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, behavior,
Speaker 1: and creativity. Each episode will feature a new guest who
Speaker 1: will stimulate your mind and give you a greater understanding
Speaker 1: of yourself, others, and the world we live in. Hopefully
Speaker 1: we'll also provide a glimpse into human possibility. Thanks for
Speaker 1: listening and enjoy the podcast. Today. I'm really happy to
Speaker 1: have Karen Baruch Feldmann on the podcast. Karen is a
Speaker 1: clinical psychologist and a certified school psychologist. She has authored
Speaker 1: numerous articles and led workshops on topics such as cognitive
Speaker 1: behavioral therapy techniques, helping children and adults cope with stress
Speaker 1: and worry, helping people change, and developing grit and self control.
Speaker 1: Her latest book is The Grit Guide for Teens, a
Speaker 1: workbook to help you build perseverance, self control, and a
Speaker 1: growth mindset. Thanks for chatting with me today, Karen, Oh,
Speaker 1: thank you for having me. Can this guide also apply
Speaker 1: it to adult teens such as myself? Yes, yes, I
Speaker 1: wrote it for teens because I think teens really need
Speaker 1: in today's world to have great But definitely the concept
Speaker 1: can be applied to myself, and I do say that
Speaker 1: a lot in the book, and to you too, Scott
Speaker 1: as well, Great yay. Been to a lot of our
Speaker 1: listeners who are adults, so why or who have children
Speaker 1: who are teens, So why did you write this book? How?
Speaker 1: Was it? Maybe a natural outgrowth of the work you've
Speaker 1: done in your clinical practice, So that's sort of actually
Speaker 1: a key part. It is sort of a natural outgrowth
Speaker 1: of my clinical practice. So I work with kids, teens
Speaker 1: and adults who often have anxiety. And what I noticed
Speaker 1: in my practice was that the kids and the teens
Speaker 1: and the adults who were able to be gritty and
Speaker 1: be able to stick with it even when it was
Speaker 1: we're the ones who really got better. And it got
Speaker 1: me thinking, like, yes, I can do this work in
Speaker 1: my practice, but wouldn't it be great to be able
Speaker 1: to spread this message to other people? And it's also
Speaker 1: a personal story for me as well. I have always
Speaker 1: been very academically gritty, but in terms of my wellness
Speaker 1: and health not so much. So what I did was
Speaker 1: I started to read everything that there was out there
Speaker 1: on the topic and try to apply it to myself.
Speaker 1: And that's also a kind of like a little bit
Speaker 1: of a personal mission on myself to help people when
Speaker 1: grow their own grit. So how long have you been
Speaker 1: interested in grit? So I would say I've been interested
Speaker 1: in the topic of helping people change and self control
Speaker 1: and willpower for a number of years. I've always been
Speaker 1: really fascinated by the question of how people change people
Speaker 1: office or I see kids in school and they say
Speaker 1: they want to do things differently, and despite having those goals,
Speaker 1: they don't accomplish them. So I've always been interested in,
Speaker 1: like what makes people stick to the goals that they
Speaker 1: set out. And so, as I said, for a very
Speaker 1: long time, I've been thinking about that. And then I
Speaker 1: guess in terms of writing about that, i'd say in
Speaker 1: the last like, you know, five years, but actually and
Speaker 1: I know we talked about it. I had the pleasure
Speaker 1: of studying with Walter Michelle when I was in Barnard,
Speaker 1: which was a very long time ago, and he sort
Speaker 1: of got me very interested in the topic of self
Speaker 1: control and also the topic of how people are different
Speaker 1: in different situations. And so one of the things I
Speaker 1: was really interested in is sort of my own personal
Speaker 1: story is really gritty. Why am I not doing that
Speaker 1: in a different domain. So part of what I really
Speaker 1: was interested in in sort of part of positive psychology
Speaker 1: was looking at people's strengths and seeing how can we
Speaker 1: apply what we're doing in our strength to an area
Speaker 1: where we want to grow? Sure and WALTI Michelle's still
Speaker 1: going strong, isn't he? Yes? Yes, it's amazing what a
Speaker 1: human being? So Okay, Well, I'd like to know a
Speaker 1: little bit how you defined grit. Do you define it
Speaker 1: in the same way as angel Duckworth. I define great
Speaker 1: similar to Angela Duckworth. I based a lot of my
Speaker 1: book and my research on her work. She defines it
Speaker 1: as passion and perseverance for goals. One thing I would
Speaker 1: add to my definition is adding the word meaningful. Although
Speaker 1: you hear Angela talk, she often talks about things being meaningful,
Speaker 1: But for me, it's having a goal that's really important
Speaker 1: to you and be able to persist in that goal
Speaker 1: and being able to rebound when things get tough. That's
Speaker 1: how I would define great. So for you as resiliency
Speaker 1: an intimate part of that, Yes, definitely. I think for me,
Speaker 1: like again from my clinical perspective, helping people learn that
Speaker 1: on the path of success, there are going to be
Speaker 1: moments of temporary setbacks and that that's part of the journey.
