it's parents themselves

like we have to have a lot of compassion for ourselves

and we have to take a good look at ourselves

and to be able to take care of ourselves

because this is an incredibly

incredibly hard job and I think just the

raising good humans

comes from a place of deep compassion for parents

cause it's so hard to be a parent

we're so we have so little

you know in the United States

we have very few resources directed at parents

and very little support and we're all on our own

hi welcome back to raising Men today

on the podcast we're joined by Hunter Clark Fields

she is the best selling author of Raising Good Humans

and Raising Good Humans every day

and she's a creator of the Mindful Mama podcast

and Mindful Parenting training

Hunter's books bring clarity

wisdom

and real tactical tools that we can use right away

so let's jump right in hunter welcome to raising men

thank you I'm so glad to be here Shawn

I think it's it's an honor to have you

I I really

really appreciate you taking the time

so tell me what is a good human to you

that's a good question I mean

when I think about that what I want for my kids

and what I want for other kids is

I want them to be um

to feel comfortable in their own skin

I want them to feel

you know

secure and comfortable in their own skin so that

and so they can process their emotions and they can

go you know

make choices

and go out into the world and do what they wanna do

you know kind confident kids who are

you know a

a a little aware of themselves

aware of themselves aware of others

but I want that feeling of

just comfort in their own skin

that's kind of really what I'm

what I'm going for

for when I think about a good human cause

then from that secure base of solidity and security

then they can just make all kinds

of decisions about the world and how to be

yeah you need a secure base to thrive and

you know that's

that's really what you want for your kids right

you want them to thrive maybe even more than you did

yeah yeah

yeah I mean yeah

you do want it kind of more than

than you did

but I think that one of the interesting things about

you know parenting is that

it always sort of points back to ourselves

you know like we have um

enormous influence on the

the sort of emotional weather in our household

um in our kids

you know as far as like

feelings and a sense of security and ease go

that's those are things that um

you know we humans

we inter are like we feel each other's feelings

yeah very palpably

even through zoom you and I are talking

you can you

you'll be you know

without knowing whether I'm tense

or whether I'm not tense

or all of those different things

and I can see the same about you

and so when you're in the same room

in the same household with your kids

they can feel that so much

so we have

you know we want that for them

we want them to thrive so much and

and but it's important to realize that like

the best parenting that we're ever doing

is in modeling so if we're show

you know we can't just tell them how to be

and hope for it for them we have to

we have to live what we want our kids to learn

we have to show them how to

how to do those different things right

we have to model right

I think that's the most important thing is that

you know

you know we all want our kids to be able to

stop crying and calm down

and regulate emotions and things like that

but they need to watch us do it

so we need to so for a lot of us

we need to sort of learn how to do it ourselves

cause I mean

at least for me

I was taught like just don't cry and go to your room

basically don't have those feelings or whatever it is

right and

and and really we have to recognize that um

you know

there's nature and there's nurture and nature is really

really strong

and kids come in all kinds of genetic flavors

et cetera but we do have enormous influence

and not so much in like what we're saying or doing

but like who and in who we are and how we are being

yeah I have been uh

blessed or cursed

depending on how you want to look at it

with a son who feels everything so deeply

that I became aware at a pretty early age for him that

at how much my unregulation impacts him

I so for example

we'll be I

I take him to school in the mornings

and it's it's a seven minute walk

but for me

it feels very important that we make absolute sure

that we're not late

that was a triggering thing for me as a child

my mom was always dropping me off at school late

and then the kid gets punished

when the parent is completely out of their control

it's it's horrible and

and so I feel a great deal of anxiety in the mornings

if we're not on time

and there will be times where I will be like

come on man let's go

we gotta go we gotta go

and I'll kind of get on him about that

because of the anxiety that I'm feeling

and it completely spins him off the rants

and we've had situations where in fact

and and one of

kind of

my central principles about sending him to school is

I don't

I will not send him to school when he's in a frenzy

when he's unregulated

