With the beginning of the school year, I’m feeling mixed emotions: sadness that summer is over, relief for the return of routine, excitement for the ways in which my kids will grow and learn – and cautiousness about the intense messages about achievement and success that my teens, who attend high-achieving schools, will inevitably face.
They won’t be alone. Researchers have estimated that 1 in 3 American adolescents – 14 million kids – feel an “excessive pressure to achieve.” These students are now officially an “at risk” group, meaning they are 2-6xs more likely to suffer from clinical levels of anxiety and depression and 2-3xs more likely to suffer from substance abuse disorder than the average American teen. That’s the bad news.
We can teach them how to be healthy strivers
The good news is that we can push back against the toxic achievement pressure our kids face and teach them how to be healthy strivers. What I have found in my reporting for my book Never Enough is that there are actions we can take now in our homes, in our classrooms, and on the athletic field to buffer against the increasing anxiety, depression, and loneliness too many of our young people are feeling.
For my book, I went in search of the kids who were doing well despite the pressure. I wanted to know what, if anything, they had in common: What was home life like for them? What did their parents focus on? What was school like and their relationship with their peers? What did they see as their role in their larger community? It boiled down to this: the kids who were doing well felt like they mattered to their parents – they felt valued for who they were deep inside, away from the trophies, GPAs and acceptance rates.
Pressure, anxiety, depression, and loneliness in our kids is an unmet need to feel valued unconditionally
When we talk about pressure, anxiety, depression, and loneliness in our kids, what we are really talking about is an unmet need to feel valued unconditionally for who we are deep at our core. Our kids are bombarded with messages that they are valued for what they achieve, not who they are. So, the parents of the healthy strivers made a conscious effort to make home a haven from the pressure, a place where their kids could recover, a place where they never have to prove their worth.
To be clear, feeling like we matter is not separate from performance. These parents still had expectations, they still wanted their kids to reach their potential but they communicated these messages in a way that preserved their child’s sense of self-worth and mattering. When we matter unconditionally, we are more likely to show up at home and school in positive and healthy ways with a kind of healthy fuel that motivates us to reach higher, to go further, and to bounce back from setbacks.
Here are ways to make home a haven from the pressure and to encourage wise striving in our kids
1. Delight in them
As parents, we can be under so much pressure to get through our endless to-do list that we don’t take time to show our kids how much we love them. When they walk in the door, greet them at least once a day with the same unabashed joy the family dog would.
2. Strive to be a good enough parent
Kids don’t need perfect role models. What they need is someone who loves them and teaches them what it means to be an imperfect but loveable human. To teach our kids how to love themselves unconditionally, they need adults in their lives modeling self-acceptance, flaws and all.
3. Be a balance keeper
Kids need to learn self-care skills. The nonprofit Challenge Success suggests the mnemonic “PDF” to remember that our kids need playtime (in order kids, recharging time), downtime and family time every day.
4. Get curious, not furious
Be mindful about how we express disappointment about their performance –whether it’s academic or athletic – by focusing on the deed, not the doer. All kids want to do well, so if they’re not doing well, dig deep to find out why. Support them by teaching them how work gets done instead of focusing on shiny outcomes.
5. Finally, lead with lunch
Instead of asking them how they did on the Spanish test, ask them a more innocuous question, like what they had for lunch. It takes the pressure off and signals you are interested in them for reasons unrelated to their performance.
When we make home a haven from the pressure all around them, we give our kids a sturdy foundation that supports them as they reach for their goals and a soft place for them to land and recover. When we are clear in our words and actions that we love them unconditionally, our children internalize the idea that they aren’t their mistakes, that their worth is constant, never wavering – and that they matter to us no matter what.
More Great Reading
Never Enough: What Parents Can Do to Push Back on Achievement Pressure