Speaker 1: I think that message has really been important to me
Speaker 1: and the teens and the children that I work with,
Speaker 1: so reframing that that that's what all people do, that
Speaker 1: that's what happens when you look at successful people, that
Speaker 1: they do have setbacks and learning how to deal with
Speaker 1: setbacks as well as when things are really tough, how
Speaker 1: do you stick with things? And then also how do
Speaker 1: you ultimately decide that maybe something isn't for you? Because
Speaker 1: I don't think that grit is just about continually just
Speaker 1: to knock your head. And what I sometimes say is
Speaker 1: the word perseverance and perseverance are very similar. They're just
Speaker 1: a little bit different in the way you put the accent.
Speaker 1: And my goal is not to encourage people to be perseverance,
Speaker 1: but rather to be have these goals and often to
Speaker 1: do them, not only often for yourself but for other people.
Speaker 1: That's like, for me, the highest level that we can
Speaker 1: achieve in terms of being gritty fair enough. I mean,
Speaker 1: was Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz delusional or gritty
Speaker 1: or both? Well? I actually I don't know if you're
Speaker 1: using that because you read my book but I actually,
Speaker 1: you know, I read your book. I know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: Come on now, and yeah, the end part is I
Speaker 1: do talk about Doc Dorothy in the last chapter, and
Speaker 1: I closed with Dorothy in that way. I do think
Speaker 1: the story of Dorothy really shares. One of the most
Speaker 1: important parts to me is that grit is The word
Speaker 1: grit has the word ey in it, but it also
Speaker 1: has the word tea for team. And for me, what
Speaker 1: made Dorothy gritty was the team that she had. She
Speaker 1: couldn't have done this whole journey by herself. She needed
Speaker 1: her people to get it across. And that's one of
Speaker 1: the things that I think I really wanted as an
Speaker 1: important message to share with people is that when you
Speaker 1: look at people who are able to do this, or
Speaker 1: if I look at myself, when there were times when
Speaker 1: even writing this book, when I was like at a loss,
Speaker 1: it was because of my people, and you're one of
Speaker 1: my people, Scott, by the way, that I was able
Speaker 1: to do this, and so I think I can't under
Speaker 1: express that enough. Also, when I would interview teens and
Speaker 1: they would tell me what helped them, they often said
Speaker 1: it was a parent, it was a teacher, it was
Speaker 1: somebody in their life that got them to be able
Speaker 1: to persist and be resilient. Wait, did you answer if
Speaker 1: Dorothy was delusion or gritty? It's Dorothy delusional, and what
Speaker 1: aspect that she was delusional? That she wanted to get
Speaker 1: back to Kansas? So what part are you saying is
Speaker 1: being her being delusional? Didn't she dream the whole thing?
Speaker 1: Did she dream the no? Say, I guess so, I guess.
Speaker 1: You know, whatever dreams are inspirational, I think it's really
Speaker 1: like a metaphor not necessarily a actual story. I'm not
Speaker 1: encouraging people to, you know, get into these kind of dreams.
Speaker 1: But I do think, as I said to you, what
Speaker 1: I learned from the Dorothy story is not necessarily whether
Speaker 1: that she was having a dream or not. But what
Speaker 1: struck me about her story was that the way she
Speaker 1: ultimately was able to get home and to do what
Speaker 1: she needed to do was when she surrounded herself with
Speaker 1: the people who couldn't inspire her. So I hope I
Speaker 1: answered your question yes fair enough, Yes you did? You did? So?
Speaker 1: Is there a formula for grit? So a formula in
Speaker 1: terms of one thing that I read that Angela Duckworth
Speaker 1: had written in a paper, and I really like in
Speaker 1: terms of the formula, is like an economic principle, which
Speaker 1: is that when a goal is important to you, when
Speaker 1: the costs are low and your likelihood of success is high,
Speaker 1: you will accomplish and be able to be gritty or
Speaker 1: accomplish your goal. So when I work with people, I
Speaker 1: try to look at it across those three premises. Is
Speaker 1: the goal important to you? Like the thing you're saying
Speaker 1: you want to be gritty about. Let's say you want
Speaker 1: to be more emotionally gritty. So, for example, I have
Speaker 1: someone in my practice right now who is socially wants
Speaker 1: to put herself more out there. She wants to be
Speaker 1: able to talk to people to feel more comfortable. So
Speaker 1: is that goal important? Yes, the goal is important to her.
