I think sometimes when we praise our kids

they're then they're working for the praise

not necessarily for the improvement

so I think a lot of it's pointing it back at themselves

like that was an awesome play

how did you feel when you made that play

that was a great job on that presentation

you know what did you learn from that

welcome back to raising men

now today on the Raising Men podcast

we're joined by Doctor Carla Katuria

Carla is an elite mental performance coach

she's a former teacher vice principal

and a university professor

with over two decades of experience in education

she's mentored over 10,000 youth and families

and she now specializes

in helping high achieving young people

separate their self worth

from their external performance

as a founder of the house of Rise

Carla works with young athletes

students

and leaders to break free from the trap of burnout

and identity driven to achievement

grounding her practice

in the core philosophy

that success without self is not sustainable

today she's sharing her rise framework

and insights on emotional regulation

high achieving anxiety

and building genuine self trust in young men

Carla welcome to Raising Men

thank you so much for having me

I look forward to our conversation

it's gonna be awesome me too

me too I uh

I this is

this is a topic near and dear to my

my heart

I was one of these people that you are describing um

both from the standpoint of having uh

a lot of achievement when I was younger

but also just suffering from um

uh a lot of kind of crippling

uh

issues outside of

what outwardly seemed to be just a lot of success

and so I uh

I'm I'm excited to

to have this discussion with you

yeah thank you

yeah so let's just

let's just dive right into it

what's the problem here I

I mean you know

you see a young man and he's just crushing it in school

he's crushing it in sports

he just seems to have it all put together

but then behind the scenes is crippled with anxiety

I know a lot of people like this

yeah what's how

how how does that come about

yeah I think

um initially when I started

you know working with families

I thought and I saw some parents

putting a lot of pressure on their kids

and that 100% does happen

um what I've seen more recently is

a lot of

the kids are putting the pressure on themselves please

to please their parents um

you know to get the good job and to get the Atta boy

and I don't think they consciously know that um

but they're you know

kind of feeding off the that achievement

and then that becomes their identity

and they become attached to it

um so I think they put a lot of pressure on themselves

that's when they kind of start to maybe perform at even

a higher level um

but then start to like stop trusting themselves

so they're always looking for

you know someone to say that that's okay or do that

or they're having trouble problem solving and um

they're kind of losing that kid

of curiosity and joy and play

and they've become this kind of like GPA and grades and

you know awards that

that has become their identity

and before you know it they have

you know high levels of anxiety

and they get to the point of burnout

as you stated earlier where they're just like

I don't have time for that

I can't do this I can't

you know and then

their life just becomes overrun with

activities and things and they're kind of numbed out

and they're just this achievement robot per se

and it's how do they get back to themselves

and still be able to achieve

yet through at the lens of a well balanced human being

so let me ask you this question

I

so I was

I was a volleyball player and in that community a lot

and so I know a lot of of

of very elite volleyball players

mm hmm and one of the things that I noticed is um

I I met a lot of

of very high achieving female athletes

who just really burned out on their sport

like by the time they got done with college

they played in college they played at a very high level

they were just

they were done playing sports

uh huh um

and I mean just an extreme version of the burnout

that you talk about

but that seems to happen less with the male athletes

is that just my perception because I happen to be

be um

in a sport that was a lot more dominated by women

or is that something that is more universal

gender wise hmm yeah

no good question

um I think uh

I guess it could be a case by case

cause yes I

I exactly know what you're talking about

and uh

with women and even with women in a career

you know they have their kids and

you know

they're balancing everything and then they just they

they burn out um

but I do have a lot of male athletes that

you know maybe it's school that stresses them out

and maybe not so much the sport

or it is the sport and they're a perfectionist

like a lot of tennis players or golfers

things like that so the question is

it depends so it's hard to say that

you know more females than males

though I do see what you're saying

um and I guess with females too

it's like maybe they're pushing so hard

because nine times out of 10

there's more opportunity for a guy to go beyond college

than there is a girl even though most males don't

