Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to the Psychology Podcast with doctor Scott
Speaker 1: Barry Kaufman, where we give you insights into the mind, brain,
Speaker 1: behavior and creativity. Each episode will feature a new guest
Speaker 1: who will stimulate your mind and give you a greater
Speaker 1: understanding of yourself, others, and the world we live in.
Speaker 1: Hopefully we'll also provide a glimpse into human possibility. Thanks
Speaker 1: for listening and enjoy the podcast. So today I'm really
Speaker 1: excited to have Professor Lee Waters on the podcast. Lee's
Speaker 1: an Australian academic researcher, psychologist, author and speaker who specializes
Speaker 1: in positive education, parenting and organizations. Waters holds the Jerry
Speaker 1: Higgins Chair in Positive Psychology at the Center for Positive
Speaker 1: Psychology at Melbourne Graduate School of Education at University of Melbourne.
Speaker 1: Her latest book, The Strength Switch, offers parents and educators
Speaker 1: free resources to better build the strengths of young people. Lee,
Speaker 1: it's just so awesome to have you on the podcast today.
Speaker 1: It's wonderful to be here. Thanks for having me, Scott.
Speaker 1: We've been planning this for a long time we have.
Speaker 1: Isn't it good to see when a dream comes true? Oh? Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: Well the real dream here is that you publish this book.
Speaker 1: You did it. Now, how does that feel to actually
Speaker 1: have that come to fruition after so long in the
Speaker 1: planning stages and writing stages. Well, it's such a nice
Speaker 1: question for you to start with, and I mean, you've
Speaker 1: I don't know how you've done this. You've published multiple books,
Speaker 1: so you would have your own answer. But for me,
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a deeply meaningful feeling because the book,
Speaker 1: for me is my gift to as many parents and
Speaker 1: as many families as the book can reach. I think
Speaker 1: I've been really, really fortunate in that I've been a
Speaker 1: psychologist and a researcher for over two time decades but
Speaker 1: also a mum, have a fourteen and a half year
Speaker 1: old son and a ten year old daughter. And I
Speaker 1: think I've been very lucky in that the field that
Speaker 1: I research in and that I practice in the field
Speaker 1: of positive so much to offer me as a mother
Speaker 1: in raising my son and my daughter to be resilient
Speaker 1: and optimistic little human beings. And so for me, the
Speaker 1: book is really about bringing together what I was learning
Speaker 1: and what I was seeing in schools and what I
Speaker 1: was seeing through the research and other families, and really
Speaker 1: being able to provide that to as many families as
Speaker 1: I can, but it's deeply meaningful experience. Writing books is hard,
Speaker 1: you know, and I did it on top of a
Speaker 1: full time job and being a mother to two children.
Speaker 1: It took me three years to write the book. I
Speaker 1: think I had various confectionery companies alive and kicking with
Speaker 1: profit because I would write the book late at night
Speaker 1: and on weekends and prop myself up with coffee and
Speaker 1: sugar and to get the book out. You know, that
Speaker 1: was like a full time job on top of full
Speaker 1: time job and mothering, which is also a full time job.
Speaker 1: I see that it's now. Seeing it on the shelves
Speaker 1: in Australia was a big kick. And the biggest kick,
Speaker 1: of course, is getting feedback from parents who are letting
Speaker 1: me know that they're reading the book, that you know,
Speaker 1: finding it easy to read, and that they're using changing
Speaker 1: their conversations with their kids. They're changing the way they
Speaker 1: see their children. They're setting in front of the activities
Speaker 1: and the techniques. And I had a lovely father the
Speaker 1: other day. He was using some of my techniques when
Speaker 1: he picked seven year olds up from school and they
Speaker 1: had a lovely trip on the way home and he
Speaker 1: was taking his child. He's taking his son to swimming
Speaker 1: lessons that that evening, and in the protic his son said,
Speaker 1: you know what, Dad, I take back everything mean I've
Speaker 1: ever said about you. I know, just from one evening
Speaker 1: of him putting in play some of the peperful to
Speaker 1: fear of the books, that part of it is super
Speaker 1: meaningful to me. Well, that's just so wonderful to hear.
Speaker 1: And you are in a lot of ways correcting this
Speaker 1: negativity bias that exists in parenting. Where did that negativity bias?
Speaker 1: Where did that come from? What are the roots of it?
Speaker 1: Why has it been so pervsive? Well, I mean, I
Speaker 1: think there's kind of two reasons. So that one is
Speaker 1: to do with the biology of our brain, and one
Speaker 1: is to do with our society in the way that
Speaker 1: we've been socialized to understand processes like development and improvement.
Speaker 1: So starting with the biology of the brain, you know,
Speaker 1: neuroscientists have now shown us that we have this in
Speaker 1: built negativity bias whereby our brains notice and are alerted
Speaker 1: to and pay more attention to the negative things in
Speaker 1: our environment more quickly than the positive things in our environment.
Speaker 1: And this is an important feature of our brain, of course,
Speaker 1: because it gives us a survival advantage, certainly from a
Speaker 1: beefist perfect but also just in our own day to
Speaker 1: day basis, it's our negativity bias that alerts us to
Speaker 1: a potential threat, potential harm, stops us from stepping out
Speaker 1: onto the street because we've got this little bit of
Speaker 1: a gut instinct that maybe a car's about to come
Speaker 1: around the corner. And so it's a really important feature
Speaker 1: for our survival. It's not the best feature of our
Speaker 1: brain when it comes to having a positive relationship with
Speaker 1: our children, because our brain is wired to look first
Speaker 1: for problems in our children before it looks at the
Speaker 1: potential in our children. And a lot of what I
Speaker 1: do in the book is, you know, a range of
Speaker 1: different techniques and exercises for parents and for kids themselves
Speaker 1: to sort of counteract that negativity bias. I mean, in
Speaker 1: the end, our brains are pattern detecting organs, and so
Speaker 1: it is about just repatterning our brain to look first
Speaker 1: for the positives before the negatives. But I think in
Speaker 1: addition to the biology of our brain, there's an overlay
Speaker 1: of society in terms of why it is that we
Speaker 1: tend to parent more or by correcting the weaknesses in
Speaker 1: our children than we do by amplifying the strengths in
Speaker 1: our children. And if you think about you know, our parents' generation,
Speaker 1: the generation before them, there was this kind of default
Speaker 1: assumption that the processes of development and improvement, and you
Speaker 1: know they're the two key processes that we use to
Speaker 1: raise our children, that just by default, improvement is about
Speaker 1: correcting weakness. It's about fixing what's wrong with us. I mean,
Speaker 1: you tell me, Scott, if I use the expression areas
Speaker 1: for improvement, what comes to your mind? What naturally comes
Speaker 1: to your mind when you hear the expression areas for improvement,
Speaker 1: that there's like room for growth, that there's hope for me. Well,
Speaker 1: that's nicely ring hope into it. I'm trying to. I'm
Speaker 1: putting a positive spin on that phrase. You really are,
Speaker 1: and most people don't, so certainly the idea that there's
Speaker 1: room for growth. But I think, you know, we've been
Speaker 1: raised by a generation and they were raised by a
Speaker 1: generation where improvement is a process of fixing what is
Speaker 1: wrong with us. So no, but the point is true
Speaker 1: in that it is it's about room for growth, and
Speaker 1: most people see improvement as growing what's wrong with us.