Speaker 1: B Are the costs too high? Does it feel like
Speaker 1: too scary? What I know from my work is that
Speaker 1: when things are from like an eight to a ten
Speaker 1: on that anxiety thermometer, people aren't going to do it.
Speaker 1: So I need to bring the costs down. So I'll
Speaker 1: say to her, is there somebody at work that you
Speaker 1: kind of feel more comfortable with? Could you talk to them?
Speaker 1: So I bring the cost down? Is her likelihood of
Speaker 1: success high. So again, the more she does it, the
Speaker 1: more she's successful, the more likely she's going to be
Speaker 1: doing it. So, as somebody who cares about growing people's grit,
Speaker 1: I kind of work with that formula and tweak it
Speaker 1: to make it work, because often the formula is not working.
Speaker 1: And that's the reason why I think that sometimes, especially
Speaker 1: the costs cost people, as you know from behavior economics,
Speaker 1: are very sensitive to costs, So if the costs seem
Speaker 1: too high, they're not going to be able to do
Speaker 1: what we're asking them to do. Yeah, but I also
Speaker 1: feel like people from behavioral economics tend to treat humans
Speaker 1: as machines as well, not as human beings. Well, I
Speaker 1: do think that there is a little bit of philosophical
Speaker 1: difference in behavior economics in psychology. I think sometimes behavior
Speaker 1: economics people believe that there are these things that exist,
Speaker 1: that we are fulty thinkers and people don't change. And
Speaker 1: as a psychologist and as a student of Walter Mache
Speaker 1: and Albert Ellis and all these other people, I do
Speaker 1: believe that we can change. That the first step is
Speaker 1: teaching people, and it's not easy to change, but that
Speaker 1: by learning how our mind works and then kind of
Speaker 1: tweaking it, we can make changes and I've seen that
Speaker 1: in my practice. Well, can I be your client? That
Speaker 1: sounds amazing? Not not all the time. And I think
Speaker 1: that's something that's tricky with working with teens is that
Speaker 1: you know when you have an adult not and this
Speaker 1: may not even be true all the time for adults,
Speaker 1: they're coming to you because they want to change a
Speaker 1: lot of times with teens, and I think this is
Speaker 1: the trickiest part about doing this work is getting that
Speaker 1: buy in. How do you get teens so that they
Speaker 1: are ready to work? You know, I know you're probably
Speaker 1: familiar with Protessca and Declem's work on how people change,
Speaker 1: But sometimes people are pre contemplative. They don't even know
Speaker 1: that there's a problem. So with teens, sometimes they don't
Speaker 1: even know that there's a problem that they you know,
Speaker 1: lacker it and so we have to start where they
Speaker 1: are and kind of hook them in and see why
Speaker 1: this might be important. I think sometimes it's hard to
Speaker 1: have clinical success when somebody comes to you and they're
Speaker 1: pre contemplative and you're trying to help them to change
Speaker 1: and that's not where they are. Yeah, you really do
Speaker 1: it to meet people where they are you do? And
Speaker 1: people kind of have to accept themselves first. They kind
Speaker 1: of have to meet themselves where they are, and we
Speaker 1: don't tend to do that, I know. And one of
Speaker 1: the things I've done in terms of sharing this book
Speaker 1: and trying to be how to get this message across
Speaker 1: is one of the things is I've been videotaping teens.
Speaker 1: One of the themes that I'm hearing them say over
Speaker 1: and over again is something you just said is about acceptance.
Speaker 1: I like, for example, interviewed a teen who has Turett's
Speaker 1: ocd ADHD and what he was saying is that through
Speaker 1: acceptance he was able to do the hard work that
Speaker 1: he needed to do. And each person, when telling their
Speaker 1: different story, often talks about this theme of acceptance. So
Speaker 1: I think you're onto something. Oh well, thank you, But
Speaker 1: I I think you know who used to say that
Speaker 1: a lot? Carl Rogers used to say that a lot.
Speaker 1: You know, we need to accept ourselves before we can
Speaker 1: change ourselves. A lot of people have been saying that, well,
Speaker 1: thank you. So I want to talk about some of
Speaker 1: the controversies surrounding Grid and what your thoughts are about them.
Speaker 1: What are some of the controversies surrounding grid and what
Speaker 1: are your thoughts on them? Okay, So I think some
Speaker 1: of the controversies have been first of all, whether grit,
Speaker 1: I guess, is different than conscientiousness. That's one of the controversies.
