Speaker 1: Pushkin. It's no secret that Nordic countries have very high
Speaker 1: levels of well being. Ever since the World Happiness Report
Speaker 1: launched their famous country happiness rankings back in twenty twelve,
Speaker 1: Scandinavian countries have consistently dominated the competition. In fact, Finland
Speaker 1: and Denmark have claimed the top spots for an impressive
Speaker 1: seven years running. The US and UK, by contrast, they
Speaker 1: haven't even broken into the top ten. So what's behind
Speaker 1: this Nordic happiness advantage. Journalist Helen Russell believes it starts
Speaker 1: in childhood.
Speaker 2: It's not an accident that people from the Nordic countries
Speaker 2: have voted the happiest in the world year after year.
Speaker 1: This is how they are raised. If you're a fan
Speaker 1: of The Happiness Lab, you might remember Helen from a
Speaker 1: previous episode entitled Move to Your Happy Place. I asked
Speaker 1: Helen to return for this special series on parenting because
Speaker 1: she is travel a rather circuitous path towards a happier
Speaker 1: family life.
Speaker 2: So I am London born and bred and my husband
Speaker 2: got a job at Lego in Denmark and we had
Speaker 2: no intention of ever leaving London, but Denmark kept being
Speaker 2: voted the happiest country in the world, and I kind
Speaker 2: of wondered, what was it all about? Could it be
Speaker 2: that beer, bacon, Danish pastries really made you that happy?
Speaker 2: So I decided I would give it a year, investigating
Speaker 2: the Danish happiness phenomenon firsthand, looking at different areas of
Speaker 2: Danish living to see if any of them made me happier,
Speaker 2: and spoiler alert, it sort of did. And I ended
Speaker 2: up staying not one year, but nearly twelve in the end,
Speaker 2: and parenting a very loud mini redhead and surprise twins.
Speaker 2: So life changed in ways I didn't expect at all,
Speaker 2: But I did learn that Viking children grow up happier
Speaker 2: and healthier and more independent. We bought a home, our
Speaker 2: first home together, in the Danish countryside, in a very
Speaker 2: Danish neighborhood, so yeah, really getting under the skin of
Speaker 2: being part of the groups and clubs and associations, and
Speaker 2: sending our kids into Danish childcare, really understanding what it
Speaker 2: means to live danishly, and then really looking throughout the
Speaker 2: other Nordic countries of the things that they do that
Speaker 2: are very similar and very different to how I think
Speaker 2: we do it in the.
Speaker 1: Rest of the world. Helen's now the author of the
Speaker 1: Deaner's Secret to Happy Kids, how the Viking way of
Speaker 1: raising children makes them happier, healthier, and more independent. I
Speaker 1: wanted to chat with Helen about why Nordic parenting is
Speaker 1: so much less stressful than parenting in the US. One
Speaker 1: of the big things you talk about is being really different.
Speaker 1: Concerns this idea of trust in Denmark, which seems different
Speaker 1: in the US and the UK. You talked in your
Speaker 1: book about this idea of tillid. What does that word
Speaker 1: mean and why is it so important in Denmark? So
Speaker 1: this is this magical word. It's a mixture of trust
Speaker 1: and faith, and really the whole of Danish society is
Speaker 1: built around this. You have to have trust in the
Speaker 1: people around you that they will also behave well and
Speaker 1: that everyone will contribute their fair share, and then you
Speaker 1: have to kind of have a bit of faith that
Speaker 1: it will all turn out okay. So things like this
Speaker 1: famous idea of Danes leaving their babies to nap outside
Speaker 1: in their prams during the day while they pop into
Speaker 1: a cafe for lunch or go for a coffee or
Speaker 1: go for a swimming And I've seen once and there
Speaker 1: is this trust that no harm will come to them.
Speaker 1: There's a faith that the whole community will rally round
Speaker 1: so that whoever the adult is in a certain situation
Speaker 1: will have eyes on the children in their sphere around them.
Speaker 1: And as a parent, where you can feel so alone
Speaker 1: and so isolated and so terrified, frankly, a lot of
Speaker 1: the time, that really helped, because you sort of have
Speaker 1: the headspace to be happy and relaxed if you have
Speaker 1: this trust and faith that it's kind of going to
Speaker 1: be okay and that most people are not out to
Speaker 1: get you, that people have got your back. And that
Speaker 1: kind of trust seems to extend to how parents think
Speaker 1: about kids and what they're capable of. How is this
Speaker 1: different in terms of how Danish parents trust kids than
Speaker 1: the kind of thing you've see in the US and
Speaker 1: the UK.
Speaker 2: Well, I think when I first started looking around Danish daycare,
Speaker 2: so they start around ten months in something called bugustu
Speaker 2: or nursery room, and the children from around the age
Speaker 2: of two are expected to dress themselves to go outside.
Speaker 2: They can climb trees, they can do all this stuff.
Speaker 2: They're trusted to have autonomy over their body, and then
Speaker 2: from around the age of three they'll often be maybe
Speaker 2: candles lip candles in the window sills of the bernerhun
Speaker 2: or the children's gardens, and again the children are trusted
Speaker 2: to do it. They're trusted to use knives to chop
Speaker 2: up the fruit. My children all attended something terrifying institution
Speaker 2: known as Family Scouts from around age two, where they
Speaker 2: taught kids how to whittle would so I had two
Speaker 2: year old twins either side of me, each being given
Speaker 2: a knife.
Speaker 1: It was terrifying. It feels like the Danish Health and
Speaker 1: Safety should like jump in and make you not do this,
Speaker 1: But now.
Speaker 2: There is no Danish health and safety. It does not
Speaker 2: exist for Viking. We have this now family catchphrase if
Speaker 2: you can have a saw once you're four, that I
Speaker 2: had to say to my two year olds because their
Speaker 2: big brother was five had his own saw. But there
Speaker 2: is this trust that if you let children have that freedom,
Speaker 2: and of course there's a healthcare service, so it's not
Speaker 2: like a broken arm as medical bankruptcy, but it's a
Speaker 2: sense that if they fall and they break an arm,
Speaker 2: nor one wants that, but if it happens, it's not
Speaker 2: the end of the world, and it's much better for
Speaker 2: them to learn. So they are given this great freedom
Speaker 2: and Yeah, this great trust is placed in them to
Speaker 2: be responsible for their own bodies, to do the right
Speaker 2: thing and to learn by doing I.
