Today on the podcast, I’m joined by Jill and Mary, founders of Girls Mentorship. We’re diving into what teen and tween girls need and what they’re going through at this stage of life. 

You’ll Learn:

• What makes teen & tween girls so awesome!
• Benefits and pitfalls of greater emotional awareness in this generation of kids
• How small shifts can make a big difference in identity and self-esteem
• 5 ways to support the tween or teen girls in your life

Listen in for tools to start helping your teen or tween daughter with her confidence, self-esteem, and emotional health.

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Today on the podcast, I’m joined by Jill and Mary, founders of Girls Mentorship. We had so much to talk about, we had to make it two episodes so you could get ALL the goodness out of our conversation. In this episode, we’re diving into what teen and tween girls need and what they’re going through at this stage of life. Next week, you’ll learn what you, as a parent, can do to support them.

Jill and Mary are the founders of Girls Mentorship. They say, “Everywhere we looked, we saw girls struggling—grappling with confidence issues, battling negative self-talk, wrestling with poor self-image, and navigating the tricky waters of anxiety and depression. It hit close to home. Hadn’t we been in those exact same shoes 20 years ago?” 

Girls were STILL missing the vital tools to rise about these challenges. So Jill and Mary decided to become the guides they wished they’d had - offering young girls the skills and support to build confidence, resilience, and self-worth. They now teach life and personal development skills to tween and teen girls so that they can become the brightest, most authentic versions of themselves.

Life As A Tween Girl

With all the conversation about kids and anxiety and how much girls are struggling, it’s easy to forget about the beauty of this age. 

Mary shares that girls this age speak their mind. They’re curious. They make you question things, and you get to learn from their questions, too. They’re experiencing all the firsts, and it’s really fun to walk that path with them and see their eyes get really big when they understand a concept for the first time or realize that they're not alone in what they're struggling with.

Jill says they’re also hilarious, creative, and talented. They have access to so much information that if they’re curious about something, they will just go and seek it out. 

And with a lot more awareness of mental health in today’s culture, these girls are genuinely curious about it. When they experience anxiety or other feelings, they now have words to articulate and express themselves, which leads to really rich conversations. 

Mary says that when you’re talking about girls ages 10 through the teen years, the distinction between tween and teen isn’t all that big. She says, “the conversation doesn't really change much, neither does what the girls in particular are struggling with.” The differences come up in their maturity level, experiences, and what topics they’ve been exposed to. 

Challenges for Parents

No matter how old your kids are, you know that each stage comes with it’s own unique challenges. Two that we see come up most often are generational differences in the ways we talk about and deal with emotions and how the way we define success for ourselves can trickle down to our kids…whether we want it to or not.

Expressing Emotion - The Generation Gap

We all agree that we’ve seen a shift in the way people express emotions from our parents’ generations to now. 

Gen X parents wanted to act like everything was fine. Stuff the feelings down, and pull yourself up by your bootstraps. 

Now the pendulum has swung toward being very open and honest in expressing our feelings. But we can see with our kids how this sometimes goes a little too far and becomes hurtful. 

We don’t want our kids to get stuck on the labels of being anxious or depressed. When they identify too closely with these, it can actually hold them back. 

I’ve even noticed what I think of as pathologizing adolescence. We take these normal, hard things that adolescents go through around their identity and try to diagnose the problem.

 Kids aren’t necessarily experiencing more pain these days. They are just expressing it more because we’re allowing them to. When I was an adolescent, I was in so much pain, and I didn't have anywhere to put it. So I developed my own negative coping strategies. Our kids now are more able to talk about their feelings, but that doesn’t mean they necessarily know what to do with them. 

Defining Success

At some point along the line, our culture decided that the way children behave and perform is a direct result of parenting. So, as parents, we feel like we need to check certain boxes and see certain outcomes from our kids in order to show that we’re doing a good job. 

Extracurriculars, good grades, cute outfits, nice manners…the list goes on and on. And we feel like we’re being rated on them all.

But who set those standards? And how much control do we even really have here? Our society has started to overemphasize parenting a bit in this way. It leads to a misunderstanding of the role and what it actually means to be a parent.

Each child’s needs and personality are so vastly different that there truly isn’t one “right” path. And even though all of the millennials who did things “right” - got good grades, went to college, got a great job, bought a house - are all now sitting here unhappy and complaining about how we can’t afford this life we were “promised”, we’re still putting this same standard on our kids. 