don't become professional athletes either right yet

but it can be but

it's more of a realistic aspiration that for

for a man than it might be for a woman

you know so maybe that's

so maybe that's the like I have to give it up

my all through college kind of thing

um there could be that underlying subconscious there

um of I

you know and

and I know they're starting more women's leagues but um

but yeah I've seen it in both

both males and females that I've worked with for sure

um yeah

so that's a tough one

yeah yeah

no I was just

I was just interested from your Vantage point

if you've noticed there and it yeah

it seems like maybe maybe

maybe there is and maybe there's not yeah

how do parents you know what

what's

what's a healthy way to support a young man's drive in

to win in sports or academics

without letting his performance dictate his self worth

without falling into that trap

yeah

I think a lot of it is pointing them back to themselves

versus always the good job

and not that you don't

proud of your kids and shouldn't praise your kids

but inadvertently

I think sometimes when we praise our kids

they're then they're working for the praise

not necessarily for the improvement

so I think a lot of it's pointing it back at themselves

like that was an awesome play

how did you feel when you made that play

or that was a great job on that presentation

you know what did you learn from that

and kind of pointing it back to them

so that they start to just trust themselves

as well as know you're proud of them

of course so I think sometimes that can be

you know we kind of say when they win

we give them accolades but when they lose OK

well what did you learn it it

you know and a lot of the kids I work with it's

you know how are we go into the match or the game on

how are we gonna progress today or this weekend or

or during this this tournament

versus the outcome of the trophy or the win

um

yeah yeah

focusing more on the process than on

on the result and so is that

I mean what about on the motivation side

like how do parents you know

what are big mistakes that parents use on

to motivate their boys to achieve or

you know what is a healthy way

I guess maybe a better way to put that is what is

what is a healthy way to cultivate that drive without

without

running the risk of having them be just so focused on

performance and outcome

that it creates that anxiety that you're talking about

yeah so

I mean if you think about it

like nobody can motivate anyone else

though many parents are trying if they see their kids

I don't know frustrated and struggling on the

on the field then they're like

they wanna fix it for them or solve it

or if they see their kids

I don't know

being lazy and they get pulled out of the game

they're they're

you know like

come on let's go

and really it's not pressuring

it's not emotionally attaching to that

it's not you can't motivate your sons

so it's more about their

the identity driving the behavior

so it's not the pressure

it's not giving them the motivation

but it's seeing them at the next level

of where you wanna see them and

you know not just saying you have so much potential

you know well

you know and

and and giving them Grace when they have a bad day

they might have a bad day

but if you see a repeated lack of motivation

OK that's when you need to step in and

you know it's more about kind of shifting their mindset

to helping them coaching them through

knowing that they're capable

and that there's gonna be highs and lows um

but I see you as this strong smart

uh capable human being uh

and just reiterating that with them

um more so than the

trying to motivate them

or trying to save them from struggle

yeah yeah

yeah it's like

I mean what I'm hearing from you is somehow you

actually I would

I would love to hear your feedback on this statement

so I'm going to restate what I'm hearing from you

and then I want to hear

I want to hear your feedback on that yeah

um

it's like your job

is to give your son the experience of feeling

worthy of life's challenges

and capable of overcoming them

and then worthy of the rewards

that accrue as a result of meeting those challenges

right I at the end of the story

if if you could

if you could do one thing for your son

that's it that's at the when

when he walks out the door at age 18

if that's even a thing um

he feels that way right yeah

and I mean it oh

go ahead go ahead

yes alright

go ahead well

I was gonna say like

many of the families that I'm working with

and the children that they have they

the family potentially like

started a business or did really well in their

their companies

and so they have the means as far as like

a lifestyle where their kids can live a very nice life

and so what

what parents are doing inadvertently with sports

or with volunteering or um

other types of situations that they're creating a um

way for their kids to productively struggle

and to learn and to be challenged

because if you have Apple Pay on your phone

you have a potentially a car and I don't know

all the friends that you need

and you never have to worry about food in the fridge

you don't have any problems per se

there's no reason for you to be motivated