Speaker 1: Or how well let's start there right. So for me,
Speaker 1: I guess I'm not a researcher scientist. I am a scientist,
Speaker 1: I guess, but a researcher in terms of terminology. But
Speaker 1: what I definitely know, whatever we call it, this quality
Speaker 1: that we're describing having a goal and be able to
Speaker 1: stick with something as important to you and being wise
Speaker 1: about it and be able to be resilient, I know
Speaker 1: that that concept from my clinical work, from work I
Speaker 1: do in my school is really important. So again for me,
Speaker 1: I don't know what we can call it. We can
Speaker 1: call it, you know, oongababa, whatever it is that quality
Speaker 1: were describing is really important. I also think, and I
Speaker 1: think this is an important thing. And when I do presentations,
Speaker 1: I often say what grit is not. So what grit
Speaker 1: is not is blaming children for their life circumstances. Grit
Speaker 1: is not saying that other things like inequality and poverty
Speaker 1: and all those things aren't important. So I think we
Speaker 1: also have to know that grit is not the end
Speaker 1: all be all. It's essential, but there are so many
Speaker 1: other things obviously that are important to people's success. But
Speaker 1: grit is one of the things that I think, especially today,
Speaker 1: given that everything is so short term, is really important
Speaker 1: to foster in our youth. Yeah. Thanks, Karen. You brought
Speaker 1: in a bunch of controversies in one there, and I
Speaker 1: really appreciate. I appreciate that. No, he saved me a voice. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I think that that's right. And so, therefore, if
Speaker 1: someone is struggling, do you always immediately think, oh that
Speaker 1: the reason there is that they just might must not
Speaker 1: have enough grit? No, No, yeah, Like so the short
Speaker 1: answer is absolutely not. So I think you know this
Speaker 1: is a little bit of a sidebar, but I actually
Speaker 1: and I think you may know this because you said
Speaker 1: that you saw some of my research papers for when
Speaker 1: I I did when I did my dissertation, I actually
Speaker 1: was interested in looking at productivity among traffic agents and
Speaker 1: one of the things that I looked at were factors
Speaker 1: within the organization and factors within the person. And what
Speaker 1: I found was that obviously it's a combination, but one
Speaker 1: of the things that was most important, and it's sort
Speaker 1: of a theme in all the things that I do,
Speaker 1: is this notion of social support, and the people who
Speaker 1: had a close group and social support were able to
Speaker 1: be productive. And I think that also if you even
Speaker 1: look at some of this John Henry stuff. I don't
Speaker 1: know if you're familiar with what I'm talking about, but
Speaker 1: this notion that if you really especially the notion that
Speaker 1: some things that are actually helpful even in that population. Obviously,
Speaker 1: just telling people to gritty have cardiovascular implications. And again
Speaker 1: back to my dissertation work, I worked in a lab
Speaker 1: where we were interested in blood pressure and measuring that
Speaker 1: and looking at that. So that is something from my past.
Speaker 1: But one of the things that came out of some
Speaker 1: of those studies is that the problem there is the
Speaker 1: lack of social support. So again, just telling people be
Speaker 1: gritty but not giving them a roadmap or the people
Speaker 1: or the sport is not the way to do it.
Speaker 1: So for me, it's really important to look both at
Speaker 1: the individual but also looking at the environment in terms
Speaker 1: of what is missing or what do we need to add,
Speaker 1: because together those things are important. And I don't think
Speaker 1: it's right just to say to kids who are poor
Speaker 1: or who need this more than anything. Oh, we forget
Speaker 1: about you. We can't do anything that. Then the psychological
Speaker 1: had of me comes back and says, no, let's figure
Speaker 1: out there's obviously a problem here. Let's be creative. Let's
Speaker 1: look at the research. Let's see what's going on there
Speaker 1: and figure out what we can do, both internally and
Speaker 1: externally to make this better. That sounds great, and the
Speaker 1: problem is not always well grit right, So the solution
Speaker 1: is not always growing grit right. So that's yes, absolutely.
Speaker 1: It might be environmental, it might be the teachers, it
Speaker 1: might be the culture, it might be something else. But
Speaker 1: I think that and again, if you ever hear Angela speak,
Speaker 1: she's talking about one part of it. Just because I'm
Speaker 1: speaking about grit doesn't mean that these other things aren't important.
Speaker 1: But I do think that we can being mindful of
Speaker 1: some of this other data out there, even about some
Speaker 1: of the cardiovascularists, especially among poor kids, you know, that
Speaker 1: we can help people be more long term minded, because ultimately,
Speaker 1: for me, grit is also about being more long term minded,
Speaker 1: and I think that that has incredible value today in
Speaker 1: the world we're living where everything is like instantaneously. You know,
Speaker 1: people say that if they go to a website and
Speaker 1: they don't get the results within three seconds, they're done
Speaker 1: with that website. Or I know when I go to
Speaker 1: a restaurant now they have like, you know, an app
Speaker 1: where you can pick up the phone. Nobody's learning how
Speaker 1: to wait and how to wait for the long term.
