The Relationship Framework to Ethically Influence Your Kid
part 3 (of 3):
what we know:
Recap of Part 2 (of 3): Why Our Modern World Requires a New Kind of Parent
1. The style of communication you adopt determines your kid's level of openness to your ideas, direction, and guidance.
2. Child compliance is not an indication that a kid is "well-raised" or en route to a life of joy, meaning, and connection.
3. The idea that every child is a whole, complex person, worthy of respect and consideration is relatively new. Parenting with this belief requires intentionality and solid communication skills.
You and your kid deserve a framework built on practical, connection-centered communication, not a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants approach to the shifts of our modern world.
Key Concept #3: The WORTHINESS model empowers you to positively influence your kid’s assumptions about who they are and how they fit into their greater societal context.
A kid whose needs aren’t met in a constructive manner will meet their needs through destructive methods. The way in which these needs are met will determine how they conceive of themself. And how they conceive of themself will, in turn, lead them to “show up” in the world in specific ways.
The ways a kid shows up in the world may lead others to label them, which can further reinforce a self-story that may not serve them...
The Troublemaker
The Quiet Kid
The Perfect Student (read: overachiever)
The Class Clown
The One Who’s Wise Beyond Their Years (read: had to take on too much too soon)
Your kid is actively constructing their self-story. All of us build our self-story and we use, in large part, the messages we get from the world around us.
Your kid requires context to integrate the world’s information in ways that help them shape their positive identity. It’s on you to help give them that context.
Kids experience the world as both an observer and as a participant and – without context – they can make some wild assumptions about what they experience. These assumptions become the stories that make up their sense of self and lead to the identities they present to the world.
Btw: Most social media companies and the corporations who advertise there would be totally content with you taking a backseat to helping your kid craft their identity. That gives them more room to influence (i.e., make money off of your kid).
A kid whose needs aren’t met in a constructive manner will meet their needs through destructive methods. The way in which these needs are met will determine how they conceive of themself. And how they conceive of themself will, in turn, lead them to “show up” in the world in specific ways.
The ways a kid shows up in the world may lead others to label them, which can further reinforce a self-story that may not serve them...
The Troublemaker
The Quiet Kid
The Perfect Student (read: overachiever)
The Class Clown
The One Who’s Wise Beyond Their Years (read: had to take on too much too soon)
Your kid is actively constructing their self-story. All of us build our self-story and we use, in large part, the messages we get from the world around us.
Your kid requires context to integrate the world’s information in ways that help them shape their positive identity. It’s on you to help give them that context.
Kids experience the world as both an observer and as a participant and – without context – they can make some wild assumptions about what they experience. These assumptions become the stories that make up their sense of self and lead to the identities they present to the world.
Btw: Most social media companies and the corporations who advertise there would be totally content with you taking a backseat to helping your kid craft their identity. That gives them more room to influence (i.e., make money off of your kid).
You’re 10 and a chihuahua bites your hand. You make an assumption that little dogs are a risk. You develop a phobia of little dogs. An experience and a subsequent assumption create a story. That story influences the way you live your life.
assumptions can lead to story creation in an obvious way:
Other times, the way an assumption creates a story is less direct:
You’re five and your mom seems to notice you most when you cause a disruption. You learn the lesson (internalize the story) that being a “troublemaker” leads to attention, based on the assumption that conflict and love are linked.
Experiences and assumptions create stories that solidify into beliefs about how you “should” interact with the world to receive attention, love, and security.
This is true for your kid, too.
It’s crucial that you understand the stories your kid is telling themself about who they are, so you can fill in any gaps in context in order to ensure they can access a positive sense of self.
That’s how you make your kid resilient to the cacophony of voices vying for their attention. And it’s how they form feelings of trust and connection with others -- including you.
Think about it: you’ve made a billion assumptions in your life. How many of those assumptions got in the way of you forming a self-story that centered your innate worthiness?
What if you could use a relationship framework that uplifts your kid's positive self-image and supports the story that they're inherently worthy of respect and love? That they belong? And that their future is worth feeling excited about?
Let's dig in...
Part II: The communication style that lets you ethically influence your kid's sense of self >>
- Feel intrinsically worthy of your attention and respect
- Have safety to explore their developing identity
- Understand the boundaries you set and the reasons for them
- Know you speak not from ego, but from love
- Recognize the ways your kid is currently meeting their root emotional needs
- Spot the behavior and belief patterns that emerge in relation to how their needs are met
- Determine when, where, and how to engage around their assumptions (i.e. give context and support) and when to give them space to figure it out
There are TWO PARTS to create effective and ethical parental influence:
The WORTHINESS Framework to Ethically Influence Your Kid
We’ve identified the 10 essential stories all kids tell themselves about who they are in relation to the world.
These stories directly relate to how they will choose, consciously or not, to meet their root emotional needs. These stories have the ability to impact their self-image, capacity to connect with others, and to live a fulfilling life.
WORTHINESS: THE 10 STORIES KIDS TELL THEMSELVES ABOUT WHO THEY ARE
Note: There are numerous questions we could ask about each of these themes to gain an understanding of how a kid might be crafting their self-story. These are some examples.
WITNESSING
What does your kid believe is required for them to be seen?