because I'm gonna get a phone call from the principal

it happens 90% of the time

and it's a negative experience for him

it's a negative experience for the school

for the other kids everything

so what we'll do instead is just take

a walk around the block so

it turns out that if I get all stressed out

and unregulated and start pushing him to move faster

and all that stuff number one

he's gonna move slower number two

he's gonna be unregulated and then we're

we're not even gonna be able to go to school on time

we're gonna have to walk around the block

for 10 minutes

yeah it takes so much longer yeah

I mean that's the interesting you know

there's all the communication skills and

and raising good humans and

and people push back against them like oh

but that takes so much time

but it has it takes so much longer

when everyone gets totally disregulated

and your kid is losing it

and you're losing it it takes way longer yeah yeah

it's like you're

you're you're driving a train and the train

you know if you if you push the train too fast

it'll go off the rails

and then you gotta get the train back on the rails

somehow

it takes way longer than if you just slow down by 10%

and took the corner at a nice

leisurely pace you'd be fine and you'd be on your way

well I'm glad you're seeing that about yourself

I mean I was like that I was totally like that too

like when my kid was 3 and 2 and we

we walked to a school too

actually like a five minute walk away and um

and yeah and time pressure was such a thing for me and

and I think someone asked me yesterday in an interview

someone said like you know

what would you you know

what advice would you give your younger self

and I would say

tell my younger self to kind of slow down yeah

slow down man because

because yeah it

it it always makes everything worse

when we get disregulated

and that's not to say that like we're gonna

like we're gonna not be perfect

we're gonna yell we're gonna lose our cool

that's definitely gonna happen for everyone

even for people who are listening to parenting podcast

right like it's definitely gonna happen right for you

and that's okay like

it's good like our kids don't need perfect parents

they don't need you to be perfect

in fact it would be terrible for them

if you were always perfect and regulated

and like they never saw a human losing it

yeah they wouldn't know how to deal with anything right

so you know

we need to be ourselves we need to be imperfect

but yeah like getting ourselves

getting so anxious ourselves

you know when we get

when we get anxious when we get um

frustrated when

when we yell none of those things do help a situation

they they

they generally don't like yelling

you know makes it so our kids go into fight

flight or freeze there you know

that cuts off you know

then their their nervous system cuts off

access to the slower parts of their brain

the prefrontal cortex area um

they they literally can't learn then

anything you want them to learn in that moment

about what to do better so it's

it's not a skillful tactic

but it's something that um

one thing that was important for me to understand

cause I I would feel that late pressure

and I felt a lot of anxiety when my kids were little

and I felt a it was a lot of frustration

it was really difficult

and that brought out my temper and I have this

I have a bad temper yeah

and I

what I had to learn about my own yelling was that um

was that a it it's not it's not my fault

like it's not something I'm choosing

it's something that that my own nervous system

my own fight flight or freeze system is activated

and it sees my child as a threat

I never woke up in the morning and said oh

I think I'm gonna like

yell at Maggie at 7:30 on the way to school like no

like I never ever once did that I never made

and you never feel good about it after it was done no

you never feel good about it

you're no one's making a conscious decision

if you're listening to a parenting podcast

you have never once made a conscious decision to

yell at your kid right right

this is something that is a a reaction and

and it's unconscious reaction

that's just happening without conscious thought

so it doesn't make sense to berate ourselves for it

cause you never consciously chose to do that

but it is your responsibility

so we can train our nervous system

our body

minds to more skillful means bit by bit over time

not that we will ever be perfect

but we can train towards more

more skillful means and

and it does help enormously

cause we gotta live what we want our kids to learn

we gotta show them how to do it right

you have this great story early in Raising Good Humans

where you talk about the absurdity

of yelling at your kids to be quiet

yes and it's that

that illustrates it perfectly

I I have almost never read

I mean there's like 10 words that

where you where you convey that story

and it's like wow

that hit me straight in the eyes

and it was so concisely and so well put the

the metaphor that I like to use for that is

you know we have the two brains

we have the cone in the barbarian brain