Speaker 1: So I think, again, in this world that we're living,
Speaker 1: I think it's really important for us to help teens
Speaker 1: and adults cultivate that long term more mindful self. I
Speaker 1: totally agree with that. So let's focus for a second
Speaker 1: on teens. Why do you write this book for teens? Like,
Speaker 1: what do you think is the core thing maybe with
Speaker 1: this generation that is kind of inspiring you to to
Speaker 1: try to fix. First of all, I have two teens.
Speaker 1: I have an eighteen year old and I have a
Speaker 1: fifteen year old, and I think today it's really hard
Speaker 1: to be a teen. I think that there's a lot
Speaker 1: of pressure on teens to compete. I think this whole
Speaker 1: notion of everything being instantaneous is unique to this generation.
Speaker 1: I know, you know again with the phone and the
Speaker 1: social media and everything those pressures. I'm seeing such an
Speaker 1: increase in social anxiety in my practice in recent years.
Speaker 1: So I think that there's a lot of forces, and
Speaker 1: also teens emotionally, they feel things really strongly, so that
Speaker 1: when they have failure it can feel crushing and things
Speaker 1: in the moment can feel very pressurized. So I wanted
Speaker 1: to write this for them, especially to help them to
Speaker 1: think about things and behave in ways that researchers are
Speaker 1: showing us can help them in this more challenging time.
Speaker 1: I also think that parents today are different than parents
Speaker 1: in the past. I think that you know, in the past,
Speaker 1: like when I was growing up, I think my parents
Speaker 1: felt their job as a parent was to make an independent,
Speaker 1: autonomous person, whereas I think today parents feel very overwhelmed themselves,
Speaker 1: and they're anxious and they want to protect their kids.
Speaker 1: So often kids don't experience failure or they are kind
Speaker 1: of bubble wrapped, and so I think that that's why
Speaker 1: I wanted to write this specially for teens today. Kids
Speaker 1: don't experience failure. Well, a lot of kids, especially in
Speaker 1: poor SS, experience failure every day of their lives, right right,
Speaker 1: So I think that we have two sort of different groups.
Speaker 1: I think that we have the bubble wrap helicopter snowplow
Speaker 1: kind of parenting society who are protecting their kids. And
Speaker 1: then you're absolutely right, there are teens who having it
Speaker 1: really really tough, who you know, have all the stuff
Speaker 1: going on outside their life, and who if they just
Speaker 1: show up at school that took a lot. So I
Speaker 1: think that the stress, and we also know that being
Speaker 1: stressed makes us more in tune and wanting to do
Speaker 1: what's going to be good in the short term. So
Speaker 1: I think that because of both those polls even more so,
Speaker 1: we need to help kids learn what again, what we
Speaker 1: know can help them in these situations. Cool. Cool, So
Speaker 1: what are the two minds you talk about in your book? Oh?
Speaker 1: So I am really sort of that intrigued about this notion,
Speaker 1: as I said to you before, about how people change,
Speaker 1: Like if you think you want to, for example, exercise,
Speaker 1: why are you not exercising? Like what happens? So we
Speaker 1: have this kind of two minds, you know, Danny Cadaman
Speaker 1: speaks about having two minds, Walter Michelle talks about having
Speaker 1: two minds. So all philosophers talk about this. So we
Speaker 1: have part of us that sort of gravitates to what
Speaker 1: feels good in the moment, and then we have what
Speaker 1: feels good in the long term, and I feel like
Speaker 1: the short term part of ourselves comes out in a
Speaker 1: scream and the long term more in a whisper. And
Speaker 1: so a lot of the techniques that I talk about
Speaker 1: in the book try to take the long term and
Speaker 1: bring it into the present so that it's more concrete
Speaker 1: and it's more available. So, for example, writing down your
Speaker 1: goals or writing down on why this would be good
Speaker 1: for you to do is a technique to make the
Speaker 1: foggy future a little bit more concrete and more likely
Speaker 1: to be successful. And so in my practice, a lot
Speaker 1: of the things that I do is trying to use
Speaker 1: those techniques to try to bring the long term mind
Speaker 1: up to the forefront and sort of recognize and accept
Speaker 1: that we all have that short term mind, but maybe
Speaker 1: bring it a little bit further to the back. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I like that. I do like that, And especially a
Speaker 1: lot of people in harsh and unpredictable environments tend to
Speaker 1: focus on the present because their future is not certain, right,
Speaker 1: And sometimes that's adaptable, right, And it's adaptive. And even
Speaker 1: there's been studies with Walt Michelle's Marshmallow study that when
Speaker 1: the researcher who was you know, just to sort of
Speaker 1: give everybody. Probably people everyone knows the Marshmallow study, but
Speaker 1: just for those who don't. You know, there was this
Speaker 1: option with children preschoolers that they had one marshmallow now
Speaker 1: or two marshmallows later. But when he ran the study
Speaker 1: where the researcher was very undependable, where it was not
Speaker 1: so clear whether or not they were really going to
Speaker 1: give them the second marshmallow, then less people chose the
Speaker 1: second marshmallow. So if your life is always feeling like
Speaker 1: you don't know if people are going to give you
Speaker 1: the second marshmallow, why would you wait for the second marshmallow?