We’re still telling them that they need to go to college and do all these things in order to be successful. And teens are feeling the pressure of that. 

Mary shared a story about one of their clients who is struggling with this herself.

“We're working with a girl right now who is a sophomore in high school, and she's got it all together. It's all buttoned up. Great grades, lives in a great home, two successful parents. Absolutely drop dead gorgeous. She referees for the little league. She's got a job…

She is not happy in any way, shape, or form. It is coming undone for her at a very quick rate. Her family reached out to us because they were scared about what was going on in between her ears. We have told our kids that this is what's important, and we've held them to that standard to their own detriment.”

Tools for Teen & Tween Girls

One of the many things I love about Jill and Mary is that they give girls so many tools so that they don’t have to keep looking for happiness outside of themselves. 

The Words You Use

A big shift can come from simply changing the language we use around our struggles. Sometimes, it almost seems like we introduce ourselves as, “Hi. I am anxiety, and my name is Mary.” 

Subtle shifts can make a big difference. For example, instead of saying, “I am anxious,” or “I have anxiety,” we can say “I feel anxious sometimes.” 

Mary says that this helps separate who we are from the tendencies we have because we can improve our tendencies. 

She also says that we often overthink about the negative things in our lives. You hear people all the time say, I’m anxious,” or “I procrastinate,” but you don’t often hear them say things like, “I’m gritty,” or “I’m so content.” We overanalyze the good and turn it into something negative.

Ultimately, we want to help girls move toward something like, “I might have anxiety every once in a while, but I'm gritty and I'm perseverant, and I can find my way through the problem and feel good on the other side.”

Embrace the Struggle

There is a tendency for millennial parents to unintentionally rob our kids of their self esteem. Our kids boost their self esteem when they think critically and problem solve, but we’re often too quick to jump in. In some cases, we even take our kids’ self-esteem in order to boost our own.

Here’s how it happens…

Let’s say your kid is working on a science project. They get stuck on something, so you jump in to help. You take over production so that it gets turned in on time and your kid gets a good grade. You feel great about yourself and what you did, but your kid doesn’t get that same self esteem boost and likely misses out on valuable lessons and experiences. 

As parents, Jill says, we need to check ourselves and remember that it’s okay to watch our kids fail in a safe container and environment. In fact, we want them to fail now rather than later when they’re out there in the world by themselves. We can be available when they struggle and be that safe landing place for them.

The truth is that pain is part of the process of growing up (and living as a human on this earth). Sometimes, you just have to wait the pain out. It will pass. 

We can help our kids by normalizing the pain and not trying to create a diagnosis or prognosis for it. Help them talk about feelings as what they are - a stage, a phase, or a moment. Your kid needs to look at you and see that you believe that they can overcome.

Really, the truth to happiness or contentment is knowing that we can be unhappy and figure out how to get back. I am not happy because I have a house, job, car, husband, and kids. I’m happy because I know how to find it inside. I can grapple around in the darkness, and keep pushing myself toward some kind of light. Let’s give our kids the chance to do the same.

A Lifelong Journey of Growth

It’s also important for parents to understand that nothing is a one-and-done. Parents come to Jill and Mary searching for what’s best for their daughter. But there is no quick fix. Growing up to be confident and resilient is a journey for her that she will be on for her entire life. 

Mary says, “You can see a distinct difference between the parents who are at their wits' end in wanting to help their daughter, so they buy into our programs and services, and [the parents who] are on that other level - not just paying us money, but they're on board to help and support. And they see the changes. It's astronomical… The ripple effect of what this work will do - not just for the individual, not just for the family, but for a community - is vast. It's huge.”

An Outside Perspective

Mary says, “I wish I had a recording of every parent who's ever said, ‘Well, she doesn't wanna talk to me because I'm just mom or I'm just dad.’ Every parent child relationship has that period of time where you don't get the answers you want from your child because they're going through their own journey. They're discovering who they are.”

They don’t want to feel judged or shamed or guilted by your response to what they’re telling you. They’re working really hard as an adolescent to prove to you that they are capable and good. 

It can be so scary when we see our kids struggle. A lot of times, teen girls want to get feedback from a parent, but they don't want to tell everything to their parent. They just don't. They want to preserve that mother-daughter or father-daughter relationship and allow there to be a some mystery.  