Speaker 1: Guess, and in Denmark trust is sort of heralded and
Speaker 1: everyone's into it. But the idea that's poop pood is
Speaker 1: this concept of curling, which seems to be something that
Speaker 1: parents in the US and the UK are really into.
Speaker 1: So what's curling?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so named after I think this is the Scottish
Speaker 2: sport where you're kind of going ahead with brooms trying
Speaker 2: to make space and the ideas that you're clearing out
Speaker 2: any obstacles away from your children, also known as helicopter parenting.
Speaker 2: But there's not so much of it, I would say
Speaker 2: in the Nordic countries. In Denmark, my Danish parent friends
Speaker 2: were the best teachers. They are explaining how to do
Speaker 2: things on a day by day basis when I am clueless.
Speaker 2: I am always the idiot in these situations. So every
Speaker 2: day was a school day. But they would explain to
Speaker 2: me things like, instead of intervening in doing things for
Speaker 2: your kids, you set it up so that they can
Speaker 2: do it for themselves. So for example, you make sure
Speaker 2: all the hooks where their coats or their backpacks for
Speaker 2: school are or an area that they can reach them,
Speaker 2: a place where they can put them away. All of
Speaker 2: that is accessible to them, and so you're not doing
Speaker 2: it for them, but thinking what are the obstacles to
Speaker 2: the child doing what I want them to do? Quite
Speaker 2: child led.
Speaker 1: I'd say. You've also talked about how Danish parenting is
Speaker 1: more focused on the process than the product. What do
Speaker 1: you mean there?
Speaker 2: I guess in all of Danish society, for example, and
Speaker 2: there's this great idea that everyone is equal and that
Speaker 2: no one is to think they're special, and everyone is
Speaker 2: worthy of respect just because and this extends to children.
Speaker 2: So this idea that it doesn't necessarily matter if you
Speaker 2: become the CEO of a company. It matters if you're
Speaker 2: a good person. It matters if you have good friends,
Speaker 2: if you have maybe great hobbies, if you have a
Speaker 2: full and rich life, not rich in the financial sense.
Speaker 2: I spoke to parents who weren't that fussed about how
Speaker 2: their kids did grades wise at school, which is lucky
Speaker 2: because there's not that much pressure on that. That's not
Speaker 2: much book learning very early on, but it's more about
Speaker 2: will they be happy and first, as a sort of
Speaker 2: cynical brit I thought, well, maybe this is a massive
Speaker 2: nation of slackers, but no, you see the statistics. Denmark
Speaker 2: punches above. It's in terms of businesses, in terms of
Speaker 2: creative endeavors, and kids do quite well by the age
Speaker 2: of fifteen. It's above of the OECD average in terms
Speaker 2: of maths, reading science. So they're doing well, but they
Speaker 2: are happier in the process. I think that's the big thing.
Speaker 2: So for a Danish parent, it would be no good
Speaker 2: if your child was top of the class but miserable.
Speaker 2: And actually I spoke to some parents in Finland. He
Speaker 2: said they sort of told their children to study a
Speaker 2: bit less because they wanted them to just do a
Speaker 2: few more extracurricular activities. It doesn't matter about being top
Speaker 2: of the class. It matters about being happy and balanced
Speaker 2: and fulfilled, which is a very different approach, I guess,
Speaker 2: to the one that many of us will grow up with.
Speaker 1: Oh man, it's such a different approach than the Yale
Speaker 1: students that I work with, you know, And it sounds
Speaker 1: like one of the best ways to get there is
Speaker 1: to sort of not intervene, even in these domains where
Speaker 1: you think intervention is the best approach, and one of
Speaker 1: the ones that you talked about in your book, which
Speaker 1: I think you had a hard time with yourself, was
Speaker 1: not intervening when kids are fighting. Explain why that was
Speaker 1: so tricky for you and what you learned from Danish parents.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it starts really early on. So in this ugustoo,
Speaker 2: in this nursery room, the pedagogues, the early years educators
Speaker 2: have a policy of sitting on their hands.
Speaker 1: They would tell me.
Speaker 2: I thought they meant this sort of metaphorically, but no,
Speaker 2: they mean literally that if little Anton is starting a
Speaker 2: fight with little Spen, then you sit on your hands,
Speaker 2: so you're not intervening. You see if they can get
Speaker 2: themselves to the peace table by themselves. You know, I
Speaker 2: grew up an only child and went to an all girls' school.
Speaker 2: There was no rough and tumble, none of that sort
Speaker 2: of physical contact. I never had that at all until
Speaker 2: I became a parent. And then parenting toddlers is fifty
Speaker 2: percent running, fifty percent WW and you wrestling.
Speaker 1: So I've got all that then.
Speaker 2: But actually play fighting itccurs throughout the animal kingdom. So
Speaker 2: they've seen studies in rats that those deprived of the
Speaker 2: opportunity to play fight will end up not being able
Speaker 2: to read social cues properly. In later life they become
Speaker 2: a bit lary. They don't know when it's appropriate to
Speaker 2: escalate to aggression and when it isn't. So the approach
Speaker 2: for a lot of the Danish parents and experts I
Speaker 2: spoke to you was that it's better to let children
Speaker 2: find that physicality to grapple it out. Only intervene if
Speaker 2: you really have to. I with seriously talking cut lips
Speaker 2: and to see if they can get themselves to the
Speaker 2: peace table. And it was even my children's teachers telling
Speaker 2: me this, which is quite shocking as a parent and
Speaker 2: you're considering sending your child to this school and then
Speaker 2: the teacher is telling you that, well, they might have
Speaker 2: some bumps and bruises. I do see the point there,
Speaker 2: but I still find it quite hard.
Speaker 1: One.
Speaker 2: No one wants to watch their kid getting hurt.
Speaker 1: Talk about the Danish parents' relationship to allowing their kids
Speaker 1: to be outside.
Speaker 2: I mean the relationship is put them outside all time
Speaker 2: from a really early age. So the sleeping outside in
Speaker 2: your prams, for example, it can be up until it
Speaker 2: used to be minus fourteen, and now it's minus four
Speaker 2: Since what I did all my kids they've made it
Speaker 2: a little bit less freezing.
Speaker 1: But are you put your kids outside in negative for
Speaker 1: degree weather.
