Growing Up Well

  • Reducing Anxiety

    Anxiety is a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome. Every human experiences anxiety. It is 100% normal, natural, and essential to life. Anxiety is a natural force that protects human life. We are hard-wired to sense threats to our wellbeing and to protect ourselves when threatened. Anxiety rises highest…

  • Living on 1 Dollar Per Day

    Young people in America need to know more about real poverty, and this video is possibly the best I have ever seen at getting kids to relate to abject poverty. It’s entertaining and educational. They pack a lot of information and experiences into just 28 minutes. Plus, it’s appropriate for kids age 11 and up,…

  • Parenting is Regulating

    Every parent should regulate their children’s behavior until they are ready to regulate their own. It will likely be a 20-year process, which starts with full regulatory control of the infant and ends with total release of all control at adulthood. What does it mean “to regulate?” In grammatical terms, it is a transitive verb,…

  • The Power of Kindness

    Josh was a normal teenager whose father died. His mother moved them from their home in the country to the city, with the hope that a fresh start would improve their lives. But Josh was ridiculed in his new school for no good reason. In fact, he was ridiculed for a horrible reason. Instead of…

  • Advice for Middle School Kids

    Recently, I asked my Facebook friends to give me advice for my 7th graders. Here’s what my friends have learned in their 30 years of growing up since 7th grade. Be cool to everyone because there’s a good chance you will either marry, work with, or work for one of them one day. “It’s not…

  • The Distance Run

    I coach middle school cross country, which is not a glamorous job, but it is uniquely rewarding. For young distance runners, the hardest part is embracing the pain that creates stronger legs and faster times. I try to make practices and meets fun, but there is no way of getting around the fact that running…

  • Why Young Kids Should Learn to Use Dangerous Things

    A friend recently posted on Facebook a picture of her three young children helping their dad build a deck. The seven year-old boy was using a power drill to sink a deck screw. Another woman posts a picture of her two kids 6 feet high up in the branches of an old oak tree. One…

  • Raising Resilient Children

    Resilience is the capacity to recover from adversity and return to well-being. Paul Tough, in his book How Children Succeed, explains that even kids who grow up in the most difficult situations of poverty, abuse, neglect, and stress can rise up from the ashes. It may not be the norm for kids of adversity, but…

  • Families Should Be Tough

    My wife is kind and compassionate, but she is one of the toughest people I have ever known. She does not have a mean bone in her body, but she is strong. She will tell you like it is and somehow make you feel like she is on your side. And when it comes to…

  • Connect With Your Young Teen

    First Connect, Then Guide The best parents are the ones who are deeply connected with their children and offer support and guidance all along the path of life. They’re the ones who care enough to say, “No, you can’t do that, because I love you too much to let you settle for that.” And their…

  • Living in Crisis

      Our family is in crisis. It’s not the first time, and it won’t be the last. Three weeks ago, our severely disabled 13-year-old daughter, Kathryn, had a full spinal fusion surgery. According to the “pain team” of anesthesiologists and neurologists, it is the second most painful surgery to recover from. (It’s second only to…

  • Ten Ways to Help Someone in Personal Crisis

    Our family has been going through rough waters related to some serious medical issues, and we have only been making it with the help from family and friends. People keep asking what they can do to help us. They want to help, but they don’t know exactly how. We have been very specific with them,…

  • Storm Preparation

    A Creeping Crisis Some crises develop gradually. Some are excruciatingly slow. Perhaps it is the approaching death of a parent with terminal cancer. Or it is the military dad/son/husband who will be deployed to an overseas conflict. Or it may be a huge financial crisis, which will likely take away the family’s savings and home.…

  • Loving Grandpa

    One of my favorite 7th grade essays ever is this memoir about a grandfather. Ashley Aucker, is now a 25 year old, wife, mother, singer, and songwriter. She was a sweet, quiet little 12 year old in my 7th grade English class many years ago when she wrote this essay. It blew me away then,…

  • Raising Boys to be Real Men

    Boys are misunderstood.  Too often, they are disciplined and shamed by their teachers, parents, or grandparents because it is falsely assumed that good boys should act just like good girls. Raising boys is a topic of numerous books, but one that stands out is Raising Cain, by Dan Kindlon and Michael Thompson.  I had the…