Speaker 1: And I think one of the biggest messages that the field,
Speaker 1: the science of positive psychology has given us be the
Speaker 1: last almost two decoys about is really expand and extend
Speaker 1: our understanding of what we mean by improvement and growth.
Speaker 1: And so we previously would think we wouldn't think about
Speaker 1: improvement in terms of strengths because we think, well, it's
Speaker 1: already strong, there's no need to grow that, there's no
Speaker 1: need to improve that, and so we put all of
Speaker 1: our emphasis on improving what was wrong with us and
Speaker 1: fixing up our weaknesses. And that's the way we've been parented,
Speaker 1: and that's I think that's the factor that comes into
Speaker 1: why it is that as parents we tend to go
Speaker 1: first for fixing what's wrong with our children before we
Speaker 1: look for amplifying what's right with our children. A lot
Speaker 1: of sense this idea. Also, it's easier to see overt
Speaker 1: signs of things that are wrong. It's usually typically easier
Speaker 1: to see yeah then to see ladent potential. But it
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that lead potential is not equally as important.
Speaker 1: It's more important to bring out. So the question is, like,
Speaker 1: what are the ways of identifying our capturing some of
Speaker 1: these strengths. I mean, you do talk about that. I
Speaker 1: thought you could elucidate that for the audience a little bit.
Speaker 1: Mm hmmm. You mean the techniques that we use to
Speaker 1: start to actually see your strength in our children. You
Speaker 1: measure it, you know, you've identified it, you've helped develop tools. Right, yeah,
Speaker 1: what are things like parents can do to start to
Speaker 1: see that. You can't bring out things that you haven't
Speaker 1: identified first, right, that's right. Okay, So I think I
Speaker 1: just want to pick up on your point about it's
Speaker 1: easier to say the problem behavior in our kids than
Speaker 1: it is to say the strengths and the good qualities
Speaker 1: and our kids. And I'm not even sure if that's true.
Speaker 1: It certainly is a truism in the sense that that's
Speaker 1: the case for most of us. But that's because we
Speaker 1: weren't bought how to see strength. So our biology makes
Speaker 1: us see the problem behavior and the weaknesses very quickly.
Speaker 1: But once we're taught how to see strengths, it becomes
Speaker 1: a very easy process. And what we're looking for as
Speaker 1: parents is, you know, there are three kind of core
Speaker 1: elements to a strength, and that is that a strength
Speaker 1: is something that we have we perform well, we are
Speaker 1: energized when we're doing it, and we're self motivated to
Speaker 1: do it. So I guess one important point to make
Speaker 1: about that immediately is that we've all grown up with
Speaker 1: a bit of a false impression of what strengths are,
Speaker 1: and we've all been taught that a strength is something
Speaker 1: that you're good at. And it's not that that's untrue,
Speaker 1: but it's only part of the story. So as parents,
Speaker 1: if we're only looking for the things that our children
Speaker 1: are good at, we're missing a whole kind of range
Speaker 1: of strengths that our children have because we're not looking
Speaker 1: at the energy piece and we're not looking at the
Speaker 1: self motivation piece. So for something to be classified as
Speaker 1: a true strength, it's something that you perform well in,
Speaker 1: have energy and a self motivated to do. You might
Speaker 1: have a child, for example, who's performing well in piano,
Speaker 1: but you know, is clearly not energized. You have to
Speaker 1: keep nagging them to practice they're not self motivated. Then
Speaker 1: in positive psychology we would say that's not a true strength.
Speaker 1: We would say it's a skill that they have, but
Speaker 1: it's not a strength. And so the first thing as
Speaker 1: a parent is just to start observing your child's behavior
Speaker 1: and their actions, and start looking for these signs of
Speaker 1: high performance, meaning that the child is performing above average
Speaker 1: for their age level, or performing better than their peers,
Speaker 1: or has a quick learning and growth curve in a
Speaker 1: particular skill. And then you're also looking for you know,
Speaker 1: what are the things that energize your child. You can
Speaker 1: see that as a parent, when your child has a
Speaker 1: lot of energy for a particular task, you can see
Speaker 1: you can see it in their body language. You can
Speaker 1: see it in their facial expression, you can hear it
Speaker 1: in their voice, they feed up in the way they talk.
Speaker 1: They're super palmed, super excited about a particular thing. And
Speaker 1: then look for what's self motivating. Look at what they're
Speaker 1: just choosing to do without you having to direct them.
Speaker 1: So to use an example from my own home, my
Speaker 1: ten year old daughter Emily is very creative, very artistic,
Speaker 1: and she will sit and watch TV and almost always
Speaker 1: have pencils in her hand. She'll be watching TV, but
Speaker 1: she'll be doodling and drawing and creating a little masterpiece
Speaker 1: as she's sitting there. Even in her downtime, she can't
Speaker 1: help but want to kind of live out that creative
Speaker 1: purth that she has. And so that's the first thing
Speaker 1: is to look for a technique called strength body. And
Speaker 1: as a parent, you're starting to observe your behavior and
Speaker 1: just wondering what is the strength that sits underneath that behavior.