Speaker 2: To sleep during the day?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Wow, let me just check the temperature and yeah, so
Speaker 2: it's a I'm going celsius to fahrenheit. Yeah, so it
Speaker 2: used to be the advice was minus twenty degree celsius
Speaker 2: or minus four and now the advice is minus ten celsius.
Speaker 2: So that's fourteen degrees fahrenheit.
Speaker 1: I mean either way, like, that's cold, that's cold.
Speaker 2: Well, they're really used to. You get the gear, I
Speaker 2: mean it's an investment, but you get your child's a
Speaker 2: snowsuit and a balaklava. They call it an elephant hat,
Speaker 2: don't No one knows why, and mittens and layers and
Speaker 2: wool and you're getting this for your kid from the
Speaker 2: age of around six months onwards. But there is an
Speaker 2: understanding that as a parent, part of what you do
Speaker 2: is you equip your child with the necessary clothes to
Speaker 2: survive outside all year round. And so there's no question
Speaker 2: that you don't go outside when it's raining. You go
Speaker 2: outside every day. Otherwise you would never go outside at
Speaker 2: all if you waited for a sunny day. So there's
Speaker 2: no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothes,
Speaker 2: and all their peers do it as well, so it's
Speaker 2: normalized in a way that's very helpful. As a parent,
Speaker 2: you do it because that's what you do here.
Speaker 1: And what are some of the benefits of kind of
Speaker 1: getting outside so often even in the yucky weather.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, there's so many studies about how helpful
Speaker 2: it is for us psychologically, better for our mind, better
Speaker 2: for our bodies to get outside in nature. There was
Speaker 2: an amazing studies saying that the average British child spends
Speaker 2: less time outside than prisoners, and that's madness. So the
Speaker 2: idea of shoving children outside in all weather is really good.
Speaker 2: And the Viking approach is that that's what they had
Speaker 2: to do historically to survive, and so you keep doing it.
Speaker 2: In Sweden they even have sometimes classes about how to
Speaker 2: dig yourself out if you get into an ice hole.
Speaker 2: Toddlers in Norway will learn how to use a match
Speaker 2: and use a compass and read maps. These real sort
Speaker 2: of boy scout skills that they're learning really early, makes
Speaker 2: them feel more resilient, makes them feel quite strong. My
Speaker 2: kids certainly felt quite proud when they had been out
Speaker 2: all day in the snow, and they had mastered how
Speaker 2: to whittle sticks. They feel this sense of mastery over
Speaker 2: their body. It makes them feel more confident and they
Speaker 2: seem to thrive on it.
Speaker 1: As you talk more about kind of danger and whittling
Speaker 1: and all this stuff, I can assume that there might
Speaker 1: be some parents who are thinking, Oh, my gosh, are
Speaker 1: you just saying I should just like throw my kid
Speaker 1: into the woods with a knife and sort of see
Speaker 1: what happens. How would you respond to a critique like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, don't do that. It's age appropriate risk in a
Speaker 2: sort of environment where you know that it's safe and
Speaker 2: supported and parents know, we know what is best for
Speaker 2: our child. Caregiverers understand what the limits of that child is.
Speaker 2: So it's just baby steps to see what that child
Speaker 2: is ready for. I grew up with that sense of
Speaker 2: wanting to wrap my children in cottonwooll at all times.
Speaker 2: And I lost my sister when I was younger, so
Speaker 2: this idea of protecting a child. I had a lot
Speaker 2: of fertility treatment, took me a long time to become
Speaker 2: a parent, and when I finally had children, yeah, I
Speaker 2: didn't want any harm to come to them at all,
Speaker 2: But actually play researchers have looked at the link between
Speaker 2: being able to have this kind of risky play and
Speaker 2: resilience and the short term it can lead to injury.
Speaker 2: Within the long term it's going to help them. Children
Speaker 2: are natural risk seekers, that they have curiosity, and one
Speaker 2: psychologist told me that she saw in her experience that
Speaker 2: it was the children who didn't climb trees that had
Speaker 2: the fear of hypes. It's not the one who climb
Speaker 2: trees and fell. Also, she saw a lot in her
Speaker 2: practice that it was the children maybe who who denied
Speaker 2: these opportunities for age appropriate, relatively safe risky play in
Speaker 2: childhood will end up seeking out those thrills. There's risks
Speaker 2: in maybe adolescence at a time when it's much more precarious,
Speaker 2: the stakes are far higher. So I ended up sort
Speaker 2: of reasoning it was hard, it took me a while,
Speaker 2: but that it was better for to let my children
Speaker 2: run a bit wild and climb the trees and whittle
Speaker 2: at this age than to have them go off riding
Speaker 2: a car in an unsafe way in their teenage years.
Speaker 2: That it was better for them to get their thrills
Speaker 2: this way.
Speaker 1: But the idea is that probably those thrills and that
Speaker 1: risk taking is also normative for teenagers too. So any
Speaker 1: advice for parents with older kids who are maybe trying
Speaker 1: to embrace this idea In the book you mentioned this idea?
Speaker 1: Is it bool?
Speaker 2: A friend of mine who's also a Scout leader ended
Speaker 2: up saying this, my pronunciation is also terrible, but ball
Speaker 2: this idea of trouble or problems, like you seek out
Speaker 2: trouble not so much, but just a bit. There is
Speaker 2: a sense that you fail as caregivers if you don't
Speaker 2: deny your children opportunities for risky play, and many parents
Speaker 2: would suddenly instead just doing maybe a risk assessment of
Speaker 2: a future scenario, they do a risk benefit assessment and think, well,
Speaker 2: hang on, here's what they could learn. It's a bit
Speaker 2: like that, what if I fall, but what if I fly?
Speaker 2: What are the things that they could learn from this experience?
Speaker 2: How is it expansive? So trying to bear that in mind,
Speaker 2: but it's not easy. And certainly if you parent this
Speaker 2: way from the beginning, you have a bit of an
Speaker 2: advantage because actually teenagers don't have that much to rebel
Speaker 2: against in Denmark because they've had a pretty free life
Speaker 2: until then. Egalitarian society no hierarchy, so there's not much
Speaker 2: to kick back against, to push against. Danish teenagers tend
Speaker 2: to get along better with their parents than teenagers. Typically
Speaker 2: the cliches go elsewhere, But I think there is still
Speaker 2: some opportunity. I would hope, and I'm not there yet
Speaker 2: with my own kids, but to give them that freedom,
Speaker 2: and as you say, it's that natural thing to want
Speaker 2: to separate yourself from your parents and see if they
Speaker 2: feel that they have that autonomy to be able to
Speaker 2: take that next step.