and we have the Sherlock Holmes brain

and the cone in the barbarian brain is that fighter

flight or freeze thing

and you need you actually do need that brain if

oh yeah

the oncoming car is coming it's

it's a good thing the parent arm come out

yeah the parent arm

yeah that's what controls the parent arm

but the vast majority of the time when you're

when you wanna drop into that brain

it's not the right thing

you want to stay in Sherlock Holmes brain

because that's where you

have access to the learning the additional context

all of all of the other stuff and

and if you're in um

if you if you drop down to Conan the barbarian brain

then it it's

it's just pure potentially it's pure chaos

and the same true

this might be explaining why me and my dad

who I got my temper from had a

like an obsession with Conan

the barbarian when we were little is that right

how funny yeah

that you know

that was a surprisingly great movie

Red Sonia it was a surprisingly great and in fact

Arnold Schwarzenegger has has um

he's written a book

um called

and now I'm drawing a blank on what it's called uh uh

be useful and it's spectacular

it talks it

I mean

it it

it it points out one of those absurdities

like yelling at your kids to be quiet it

it's he's

you know grew up in rural Austria

and decided that he was gonna become

a leading man in movies in the US

and then set about to make that happen

and you think about the absurdity of that goal

I mean imagine being 16 with him

and he tells you this goal

you would make fun of him for

and yet look what he did he

he did it and it it

the book is the book is really really good

go Conan yeah um

yeah there's

there are a zillion parenting books out there why

what makes raising good humans special

you know it's funny

cause when I wrote it I didn't

I was like I'll be so happy if like I sell 3,000 copies

yeah like

and here we are 750,000 copies later

it's crazy it was really

it really surprised me um

and I think I've thought about that and I think

of course

I've had like some amazing luck as far as that goes

cause nobody who's made it

really

done some big things doesn't have a good dose of luck

so I do want to acknowledge that

but like I think it's

because

this is something I felt like I was really bad at

I was struggling in I was I

you know I share very honestly my

my struggles and my failures

and then I was like and this is

and I was in a place of desperately wanting to know

like people would all these parenting coaches would say

well you have to like pause before you respond

I'd be like but how

how do you pause you know

and I really really wanted to know how to

how to do these things and I really

I guess I you know

what I bring to the table is that like

at the time there was a lot of advice

great advice about how to be skillful with your kids

and

but I couldn't implement any of it when I was activated

when I was disregulated you know

and I was anxious trying to do my best for this kid

and I had a temper and I'm all

I'm highly sensitive like your son right

so I had all these things and I

it would all go out the window

as soon as my stress response was activated

so I think this it's to me

it's like you know

some of the best ideas are the ones where you're like

oh duh

of course right

like of course

we can't

make a choice about how to respond

until we can regulate ourselves

you know of course we can't do those things and we

we and

and there are ways to do it

and I had you know

started to study Buddhism and mindfulness as a teenager

and so I realized like oh

this this tradition

you know this

and all this research backs it up

has all these ways to regulate ourselves

to be more peaceful to be more steady

to be like

the calm mountain that our kids need us to be

right they need that really desperately and um

and I I really wasn't that and I

and and I I

you know had bits of that

but like I

I was able to sort of cultivate that a real steady uh

steadiness in me without changing who I am

will becoming more of who I am but but um

but yeah to

to recognize that you know

it's parents themselves like

we have to have a lot of compassion for ourselves

and we have to take a good look at ourselves

and to be able to take care of ourselves

because this is an incredibly

incredibly hard job and I think just the

raising good humans

comes from a place of deep compassion for parents

cause it's so hard to be a parent

we're so we have so little you know

in the United States

we have very few resources directed at parents

and very little support and we're all on our own

yeah and um yeah yeah

we've lost a lot of the institutions

there's not as the families aren't as big

and the grandparents aren't around anymore

and the cousins aren't there and

mm hmm yeah

yeah no

no aunties to tag off with if you're a single parent

like if you have two parents in the household

like you're like oh gosh

thank goodness I have another person there

some of the hours of the day to tag off for but

you know that it really humans should be

we should have like

10 other people that we could tag off for