Speaker 1: And what you're looking for is the three clues of
Speaker 1: high performance, high energy, and self motivation high energy. I
Speaker 1: like that. I want some of that in myself. Does
Speaker 1: this apply to adults too? Of course it does. Yeah,
Speaker 1: all of us. I feel like, no matter who we are,
Speaker 1: could use a parent in our lives, do you know
Speaker 1: what I mean? Like even it doesn't have to be
Speaker 1: a biological parent, but like it'd be nice for her
Speaker 1: to be slen in each of our lives that has
Speaker 1: read your book and cares about bringing out We could
Speaker 1: be a relationship partner. I'm saying, it could be a
Speaker 1: good friend, you know, something like that, because we can't
Speaker 1: see it in ourselves. It's very true and I love
Speaker 1: that idea. In the book, I talk about strength helpers,
Speaker 1: So I who are the people in your life who
Speaker 1: help you to see the strength? Because as you say,
Speaker 1: you know, and I want to pick up on that point, Scott,
Speaker 1: is that a lot of us have strength blindness. And
Speaker 1: this is a phenomenon that psychologists have identified where we
Speaker 1: are blind to our own strengths. And that's because what
Speaker 1: we know about strengths is they're partly nature and they're
Speaker 1: partly nurture. So something that you have a natural aptitude
Speaker 1: for that sits under the performance basis of you, and
Speaker 1: because you're sort of born with it and you've naturally
Speaker 1: been good at it most of your life, you start
Speaker 1: to take it for granted. It becomes invisible to you,
Speaker 1: so you don't see it as a strength in yourself.
Speaker 1: One of my friends come over on the weekend and well,
Speaker 1: I'll start this story by saying, I'm not very domestic,
Speaker 1: I'm messy, I'm not a very good cook. It's not
Speaker 1: my strength being domestic. She's an amazing cook. She came
Speaker 1: over to my house and she opened up my fridge,
Speaker 1: which was truthfully a little bit there, and she pulled
Speaker 1: out a whole range of things from my fridge that
Speaker 1: I would never have thought to put together in a
Speaker 1: million years, and she whipped up this amazing meal. And
Speaker 1: I'm sitting there saying, that's amazing. How do you do that?
Speaker 1: But she doesn't see that in herself. That that's something
Speaker 1: that she's good at, that's something that she has a
Speaker 1: strength for, that she's energized by, because it's just who
Speaker 1: she is, So she has blindness towards that, whereas for me,
Speaker 1: I see it really clearly and so well, you know,
Speaker 1: it's interesting because you're mentioning strengths that wouldn't like be
Speaker 1: captured by like a Positive Psychology Character Strengths survey that
Speaker 1: only has a limited amount of strengths. So are we
Speaker 1: allowed to be open to strengths that aren't listed on
Speaker 1: the Positive Psychology Character Survey? Like you know, like yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean people start to treat that stuff as though
Speaker 1: it's the Bible. You know, they're like, oh, have you
Speaker 1: taken the VIA? Have you taken the VIA? My top
Speaker 1: thick character strengths are creativity, creativity, and creativity. I'm so
Speaker 1: amazed at just how great I am in creativity, creative.
Speaker 1: And then it's like we kind of can ignore all
Speaker 1: the things that fall outside of that boundary that we're measuring. Yeah,
Speaker 1: what's my point here? I think I'm trying to make
Speaker 1: the point that we don't always need a self report
Speaker 1: survey to reflect and hold a mirror back on us.
Speaker 1: Sometimes we're allowed to because we do we act as
Speaker 1: though like the results of the survey like found some
Speaker 1: sort of deep and meaningful thing about us, when it's
Speaker 1: really us that are answering the questions to begin with,
Speaker 1: Like we don't forget that, you know, they're like we're
Speaker 1: allowed to discover strengths in ourselves all throughout the day, right,
Speaker 1: even without a formal test. Absolutely, it's going to be
Speaker 1: I mean, the benefit of the survey is it's a
Speaker 1: bit of a mirror. As you say, we're completing the
Speaker 1: survey ourselves, so it's a mirror. It's a way of
Speaker 1: accessing our strengths. And there are a number of ways
Speaker 1: that we can do that ourselves, independent of a survey,
Speaker 1: and then there are also a range of ways that
Speaker 1: other people do that for us. So they become help
Speaker 1: where they become the mirror they see in us, when
Speaker 1: we're energized, when we're self motivated, when we're performing well
Speaker 1: in areas where we may have our own strength blindness. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's good. I hope that everyone has something like that
Speaker 1: in their life. Yeah. I mean, the course of about
Speaker 1: that is the strength spotting. The surveys are one way
Speaker 1: of identifying your strength, but just being tuned into yourself,
Speaker 1: being mindful of when are my energy levels high? When
Speaker 1: am I having a fast learning curve? When am I
Speaker 1: having like deep sense of flow and enjoyment in what
Speaker 1: I'm doing? What am I self motivated to do? Like
Speaker 1: where am I yearnings? If I'm not getting to do
Speaker 1: this particular thing, am I feeling frustrated that I'm being
Speaker 1: thwarted in doing that? That's much more about your own
Speaker 1: internal introspection and being mindful of the clues the signals
Speaker 1: for strength and of course the strength s body you
Speaker 1: can apply to yourself where you can apply to others.
Speaker 1: And that's a big piece in the book for parents
Speaker 1: is how to engage in strength spotting so they start
Speaker 1: to see the strengths, the talents, the skills, the positive
Speaker 1: qualities in their own children. And you know, really at
Speaker 1: its core strength based parenting. And this is why I
Speaker 1: call the book the Strength Switch, just about switching or
Speaker 1: shifting your emphasis from the direction that our negativity desires
Speaker 1: takes us to spending more of our time fixing the
Speaker 1: weaknesses in our children and shifting or switching that and
Speaker 1: flipping it so that you spend more of the time
Speaker 1: identifying and amplifying the strength in your kids. But you know,
Speaker 1: to come back to your point about the surveys, I
Speaker 1: think surveys they're useful. They're a useful tool, but I
Speaker 1: agree with you that sometimes the usefulness of that tool
Speaker 1: gets over exaggerated and people kind of just stick to
Speaker 1: the survey. And the downside of that, of course, is
Speaker 1: that you're labeling people or you're not understanding that strengths
Speaker 1: of dynamic that they grow and change over time, and
Speaker 1: missing unique strengths in an individual that aren't necessarily in
Speaker 1: the profile. For the VA, for example, there's twenty four strengths.
Speaker 1: Realize too and Gallop they have great profiles as well.
Speaker 1: Angela Duckworth she's got her character strength that she's brought
Speaker 1: in as well. So there's a range of different strengths.