  • Same Lake, Different Boat

    When you are a parent of a child with severe disabilities, you have to accept the fact that your life journey is going to be much different than most people’s and that you are not in control of circumstances.  Those two truths are much easier said than lived-out, but they are crucial to living well.…

  • I Wish You Failure

    Once again, I offer an article from NPR’s This I Believe.  Jon Carroll started at the San Francisco Chronicle editing the crossword puzzle and writing TV listings. He has been a columnist for the paper since 1982. Last week, my granddaughter started kindergarten, and, as is conventional, I wished her success. I was lying. What…

  • Books for Boys

    Finding a well-written, entertaining book for a boy who hates to read is always a challenge.   Woods Runner, by Gary Paulsen, grabs your attention at the get-go. It opens, “One day, it seemed he was eleven and playing in the dirt around the cabin or helping with chores, and the next, he was thirteen,…

  • Thanksgiving Child

    Kathryn was born on Thanksgiving weekend 11 years ago on an unforgettable day.  Due to the trauma of her birth, she sustained brain damage which causes her to have spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy, epilepsy, and cognitive delays.  She cannot walk, talk, or do anything without assistance. Her disabilities are many, and her life is full…

  • Questions Kids Have But Don’t Ask

    Here are some of the big questions kids (10-14) have, although they will rarely, if ever, vocalize them.  Understanding the questions is half the battle; having all the answers is not necessary, even if it were possible. Who are my real friends?  Who really likes me?  In which group do I belong? Who am I? …

  • The Wrong Kind of Pain

    Generally speaking, children who face difficulties will grow up stronger in the long run.  They earn a host of other character qualities, forged in the fires of adolescence.  I say “generally” because there are some trials which are truly damaging to the soul of a child: molestation being one that comes to mind.  But intense,…

  • The Value of Pain

    As I walk through the halls after school, there is a barrage of faces along my path.  Some I know well; some I don’t know at all.  Some are happy; some look very frustrated.  But all of these kids have stories inside.  Some of their stories are silly — full of joy from a life…

  • Prepare Them for Life

    Protection and provision are not enough. “Here’s the paradox: If we protect our children too absolutely, we actually end up exposing them to other risks.  And leave them without the skills, experiences, and minor life lessons that they’ll need to handle the big challenges as they grow up.” (Perri Klass, M.D.) When children are very…

  • Avoiding a Mid-Life Crisis

    If you are growing old well, then you are likely to help a child grow up well. 40 is not old, but it’s certainly not young either.  It’s the start of mid-life, and it has a well-earned, dangerous reputation.  It’s when so many people have an inner crisis, even if life is sailing along smoothly…

  • Lousy Starts and Strong Finishes

    I’m grading papers on the second to last day of the school year.  I’m grading fast, trying to finish ASAP, so I can go run some errands.  I am more than a little ready to get out from behind my desk and browse around the hardware store, before heading home.  Teaching in May is exhausting. …

  • Realistic Expectations for Life

    Donald Miller’s book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years is quite good, but the end of chapter 29 is truly great.  In it, he refers to a recent episode of 60 Minutes, which I vividly recall seeing myself a few years ago.  It was about the happiest people in the world, and I found…

  • Are Your Kids Resilient?

    Bouncing Back: Increasing Resilience for Hurting Kids This is an excerpt from an article by Maria Drews on August 3, 2009. (Fuller Youth Institute) Our kids face obstacles every day — difficulties with friends, stress at school, issues with boyfriends or girlfriends. But many of the students we work with also face larger obstacles-poverty, violence…

  • It’s a Wonderfully Difficult Life

      It’s a Wonderful Life strikes a chord — several chords — deep in my soul, every time I watch it.  Most importantly, it makes me want to be a better man and to live my life as well as I can for my friends, family, and community. Deep down, I want to be counted…

  • Kids Need Community

    “No man is an island,” said John Donne, in reference to the ripple effect of the death of one man in a community.  Indeed, we are made for community; we are not meant to live alone.  By living and working with others, we enjoy many benefits.  By choosing to go it alone, whatever the endeavor,…

  • Being a Good Loser in Youth Sports

    After a weekend out of town at my son’s soccer tournament, I’m a little tired of hearing, “Did you win?”  It was, without question, the single-most popular question of the weekend. Even strangers in the hotel would ask my uniformed son, “Didja win?”  And each time he would sadly reply, “No,” followed by an awkward…

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