absolutely because think how regulated we would be

think how steady you know

the the kids could have this such a steady influence

and I think that would be really

really healthy for us to have that

you know

for kids to have lots of different attachment figures

that and then parents could have space to breathe

cause it's so intensive when kids are

little humans take a lot of intensive care

I mean a giraffe baby plops down 4 feet falls

is born falls out of the sky 4 feet to the ground

and then stands up and walks around

that's like a what like a

the equivalent of like a seven year old maybe right

human like it's just like we're

we're we're

you know it's very intensive for us

yeah no

that is so true

part of what strikes me about raising good humans is

and what makes it unique for me is how authentic it is

it comes from your own personal journey

and how tactical it is and like

these are the specific tactics that I'm using for my

I get really mad all the time

and I know needed to kill that monster

and here's how I did

it is basically the story of the book

as far as I can tame the monster

I mean it's still there

but yeah right

okay that's fair

yeah tame the monster

but it's amazing like with practice

I think that's the thing that's really important

and key is that like

these are things that we can practice and train

like we have this neuroplasticity

we can train our brains we can

you know bushwhack a new uh

path through the the woods of our brain

um but uh

but yeah like it

and we can train our brain

so then even like at some point

when my second daughter was like 9 years old

so this is like 10 years after I had started to

to practice all these things and started to learn and

and at one point she

we had while watched a movie and we had movie night

and then she was supposed to go to bed

she was 9

so she could go put herself to bed and get ready and

and I was like she was being nudgey

so I was like

I'm gonna just read my book and ignore her

and she's gonna just go to bed oh

she's being nudgey and then from the stairwell

she said something and she like laughed at me

and it was like

like it was like this

I was this whole new trigger that came out

like I was just like from zero to

you know 100 in like a second right

you know I was so angry all of a sudden

cause she had been nudging and nudging

and I stood up and I was so actually

in in retrospect I was quite proud of myself

because I stood up and I yelled

but I yelled

I am so angry right now and then I open the door

and I threw my poor library book down onto the carport

and I walked up and down the street for 10 minutes

until I calm down

but I was so proud of myself for yelling

something skillful yeah

rather than like you what's wrong with you

et cetera no blaming and shaming language

I yelled an imessage haha

I'm so angry and I was really proud of that moment

that is yeah

I I think that encapsulates

that encapsulates the skill right now

it's I mean

you're gonna feel angry that's fine

the the

the skill is in handling it in a way that enhances

your relationship with your kid

and as opposed to ruins it

yeah ruins it

it damages it damage yeah

yeah yeah

I could feel the damage happening with my oldest child

when she was little and I could

I was really scared you know

it really scared

and you kind of have to give yourself the Grace

of understanding that okay

mistakes were made that's okay

and then you move on

yeah exactly

and also I think it's so important to understand that

you can always always begin a new

you can always

always start and practice and heal things

it's so fascinating um

you know uh yeah

I taught mindful parenting to um

a low income community in Wilmington

Delaware and a grandmother was there

cause she was taking care of her 6 year old grandchild

and at the end she shared yes

things are going better with the 6 year old

but she shared with me that she healed

her relationship with her adult daughter

which was so exciting I

I mean it just made me feel amazing

but for like in my own circumstances

I remember thinking

I can see in my daughter you know

my oldest daughter got the worst of me and she

I could see these you know

I saw her like bark orders at her younger sister

and I was like oh God

that's what I sound like oh no

and I I used

I used to think you know

oh you know

they say the first three years are so

vital for your development

and maybe I just I would just worry that

maybe I really screwed up my kid

even though I've

I've done a lot of changing and growing and I've

I've really

really Learned and practiced some skillful means

and but anyway I

I would worry that from time to time over the years

when I would just she's just um

she's kind of an intense kid

and seeing her

kind of intense reactions and snappy reactions

sometime with other people

but then and I worried that like

she was a little not compassionate with others

because I was snappy

because I was stressed and not so compassionate

I got think with her sometimes when she was little yeah

and I would worry about that

but then