what what are you being motivated for

right right

so playing a sport and struggling through that or

you know offering your time to others and just

I think parents are creating um

and I've spoken to many parents about this

creating ways for their kids to be challenged

ways for their kids to fail and learn from that

and so it's you can fail at volleyball

you can fail at football um

we don't want you to fail at something

you know we want you to fail now

so you can learn those lessons

in middle school and high school

through sports or some other means yeah

and then um

you know be able to have low stakes failures so that

so that you you

you learn how to handle that in a productive way

as opposed to you know

never never failing until you're outside the nest

and then all of a sudden

you can't seem to succeed anywhere

and exactly and it's like

I feel like and this hasn't been necessarily

you know but I feel like middle school is like

it's failure you can fail all you want in middle school

because middle school

you're gonna get passed to the next grade

they're most likely not gonna hold you back

you know that you don't have credits and all that

like you do in high school

so it's a nice it's an

I mean not saying I want kids

to fail but there that's when a right yeah

and that's when a parent can like step back

let their kids handle it

take initiative and speak to the teacher or the coach

and you know

they can kind of let them flounder a bit yeah

so that

so then they can build those skills because they

you can tell them what to do

but until they actually do it

they're not gonna learn you know

I when when I was young

um

sports was a thing like you

you you played sports at school and you know

you were on the high school football team or

and then the high school basketball team

and then the high school baseball team and then

you know some people played soccer whatever right

and and that was what you did

and there weren't really club sports

like maybe there was a little bit of that

or there was a summer camp

that you could go at a university

or something like that but nowadays

it feels like the professionalization of sports

mm hmm it's happening at a much younger age

which means that I mean

I I've heard people talk about oh yeah

your kid needs to specialize in a sport

if you want them to go to college in volleyball

then they need to specialize in volleyball

by the time they're twelve

and I look at that and I'm just like oh

this is not good that this is because it

because what it does is create the situation

that is the antithesis of what you're talking about now

when they're 12 when they should be going out there

and experimenting with failure

it is now really really high stakes

because if they don't get onto the best team

in the club volleyball scene

well then they're

they're gonna get relegated to the lower squad

and then they'll never get on the top on

on the top team and then

you know it's kind of like they're screwed already

and putting that kind of pressure on a 12 year old

just seems to me to create exactly the cycle that

that you're trying to prevent

yeah and I think it depends on your family's values

so

I do have families that go to public or private school

play the sports where the soccer volleyball

whatever it is and have

you know that type of life

and then I do have families

where their kids go to online school

and they play their sport

like they snowboard all day or they do tennis all day

and they do specialize so

the good part about the specializing is

they have this opportunity to like

live this life that is not a

you know sit in a desk and do study hall and be sitting

you know like you have this amazing life where you

you're living your dream basically

so there's a there's the good part about it

and then there's also the

part about many of my kids that specialize have trouble

like doing other things and enjoying it

like taking a break from their sport and just like

eating pizza with their friends and watching a a

I don't know a movie yeah

because they're just so into the sport

which is you know so it's good and bad yeah um

so yeah I mean

you it again

not there's no right answer yet though there is yeah

like when I grew up I was like in AAU

basketball and travel

soccer and softball and all these things

and I played all those things

but it was on a level of like

I don't know

it it felt like we were I was scheduled all the time

but in a good way and I was able to really manage that

and I don't know if

some families are doing it in a much

in a very balanced way and then other families

it's like I have five calendars

one for each kid and my husband and me and

and then it's like okay

well are you living your life

or are you just like calendaring

you know yeah

yeah so yeah

there it's finding again like I said at the beginning

it's finding like your family values

and what's gonna work for your family

and do we you know

what do we want our kids to experience and how

and what's important to us yeah yeah

let's talk about let's talk

about what the solutions look like

so yeah you know

you've developed the rise framework