Speaker 1: But the survey is just one tool, it sure as
Speaker 1: I'm really glad you made that point. So tell me
Speaker 1: more about your framework that considers problematic behaviors as resulting
Speaker 1: from both the overuse and under use of strengths. I
Speaker 1: think this really makes your model quite unique in that
Speaker 1: you really address both of those aspects. The overuse in
Speaker 1: our use aspects. Can you talk more about that. Yeah, well, firstly,
Speaker 1: thank you for the compliment about the framework. I think
Speaker 1: it's really it's such a useful framework for parents because,
Speaker 1: I mean, when we take a strength approach, it's something
Speaker 1: that we need to learn to do. But it's sort
Speaker 1: of easier to do it when your kids are behaving
Speaker 1: well and everyone's happy, and everything's going beautifully and life
Speaker 1: is rainbows and sunshine. You know, we all know that's
Speaker 1: not the reality of parenting. Those states are beautiful when
Speaker 1: we have them. But the question is, how do you
Speaker 1: take a strength based approach when you're facing life's difficulties,
Speaker 1: when your children are having combon behaviors or they have
Speaker 1: obvious bicknesses, And particularly in those moments and where I've
Speaker 1: really influenced around that is all the work of the
Speaker 1: beautiful humanistic psychologists, you know, Maslow and ericson warning. Oh
Speaker 1: they're my peeps too, I love them, you know, and
Speaker 1: they really come from this very deep well you know,
Speaker 1: their philosophy is that every every one of us is
Speaker 1: motivated to evolve and develop. And so moving on from
Speaker 1: the sort of humanistic psychologist. As a parent, when we
Speaker 1: see problem behavior, when we see weaknesses, when we see
Speaker 1: our kids being naughty or misbehaving. Instead of immediately thinking,
Speaker 1: you know, why is my kid always doing this? They're
Speaker 1: deliberately trying to annoy me. There's some fault or flaw
Speaker 1: in them is to think, okay, well, my child is
Speaker 1: programmed to be on this positive developmental trajectory. So the
Speaker 1: behavior is wrong, then maybe it's something to do with
Speaker 1: strength being blocked or thwarted, or maybe it's something to
Speaker 1: do with them not knowing how to apply their strength
Speaker 1: appropriately in this situation. So in the book, I talk
Speaker 1: about asking as a parent, asking yourself, is there a
Speaker 1: strength that's missing? Is there a strength that being overused?
Speaker 1: Is there a strength that's being underplayed in this situation.
Speaker 1: I'll give you an example. My husband is very humorous.
Speaker 1: He hasn't taken the Veda Scott You'll be pleased to
Speaker 1: know he's never taken a survey. But we all know
Speaker 1: that that is a really core strength in my husband.
Speaker 1: In fact, it's one of the reasons I fell in
Speaker 1: love with him, and it's one of the reasons why
Speaker 1: west together day because he's funny and he makes me laugh.
Speaker 1: But when he was in school, he had a lot
Speaker 1: of trouble with the teachers because he was overplaying his humor.
Speaker 1: He didn't know when it was appropriate to sort of
Speaker 1: tone things down a bit and maybe not be cheeky,
Speaker 1: not being mischievous, and so he got into a lot
Speaker 1: of trouble at school. The teachers were interpreting his behavior
Speaker 1: as him being sort of deliberately disruptive. That sounds like me.
Speaker 1: So I do think that that is like you, Scott.
Speaker 1: I see some the same qualities between you and my husband.
Speaker 1: But the thing is that instead of interpreting that behavior
Speaker 1: as being deliberately disruptive or you know, trying to cause
Speaker 1: arguments by using humor or questioning, is just to see
Speaker 1: that you, Scott, my husband Matt. I mean, this is
Speaker 1: an incredible quality to have. Humor brings forward so many
Speaker 1: positive qualities in people, Its perspective taking, it's bonding, its
Speaker 1: relationship building. But in this instance it's being overused. And
Speaker 1: so as a parent, rather than thinking my child is naughty,
Speaker 1: is to think, Okay, this is a great quality, but
Speaker 1: I need to teach my child when to use humor
Speaker 1: when it's appropriate, when they need to dial it down
Speaker 1: a little bit, and you know, maybe not bring that
Speaker 1: strength forward, but bring a different strength forward, bring curiosity forward,
Speaker 1: for example, rather than humor. So it's an interesting way
Speaker 1: of looking at misbehavior. Instead of saying there's something wrong
Speaker 1: with my child that's deliberately being naughty, is to say, Okay,
Speaker 1: we definitely need just overplaying a strength and we need
Speaker 1: to help them to dial it down a little bit.
Speaker 1: That makes so much sense. And then what about wait,
Speaker 1: help me with the under use of strengths that I
Speaker 1: guess that that is just more of what people tend
Speaker 1: to think of when they is that we're not giving
Speaker 1: people enough opportunities to be able to use it. So
Speaker 1: it seems like opportunities is central to the under use aspect. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're spot on. So I mean there's two elements to
Speaker 1: the underuth. One is that if you're seeing misbehavior in
Speaker 1: a child, maybe it's because they're not having an opportunity
Speaker 1: to bring forward strength. Remember that strength of the things
Speaker 1: that we're born with. They're sort of programmed into us
Speaker 1: and they're self motivated. We yearn to use them. They
Speaker 1: give us energy, they make us feel good about ourselves.
Speaker 1: So if you're in a situation where you're unable to
Speaker 1: use the strength, where you don't have the opportunity where
Speaker 1: it's being forwarded, it's going to cause natural frustration. In
Speaker 1: the book, I have a lovely story about a friend
Speaker 1: of mine who is as an adult is a professional writer,
Speaker 1: but as a child, she really wanted to learn to
Speaker 1: read before she went off to school. And she had
Speaker 1: an older sister who was reading, and her parents who
Speaker 1: were reading. They would sit down every night to read
Speaker 1: their books, and she would have a tantrum because she
Speaker 1: wasn't able to read yet, because no one had taught her,
Speaker 1: because she was raised in an era where you don't
Speaker 1: learn to read until you actually attend grade school. And
Speaker 1: when we look back at that behavior now, she understands
Speaker 1: that it was because she had this strength was being
Speaker 1: blocked and that was leading to poor behavior. But a
Speaker 1: second way of looking at the under use of strengths
Speaker 1: is really more as a way of restoring good behavior.
Speaker 1: So rather than saying to your child, you know you're wrong,
Speaker 1: this is bad, you're disorganized, you're rude, you're impatient, it
Speaker 1: is just to think to yourself, Okay, what is the
Speaker 1: strength that could fix this situation currently being underused? And
Speaker 1: to give you a concrete example, if you have your
Speaker 1: children arguing and fighting with each other instead of kind
Speaker 1: of yelling at them and saying, stop fighting, I'm sick
Speaker 1: of this. You're always fighting. Is to think, okay, well,
Speaker 1: maybe there's some strengths here that are being underused, that
Speaker 1: are not being used. So that is, hey, guys, you know,
Speaker 1: where's the kindness. Let's bring forward some cooperation. I think
Speaker 1: a big source of this argument is that you're not
Speaker 1: being fair, So let's just bring forward some fairness in
Speaker 1: this situation. So the child is learning I'm not bad,
Speaker 1: It's just that I have these strengths that I should
Speaker 1: be using that I'm not using at the moment that underused.