Speaker 1: So do sum up what we've worn so far. Beer
Speaker 1: bacon and Danish pastries may be delicious, but there's more
Speaker 1: to the American Danish well being gap than access to
Speaker 1: Nordic fresh means. If we want children to become happier, healthier,
Speaker 1: and more independent, we need to build a society based
Speaker 1: on trust, one in which people take a more relaxed
Speaker 1: approach to low stakes risks when the happiness labor turns.
Speaker 1: From the break, we'll take into a few other things
Speaker 1: we can learn from modern day vikings. We'll see why
Speaker 1: playtime matters both for kids and adults, and why Danish
Speaker 1: parents don't hang children's artwork on their refrigerators. The Happiness
Speaker 1: Lab will be right back. If you're a fan of
Speaker 1: the show. You and I often talk about the painful
Speaker 1: phenomenon of time famine, that sense of overwhelm we feel
Speaker 1: when our days are filled to the brim with obligations,
Speaker 1: leaving little room to relax or even breathe. But studies
Speaker 1: show that these days it's not just adults who suffer
Speaker 1: from time famine. Our kids also have packed schedules filled
Speaker 1: with school obligations, homework, structured activities, lessons, sports, dates, and
Speaker 1: on and on. Most parents want what's best for their
Speaker 1: life children, but are super packed schedules the right approach.
Speaker 1: Danish parenting expert Helen Russell thinks parents and kids might
Speaker 1: be missing out on something even more important. Time for
Speaker 1: a play.
Speaker 2: Play is so big in the Nordic countries that they
Speaker 2: named it twice. It's the New York of the Nordics.
Speaker 2: So there's a verb form of play which is liar
Speaker 2: with sort of unstructured, intrinsically motivated play. And then there's
Speaker 2: also spiela in Danish for when you're playing maybe sports
Speaker 2: or a board game or music. And it's really important
Speaker 2: for Danish parents that to have all of these types
Speaker 2: of play covered, and there's a sense that if you're
Speaker 2: not playing, then something's wrong, and that if children aren't
Speaker 2: allowed to play, then there's almost a deficit that builds up,
Speaker 2: and that they need to be able to just get
Speaker 2: out there and express themselves in that way, and they
Speaker 2: believe that it helps with collaboration and teamwork and communication,
Speaker 2: and play is kind of all Nordic children do. It's
Speaker 2: all Vikings do until they turn six when they start
Speaker 2: school in Denmark. They start till their seven in Finland,
Speaker 2: so it's everything. There is a sense that that's how
Speaker 2: you learn, and these are the skills that you developed first,
Speaker 2: nothing to do with book learning until much much later.
Speaker 2: And actually I spoke to researchers at Cambridge who were
Speaker 2: saying that children who learn via play rather than via
Speaker 2: the old school book method tend to be happier and
Speaker 2: more calm and better at collaborating too. So there's a
Speaker 2: lot of play research out there. I think as a parent.
Speaker 2: I tried to read it all, found it all quite
Speaker 2: hard going, but I kind of broke it down to
Speaker 2: this four approaches to play that are things that I
Speaker 2: think about in terms of like decorating a cake. So
Speaker 2: there's the getting the decorations of the cake, so getting
Speaker 2: it out and saying do what you like. They're sort
Speaker 2: of guided, so saying well can you make your cake
Speaker 2: look like an otter whatever? Or the gamification so who
Speaker 2: can do it the fastest. And then there's this step
Speaker 2: by step instruction of sitting down with them best attempted
Speaker 2: after a really good night to sleep. But by Danish
Speaker 2: parent friends were making time to do all of these
Speaker 2: in a way that I found quite overwhelming and stressful,
Speaker 2: almost as a parent, because I'm not used to that.
Speaker 2: My own experience of childhood was very much get on
Speaker 2: with the books, get on early, and this idea that
Speaker 2: we should all just be having fun and playing was
Speaker 2: quite alien. And even in the Nordic country's parents still
Speaker 2: feel quite time stretched. Eighty percent of mothers work, both
Speaker 2: parents tend to be working. But play is so important
Speaker 2: that people are prioritizing it. They are putting aside time
Speaker 2: and they're thinking, I'm going to be doing this playing,
Speaker 2: and yeah, all the research there is seem to say
Speaker 2: that's a really good thing, and that children playing with
Speaker 2: their parents as well as their peers is very good
Speaker 2: for bonding. So I found that quite hard, but it's
Speaker 2: something that I try to do.
Speaker 1: I think one of the things that comes up in
Speaker 1: the US and the UK is that, you know, it's
Speaker 1: not like parents are down on play. It's just like
Speaker 1: there's this different pressure that takes precedence, which is this
Speaker 1: pressure to succeed, especially academically. What's the kind of right
Speaker 1: way to balance that if you're thinking about happiness from
Speaker 1: a Danish perspective.
Speaker 2: So Danish parent, friends and caregivers and the teachers would
Speaker 2: say that the play will give them a lot of
Speaker 2: what they need, which I think that's the shift from
Speaker 2: the approach maybe in the US and the UK certainly,
Speaker 2: so that that way they'll be happier and that actually
Speaker 2: you can make a lot of things into play. What
Speaker 2: the Nordic countries have is the idea that the goal
Speaker 2: sort of is happiness and a good life, and not
Speaker 2: happiness in that sort of jazz hands Richts grinway, but
Speaker 2: a deep contentment and a really balanced life where you
Speaker 2: have time for family, time for friends, time for your
Speaker 2: hobbies and a job. So the academic part that would,
Speaker 2: I guess later become the job part. The career success.
Speaker 2: That's only a small slice of the pie in the Nordics,
Speaker 2: that's not everything. So by that metric, it means that
Speaker 2: it's never going to be as much pressure, and that
Speaker 2: filters out of children because they see their parents. I mean,
Speaker 2: of course they're still workplace stress for parents and even
Speaker 2: high levels of antipressant use in Denmark, but that's because
Speaker 2: there is this sense that you're supposed to enjoy life,
Speaker 2: you're supposed to be having a nice time, and if
Speaker 2: you're not, you do something about it. So I think
Speaker 2: for children, they will go to clubs and activities, they
Speaker 2: will do sports, they will do hobbies and things, and
Speaker 2: there's a big volunteer culture, so that these clubs and
Speaker 2: associations that kids go to tend to be run by parents.