OUTLOOK
How does your kid envision their future?
REBELLION
What does your kid need to push back against in order to define their autonomy?
TRANSCENDENCE
How does your child consider the meaning of our broader context (e.g., through religion, spirituality, science, art, tradition)?
HONESTY
Does your kid feel safe enough to show their "true" self?
IMPACT
Does your kid feel they make a difference in the world?
NURTURING
What does your kid feel is required of them to deserve safety, support, and shelter?
EMPATHY
What assumptions does your kid make about how others experience life?
STIMULATION
Does your kid feel comfortable in moments of stillness or quiet?
STRUGGLE
Does your kid believe that endeavor leads to growth?
How would you want your kid to answer the questions above?
When you're not helping your kid meet their needs in healthy ways, opportunities form for others to influence the way these needs are met.
Part II: The communication style that lets you ethically influence your kid's sense of self >>
There are numerous ways social media apps might help your kids craft "answers" to the questions around their WORTHINESS.
Through these rewards and the ever-churning content engine, online influences can:
- Make your kid feel seen
- Give them a glimpse of a fantastical future through aspirational influencer content
- Offer opportunities for rebellion
- Foster a sense of subcultural insider status
- Have them in a spiral about the nature of reality
- Make them wonder if anything they do matters
- Instill a sense of ever-present precariousness
- Give them a distorted sense of how others live (IRL)
- Normalize a chaotic mind that craves constant stimulation
- Suggest it's savvy to opt out of caring
some ways social apps function to fill in the gaps in your kid's self-story
To see how the WORTHINESS Framework applies offline, let’s take a closer look at the theme of Witnessing.
All humans have a need to be witnessed. We need to know that someone in the world sees us. (Yes, even "introverts" want to know they're understood and valued for who they are.)
Your kid may feel witnessed through a deep conversation with you, from performing a role in the school play, or by writing their name in Sharpie on their desk.
In my (Alex's) experience as a behavioral therapist, I’ve seen this need met in through destructive behaviors: theft, fighting, bullying, throwing tantrums, defiance, or fire starting. And I've seen them met through constructive behaviors: like being acknowledged for sharing one’s toys or earning a "good citizen's award" at school.
Feeling witnessed is a root emotional need and your kid has a story about how witnessing occurs for them. A kid who doesn’t have that need met in a constructive (or neutral) way will meet it in a destructive way.
It’s not a bad thing that we all want attention to feel whole and worthy. We’re social beings, after all. Our species flourished because we evolved with community and connection as core traits.
If we ask “What does a kid believe is required for them to be seen?” we can reverse engineer the stories that the five “labeled” kids we talked about earlier might have internalized.
constructive >>>
Your kid moves toward greater lifetime joy, pleasure & connection
destructive <<<<
Your kid moves toward reduced lifetime joy, pleasure & connection
THE TROUBLEMAKER
“Friction brings attention” or
“I must compete for attention through disruptive or destructive acts” or
“I’ll meet my need to be witnessed through any means necessary”
THE QUIET KID
“I’m not worth noticing” or
“It’s safer not to be noticed” or
“These fools wouldn’t understand me anyway”
THE PERFECT STUDENT
“My excellence is the way I get acknowledgment” or
“If I cease performing at a high level, I’m no longer worthy of being noticed” or
“We’re constantly competing for attention, and some of us will lose out”
THE CLASS CLOWN
“I’m valued for being goofy, so I’m not a serious person” or
“Attention is something that is taken, not given freely” or
“The only thing about me worth noticing is my sense of humor”
THE ONE WHO'S WISE BEYOND THEIR YEARS
“Adults notice me when I’m proving my wisdom” or
“I don’t belong in my ‘peer group.’ They’re incapable of seeing me for who I am” or
“If I ‘act my age,’ I lose the power to captivate others”
Remember the kids who were "labeled" because they internalized negative beliefs that informed how they chose to show up in the world?
Here are some of the conscious or subconscious thoughts they might have...
the way your kid's root emotional needs are met (constructive/destructive) directly correlates to their well-being over their lifespan
First we have to identify the stories. Second, we can begin to unravel them. Third, we can learn to support our kid in creating new stories about how they can get their root emotional needs met. (Inside the Ethical & Influential Parent: Course and Coffee Dates, we integrate these steps and processes. You’ll understand your kid's assumptions and subsequent stories and do activities to help you implement the relationship framework for ethical influence. In our live, virtual coffee date, we'll troubleshoot and connect.)
Parents like us, who want to ethically influence our kids so they feel connection and like their future matters, have got to be proactive.
Part II: The communication style that lets you ethically influence your kid's sense of self >>
find out more about
the ethical & influential parent: course and coffee dates
We can’t rely on the Old School methods of raising kids (Top-Down Parenting was always suspect, and now is plain out-of-touch).
We can't be passive and just cross our fingers that it will all work out.
Because having no intentional strategy means you're choosing the status quo by default...and you may be turning a lot of your influence over to entities that don't have your kid's best interests in mind.
You want your parental impact to have lasting results, so your kid feels a strong sense of self now and is optimistic about their future.
Thank you for reading, and I’d love to see you in The Ethical & Influential Parent:
Course and Coffee Dates.
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