there was this time when she was maybe 14 or 15

and we had a a dog then and I had had the

a scary incident

where the dog met another dog out on our street

and there was barking and there's growling

and it really scared me and I was really upset and I

came inside and I was like

talking about the dog and I was really upset

my younger daughter who's normally

she's like very sort of intuitively compassionate

and she's she was kind of like getting upset at me and

and defending the dogs and I was just like

and really upset

and my older daughter said to my younger daughter

you know can't you see that mom is upset right now

and she said to me mom

do you need a hug and I was like yes

yes I do need a hug

and she came over and gave me a hug

and I was like oh

I didn't ruin my child too

oh my gosh

I was like I'm not only I'm getting a hug

but I also didn't ruin my child

yeah

yeah I

I you know

children are very resilient if

if you if you allow them to be

and you don't want to rely on it too much

but it you can give yourself the Grace

that there is no specific incident

pretty much that ruined them for life

and that it really is a Marathon

not a sprint yes

and you know

there are I mean

I could think of a handful of things in my childhood

that

that really impacted the way that I look at the world

but they were

examples of a trend right

you know

they were just kind of emblematic situations that I

that the touchstones about a more generalized trend and

um and so

you know without that generalized trend

those those specific events would not have had

the significance that they do

yeah there's a pattern yeah

and I think that we can also you know you know

we know that yeah

we're gonna be human we're gonna mess up

we're gonna

there's gonna be damage and conflict that's

that will happen that's

that happens conflict happens in families every day

all the time and that's normal and of course

but we can um you know that repair is so

so important and it

it really goes a long way and you know

just of course

us saying I'm sorry to our kids and and I

I had a you know I had a couple

I had a

you know moments when I

when I apologized to young Maggie

when she was like 6 years old

for my yelling in the past

and I you know

cried and cried and just

I apologized to her and it was for me impactful um

of course to do that but but yeah

it's um

and then someone asked me actually a little while ago

um you know thinking about you know

I have my temper

because my father has an intense temper

he's an highly sensitive person raised in a

a generation that of course

you know where things that we would call abuse are

were normal then you know

and um

and so I used to be very scared of him at times

he was also very like

affectionate as well he was like

I could definitely rely on him to be very affectionate

and cheerleader but also

he scared me sometimes

and I remember someone asked me recently like oh

you know what if your father

you know like apologize to you

and I was like oh

my God wow

I mean it was such a shocking idea

like I

I it was so hard to imagine yeah

yeah it was so hard to imagine

but I could

see that it would make such a profound impact

on him too

even probably yeah

and you know

as a grown adult woman

like with almost grown children now

like it would

it would make a real profound impact even now

so I think it's just to say it's never

never too late to to practice skillful means

and to heal those relationships

you know you

you almost I mean

certainly unintentionally

did a natural experiment with your two kids

where the first one got the full brunt of of

of the old hunter

and then the second one got the a

a lot more of the new improved

mindful hunter

more relaxed yeah

what differences

have you noticed about the way that they are

or the way that your experience was

raised them

what were the different outcomes that you've gotten

as a result of that experiment

I mean well

they're very different people

so you know who's right

and so yeah

the variables are isolated

you can't you can't assign causation yeah

yeah I mean

I think though my younger daughter

I mean she is more um

she has been kind of

naturally a little bit more emotionally aware

a little bit more relaxed

a little bit more in tune with things

um

she was also just like an easier baby

and I'm not sure if like

my first child

probably got more anxiety hormones in the womb

you know because yeah

I was more anxious with the first one

so there's so there's

so there's no way to sort of tease apart anything

but yes she did get and

and you know

she was more open to um

me talking to her about all kinds of things

like all those awkward conversations

you have to have about sexuality

and all those kind of things

she was more open to those conversations

and is a little more open to some of those things

you know she

we can talk and actually

she and I um

yeah I don't know we

we get along very well I mean

I love both my daughters enormously

but yeah the youngest one uh

is you know

I travel well with her

like we take care of each other well