Speaker 2: It's for free giving up their time, and a parent
Speaker 2: will typically think, if I want my kid to be
Speaker 2: able to go to this club, I will have to volunteer.
Speaker 2: So throughout my friends, for example, one dad was a
Speaker 2: basketball coach, one taught football, one was a swimming teacher.
Speaker 2: So again children then see their parents modeling that behavior
Speaker 2: and think, oh, that's what you do.
Speaker 1: I guess.
Speaker 2: I guess one part of the pie is you have
Speaker 2: a job and then you have your family, and then
Speaker 2: you do something for the community, and it's just a
Speaker 2: much more balanced life than I think the culture that
Speaker 2: many of us will have grown up.
Speaker 1: In, which is really important because it suggests parents are
Speaker 1: doing something different too. They are also prioritizing their own fun,
Speaker 1: which is something I think definitely in the US, a
Speaker 1: lot of parents say they're really struggling.
Speaker 2: When there's a bit of putting your own oxygen mask
Speaker 2: on first, I think in the Nordic countries because again,
Speaker 2: at this egalitarian society, there's no but being a martyr,
Speaker 2: and I grew up Irish Catholics, so I'm on that bit.
Speaker 2: But that's not going to make you happy, it's not
Speaker 2: going to help your child. So of course it's a
Speaker 2: luxury and a privilege to be able to have free
Speaker 2: time and to have any time outside of the work
Speaker 2: that pays the bills. But if you are fortunate enough
Speaker 2: to have that, then there's no point busting. The tax
Speaker 2: situation in the Nordic countries is high, and so if
Speaker 2: you work harder to get a promotion, to get a
Speaker 2: pay rise, you're going to be ending up giving quite
Speaker 2: a lot of that away in tax anyway, so there's
Speaker 2: less of an incentive I guess financially to be doing that.
Speaker 2: But people are still ambitious. People still earn good money,
Speaker 2: they have nice cars, they have nice jobs. But that's
Speaker 2: not the be all and end all. You're not judged
Speaker 2: by that. So I guess children see that as well.
Speaker 2: Their goal is not to have the flash's car. Your
Speaker 2: goal is to have spare time. That's the price. It's time,
Speaker 2: not money, And so I think children see that as well,
Speaker 2: and it makes people more relaxed.
Speaker 1: I guess, And that relationship to time I think changes
Speaker 1: the way parents are spending time with kids a lot.
Speaker 1: One of the things I was surprised by in your
Speaker 1: book is all the kind of tiny moments where you
Speaker 1: and your kids weren't necessarily doing kid activities specifically, but
Speaker 1: you had the kids participating in whatever activities you were doing,
Speaker 1: kind of getting the kids to do adult things early on.
Speaker 1: What are some of the consequences of that for parent happiness? Oh?
Speaker 2: Interesting, There is a sense that with a shorter working
Speaker 2: week than elsewhere, the idea of having a home cooked
Speaker 2: family dinner, for example, is a norm in the Nordic countries,
Speaker 2: and it will be a child's job to lay the
Speaker 2: table a child's job to light the candles, candles for
Speaker 2: all meal times, even breakfast, to get that Hugo vibe.
Speaker 2: A child will help with tiding up, and then you
Speaker 2: do your clubs and activities after, so.
Speaker 1: It kind of seems like kids are even more members
Speaker 1: of the team.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Some American parents complain about feeling like they're kind of
Speaker 1: like high end concierge for their kids, where they're driving
Speaker 1: them around and making sure everything's perfect for them, you know,
Speaker 1: even being their alarm clock in some situations. Or it
Speaker 1: sounds like in Denmark there's like just an expectation that
Speaker 1: kids are going to do more and that helps the
Speaker 1: parents not feel so overwhelmed.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think the team point is a really good one.
Speaker 2: There's definitely a sense that we are in this family team.
Speaker 2: I mean, the whole of Danish society is about teamwork,
Speaker 2: so yeah, of course, why wouldn't your family be a team.
Speaker 2: There's not a hierarchy. A lot of my Danish friends
Speaker 2: would say I had no clue when I was growing
Speaker 2: up that my vote on like what color we painted
Speaker 2: the kitchen was no less worthy than my parents, and
Speaker 2: just had no concept that they were lesser just because
Speaker 2: they were children. But yeah, this emphasis on autonomy again.
Speaker 2: There's a great late Danish psychologist called yes but Yule
Speaker 2: who wrote a very seminal parenting book. He famously said
Speaker 2: all children from the age of around five should be
Speaker 2: able to wake themselves up with an alarm clock.
Speaker 1: Wait. Wait, I just want to point out that you
Speaker 1: said five, because I have Yale students whose parents still
Speaker 1: call them and are their alarms especially during the like
Speaker 1: you know, midterm season and so on, like, So five,
Speaker 1: not twenty five, five repeat five. Just want to make sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And he even gives parents a script of what
Speaker 2: to say if they're not sure. My eldest, fiery redhead,
Speaker 2: I didn't know quite how this was going to go down.
Speaker 2: And I've got three children, and I have a job,
Speaker 2: and I'm busy, And so he said, you say to
Speaker 2: the child, listen. When you were really little, I thought
Speaker 2: it was quite cute to wake you up every day,
Speaker 2: but now I find it kind of a pain. And
Speaker 2: so this is the alarm clock. You're going to wake
Speaker 2: yourself up. That's how it is now. And I was
Speaker 2: expecting some pushback, but my son just went, I got
Speaker 2: my own alarm clock. Cool, it was done, and so
Speaker 2: all of my children have their own alarm clocks. They
Speaker 2: get themselves up. There is also a sense of for example,
Speaker 2: if a parent needed to talk on the phone, or
Speaker 2: even if they just wanted to again, not that martyr thing.
Speaker 2: Maybe you just want to chat with your friend. You
Speaker 2: say I can't talk right now because I'm talking to
Speaker 2: my friend, and no explanation. Again, it's the equality piece,
Speaker 2: so you don't have to be trying to raise the
Speaker 2: ego of a child. You just say it how it is.