which is kind of seems like the foundation of

of your you know

kind of principle based solution

talk to me about that what is

what is that framework and

and how do you apply it um

to to this world

yeah so rise stands for resiliency identity

um self confidence and emotional intelligence

and I really believe like

the first step is always handling your state

or the emotional intelligence

so having teens it's never gonna be perfect

you're never gonna get there

you're always gonna have anger

and frustration and other emotions um

but learning how to um

better process those stay in those emotions a lot

a lot

a shorter window of time and just be able to

I don't know I would say more

you live powerfully because not

no realizing that your brain and your emotions

they don't control you you control them

and then what I do with them is we start

you know habits and routines

that's where they start to build some confidence

as they integrate so integrations always the thing it's

they're very I work with a lot of kids and it's and

and people but it's actually doing the work

not just talking to me

but it's doing the work when I'm not there

but then

they start to build that foundation of their values

and then they start to see themselves as resilient

cause they're like

oh I didn't think I could do that hard thing

now I can I see the evidence

and that's where they begin to transform

and they kind of step into this next identity

and then they do that over and over again

cause they're working on different areas of their life

so they begin to transform with their relationships

and then their emotions and

you know maybe it's um

through their sport uh

you know fill in the blank

they there

any part of their life um

and that's how we kind of work through

and then we we start a new thing

and a new emotion comes and a new situation comes and

you know

now there's boyfriends and girlfriends and things

so yeah it

it you

you go through all the all the um

thing but that's

those are the four pillars yeah

that I that I work through with my clients

yeah

and is there a particular age that you want to start

like focusing on these things with or yeah

so fun is yeah

when I started too young or too old or anything

no there isn't

so when I started I was high school

like that was in my mind and in middle school

cause that's where I I spent most of my

my career but I've had a handful of kids 11

10 8

a lot younger than um

what I initially thought um

and I have a lot of young adults

too that you know

maybe they're an entrepreneur in their mid 20s

or they're in college so there is no wrong time

the sooner the better because

you know

the sooner you can get them to think differently and to

to really have that self belief and self trust

the better

um

it just might look a little bit different for an eight

year old than it does for an 18 year old

um but it's still um

it's still

it still works yeah

yeah no

I love that and then

you know so what kinds of

what kinds of results are you seeing out there

it seems to me that there's this really wonderful

virtuous cycle that can happen here where

where the

the practice that you're talking about

identifying those values and and

and doing kind of the

the exercises associated with improving your world

in those four ways um

can create a situation

where you're even better at the things that

it gave you anxiety it almost gave you anxiety to to

to be so good at baseball

for example

and then you actually don't know where that came from

and that's the nature of the anxiety

and then you you start to do this work and now you feel

oh

now I understand a little bit more about why I succeed

in failure about fail about different things

that reduces the anxiety

which in turn makes you better at the baseball right

there's a virtuous cycle there well yeah

it's funny you say baseball

because I was working with this baseball player

and it would be you know

he would he would get up to bat

and if he struck out his first at bat

then the rest of the game forget about it

he was frustrated he's you know throwing his helmet

you know kind of in the dugout

and then when he went to play on the field

it affected his game on the field

and then it affected his next at bat

and so what what with him

it was it didn't

it didn't mean that he was happy when he struck out

after when we were working with

you know he's still frustrated um

but he Learned to recognize his patterns

so first it was what am I gonna do prior to the game

in the practice how am I gonna get my mind right

and so we work on mindset exercises you have to do

just like you have to stretch your biceps and triceps

and all the things you have to kind of do

a lot of kids don't realize

like the mind gym is

is equally as important as the actual gym

and then it was OK

now that I recognize my patterns

and if I do strike out on my first app at

how am I gonna handle this

and you know

what kind of resets am I gonna use during a game

and then after a game

how am I reflecting on OK

this went well this didn't

and how am I gonna shift next time

so over time he yes

began to do better with you know his um

with hitting

and but that was a byproduct the