I don't know she's a

she's a very cool um

balanced person and I think she

she benefited from a a more relaxed parent for sure

yeah interesting

you know I

I

in keeping with the the the

the sense about the tactical nature of your book I

I wanna talk about

I'll tell you a story of something that

that happened with me and my son

and I would love to get

your feedback on how I handled it and

and what I should have done

how I should have thought about this and

and what I should have done differently um

my son when he was three and a/2

was terrified of escalators

he he spent his entire life not being

terrified of anything

he used to jump in the deep end of the pool

even though he couldn't swim and

and then he he developed this

this fear of escalators for no reason

just all of a sudden

was terrified to go down escalators

we would have to use elevators anywhere we went

and this irritated me it felt like it actually

frankly it

it was a trigger for me

because I felt like I was a failure as a father

because he wasn't tough enough

to go down the escalator he's three and a/2 years old

and it felt like he was just being a weak

it felt like he was being weak

and I wanted to teach him that no we

we overcome our fears and we do this

and I felt like it was it was an opportunity to do that

um now and

I was pretty you know

I didn't

I didn't ever force him to go down an escalator

I I

I I didn't

I didn't mess with him in that way

but I felt this urge to

to want to impart this lesson to him

and we went to target one day and we were

he had allowance he had $11

and we he wanted to spend it on toys at target

the toy section of target

in the target that we went to is

is upstairs and there's an escalator

he could go up the escalator just fine

but he just couldn't go down

so we went to the target and we grabbed his

we got we grabbed

so he wanted to buy um

a set of Hot Wheels cars and they were

you get five Hot Wheels cars for $6

so he could afford since he had $11

he could afford one pack of Hot Wheels cars

but they were running a special

and the special was

if you buy two packs of Hot Wheels cars

you get a third one for free

oh my gosh and he was so close

he was so close $1 away

and so I told him I said listen

if you're willing to go down the escalator

I'll make you a deal I'll give you the extra dollar

and you'd be able to buy three packs

instead of just one

do you want the deal

and he goes yeah

yeah yeah

I want the deal I want the deal

so we got the three packs of Hot Wheels cars

and we approached the escalator and I said listen

we were approaching the escalator

I said listen

I'm here for you whatever you need to succeed

on going down the escalator

I will do for you you need me to pick you up

you want me to blindfold you

you want me to just carry you down

you want me to force you down

you want me to stay away whatever you need

he goes okay okay

just hold my hand so I held his hand

and we approached the escalator

and we got one step away

I stepped on the escalator and he says pause

pause and he whipped his hand up from under mine

and I start going down the escalator and he freaks out

and so I run run back up and he has a total meltdown

it lasts 45 minutes he's screaming

he's crying he's like freaked out

and at some point 30 minutes into it

I'm like

I'm the worst parent in the world

I I can't believe I've done this

I'm so sorry like

let's just forget the deal man

let's forget the deal and he goes no

I want the deal I want the deal and

he we finally got him regulated again

we finally we came up with an approach

we decided we were you know okay

we're gonna hold I'm gonna hold his hand

and we're just gonna walk really

really fast

he's gonna close his eyes and um same exact thing

happened

we got to the top of the escalator and he goes pause

pause but it was too late by then

he was stepping on the escalator

and I just pulled him on and I held him tight

and he started like freaking out a little bit

and then about a third of the way down the escalator

he relaxed and he started getting happy

he started realizing okay

I'm gonna get my thing and this isn't so bad

and he felt this elation at the end of it

he was thrilled and he's that he succeeded

he went home and he told his mom and he got you know

his extra 10 cars and he was really

really happy but

the whole point was to get him

not to be scared of going down escalators

and it didn't work yeah

what happened the next escalator

he was

terrified of escalators for another year and a half

um it made the fear worse

and then it just went away all by itself

huh huh

and I don't know I you know

I can see a lot of things I did right in that situation

I feel like my mind

my my my heart was in the right place

I feel like

I feel like I shouldn't have impuned this sense of like

weakness about this thing on him

but okay

I feel like I was right to try and teach him the lesson

but I I feel like overall

it was a mistake

and I feel like I should have done something different

and in fact I think if I just would have left it alone