Speaker 2: I think there's quite a reputation for straight talking, which
Speaker 2: as of people pleasing brit I was not used to
Speaker 2: it at all, But there is a bluntness and you
Speaker 2: say what you mean, and you mean what you say,
Speaker 2: and everyone knows where they stand. And I came to
Speaker 2: really appreciate that.
Speaker 1: I think after a while this was a part of
Speaker 1: your book that seems so different from American parenting. We
Speaker 1: just recently had a big report by our Surgeon General
Speaker 1: at the time, vi Vic Murphy, who talked about one
Speaker 1: of the mean things parents are experiencing these days is guilt,
Speaker 1: just this negative emotion of not doing enough stuff. And
Speaker 1: I love your example because you're just telling your kid look,
Speaker 1: it's just not fun for me anymore to wake you up,
Speaker 1: or I need to talk on the phone with my
Speaker 1: friend and just kind of deal with it. But it
Speaker 1: seems like Danish parents are able to do that without guilt.
Speaker 1: How does that work?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's not perfect, and there will of
Speaker 2: course be examples of parents who do feel guilty about stuff.
Speaker 2: But I think if you take this basic idea that
Speaker 2: respect is a given, that everyone is worthy just because
Speaker 2: they exist, you don't have to prove yourself you are
Speaker 2: enough just because you exist, which is mind blowing for
Speaker 2: people of my generation. But I think if you're taking
Speaker 2: that as your baseline, then why should anyone feel guilty?
Speaker 2: I think this idea where you don't have to overpraise
Speaker 2: your child to try and make them feel good. What
Speaker 2: I see with parent friends from other countries is if
Speaker 2: a parent is feeling a little guilty, there will be
Speaker 2: a tendency perhaps to overcompensate. Maybe that's with gifts, maybe
Speaker 2: that's with food, maybe that's with saying, oh, that's the
Speaker 2: best picture I've ever seen, well done. And the Danish
Speaker 2: ways not to do that so much. Firstly, as a
Speaker 2: Danish child, you wouldn't know if your parents thought something
Speaker 2: you'd done necessarily was good or not. But also it
Speaker 2: wouldn't matter because you would know you were loved anyway,
Speaker 2: just because. And secondly, the idea is that if a
Speaker 2: child is constantly being praised and over praised from an
Speaker 2: external person, they will spend their whole life seeking external validation,
Speaker 2: which I think many of us will find familiar. So
Speaker 2: actually it's much better for a child to develop their
Speaker 2: own internal idea of I think this is good or no,
Speaker 2: I think I can do something a bit different next time,
Speaker 2: and they have that internal compass that again helps with autonomy,
Speaker 2: feeling stronger, feeling more sort of in control of the world.
Speaker 2: The world is a big scary place, but do you
Speaker 2: feel more in control if you think, no, I know
Speaker 2: that's the right thing to do. And so instead of
Speaker 2: looking for external validation, they just center themselves and they
Speaker 2: get to know themselves a little bit. And yeah, it
Speaker 2: means that not every picture needs to go up on
Speaker 2: the refrigerator, and that you're not constantly telling your child
Speaker 2: that they're the best everthing, because they won't be.
Speaker 1: They're not. So to recap if we want to raise
Speaker 1: happier kids, we might need to broaden our definition of success.
Speaker 1: We might need to take play more seriously, and we
Speaker 1: might need to relax a bit when it comes to
Speaker 1: the academic stuff. But if you're a parent, you're probably
Speaker 1: thinking while all that's easier said than done. So after
Speaker 1: the break we'll dive into Helen's actionable tips for how
Speaker 1: caretakers can set the kinds of healthier boundaries that lead
Speaker 1: to a less stressful life, not just for kids, but
Speaker 1: for parents too. The Happiness Lab will be back in
Speaker 1: a moment. I often hear from parents who tell me
Speaker 1: that they just don't have the same sense of self
Speaker 1: now as they did before having kids. They love their children,
Speaker 1: but they worry that they've lost their own preferences and
Speaker 1: identity somewhere on the path to becoming mom or dad.
Speaker 1: Author Helen Russell says this is another spot where Nordic
Speaker 1: families seem to be navigating things a little bit better.
Speaker 1: Danish parents don't have as much trouble expressing their preferences
Speaker 1: as US parents do, For instance, take bedtime.
Speaker 2: So this is another really good example in that parenting
Speaker 2: books i'd read from the UK and the US all
Speaker 2: SAIDs things that there were basically along the lines of
Speaker 2: a little bit kind of tricking your kid into going
Speaker 2: to bed and just going, oh, look at the time,
Speaker 2: now you're going to be tired tomorrow, and sort of
Speaker 2: telling your child how they feel, which isn't the naudic approach.
Speaker 2: Instead the culture there is much more saying but you
Speaker 2: know what, I as a parent, I'm kind of tired now,
Speaker 2: I'm kind of done. So if you could go to bed,
Speaker 2: that would be great because I'm not doing any more
Speaker 2: parenting now. So good night, I love you, I'll see
Speaker 2: you in the morning with her alarm and that's it.
Speaker 2: But again it's that trusting that the child will get
Speaker 2: to know themselves. So the idea is that a child
Speaker 2: should be able to have autonomy over when they are tired.
Speaker 2: So you're not telling a child that they're sleepy. They
Speaker 2: may not be sleepy. They can sit in bed if
Speaker 2: they like, they're nothing exciting in there. They can read
Speaker 2: a book if they really want to, but they are
Speaker 2: just in bed now because it's parent time. And again,
Speaker 2: around food, it's more that a child should be able
Speaker 2: to tell if they are hungry or not. So you
Speaker 2: don't say to a child you have to finish your
Speaker 2: plate or no pudding Instead, you trust that a child
Speaker 2: may have an idiosyncretic biological clock, they may not be
Speaker 2: hungry and we are, and that they should be in
Speaker 2: control of things like whether they're tired or hungry, or
Speaker 2: whether they're too warm or too cold. You trust that
Speaker 2: the child will know that, which I found again quite
Speaker 2: challenging as an outsider, because I grew up with the
Speaker 2: generation that you finish your plate, and then lots of
Speaker 2: my peers had eating disorders in their teens and twenties
Speaker 2: and just not trusting our own appetites for anything. I
Speaker 2: do feel it's quite problematic, and so I found it
Speaker 2: very difficult, but it was something I knew. I definitely
Speaker 2: wanted to try to put in place for my children
Speaker 2: so that they again got this sense of themselves that
Speaker 2: wasn't from external voices.
