How to Raise an Adult

Raising a kid to independent adulthood is our biological imperative and an awareness of the self in one’s surroundings is an important life skill for a kid to develop.

We tirelessly examine and revise our kids’ checklist of experiences, certain that if we—they—just do one more thing, it might be enough to win them the big prize: admission to a highly selective college.

A family life is richer and more rewarding for all when parents aren’t hovering over and facilitating every moment of a kid’s life.

Just because we can be in constant contact, does it mean we should? Is it good?

What will become of young adults who look accomplished on paper but seem to have a hard time making their way in the world without the constant involvement of their parents?

The educational benefits of consequences are a gift, not a dereliction of duty.

We treat our kids like rare and precious botanical specimens and provide a deliberate, measured amount of care and feeding while running interference on all that might toughen and weather them.

We need to stop going along with a manner of raising kids that we know is wrong; we need to summon the courage to do things differently.

Children need the freedom to explore and make mistakes to develop their own strengths and interests.

It’s not their grades and scores and trophies that make us proud; it’s their good character.

The world is much safer than we’ve been led to believe, and our child needs to learn how to thrive in it rather than be protected from it.

Without experiencing the rougher spots of life, our kids become exquisite, like orchids, yet are incapable, sometimes terribly incapable, of thriving in the real world on their own.

We’ve mortgaged their childhood in exchange for the future we imagine for them—a debt that can never be repaid.

There are two things children should get from their parents: roots and wings.

Kids don’t acquire life skills by magic at the stroke of midnight on their eighteenth birthday. Childhood is meant to be the training ground.

No one can give another person life skills. Each of us has to acquire them by doing the work of life. On our own.

Resilience is the ability to bounce back from adversity. It’s what gives us the will to go on.

We need to redefine success as being a good and kind person, and as making a strong effort whether they ultimately win or lose.

Kids don’t acquire life skills by magic at the stroke of midnight on their eighteenth birthday.

We mustn’t do it for them.

Character boils down to what we do even when no one is looking or keeping score.

Mistakes can be life’s greatest teacher.

Once parents started scheduling play, they then began observing play, which led to involving themselves in play.

We’ve made the world much safer, more predictable, and kinder for kids.

How do we prevent and protect while teaching kids the skills they need?

Why do we base our daily decisions about our children’s comings and goings on a one-in-a-million chance that our kid could be killed by a stranger?

Those parents are shaping the way their daughter dreams.

As dean I was getting quite good at telling other parents not to overdirect their kids’ lives, but as a parent, I was having a hard time following my own advice.

If we’ve taught our kids that there is one predetermined checklist for their lives, we may be constructing a path that is more about us than them.

Enforcing consequences for our own kids is essential. It’s the only way they learn not to do those things.

Each of us has to acquire them by doing the work of life. On our own.

Our behavior actually delivers the rather soul-crushing news: 'Kid, you can’t actually do any of this without me.

The number of kids requiring surgery for severe injury from pitching has skyrocketed.

We want everything to be good and comfortable for our children. But that isn’t the reality of the world we’re preparing them for.

We’ve robbed our kids of the chance to construct and know their own selves. You might say we’ve mortgaged their childhood in exchange for the future we imagine for them—a debt that can never be repaid.

A checklisted childhood designed to lead to a narrow definition of success robs children of the proper developmental opportunities of childhood and can lead to psychological harm.