the real

win was that he started to recognize his patterns

he knew he had to have his habits and routines intact

and if he didn't

then he would see himself strike out more

or not do as well um

so that's the

the transformation isn't gonna be that you perfectly

start to just hit every ball yeah

yet yet that

that will happen more often

you know yeah yeah

you you

it's one of these things I

there's not a good word I

I keep searching searching for a word for this concept

and I would love it if you had one

by the way the concept is

it's something that you can only approach obliquely

meaning that if you strive for hitting the bullseye

you'll miss but if you just strive

if you focus on the process and you focus on

on the the

the if the stuff around

the behaviors around trying to hit the bullseye

then you're far more likely to hit it

yeah I mean

I think it's you know

it's kind of having faith

that it's all gonna work out

how it's meant to work out

and that could be religious faith

that could be just faith in the universe or just

trust because you've seen it happen a bunch of times

well right

and and to that point

you when you don't have the evidence

when you've been striking out

or you've been missing the ball

or you've been getting poor grades

you start to get down on yourself

and you don't see the evidence

you're like I can never do this

but you have to be you have to

part of the practice is reminding yourself

that you have done this before

you can do it again

and just because I'm in a slump right now

doesn't mean I'm gonna be a slump forever

this is temporary

and that but that's where that self belief comes

and that's hard because it's very

it's very easy to believe when we see

you know I make a million dollars

and we see it in our bank account

but it's very difficult

when we don't have the million dollars

and believing we can make the million dollars

so it's the same it's that same thing

so I think um I don't think the word you were looking

for is necessarily faith

but I think um you know

it's really allowing your

like not controlling

and allowing your subconscious to take over

you know I've done the practice

I've done the work

now go go out there and and and let it happen

and that's part of what I work with kids on

is getting into Flow State too

because it's not necessarily just

you know there's gonna be struggle

and then you're gonna have to go like in the shower

take a shower take a break

and then when you're in the shower

you think of some idea that could help you with your

with your game or whatever you're trying to work on

and then when you're you're there

you get into that flow state and

and you're kind of

where your mind and body are just attached

and you just you just feel it

you're not thinking it

you're out of your mind into your body

and then with that that can't last forever

even though we want it to um

then the key after that is to recover

is to you know

physically recover mentally recover

so that you can get back in that cycle again

super important yeah yeah

yeah so it's a

it's kind of like allowing

yeah yeah

yeah I

it's it's such an interesting

I mean I'm um

one thing that I've realized about myself is I'm

I'm kind of a flow junkie

I uh

and I have a number of friends that are that way

and that's

that's something that I have in common with a lot of

the people that I really get along with is

is that we really we really seek out

it's almost like we

it's an addiction getting into that flow state

and we seek out

we don't even necessarily

I don't even necessarily know how to make it happen

but I know that oh

if I'm if I'm flying an airplane

and doing a particularly difficult approach

you know and the stakes are really

really high um

then I'm there and

and it's I

it it

it is it's addictive to me

and that's um

you know that drives a lot of performance in my world

well I think everyone

that's why I mean

I started surfing I can't stop

am I the best surfer no

do I get up yes

and I get up for the three seconds

I got up in the 30 minutes I paddled it

I forgot about the paddling

right because I got up

so I think but I think that that is

it is an addiction and it's a good addiction

but it's technically like the

the chemicals in your brain

the dopamine and all the other chemicals

that's what's happening so it's

you're not taking a drug

or you're not smoking a cigarette

you're not getting it's not that addiction

but it's this kind of healthier addiction

if that's a term yeah

and so if the flying the plane gives it to you

if the surfing if the

you know whatever it is

um you're gonna keep doing that activity until okay

that you've mastered

it's kind of like once you master it

that's why we kind of go on to the next thing

cause we need that intersection between

skill and challenge like yeah

it's that right intersection of

it's still challenging me I can do it

but I'm not perfect at it yet kind of thing oh yeah

this is my entire life experience

you're describing right here

I I

my entire life experience is this

seeking that place where the

the performance curve is the steepest and

and just you know

going out there and improving every and then