Speaker 1: It strikes me up at this in some ways as
Speaker 1: easier for comparance. Obviously, it's harder because you want to
Speaker 1: help your kids and make sure they're you're eating rye
Speaker 1: and going to sleep on time and so on. But
Speaker 1: if you give your kids that responsibility, it must be
Speaker 1: that parents wind up feeling less overwhelmed because there's kind
Speaker 1: of less stuff that you have to do if you're
Speaker 1: worrying about their senses and their feelings and their needs
Speaker 1: all the time. Like if you offload that so that
Speaker 1: they do it themselves, not only do they learn how
Speaker 1: to do it, but it's kind of less overwhelmed and
Speaker 1: less work for you as a parent too. I think so.
Speaker 2: And some people have kids who are just a great
Speaker 2: sleepers or great eaters, and that's brilliant for them. I
Speaker 2: have three very different children. I have experienced many different approaches,
Speaker 2: but actually the only thing I have control over is myself.
Speaker 2: So if I say I'm tired, and that's true, I
Speaker 2: am exhausted by about ten PM. So if I say
Speaker 2: I'm tired now, so I need you to go to bed,
Speaker 2: I'll see you in the morning and I love you,
Speaker 2: then again that feels like I'm modeling because I'm saying, well,
Speaker 2: I have needs, these are my needs. I need to
Speaker 2: be done with parenting now for the day to be fresh,
Speaker 2: to be ready for the next day. And gives a
Speaker 2: bit of a life back to parents, which I think
Speaker 2: so many parenting manuals or advice columns or gurus out there.
Speaker 2: As you say, there's a lot of pressure and it
Speaker 2: you can feel very guilty, and you can feel like
Speaker 2: you're not doing the right thing, and it's never enough.
Speaker 2: And this Nordic approach just seemed kind of easy. You
Speaker 2: can kind of let your shoulders drop and you can
Speaker 2: exhale finally, and you get a bit of your life back.
Speaker 2: And if the studies are to be believed, your children
Speaker 2: are happier, healthier, and more resilient. And I certainly see
Speaker 2: with my own children and the children and my friends
Speaker 2: and throughout the Nordic countries, all of the young people
Speaker 2: I spoke to, that there is something in it. It
Speaker 2: makes sense that they have this autonomy, this sense of
Speaker 2: self worth.
Speaker 1: It also seems like Danish parents are just kind of
Speaker 1: chiller generally, like they just kind of don't get as
Speaker 1: upset about their kids resistant behavior and so on. Was
Speaker 1: that something you observed and was that something you were
Speaker 1: able to model yourself?
Speaker 2: Yes, you know, we all had this idea. Well, I
Speaker 2: certainly did a vikings of these big, strong, marauding group
Speaker 2: of people, but actually moder day vikings, it turns out,
Speaker 2: barely raise their voices at all. I was really surprised,
Speaker 2: and coming from a different parenting culture, I am used
Speaker 2: to perhaps hearing in supermarkets, you know, a parent telling
Speaker 2: their child off. I rarely hear parents raise their voices
Speaker 2: in the Nordic countries. In Sweden especially, there's this very soft,
Speaker 2: sort of soothing voice. And one of the parents I
Speaker 2: spoke to you there, said yeah, I couldn't believe it.
Speaker 2: She's British and she lives in Sweden and she was saying,
Speaker 2: my neighbor's kid lock themselves in the shed and said,
Speaker 2: you weren't going to school. And I said, did you
Speaker 2: lose your mind?
Speaker 1: She said no.
Speaker 2: I said, well, we'll try again tomorrow. I'm not sure
Speaker 2: I would have that patience, but there seem to be
Speaker 2: reserves of patients, and I'm thinking it's something to do
Speaker 2: with being raised that way themselves, that they know what works.
Speaker 2: As you say, it's kind of giving more time and
Speaker 2: headspace back to the parents. So they just are a
Speaker 2: little calmer. They're a bit better able to cope with
Speaker 2: the challenges that parenting can throw at any of us. So, yes,
Speaker 2: it is very calm. There is a sense that if
Speaker 2: you raise your voice, you've lost it, You've lost that battle,
Speaker 2: and again you're modeling to your child, and brains can
Speaker 2: show that if you raise your voice at a child.
Speaker 2: If you're shouting at a child, they can go into
Speaker 2: that defensive mode where they're not actually hearing what you
Speaker 2: say say or taking in anyway, which I thought sounded
Speaker 2: very convenient when I first heard it. Better, you know,
Speaker 2: I've seen the brain scans, I've seen the science, and
Speaker 2: now I'm thinking, oh, yes, okay, that's true, and I'm
Speaker 2: still not immune to doing that, but I know that
Speaker 2: I've lost when that happens, and I know that if
Speaker 2: I really want to get through, I have to channel
Speaker 2: my inner Nordic parent and try and remain, can't.
Speaker 1: I think another thing is different from America, I mean
Speaker 1: the UK parents is that even in that shed situation
Speaker 1: you talked about, like if you don't get the kid
Speaker 1: to school, and sometimes it's like, oh my gosh, the
Speaker 1: kid's not going to go to school and they won't
Speaker 1: get the right grades and they'll never get into college.
Speaker 1: There's this real fear of failure I think in US parenting,
Speaker 1: but in Danish parenting system it seems like failure is
Speaker 1: kind of okay, it's sort of just like this, oh well,
Speaker 1: there's even a word for it too that I think
Speaker 1: you really embraced, right. I think it's actually behind you
Speaker 1: right now, the pit the pyt Oh, yeah, do you
Speaker 1: know what's it?
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is this idea where it means sort of
Speaker 2: like it doesn't matter, it's fine. So yeah, along with
Speaker 2: the trouble and the tillid this is the great word.
Speaker 2: So you just think, oh, just let it go, it's fine.
Speaker 2: And as a naturally repressed British woman, I have to
Speaker 2: just remind myself of this at all times. But yeah,
Speaker 2: I think that feeds into the parenting. As you say,
Speaker 2: is this idea of it's not the end of the world.