It is so valuable for tweens and teens to have someone else in their life that they can talk to - tell the truth or say the hard thing - and get feedback.

A Shared Language

Jill says, “It is so crucial to speak your kids' language…That’s all kids want is for their parents to understand and not poke fun at or judge” That means getting involved in what they’re doing and where they’re communicating. Maybe it’s Snapchat or Roblox or joining in a dance party. 

She continues, “They want you to be a part of their lives. So the more that you can see them without judging them or tearing them down, but, really being with them and joining in on their world, the better the chance of that relationship continuing to be solid.

When is the best time to start helping your daughter with their confidence, self-esteem, and emotional health? Right now!

“You can literally never start this work for your kids too early,” says Mary. “Save her the time and the effort and the tears that you experienced. We want our kids to be better than we were, and this work guarantees that they have a head start on that.”

Connect with Girls Mentorship:

• Learn more about Girls Mentorship programs, including their summer camp, at https://www.girlsmentorship.com
• Follow Jill & Mary on Instagram @girlsmentorship

Resources:

• Permission to Feel by Marc Brackett

Free Resources:

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✨A script to say to your kids when you yell. (So they don't follow you around!)

Download the Stop Yelling Cheat Sheet here

Connect With Darlynn: 

• Book a complimentary session with Darlynn
• Learn about the different parenting programs at www.calmmamacoaching.com
• Follow me on Instagram @darlynnchildress for daily tips 
• Rate and review the podcast on Itunes

Welcome back to become a calm mama. I'm your host. I'm Darlene

Childress. And on the podcast today, I've

invited Jill and Mary of Girls Mentorship to come and

share all the things that they know about teen and tween girls

and the programs, particularly their summer camp, and how they

serve teen and tween girls and what they do to support them,

empower them, and give them confidence. And I think you're gonna love

this is a two part series because our conversation was so good. So I

broke it up into two parts so that you could get all the goodness from

them. And I just decided to jump right in with the

recording and share it with you from the beginning. So

here it is, Jill and Mary from Girls Mentorship.

Hello. Hey. There she is.

Let's see. Bada bing. We're just plugging me

in. Nice. It's getting set up here.

Hi. Yeah. And this is I'm so excited for this

conversation. Oh, we are too. It's been

it's been a hot minute. I know. K. We're gonna

plug in our headphones here. Okay. Just a moment. Your

left, I'm alright. Look at we

share headphones just I know. You share

mics. You share headphones. We just share life together.

Mhmm. Can you can you hear us okay? Do you sound okay?

I think it might be picking up the headphone mic. Oh, wait. Oh, wait.

Yeah. Perfect. Select the microphone. Sure. Boom. Better?

Does that sound Way better? There we are.

Well, welcome to Become a Calm Mama. I just wanna get right into

it. Let's let's dive right in. Right in. Because if

we start catching up, the magic's gonna happen. So I would agree about

that. Yeah. Well, I actually was thinking about this

episode a lot, and I was like, I just want it to be a takeover,

like a Jill and Mary girls mentorship takeover.

And I'll just sit and listen and learn and

poke my head in a little bit, with questions because Great.

I think you both have so much to offer. So introduce yourself, introduce

your program, and then I do have some questions to talk

about. Great. Yeah. Who wants to be first? I

mean, she's gonna Mary's gonna kick us off. The dangerous duo. We like

to usually go in alphabetical order. But since we're left to right, we'll

we'll do it that way. That's true. You're gonna hear two voices.

The first one is Mary, and I am sitting here with my best

friend and my business partner. Hi, everyone. I'm Jill.

Perfect. And we're the cofounders of a company called Girls Mentorship. We

teach life and personal development skills to

tween and teen girls, and by proxy,

all the adults in their life, because that is a comment we get all the

time as well. When's the adult program starting? Because what

I heard my daughter say when she got home from your program is something that

I have yet to learn in my life. So the ripple effect

of what we do bans far beyond the age demographic that

we we choose to do it with. Yeah. And that's what I'm hoping this podcast

episode like, it'll be a twofer. Mhmm. One, about the girls and

what they need and what they're going through and what their struggles would you teach