Speaker 1: So I think that that's really really true, and I
Speaker 1: think we need to be aware of that and figure
Speaker 1: out how do we then make things more dependent. How
Speaker 1: as teachers and people who work with kids, like the
Speaker 1: Boys and Girls Club, A lot of those places I
Speaker 1: think are working because they're setting a schema where there
Speaker 1: are these dependable, caring people who provide structure and support,
Speaker 1: and you know that there will be some level consistency. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that's right, and kind of a thoughts about
Speaker 1: the future and having hope that there is going to
Speaker 1: be a future is important. It's just as important, if
Speaker 1: not more important than actually having grit itself right, it's
Speaker 1: able to imagine that future. Right, So what do you
Speaker 1: mean by the power of yet? So the power yet
Speaker 1: comes from Carol Zwax's work on growth mindset vice. The
Speaker 1: notion of is that sometimes people have and she's done
Speaker 1: research to talk about the notion that some part of
Speaker 1: what we call the fixed mindset, which is that when
Speaker 1: I approach a task and it's challenging, that means that
Speaker 1: these are the talents, this is what I bring to it,
Speaker 1: and that's it, versus a growth mindset, which means is
Speaker 1: that when I approach something, I can grow and learn
Speaker 1: and change from that, and that I'm not fixed in
Speaker 1: the level of skills that I have. And she has
Speaker 1: also talked about the power of yet, which is sort
Speaker 1: of an outgrowth of growth mindset, which is when you
Speaker 1: add the word yet to your sentence, it makes you
Speaker 1: feel more optimistic, it helps you develop more of that
Speaker 1: growth mindset. So if I haven't you know, finished the
Speaker 1: paper I set out to do, or if I'm having
Speaker 1: a problem with a math problem, I'm just not there yet,
Speaker 1: as opposed to this is all I can do and
Speaker 1: that's it, And the power. Yet I find when I
Speaker 1: get presentations or when I talk to my kids or
Speaker 1: even my kids at home, they'll sometimes throw back yet
Speaker 1: to me. So it's a very three little letters have
Speaker 1: been very powerful. And one of the things I do
Speaker 1: in the exercises in the book is that instead of
Speaker 1: saying yes and no whether or not something is accomplished,
Speaker 1: it's yes and not yet, because I would look have
Speaker 1: that kind of scheme of that mindset that if something
Speaker 1: is not done, it's just not done yet. Oh that's
Speaker 1: really nice. I think that's tied to the whole point
Speaker 1: that I was making earlier. Right, Yes, you've hoped that
Speaker 1: it will eventually with patients, and it's also tied to
Speaker 1: your future oriented thinking thing. It's all tied, isn't it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's also tied to the importance of setting effective
Speaker 1: goals as well. Can you talk to a little bit
Speaker 1: about maybe one or two ways that you can, like,
Speaker 1: what's an effective goal versus give me an example of
Speaker 1: an ineffective goal. So I think that some things that
Speaker 1: I see with teens or even parents when they set
Speaker 1: goals with their kids. Sometimes, first of all, people set
Speaker 1: goals that are what they don't want to have happened,
Speaker 1: so they don't want their kids to yell or it's
Speaker 1: a negative. So an effective goal is set in what
Speaker 1: you want to say, So I think that that's really important.
Speaker 1: I also think it has to be measurable, so something
Speaker 1: that I and them everyone would agree what that would
Speaker 1: look like. So it's very specific. So it should be specific,
Speaker 1: it should be measurable. It should also be really important
Speaker 1: to the person. So again, sometimes I work with parents.
Speaker 1: They have a goal, but it's not their kids or
Speaker 1: their teens goals, so the goal must be meaningful to them.
Speaker 1: Often when I start with goals, and this is a
Speaker 1: little bit of I guess my clinician hat coming in,
Speaker 1: I start with goals that I feel are not yet reached.
Speaker 1: Like I like success to breed success. So sometimes with grit,
Speaker 1: we always talk about stretch goals that they're really tough
Speaker 1: and they're really hard, but where I like to start.