Speaker 1: But if I bring these forward, he's the solution. And
Speaker 1: the beauty of that is that over time, your child
Speaker 1: starts to internalize that they have the solution inside themselves.
Speaker 1: If they under use or overuse particular strength and they
Speaker 1: bring that forward in a more moderate way, it's actually
Speaker 1: going to create change. So then you stop. You don't
Speaker 1: have to be the parent, the external parent who's kind
Speaker 1: of nagging all the time, because they start to learn
Speaker 1: that I can just bring forward these strengths, or I
Speaker 1: can dial them up, or I can dial them down,
Speaker 1: and that's the solution to moving forward. Well, your perspective
Speaker 1: is really a humanistic and I have a quote here
Speaker 1: that Lee Water's approach makes sense to parents looking to
Speaker 1: escape the corrective mindset that can make both them and
Speaker 1: their children feel defective and broken. But with all this said,
Speaker 1: I am wondering, and this is a very cheeky and
Speaker 1: appropriate question. What if are you overplaying your humor? What
Speaker 1: if your child, well it's a bit dark humor. What
Speaker 1: if you have a little like a a horrible child,
Speaker 1: like a psychopath? You know, like, is it going to
Speaker 1: be helpful to be like, oh, let me just turn
Speaker 1: on your strength switch. Go, no, go, Yeah good. I'm
Speaker 1: really really glad that you asked this question, and it's
Speaker 1: an important question to ask. I'm going to if you
Speaker 1: don't mind, I'm just going to slightly reframe it, but
Speaker 1: keep the truth, keep the NuGet of your question, psychologist.
Speaker 1: I am, I know I can't help it. I'm going
Speaker 1: to keep the question of like, well, what if there's
Speaker 1: a genuine problem, what if there really is a weakness
Speaker 1: that needs to be addressed. I'm going right, yeah, thanks good.
Speaker 1: I'm going to take it away from the idea that
Speaker 1: you might have a psychopathic child, and I mean some
Speaker 1: people have you know, children that have serious behavioral issues. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So the key thing about taking a strength based approach
Speaker 1: is that it's not an either or. So if you
Speaker 1: I mean, I hope that a lot of parents listen
Speaker 1: to your podcast and this is thought provoking for them,
Speaker 1: they walk away thinking, you know it is true. I
Speaker 1: do tend to inadvertently spend more time fixing my kids'
Speaker 1: weaknesses and building up their strengths, partly because of my negativity,
Speaker 1: but bias is partly because of the way I was raised,
Speaker 1: with the assumption that improvement is about fixing weakness. I
Speaker 1: would like to spend more time on strength and strength plotting.
Speaker 1: It doesn't mean when you become a strength based parent,
Speaker 1: it doesn't mean that all of a sudden you are
Speaker 1: ignoring problem behavior, You're ignoring weaknesses in your children. It's
Speaker 1: not an either or approach. It's an end both. But
Speaker 1: as I said at the start, the name the strength
Speaker 1: switch is about switching or shifting your attention, so more
Speaker 1: of it goes towards building up strength than fixing weakness.
Speaker 1: But let's get onto the fixing weakness. Yes, absolutely, there
Speaker 1: are none of us is perfect. All of us have weaknesses, flaws, faults,
Speaker 1: problem behaviors that do need to be fixed. The question
Speaker 1: from a strength based perspective, there's two questions. The first
Speaker 1: is what proportion of my time am I spending on fixing?
Speaker 1: Is particularly in relation to is this a weakness that
Speaker 1: genuinely needs to be fixed? Is it going to block
Speaker 1: the development of my child in some way? And if
Speaker 1: it is, then absolutely, And we're very well equipped as
Speaker 1: a society and as parents to address weakness. We've been
Speaker 1: doing it our whole life. So I don't need to
Speaker 1: say much more about how it is that we do that,
Speaker 1: because we've all got our techniques, and we've got extra tutoring,
Speaker 1: and we've got behavior management, discipline areas. We've got lots
Speaker 1: of things to already do in that regard. The second thing,
Speaker 1: and this I think is really new and it's very
Speaker 1: kind of opening for a parent, is the ask yourself,
Speaker 1: does my child have a strength that I can use
Speaker 1: in this situation to address the weakness? Right? This is
Speaker 1: really new, and I know that lots of work I've
Speaker 1: done with lots and lots of parents. This is one
Speaker 1: of the biggest turning points for a parent and I'm
Speaker 1: going to start by giving you a bit of a
Speaker 1: kind of metaphor for that, and then i'll give you
Speaker 1: a Creed example. So, I have a very good friend
Speaker 1: of mine who's a remedial massage therapist and she works
Speaker 1: with elite athlete helping them with injury management. And when
Speaker 1: I was talking to her many many years ago now
Speaker 1: about taking the strength based approach and most particularly about
Speaker 1: addressing a weakness by using a strength she relayed to
Speaker 1: me she said, you know, Lee, when I do the
Speaker 1: remedial massage work with these elite athletes, I never ever
Speaker 1: start with the weak tissue. I never go straight for
Speaker 1: the injury. I always start the treatment by working on
Speaker 1: the strong and healthy tissue that is surrounding the injured
Speaker 1: or weak tissue, Because she said, if I go straight
Speaker 1: for the weakness, if I go straight for the injured tissue,
Speaker 1: the muscle seizes up and I'm unable to actually do
Speaker 1: the therapeutic deep tissue work that I need to do.
Speaker 1: So she said, I always start with the healthy tissue,
Speaker 1: and I work with the healthy tissue and then I
Speaker 1: slowly massage into the week or injured tissue. And I
Speaker 1: found that just to be a really useful kind of
Speaker 1: parallel for what we do as parents. If we always
Speaker 1: start with the weakness in our children, and we're always
Speaker 1: going for their weak spot, and you know, the injury,
Speaker 1: so to speak, the fault in them, their muscle is
Speaker 1: going to seize up. They're naturally going to become defensive.
Speaker 1: They're going to block us, and that's a natural response.