your program? And then also then the second episode a little bit more about kind

of what parents can do. Like yeah. So we'll get into both because

everyone's listening is like, yeah. Yeah. I know. I wanna also know how to do

all the things. Yeah. A %. Yeah. What are the tangible

things that we can apply today? Yep. Exactly. Okay. So, Jill, tell

us, say hi. And Hi, everyone. I'm Jill. I am the other

part of girls mentorship. And introducing

myself, I know we shared a little bit more about

us being cofounders of girls mentorship, and I

also am a mama. So I wanted to mention that because

I have two boys. I do not have girls. Everybody

is like, oh, man. You didn't go for a girl? And I'm like, I have

a whole company full of them. But the beautiful

thing and the the dichotomy of both being a

mom and in this work of me being front and center

in girls' mentorship is that I wear a couple different hats in

terms of me being forward facing with the girls that we work with,

but also applying all of those strategies and having those

conversations constantly. And I apply it how I parent and

how I am as a mom. So I have a nine year old, and I

also have an 11 year old who both of them think they're teenagers.

And we are in just we're entering the world of tween

and almost the teen years. So I am in

it with all of you and alongside all of you. Yeah. Because

you you are experts on these girls, this age group,

this teen tween. Mhmm. And I wondered if it would be

helpful. I don't know how it worked, how it shows up for you. Like, do

you see differences when you're like,

talking about this 11 or maybe ten to

twelve 10 to 13 group? I don't know how you define tween and then versus

the teen girls, like, I would imagine that there's different things that

they're working through. I mean, much with anything, it's a maturity level. I

would say the conversation doesn't really change much, neither does

what the girls in particular are struggling with.

However, given their exposure to certain topics,

friends, social media, obviously, the content of what we're

talking about or what they are experiencing becomes a little bit

more mature. The way we talk about comparison with an 18 year old is

gonna be a little different than how we talk about comparison with a 10 year

old, because we see the door just starting to open at

age 10 around we call it spotlight syndrome. Right? Center

stage, everyone's looking at me. Really, that perspective

starts to open up for girls right when they start to turn 10 or 11

to where they start to get a little bit more shy and withdrawn and start

thinking about what other people are thinking, whether they're thinking about them. Whereas

if it's an 18 year old, that's been about eight years of the comparison

game running through their brain. So not necessarily a difference

in the subject matter, just a difference in how we approach it and the language

that we use to talk about it. Mhmm. Mhmm. Okay. So we'll just anchor

our conversation in, like, these girls, right, from Yeah. 10 to

13. Yeah. Okay. I love that. Mhmm. I wanted to start with the strengths

of this age because I think we can easily focus on, oh, these

girls, they're falling apart. You know, Jonathan Heights book about the anxious

generation, and you see these a lot of commentary about how

much the girls are struggling, which is true.

And we forget to talk about kind of the the beauty of

this age or what, what are the things that are beautiful about this age?

And I wondered if we could just start there with like, what's why is it

great to be 10, 11, 12, 14 as a girl? Like what? I

don't know. I'm sure you spent all this time with these girls and they're delightful.

And I just wanted to hear, what are their strengths? And then we can get

get into their struggles or the skill gaps or the things that you work through.

They're great. You're right. They're so great.

They are wonderful. They speak their mind. They

are so curious, and they make you

question certain things. The things that you learn from their

questions because they're beginners. Right? So

you almost get to take yourself back to when you were that age, which

we do try to do a lot because it obviously helps us relate to them

and where they're at, referencing our 10, 11, 12 year old

selves and how we were feeling. They're experiencing all

the firsts, So it's fun to be able to walk that path with them

and see their eyes get really big when they understand a concept for the first

time or realize that they're not alone in what they're struggling

with. And they are funny. They're funny. They're

funny. They're funny. They're hilarious. And, I mean, we genuinely

enjoy being around, like, in their company because they

can banter back and forth with us. Like, we

are one of their peers, which is one of the greatest

qualities that I think we overlook sometimes

is we don't get to know them because we only just kind of

lump gen z or gen alpha in we we

kinda just kind of lump them all together without getting to know them

individually. And I'll also add that they're super creative. Like, this

generation is insanely talented because they have so much

access to information. So if they are curious about

something, they will go and seek it. They'll find it. They're

just wildly creative, and they have a

vocabulary that is very mature where we can

hold higher level conversations that maybe Mary and I never

had at that age. So when they talk about mental health,

they're genuinely curious about what that means because they're experiencing

anxiety or these feelings that they now have words

to articulate and express themselves. So it is really

it's beautiful to be able to have this rich

conversation with them because of the ability that

they have with information. They are just so insanely

smart. Yeah. I can see that because one of the things

as I've done this work for fifteen years, so kind of parent,

parented. I don't parent the parents. I feel like it sometimes.