Speaker 1: Often our goals that are maybe a little bit of
Speaker 1: a stretch, but the kid can really imagine it can
Speaker 1: be concrete, going back to getting that long term part
Speaker 1: of them getting involved to get done, and once they
Speaker 1: get those goals done, then we can build on and
Speaker 1: we can do more of those stretch goals. So that's
Speaker 1: the kind of way I like to work when I
Speaker 1: work with teens or anybody in my practice or school,
Speaker 1: or in throughout the book. Cool. You know, stretch goals
Speaker 1: do remind me of the construct of curiosity, and Todd
Speaker 1: Kashton has talked about, you know, a stretching form of
Speaker 1: curiosity where we are constantly trying to reach unknown heights
Speaker 1: of ourselves and things like that. So I think the
Speaker 1: curiosity construct is important here. It's not the same thing
Speaker 1: as grit, but maybe grit combined with curiosity not Maybe
Speaker 1: a research has shown that grit combined with curiosity is
Speaker 1: most effective for creativity and creative achievement. So cool, I
Speaker 1: like that. So how can we better connect with our values?
Speaker 1: It seems like, you know, just being gritty for the
Speaker 1: sake of grittiness, is I don't think is what you're
Speaker 1: advocating among teens. You talk about values in the book
Speaker 1: as well, so maybe you could give some advice on
Speaker 1: how to how teens can better connect with their deepest
Speaker 1: heiled values. Right, So there's an exercise. Again. What I
Speaker 1: tried to do in this book is lots of these
Speaker 1: concept comes from the researchers who've done really important work
Speaker 1: on this. So there are researchers who study values. And
Speaker 1: what I sort of propose is a set of values
Speaker 1: that people have used in the literature, and things like curiosity, creativity, love, family, friends,
Speaker 1: and when people can connect what is a goal to
Speaker 1: that value, they can do great things. So, for example,
Speaker 1: if I have the value of family, and let's say
Speaker 1: I'm sort of interested in raising my academic grit, how
Speaker 1: do I type this desire to do maybe be gritty
Speaker 1: with my academics to this value of family. How do
Speaker 1: I think about it in that way so that my
Speaker 1: core value is sort of driving the bus. It is
Speaker 1: when our values drive our bus, we can do again,
Speaker 1: great and hard things. So that's how I sort of
Speaker 1: tie that. And there have been some exercises which are
Speaker 1: either stealthy or not so stealthy, where you basically have
Speaker 1: teens young adults write about their values, and what they've
Speaker 1: found is by simply writing about their values, they've been
Speaker 1: much more successful in college and things like that. So
Speaker 1: we can do that, or we can even be a
Speaker 1: little bit more deliberate in terms of the way I
Speaker 1: approach it in the book, which is that we talk
Speaker 1: about those values and then we say, okay, looking at
Speaker 1: that value, how do you then tie it to the
Speaker 1: goal that you want to become more gritty in nice?
Speaker 1: And you've like your book is chock full of activities.
Speaker 1: You've got more activities than text rist. Yes, so that
Speaker 1: there's a lot of practical stuff there for teenagers as
Speaker 1: well as parents and teachers of teenagers. So you talked
Speaker 1: a little bit about mindfulness already, you covered that why
Speaker 1: does gratitude matter? How's gratitude related to grit So gratitude
Speaker 1: for me, it sort of is the lens that you're
Speaker 1: going to be looking at your life through. So when
Speaker 1: you're grateful, you're focusing on what is working, what is positive,
Speaker 1: what is good in your life, And that also is
Speaker 1: decreases stress, which stress is sort of the kryptonite of grip,
Speaker 1: and it also lets you be more optimistic and more positive,
Speaker 1: which also are things that you need to be in
Speaker 1: terms of being resilient and persistent. So it's it's a
Speaker 1: mindset to go through life that sort of helps sort
Speaker 1: of are like the bricks, the cornerstones of what you
Speaker 1: need to sort of be gritty. So if you're and
Speaker 1: you're looking for what things that are positive. It's going
Speaker 1: to have some like ripple and effects on seeing other
Speaker 1: things in a more optimistic, positive way. I often talk
Speaker 1: about this experiment that I do where I do this
Speaker 1: thing where I ask the audience to try to find
Speaker 1: the red in the room, and then I'm kind of
Speaker 1: tricky about this, and then I'll say this is actually
Speaker 1: based on Susan fe I saw her do this experiment
Speaker 1: then asking them what do they see that was blue?