two months later

he would have not been as scared of escalators

and it would have been fine

oh I feel for you because yeah

I that's such an understandable impulse right

you want him to be

I would have wanted my daughters to be strong

and to get over the escalator thing absolutely yes

I would have

I can completely relate to that feeling of wanting to

have your kid get over this thing

and it's so hard like

to accept that

we don't have any control over their stuff right

like it's not on our timetable

like we're not gonna make them read

when we want them to read

we're not gonna make them

you know what I mean

there's like all these things that we can't

that it's it's doesn't it

it really

like us interfering with doesn't really do a lot with

um so I can

I can relate to that that wanting to do that yeah

I think um

when we start to use things like

um when we try to manipulate our kids with things

like bribery or honestly

like

a punishment and reward are two sides of the same coin

right um

that um

that then kids do feel coerced right

like they they can

they feel that and it's kind of like um

it's kind of like you know

when you slow down when you're speeding on the highway

and you notice there's a cop ahead

and you slow down when there's a cop there

but then you're back up to 65 or 70 what after

you know a minute or two right

like it's doesn't

there's no intrinsic

you have no intrinsic motivation to not speed

you're just speed not speeding not to get caught and um

and similar with like reward so

you know when you're working with things that are

extrinsic motivators like rewards

you know or or bribes or things like that there's no

there's no intrinsic that

the child has no intrinsic reason to

wanna change this thing

they're just trying to to get this extrinsic reward

and that's not like the most quality change

if you manipulate the behavior in some way

it's not really coming from the inside out right

it's coming from the outside in

and so it's not a great way to learn a lesson

or to make change honestly

you know um

you know if you don't

don't hit your brother

or I'm gonna take this thing away from you

you really want your kid to learn like

don't hit your brother because hitting hurts people

yeah we don't we don't hurt people in our family right

yeah that's not who we are yeah yeah

exactly

and you really wanted him to learn to do the escalator

so that he could just do it

and it's fun

and it's easier than getting on the elevator

or sometimes it's really hard to find the whatever

you know yeah

I really I didn't want him to be limited by fears right

yeah like

like it's an irrational fear

recognize it as such and you know

push through it yeah

yeah but he wasn't ready to do that

that's a skill I wanted to impart to him

but you know

he's three and a/2 yeah

three and a/2 it's

it's um

you know I guess I would have invited you kind of

at that time to say like

you know um

why do you feel so

like to turn the attention back to yourself

you know why does

why do you feel so strongly about this

you know what is this um

you know to explore like

what is your own fear

and to kind of carry your own baggage right

in a little in a way

you were you have some baggage and you were like

here son

take my baggage take my bags yeah

you hold the baggage right

um rather than carrying it yourself right

you had some stuff going on around that

but you projected it all onto your kid

and rather than wait for him and his timetable

um yeah

I love that analysis I think that's exactly right

it's something that overall

I think it was successful

and I mean he really did have a feeling of elation

but I felt this vague sense that I've done

some things wrong there and it's really

really good lesson

it's funny cause we have to walk a middle path

you know like there's some people who

you know like there's some people who

you know we have to use our power sometimes right

as parents like yeah

all in all

like as you get to the ends of raising good humans

which you haven't gotten to yet

but like that that part

like there's a whole part about the use of power

and the more we use power

there's an inverse relationship between power

and influence

and I believe that one of the reasons why

we have this trope of like

the rebellious teenager

and the teenager that hates you

is because teenagers are not rebelling

against their parents they're rebelling against

the unskillful use of power that parents have used

for many

many many years

and they've disciplined

in a way that builds resentment to to um

teenagers by using power using

that's exactly right

using punishments and things like that

so using the power of

you can't have the iPad or you can't have the car or

you know I was grounded different things like that

and so teenagers will resent parents at that point

and then also

teenagers then have a lot of their own power

so they can call a friend to pick them up

and then they're out of there right

you so

but if we can use less power and use our influence

more use more of that intrinsic motivation

then we have a beautiful

