The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives
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The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives
Bill frequently tells the older children and adolescents he is testing, “I hope I find things you suck at—because successful people are good at some things and not so good at others, but wisely make a living doing something they’re good at.”
Ned Johnson • The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives
“This result suggests the rather horrifying possibility that when you are sleep deprived, you effectively form twice as many memories of negative events in your life as of positive events,” Stickgold concluded, “producing a biased—and potentially depressing—memory of your day.”8
Ned Johnson • The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives
Also, what seems like a disaster often turns out to be a blessing in disguise. There are many paths to success, and sometimes we only find the right one by getting a little lost.
Ned Johnson • The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives
It takes courage to face our fears about the future. It also takes humility to accept that we don’t often know what’s in our kids’ best interest. It takes a change in mindset to focus on ourselves—our own emotions and attitudes—as an extremely important element of our child-rearing.
Ned Johnson • The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives
Technology is an incredible tool with the great power to enrich lives, but the things it displaces—family time, face-to-face interaction with friends, study time, physical activity, and sleep—are invaluable, and the way technology trains the brain to expect constant stimulation is deeply troubling.
Ned Johnson • The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives
This taps into a basic psychological construct: intermittent reinforcement. With intermittent reinforcement, you don’t know if you’ll be rewarded for something each time you do it, but you might be, and the anticipation drives you.
Ned Johnson • The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives
We know kids feel most comfortable when the world feels safe, and the world will feel safest to them when we create an environment that’s predictable and structured.
Ned Johnson • The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives
Teenagers are the closest to legal age, and they are the ones who most need to hear this message: “I have confidence in your ability to make informed decisions about your own life and to learn from your mistakes.”
Ned Johnson • The Self-Driven Child: The Science and Sense of Giving Your Kids More Control Over Their Lives
We love the term “nonanxious presence,” but we didn’t invent it. It was coined by Edwin Friedman, a rabbi, student of complex systems, and consultant.