Speaker 1: And then obviously they can't tell me anything blue because
Speaker 1: I told them to look for red. But the point
Speaker 1: is is that what we look at becomes prominent in
Speaker 1: our life. So if we are focusing on what we're
Speaker 1: grateful for, the things that are working and the positive
Speaker 1: a it makes us have more positive emotions be it
Speaker 1: shapes our view of the world. A lot of my
Speaker 1: patients who are anxious or depressed, I give them the
Speaker 1: homework assignment of every day. At the end of the day,
Speaker 1: I want them to write down three things that they're
Speaker 1: grateful for. And the reason, and I explained it to them,
Speaker 1: is that that way, all day long, they're going to
Speaker 1: be noting the things that are going and w working
Speaker 1: well for their lives as opposed to walking around which
Speaker 1: with their negative a bias that we all have, but
Speaker 1: especially when you're anxious and depressed, you have looking at
Speaker 1: all things that aren't working. Yeah, that seems like a
Speaker 1: really sensible advice. So it seems like it's important to like,
Speaker 1: teenagers don't have a role book, like what I mean,
Speaker 1: they should all read your book, but they're we're not
Speaker 1: born with this. I don't know. I guess now you've
Speaker 1: written the book. We're all born with this book. But
Speaker 1: it's important having a cheerleader in your life, is the
Speaker 1: point I'm trying to make here. Regardless, you know, there's
Speaker 1: really someone that can instill these values in you, like
Speaker 1: teach you smart goals, Like we're not really taught these
Speaker 1: things in school. Right, So you talk about the importance
Speaker 1: of teenagers having a cheerleader, right, Yes, So yes, I
Speaker 1: don't think that we are taught these things in school,
Speaker 1: but I do think and this is something I believe in.
Speaker 1: And this is actually how we met. Was that IPEN,
Speaker 1: which is the International Positive Education Network. Their mission is
Speaker 1: to teach these things in schools, and I do, and
Speaker 1: that's some of the work that I do in my school, right,
Speaker 1: now and I actually work with teachers where we not
Speaker 1: only talk about academics, but we also teach kids how
Speaker 1: to have things like grit and self control, but also
Speaker 1: things like kindness and empathy and persistence and even curiosity
Speaker 1: and creativity and how we can teach these things because
Speaker 1: I believe these all these things can be taught, and
Speaker 1: they can be taught again, like you said, best when
Speaker 1: you have that cheerleader, when you have that person who
Speaker 1: has your back, has your back and also is your
Speaker 1: accountability partner. So I actually, and I don't know if
Speaker 1: I told you the Scott, I decided to sign up
Speaker 1: for the New York City Marathon, which is definitely a
Speaker 1: stretch goal for me. But the way I'm feeling like
Speaker 1: that this is getting done is that I have a cheerleader,
Speaker 1: my friend who were doing this together, and every time
Speaker 1: I do my training, I send her my little map,
Speaker 1: my walks thing about my time and she does that
Speaker 1: and we do it together. And by doing things together,
Speaker 1: I feel that's the best way for me to accomplish
Speaker 1: this stretch goal. Great, when is the big race. It's
Speaker 1: my first week in November. Oh wow. And I'm also,
Speaker 1: by the way, doing it with a sense of purpose. Actually,
Speaker 1: I did other marathon and half marathon. I only have
Speaker 1: done half marathons. And when I did the other half marathon,
Speaker 1: my daughter is like, why did you run thirteen miles? Like,
Speaker 1: She's like, were you running from somebody? I'm like, no,
Speaker 1: did you do it for charity? And I said no.
Speaker 1: So it made me think I'm going to do this
Speaker 1: for a charity, and so I'm actually doing it for
Speaker 1: the Turet Association with I have a lot of patients
Speaker 1: who have turets and have OCD and anxiety. And when
Speaker 1: I think that I'm doing this for other people, it
Speaker 1: also helps me to kind of do really hard things.
Speaker 1: So that's another thing that I think is a big
Speaker 1: message that I would say to people is like that
Speaker 1: sense of purpose, Oh absolutely, that's purpose is essential as
Speaker 1: well as values. So what is grit for life? Let's
Speaker 1: end with this question. Gritful life is helping people be
Speaker 1: the best version of themselves. That's what I'm really hoping
Speaker 1: to accomplish with this book is helping teens really kind
Speaker 1: of hook into what's important to them. How can they
Speaker 1: have passion for that and how can they persist in
Speaker 1: something even when things are tough and also knowing also
Speaker 1: when it's reasonable to quit. But I want people to
Speaker 1: be able to quit when they think that it makes sense,
Speaker 1: not as opposed to when their emotions sort of overtake them.
Speaker 1: So for me, I guess that would be great for life.
Speaker 1: Would be be the best version of yourself? Oh? I
Speaker 1: like that. That's also a major mission of positive psychology,
Speaker 1: which we talked a lot about a lot of the
Speaker 1: major themes about today. Well, thanks Karen so much for
Speaker 1: chatting with me today and all the best with your
Speaker 1: new book. Thank you, it's been a pleasure, and thank
Speaker 1: you for letting me have this opportunity. Thank you so
Speaker 1: much for listening to The Psychology Podcast with doctor Scott
Speaker 1: Barry Kaufman. I hope you found this episode just as
Speaker 1: thought provoking as I did. If something you heard today
Speaker 1: stimulated you in some way, iourage you to join in
Speaker 1: the discussion at the Psychology Podcast dot com. That's the
Speaker 1: Psychology Podcast dot com.