Speaker 1: We do it too as adults. You know, you said before,
Speaker 1: Scott that we all have our weaknesses as well, and
Speaker 1: if we feel like someone's just always pointing those out
Speaker 1: to us, we become defensive, we tune out. So as parents,
Speaker 1: when we see a problem behavior, one of the questions
Speaker 1: we can ask ourselves is does my child have a
Speaker 1: strength that they can use to help overcome this. So
Speaker 1: let's say let's use an academic example, and you have
Speaker 1: a child who's struggling with math. But you know that
Speaker 1: they've got some character strengths. You know they've got grit,
Speaker 1: you know they've got persistence, you know that they're prepared
Speaker 1: to do extra work. So you draw on those other
Speaker 1: strength and bring them into part of the film of
Speaker 1: getting them better at matt through additional help. Well, let's
Speaker 1: say one of the examples that I use in the
Speaker 1: book again is with my daughter. Emily is ken and
Speaker 1: she's beautiful, she's got amazing strengths, but she's also got
Speaker 1: weaknesses like all of us. And one of her kind
Speaker 1: of character weaknesses, which by the way, she knows and
Speaker 1: she was happy for me to put the story in
Speaker 1: the book, is that she's very impatient. She gets impatient
Speaker 1: with people quite quickly, and because she's quite fright, she
Speaker 1: gets impatient in the classroom, if she doesn't feel like
Speaker 1: the teacher is going fast enough for her, she gets impatient,
Speaker 1: she tunes out. Now she's ten, we've been spending a
Speaker 1: lot of time Matt and I as parents trying to
Speaker 1: kind of like phone down and soften the impatience. We've
Speaker 1: invested a lot of time in that we haven't had
Speaker 1: that much success in reducing her impatience because it truly
Speaker 1: is just a core part of her. So what we've
Speaker 1: done instead is say, what is our best strength that
Speaker 1: we can use to help her with this weakness of impatience,
Speaker 1: And what we've done and in the classroom, for example,
Speaker 1: when she's getting impatient with the learning environment, is one
Speaker 1: of her strengths is that she's highly curious. She's just
Speaker 1: a naturally curious kid. She's always been that child who's
Speaker 1: asked a thousand questions about a thousand different things. And
Speaker 1: so what we're teaching her to do in that moment
Speaker 1: when she gets impatient with the teacher, with the learning environment,
Speaker 1: is to start asking questions, even if she's just asking
Speaker 1: them aside her own head. Because when we draw on
Speaker 1: her curiosity, then all of a sudden, that softens the impatience,
Speaker 1: and so she's able to move forward. And likewise, in
Speaker 1: social situations, if she's getting a bit impatient, then we
Speaker 1: ask her to draw on her kindness. She is a
Speaker 1: very beautifully kind little girl, and so she starts to
Speaker 1: get impatient with her friends, and then we remind her
Speaker 1: to be kind, and the minute she be is kind,
Speaker 1: her impatience just disappears. That's a great, great, great answer
Speaker 1: you just give. Thank you. Yeah, I love that. And
Speaker 1: I was one of those problem child children in way
Speaker 1: of acting out, was being class clown. But no one
Speaker 1: saw the strength there, you know. Yeah, Well that's why
Speaker 1: we are the learning disability. Sorry Scott, sorry to interrupt
Speaker 1: you in that. I mean, that's it's so important that
Speaker 1: his strength based work goes out to teachers, and it
Speaker 1: goes out to parents, and so that they do start
Speaker 1: to look for first, look for the strength before you
Speaker 1: look for the weakness and so and once you start
Speaker 1: to do that, so many things get reframed. I mean,
Speaker 1: your behavior in class would have been reframed and the
Speaker 1: teacher would have seen this is a great strength. How
Speaker 1: do I teach Scott to channel it in a way
Speaker 1: so that it works for him not against him? And
Speaker 1: also what's sitting underneath that? You know, why is he
Speaker 1: acting out in the way that he is? And start
Speaker 1: to address some of those issues. Yeah, be great, be
Speaker 1: a great approach for everyone. So I want to just
Speaker 1: list some of these strengths that you cover in your book,
Speaker 1: and you know, people should buy your book and find
Speaker 1: out more about each of these strengths. But you cover
Speaker 1: things like a tension, gratitude, mindfulness which is associated with attention,
Speaker 1: self esteem, optimism, and resilience. I want to follow up
Speaker 1: a little bit on the self esteem one, because all
Speaker 1: this research is showing it's really self compassion that is
Speaker 1: more valuable than self esteem. And would do you agree
Speaker 1: with that statement? I would. I don't think they've actually
Speaker 1: featured self esteem too strongly. In the book, I told
Speaker 1: I've got a chapter on self control. And I think
Speaker 1: the two goal posts for me in terms of strength
Speaker 1: based parenting is building resilience and optimism. Yeah. Yeah. By
Speaker 1: the way, do you use that expression in the States,
Speaker 1: the goalposts or is that in Australia. No, that's totally Australia.
Speaker 1: That's what I wondered. I just go with it. I'll
Speaker 1: just go with it. Yeah, Okay, well I think that.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think the two what we're trying to
Speaker 1: cultivate in our children is the outcome of optimism so
Speaker 1: they have a they're motivated towards creating a positive future
Speaker 1: for themselves, and the ability for resilience so they can
Speaker 1: bounce back when they experience loss and challenge and adversity.
Speaker 1: And for me, as a parent and also as a
Speaker 1: trained psychologist, if we can parent our children in a
Speaker 1: way where we're cultivating their optimism and that helps them
Speaker 1: to reach forward, and their resilience which helps them to
Speaker 1: bounce back, they're just two really important psychological assets for
Speaker 1: anyone young children, teenagers, adults, because that's when you start
Speaker 1: to become self empowered. And I think I would probably
Speaker 1: talk more about self empowerment than I would about self
Speaker 1: esteem per se. But I totally agree with your point
Speaker 1: got about self compassion and the need for self compassion.
Speaker 1: It's not a topic I've spoken about directly in the book,
Speaker 1: but I certainly see that when we start to take
Speaker 1: when a young child is connected with their strength, when
Speaker 1: they truly understand who they are authentically in that strength
Speaker 1: and weaknesses, I think that that self compassion, that self
Speaker 1: kindness piece comes in more naturally more easily for them,
Speaker 1: because even when they've muffed up and you know there's
Speaker 1: a problem in their life, they can see you way forward,
Speaker 1: and that is reach inside, use your strength. These are
Speaker 1: your anchor point to give you the roadmap to navigate
Speaker 1: out of the mistake that you've made. And that's a
Speaker 1: much more self kindness, self compassionate way of correcting mistakes
Speaker 1: you've made, rather than I've done this again. There's something
Speaker 1: deeply forwarding me. I always keep doing this. I'm such
Speaker 1: a bad person. Well, it's great. And then I also
Speaker 1: am wondering in your list here, where's to straight up
Speaker 1: compassion other people compassion? Where's the ethical dimension in the
Speaker 1: strengths based approach such a beautiful question. There's a couple
Speaker 1: of levels to strengths. The first is the self awareness
Speaker 1: and self compassion and knowing who you truly are weaknesses
Speaker 1: and strengths. Authentically, what I found in my own work
Speaker 1: in working with strengths, both with adults and in children,
Speaker 1: is that there's this really beautiful additional layer that starts
Speaker 1: to come when you take a strength based approach, and
Speaker 1: it's building on the kind of self awareness piece to
Speaker 1: look at how it is that you use your strengths
Speaker 1: to contribute to others. And I think that's the really
Speaker 1: that's the biggest benefit of taking a strength based approach.
