mann and the team at Pods Shaper for all the support with getting the show out there and making it sound good. As I mentioned, sharing is caring. If you're willing to pass on this episode to others or take a few minutes to rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, it helps.
[00:33:39] Other parents find this useful content. Be sure to check out what we have going on for parents of kids of all ages and sign up for our newsletter to stay [email protected]. I see you doing all the things. I believe in you. See you next time.