bunch of influence left when our kids are teenagers

and this is so

so this is a really important conversation

because it is very true that when you have bigger kids

they have bigger problems right yeah

it's less intensive hour to hour

but bigger kids have bigger problems

so you do want to be there and be an influence

in their life um

so but it's also it's not like it's

it's a the messy middle

like it's not like you're never gonna use power

like I remember holding my daughter down

so that I could put that car seat on her

you know what and or take the medicine or yeah

I'm sorry I have to hold you down

like you're screaming and your body is bucking

but

we can't drive this car unless you're in the car seat

and I I

remember reading a story of a parent

who was so dedicated to gentle parenting

that they said okay

you don't have to walk in the car seat

and the kid walked along on the like

side of the road with one parent

while one parent drove along slowly like

I'm sorry I just don't have the patience for that like

and that's a little crazy if you ask me

like it's just a little crazy

totally agree to say that

and I mean I it's not sustainable

so that's not sustainable that you

they they they don't have

you know

they shouldn't necessarily really have that much power

right like we want to of course

respect our kids bodily autonomy

and we want to teach them all those lessons

and things like that but at the same time

like

when your son came on the escalator that second time

and and you just held him there

like that was probably the right choice

like help him get over it

it's like kind of like

like helping them get in the pool right

like you're using some of your your power and your

you know to to kind of make the like

let's get through this situation yeah

and so it's not like that's one of the

I think the things about that

we have to recognize

is that we can use more and more skillful means

and we should

should learn like more and more skillful means

and like we gotta cut ourselves some slack

it's gonna be messy and it's gonna be like

there's gonna be some awkward

uncertain moments and you're gonna be like

oh I should have done this differently

and you might even go you know

say to your son hey buddy

you know what that time where I

I did this thing with the Hot Wheels in the eye

you know I'm sorry yeah

we talked about it a lot you know yeah

you can do that right so it

it's gonna be messy and it's not completely you know

I think it's dangerous to go to the extremes and say

it's it's I

you know it should always be

you know of course

like the do as I say

because I say it that that doesn't make any sense

and that's unskillful

and that isn't doesn't teach your kids good lessons

right but also the complete opposite is

is also unskillful right

so but there are

there's a path there's a middle path and it

it is a little messy but but

but that's where we wanna walk yeah

there's

one thing that I've Learned through this entire journey

is that there is always a tension

so if you ever find yourself thinking

oh no

it's always X you're 100% wrong yeah

you will you

you you need to find the tension

and you need to figure out where that

where that middle is

yeah

absolutely yeah

so I always like to

finish up these conversations by asking

more or less the same question of everybody

and the question is

what is one guiding principle that you believe that

parents should hold on to as

as they raise their children in in our culture today

hmm that's a that's a

this is sort of a weighty question one day

it is it is

and and there's again

there's attention you yeah

there's there's a real value in like OK

what comes to mind right then

but then there's also you all

you also want to be deep and meaningful and

and all of that to I guess

take however much time you need

I think I would say to that

you know

my invitation for a principal would be

to invite people to slow down

and to give yourself some space to make

to make choices and and give your kids space to

to you know

I think we get so sped up

like we fill every second with like glance

you know

seeing if we've gotten a text message or whatever it is

and you know

we got all our activities and our schedules

and we're going so fast

and we're on all the teams and things like that

I guess I would invite people to slow down and

and um

protect childhood protect kids

you know ability to be bored

and to play freely without adults guiding them and um

and to just serve slow it down and protect childhood

and slow yourself down

so that you can appreciate where you are

big time I

I love that sentiment hunter

thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us today

this is Hunter Clark Fields again

she's the best selling author of Raising Good Humans

and Raising Good Humans Everyday

the mindful Mama podcast

and the Mindful Parent Training

um

all of the links for those things are in the show notes

this has been raising men and you are a great parent

raising men is produced by Phil Hernandez

this episode was edited by Ralph Tolentino