Speaker 2: And we know enough of studies now to know that
Speaker 2: failure is important for growth and that it happens, you
Speaker 2: can't avoid it, So why not just let it happen
Speaker 2: when it happens, and hope that it happens in fairly
Speaker 2: low stakes ways so that it doesn't happen in the
Speaker 2: big stakes way later on. And I think again, it's
Speaker 2: this idea where we're all worthy just because, and there's
Speaker 2: an emotional safety net at all times, so that if
Speaker 2: something goes wrong, you are still loved and held and
Speaker 2: you will be helped back up to hopefully learn from it.
Speaker 2: Next time.
Speaker 1: So one of the reasons I was especially excited to
Speaker 1: talk to you now is that I know you've recently
Speaker 1: left the Viking world and moved back to the UK.
Speaker 1: So having kind of been a Danish parent for a decade,
Speaker 1: now you're back to being the UK parent, and so
Speaker 1: I'm curious how you keep these Danish norms in a
Speaker 1: situation where many parents aren't following them. How do you
Speaker 1: follow the Danish ways even if you're maybe not living
Speaker 1: in Denmark at the time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been interesting and it has sort of put
Speaker 2: it to test because when I wrote the book, I
Speaker 2: didn't know that i'd be moving back. And as you say,
Speaker 2: it's much easier to put all these things into practice
Speaker 2: when you're in the Nordic countries, and when you're out
Speaker 2: of them, that's when they're really put to the test.
Speaker 2: But I've been going back to it, following my own
Speaker 2: advice or following the advice of these Nordic parenting experts
Speaker 2: and parent friends. And of course it's a different school system.
Speaker 2: They've never done exams for, they've never done homework before,
Speaker 2: but hoping that they understand that. Of course, I want
Speaker 2: you to learn and I want you to try your best,
Speaker 2: but it's not the end of the world. They still
Speaker 2: have their alarm clocks. I still tell them when I'm
Speaker 2: done for the day, you need to be in your
Speaker 2: rooms now. And I try and make sure with all
Speaker 2: of the activities and the business and the schedules that
Speaker 2: we all have these days, that there is time for
Speaker 2: them to just be and be really bored. Boredom's the
Speaker 2: best thing, you know. I wouldn't have been a writer
Speaker 2: if I hadn't had the opportunity to be bored as
Speaker 2: a child, and I think that's something we often lose
Speaker 2: a lot in modern lives. Also, I have one daughter.
Speaker 2: It was really important to me that she was allowed
Speaker 2: to still do all of the kind of marauding Viking stuff.
Speaker 2: So I want all of my children to still be
Speaker 2: able to take risks and to be active and to
Speaker 2: be outdoors. It was really important to me that nobody
Speaker 2: ever told my daughter that she can't climb a tree,
Speaker 2: and I'm very happy to say that in a month and
Speaker 2: a half in she is higher up the trees than
Speaker 2: she's ever been. I do get some strange looks from
Speaker 2: other parents. Someone asked me the other day, my kids
Speaker 2: were all outside and she said, you do know it's raining, right, Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, Yeah, that's fine. So just trying to, I guess,
Speaker 2: give them that autonomy. So I have given them all
Speaker 2: jobs and they have things that they have to do
Speaker 2: with the running of the household. I've got my hammer out.
Speaker 2: I've put up a lot of shells at kid height
Speaker 2: so they can reach everything.
Speaker 1: They can do everything.
Speaker 2: There's a cupboard where there are any time snacks that
Speaker 2: they're allowed any time, so I don't have to be
Speaker 2: the one providing snacks for them or their friends. And yes,
Speaker 2: someone also asked me the other day, like, you don't
Speaker 2: have any of your kids' pictures on the fridge. No
Speaker 2: kids pictured it on the refrigerator. So yeah, I'm trying
Speaker 2: to put it into practice in the non Nordic world now.
Speaker 1: And so you get pushed back from other parents. This
Speaker 1: is something a lot of American parents report feeling the
Speaker 1: most guilty about, is when they get the kind of
Speaker 1: side eye from another mom being like, oh, you're doing that.
Speaker 1: How do you steal yourself against that? How do you
Speaker 1: decide like, well, I'm proud of what I'm doing.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, I'm a massive geek, so I defer
Speaker 2: to people like you. I'll defer to all the science
Speaker 2: and say, well, actually, OECD studies, so raising children in
Speaker 2: the Nordic mode helps them to be happier and healthier,
Speaker 2: more resilient. And there's so much now that we know
Speaker 2: about things like work life balance, things like school, things
Speaker 2: like autonomy and risky play that I just tend to
Speaker 2: be a massive geek and reel off the science. So
Speaker 2: in the back of this book, I've written all the
Speaker 2: studies just flick it in their paces that's flicking in
Speaker 2: the other parent places, and we'll start a Viking revolution.
Speaker 1: I love Helen's idea of starting a Viking parent revolution,
Speaker 1: and just to recap Helen's ideas for how to do that. First,
Speaker 1: remember that taking time for what you need as a
Speaker 1: parent isn't selfish, it's modeling self care. When you trust
Speaker 1: yourself in your needs, your children will learn to trust
Speaker 1: theirs too. Second, embraced quiet, boredom and failure. If your
Speaker 1: kid locks themselves into proverbial shed one day, know that
Speaker 1: even though it feels like the end of the world,
Speaker 1: the sun will rise again. And finally, don't let other
Speaker 1: parents side eyes keep you from embracing your inner Viking.
Speaker 1: In the next episode, we'll tackle the question of how
Speaker 1: we can set healthier boundaries, both in our parenting and beyond.
Speaker 1: We'll chat with clinical psychologist and parenting expert doctor Becky
Speaker 1: Kennedy will share her expert tips for expressing boundaries and
Speaker 1: firm but compassionate ways.
Speaker 3: We have some unconscious belief that, like I'm going to
Speaker 3: set some really good boundary for my kid, my kid's
Speaker 3: gonna be like that is amazing parenting mom. Thank you,
Speaker 3: I do need to go to bed. Thank you for
Speaker 3: turning off the TV. Never no child in my house
Speaker 3: or any child I know with normal has ever said
Speaker 3: that all that.
Speaker 1: Next time on the Happiness Lab with me Doctor Laurie
Speaker 1: Santo's