Speaker 1: People often and this I think parents are a bit
Speaker 1: nervous about taking a strength based approach because they feel
Speaker 1: that it will create a sort of egotistical child who
Speaker 1: thinks they're better than everyone else because they have these strengths.
Speaker 1: And that's a natural concern. I think it's fair enough
Speaker 1: to sense for parents. But what I've actually found is
Speaker 1: quite the opposite, is that once you connect a child
Speaker 1: with the idea that they have strengths and that everyone
Speaker 1: has strengths, our strengths are not something that make us
Speaker 1: special because everyone has them. There's certainly something that make
Speaker 1: us you need, but the real benefit of taking it,
Speaker 1: of knowing your strengths is that you start to realize,
Speaker 1: how can I use these strengths to contribute to others.
Speaker 1: The second layer of strengths is that real contribution piece
Speaker 1: about what do I know about myself? What do I
Speaker 1: know about my strengths, and how can I use these
Speaker 1: in service of others? How can I use my strength
Speaker 1: to enable others to make others lives better? And I
Speaker 1: think that's where the broader piece of compassion comes in.
Speaker 1: I know, you know in my own journey speaking for
Speaker 1: myself that I only got really connected into my strengths
Speaker 1: in my early thirties and that's really changed my life trajectory.
Speaker 1: And I mean, I wouldn't be sitting here having this
Speaker 1: really interesting conversation with you, Scott now if I hadn't
Speaker 1: learned A what my strengths were, and B how can
Speaker 1: I use my strength to help others. That's what the
Speaker 1: book's all about, be using my research strengths and my communications,
Speaker 1: my storytelling ability to share that to contribute those strengths
Speaker 1: to as many parents as families as I can to
Speaker 1: make them happy, you know, loving warm families who are
Speaker 1: building resilient, optimistic children. Oh, what a beautiful at all
Speaker 1: that is. Can you talk about the strength of communication
Speaker 1: that's often not mentioned. I thought that was really unique
Speaker 1: in your book because you have a whole chapter on
Speaker 1: that and you rarely see that these list of strengths.
Speaker 1: So that was good. Yeah, we done. Thank you. You're
Speaker 1: making me feel very good about myself. Well, I mean
Speaker 1: there's different kind of models are strengths. There's and there's
Speaker 1: two broad buckets of strengths, if you like. There's strengths
Speaker 1: of talent, and then there's strengths of character. I think
Speaker 1: in the world of positive psychology, we have tended to
Speaker 1: gravitate more towards the strength of character. And so you
Speaker 1: mentioned before that many people take the VA and ask
Speaker 1: you have you taken the VA? And I mean, don't
Speaker 1: get me wrong, because I love the VA and I
Speaker 1: use it myself. I've used it with my children, I
Speaker 1: use it with lots of families. But we need to
Speaker 1: understand these two broad categories of strengths and the strength
Speaker 1: of character. There are positive personality they're kind of morality based,
Speaker 1: but then we have strengths of talent and strength of
Speaker 1: talent are performance based. They're more skill oriented, and they're
Speaker 1: things like athletic ability, intellectual ability, artistic ability, communication, communication skills,
Speaker 1: it ability. And this is part of fraadening our idea
Speaker 1: of what strengths are and not. You know, this is
Speaker 1: one of the as you said before, one of the
Speaker 1: potential downsides of just sticking to the typologies that are
Speaker 1: out there. The taxonomy is like the via classification, the gallop.
Speaker 1: They realize too. I mean, they're all fantastic, they're great tools,
Speaker 1: but in the end, they are a list. It's a
Speaker 1: typology or a taxonomy, and they're just the lists of
Speaker 1: a particular you know, psychologist who've been able to identify
Speaker 1: and measure. But we know there are many, many, many
Speaker 1: more strengths out there than fit on that list. And
Speaker 1: by the way, I just want to say that for
Speaker 1: the people who are listening, I put together the list
Speaker 1: of all of those frameworks. If they go to my website,
Speaker 1: the Strength which and go to the free resources, I've
Speaker 1: got a Strength library and it's got over one hundred
Speaker 1: different strengths, the definitions and the descriptions of those strengths,
Speaker 1: so that you can go and you can download that
Speaker 1: library and start to just read through all the different
Speaker 1: strengths that psychologists have measured, lifted, have been able to
Speaker 1: describe and define. Thanks. Yeah, my pointview was there are
Speaker 1: many more strengths than what I've just listed on those frameworks.
Speaker 1: That's great. Yeah, So do you want me to go
Speaker 1: back to communication or yeah, just can you just briefly
Speaker 1: touch on what is that? Let me ask you, what
Speaker 1: do you know people who you think have the strength
Speaker 1: of communication, who are good communicators? If you break it down,
Speaker 1: what makes you think that person's a good communicator and
Speaker 1: this person not so much? You're Australian. Have you heard
Speaker 1: of the TV show Mash? Yeah, I love Mash. I
Speaker 1: had Alan Alda on the podcast a couple episodes ago,
Speaker 1: and the whole thing was about communication because he wrote
Speaker 1: a book about this topic and he is an interesting
Speaker 1: take on this and is really central to that as
Speaker 1: attention in his model central as that is really paying
Speaker 1: attention to a person and kind of taking your preconceived
Speaker 1: ideas out of it. And you know, if we can
Speaker 1: go back to the humanistic psychologist because we both share
Speaker 1: this love and Karl Rogers talked a lot about unconditional
Speaker 1: positive regard and I think that's a concept that we
Speaker 1: need to bring that back. Absolutely, yeah, I absolutely agree
Speaker 1: with that. And actually, in the online parenting course that
Speaker 1: I've got, the very first lesson is sort of like
Speaker 1: the key foundation to being a good parent before we
Speaker 1: even add unconditional positive regard. It is one of those
Speaker 1: I've got Rogers with unconditional positive regard, Winnicott with holding
Speaker 1: the idea of holding. Well, I was saying, you know,
Speaker 1: for me, those three really true foundations that are key
Speaker 1: for good parenting, you know, unconditional positive regard, Winnicott stuff
Speaker 1: on holding, and then all the work on attachment and
Speaker 1: the importance of a secure and safe attachment coming through,
Speaker 1: and that when you have those three things in place,
Speaker 1: that's when you really start to get the best outcomes
Speaker 1: from taking a strength based approach. Absolutely, I completely agree
Speaker 1: with you. So I'm going to tell people in the
Speaker 1: show notes, I'll put the information how they can access
Speaker 1: the five week online course for parents. Tell me you
Speaker 1: know more about the course than your vision for a
Speaker 1: strengths based society. Thanks good, that's yea lovely question, thank you.