and then once it starts to nose over like that

once you get to the place of excellence

it becomes a lot less interesting for me

and that's actually a struggle

because that last 10% is very rare

and so if you really want to I mean

it's one thing

if you're doing it just for the enjoyment right

and you're going out there and surfing

and you're not gonna

you're not gonna be an Olympic surfer

if that's a thing um

and and you're doing it for the enjoyment

then it's you don't you you don't need

you don't need the performance to be that high

but um and

but you have to just take enjoyment in the process yeah

yeah and if you don't it I mean

that's the only way if you if you're

if you're frustrated

because you're not at this next level

then and then you're just gonna sit there and

continue to be frustrated

and that's not a great experience

mm hmm yeah

no I mean you kind of have to

just let it happen you you do the

you do the practice you

learn the skills and at some point

you have to trust yourself

let it happen

and practice and fail and practice and fail

and then it yeah

no I mean that it's kind of it when you were speaking

it made me think like yes

ADHD is a thing and many of us have a tinge of ADHD

but I I remember

you know friends I've had and

you know

where it's like they're always on to the next activity

and I think we see it as a negative of like well

you did skydiving now you're gonna do surfing

you did surfing now you're gonna do this

you know biking or what

but I think people are it's not necessarily a negative

that you're chasing that flow state through

these healthy activities I think it's

it's like once you've kind of mastered it

you can still do it for fun

it's not a problem yet

I feel like I want to master the next thing

and I think that's okay yeah yeah

well and as with everything

there's attention um

on the one hand you

you you want that

by the way that's

that's the very definition of resiliency being able to

you know

go from one thing to another to another to another

but you also need to be able to finish the thing

you're on right

you need to there are things that you have to finish

right you know

there there are it's not like you can um

you know the

the world expects you to complete high school

the world expects you to get

you know right

and and if you

if you get to 90% on everything

and you never get past that 10%

you never actually complete

you know close

a a mentor of mine used to call that

closing the value loop

um you know

it's really easy to get to the 80% level and then

and and then that last 20% is the hardest part

and that's what nobody does

or that's what's relatively rare

and then so

a lot of success in life is

really focusing on the thing that is rare and

because that's what's valuable

and so there's a tension between between

you know flitting from one thing to another

which is a good skill to be able to have

and being able to stick through

and being able to have the resilience

to see something through to the end yes

yes absolutely absolutely

yeah that's

there's a and yeah

some people fall into either category and some people

you know

can do it in a few ways and they finish it out and they

I guess you know

it's a little trial and error as well

but yeah yep

I always love to end these conversations with uh

more or less the same question to everybody

but I always put everybody on the spot so um

so this is my apology for

for doing it to you

but if there is one principle that comes to mind when

when I when I

when I ask you for a principle that every parent

listening should live by

when raising their sons what would that principle be

hmm

well let's see

um could be a number of things

um I think

one thing that I would strongly encourage parents to do

is to take care of themselves

have Grace with themselves

regulate themselves because no matter what

in the teen years you might have a great relationship

but there's always a lot of conflict there

there just is

and trying to kind of just instead of reacting

just regulate instead of correcting

just maybe observe you know and

and when you feel like you want to step in

then maybe just step back

and it's really hard to do those things

not gonna happen every single day

but I just encourage parents to

you know

take care of themselves and take a deep breath and

and you know

allow the productive struggle

and the natural consequences to occur when

when you feel like that

it's okay for your kid to feel those things and

and then that's okay yeah

it's been spectacular Doctor Carla Katuria

thank you so much uh

for coming on raising men

thank you so much for having me

this is awesome and

Doctor Carla Katuria

is the founder of the house of rise

she specializes in helping high achieving youth

build sustainable self worth beyond

their performance

if you want to learn more her rise about Doctor Carla

about her rise framework

or her work with young athletes and families

all of her information and resources are LinkedIn

the show notes as always

thank you for listening to Raising Men

you are a great parent

raising men is produced by Phil Hernandez

this episode was edited by Ralph Tolentino