Speaker 1: And I mean, well, let's start with I. You know,
Speaker 1: as I said earlier, I've been a psychologist and I've
Speaker 1: been a researcher for over two decades, and I think
Speaker 1: what I've done a lot in these last two decades
Speaker 1: is build up a science space for taking a strength
Speaker 1: based approach. But what I've really learned in the last
Speaker 1: decade is that there's one thing about giving people the knowledge,
Speaker 1: and that's different to giving people skills for action. I mean,
Speaker 1: we all know that there's a gap between knowledge and action.
Speaker 1: I know I should eat more natural sugars, but you know,
Speaker 1: I go to the cafe at the bottom of my
Speaker 1: university building and it just looks so good. So what
Speaker 1: I've really realized is that if I'm going to have
Speaker 1: of like a wide impact on families and introducing them
Speaker 1: to the science of positive psychology, that it can't just
Speaker 1: be about building up a science. I also need to
Speaker 1: give families. What I've realized is that if I'm going
Speaker 1: to help families, really is as many families as possible
Speaker 1: use the science of positive psychology to build optimism and
Speaker 1: resilience in their children. Is that I can't just be
Speaker 1: a scientist who's providing the knowledge. I also need to
Speaker 1: help families put this into action, and so that was
Speaker 1: a big motivation for me in writing the book was
Speaker 1: to not only introduce the science to parents, but also
Speaker 1: give them a whole host of chips, techniques, exercises, activities
Speaker 1: how to translate that knowledge into action. And so for me,
Speaker 1: now I'm really at that point in my career, twenty
Speaker 1: odd years into my career saying how can I translate
Speaker 1: this science into action for people. The book is a
Speaker 1: big part of that. But what I've also done with
Speaker 1: a collaborator of mine, Leila McGregor, is built an online
Speaker 1: parenting course, five week course for parents and families to
Speaker 1: undertake who translate that science to just bring strengths fully
Speaker 1: into the family in an everyday, easy to do, easy
Speaker 1: to live kind of way. And so the program itself
Speaker 1: is five steps. The first week is understanding strengths, then
Speaker 1: we move on to seeing strengths. Then we move on
Speaker 1: to using our strengths, and then growing our strengths, and
Speaker 1: then celebrating our strengths. And so it's this really lovely
Speaker 1: five week journey that families take in Strengths. There's an
Speaker 1: online little tutorial that parents do with me first, where
Speaker 1: there's some video files, there's some self reflection stuff, there's
Speaker 1: some surveys, and then every week they do a Family Night,
Speaker 1: and so there's a whole lot of downloadable activities that
Speaker 1: families can do to help understand the US, grow and
Speaker 1: celebrate their strengths. And for me, this is professionally and
Speaker 1: personally it has been really rewarding to do because it
Speaker 1: takes me out of the Ivory tower of the universe
Speaker 1: and it really allows me to have wide impact with
Speaker 1: families all across the world. And we're getting amazing feedback
Speaker 1: about that course and how it's changing families and bringing
Speaker 1: them together and bonding them. And so it kind of
Speaker 1: tips into the second part of your question, Good, and
Speaker 1: that is how do we take this science, the science
Speaker 1: you're doing, the science I'm doing, the science that we
Speaker 1: know is having an impact on people, and how do
Speaker 1: we spread it widely? Because I think if we're able
Speaker 1: to bring this into families, we start to see this
Speaker 1: ripple effects. The more families are using a strength based
Speaker 1: approach inside their home, it spills over to outside of
Speaker 1: their home. They start becoming not only strength based parents,
Speaker 1: but they become strength based bosses, and they become strength
Speaker 1: based friends, and they become those strength helpers that you
Speaker 1: and I were talking about earlier in the interviews where
Speaker 1: you were saying, I wish I had a strength based parent.
Speaker 1: Doesn't have to be my parent, but I wish I
Speaker 1: had someone who's seeing my strength. So the parents who
Speaker 1: are learning these skills through the online program and through
Speaker 1: the book are translating them, transferring them not only to
Speaker 1: their children, but to everyone who they're interacting with. And
Speaker 1: you know, for me, the longer term picture is this
Speaker 1: is about intergenerational change, and this is about raising the
Speaker 1: abilities and the wellbeing of our society more generally, and
Speaker 1: so taking that longer term approach, that intergenerational approach. You
Speaker 1: my hope, my aim, My goal is that this approach
Speaker 1: goes to as many families as possible now and then
Speaker 1: these children are raised in a strength based way, so
Speaker 1: they grow up to be strength based parents themselves, and
Speaker 1: they grow up to be strength based teachers and strength
Speaker 1: based doctors, and strength based nurses and strength based scientists
Speaker 1: and who knows, strength based politicians. You know, you never know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: if we bring this through families, now these other children
Speaker 1: who grew up to be the adults who lead our society,
Speaker 1: and they're leading it from a strength based perspective. I
Speaker 1: love it. Wow. Thank you so much for chating today,
Speaker 1: for being a true trail blazer in the field of
Speaker 1: positive psychology and education and kind of helping to bridge
Speaker 1: these really important areas. Thank you so much for all that, Scott.
Speaker 1: It's been such a pleasure to talk to you. I
Speaker 1: always enjoy catching up with you anytime I get the
Speaker 1: chance to you, And as I said earlier, it's an
Speaker 1: honor to be on your show. And thank you for
Speaker 1: being one of my strengths helpers and spotting my strengths
Speaker 1: and helping me to use those in service and contributions. Well,
Speaker 1: yours are very easy to spot, but you're very welcome.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for listening to The Psychology Podcast
Speaker 1: with doctor Scott Barry Kaufman. I hope you found this
Speaker 1: episode just as thought provoking as I did. It's something
Speaker 1: you heard today stimulated you in some way. I encourage
Speaker 1: you to join in the discussion at the Psychology Podcast
Speaker 1: dot com. That's the Psychology Podcast dot com.