I work with parents. Not to. We try not to. Exactly.

I work with parents who, you know, were themselves

gen x parents and then now millennial parents. Right? So I've kind of watched this

shift from traditional model. When I first started my work, I'd

have to say feelings matter to parents. I'd be like, oh, feelings really matter. You

really need to identify and help them articulate it. And now a whole generation

of children has been kind of raised with this idea that we

have feelings and that they matter. And learning to articulate

them deal with them. All of those things is all of our journey, I

think. Right. But to see these young women able

to kind of know, like, oh, I have some

stuff inside of me that I wanna express and that I can and that

there's language for it. That's so great to see the benefits

of having just opened us up as a culture to the

emotional life of anybody. Yeah. And I think that really goes to the

evolution of how we were raised. I

think the pendulum has definitely shifted in terms of when

we were raised, it was shove your feelings down and, you know, you're

gonna move on very quickly and suppress, suppress, suppress

until you explode. But if you explode in a manner that makes you look

poorly, shame on you. Right? So it was like we

are undoing a lot of how we were raised to

see what a new result can look like when when we're parenting

this generation. Yeah. And they want to talk about these things. Yeah.

Maybe to to a fault. I don't know. It's something we could talk about, but,

yeah, they wanna talk about it. They have language for it. They are

interested in their emotional life and they're they're owning like, yep. I have

one and it matters. And I'm gonna maybe talk about it a little

bit. So that's so great. I agree with what you

said in terms of we can touch on that. It seems

what we see a lot, and again, what you said, we don't try to parent

parents, but we try to make it clear what we've seen as far

as just the data goes and where the pendulum

has swung. So it seemed like with our Gen

x parents that it was not a focus

bootstraps. There was a lot of terminology around, you're

fine, it's fine, I'm fine. Right? That

was that was a popular thing.

That now that us, as millennials, are

having children, we wanna do the exact opposite, which is not

placate, which is not pretend like anybody's fine, but be very open and

honest so it feels like the pendulum has swung 180

degrees in the other direction, which can be a little damning and

a little hurtful. I do feel like there is a happy medium

somewhere between how to express our feelings in a healthy way that

helps everything move forward and not get stuck on

the labels of I am anxious, I am depressed, I am all these things

that I've now seen on TikTok that I identify with Mhmm. That are holding me

back. And that is where we're seeing the pitfalls of

maybe being overly expressive of the things that we think we have

when we actually don't know that those are the things that we have. We

just have gone to it's this generation's, gosh,

WebMD, basically. You know? Yes. We

would go self diagnose using the Internet back in the late

nineties, early '2 thousands. Now, as Jill pointed out, the amount of

information coming to any one individual is

a thousand times what it was when we were growing up.

Access to information is incredible, which is

awesome and can be hurtful. I've been noticing in

my practice that there's almost a pathologizing of adolescence. That's how I think

about it, that we've pathologized normal,

hard things that adolescents go through

around their identity around finding where they fit around

friendships, and the pain that is part of

the process. And we've become a little bit because

they're, we're allowing them to express it. And now we're afraid

like, oh, my gosh, I have this anxious, depressed

daughter, or you know, and there is, it's true, there is

more prevalence of it. But I think about

myself as an adolescent and just how much pain I was in.

I didn't have anywhere to put it. I didn't have anywhere to go with it.

So I had my own negative coping strategies. I look at

these kids and I almost feel like they're like I am I have a like,

I am an, I am, I have anxiety. I have depression. I have like, they

want to have a reason for maybe some things that

are, normal. I always think like one thing to

have the language to express emotion and

we have to know what to do with it. And

that is a little bit not it's granular. It's like whenever I

parents ask me, you know, my kid's sad because they don't get the sippy cup

or, you know, whatever. I can't take them to the baseball game, whatever. Right? Like

I said, kid kid gets sad. It's like, well, then what do I do?

I was like, pretty much you could just wait.

Pretty much let them be sad. It's okay. Yeah. Pass. We don't

have to fix it. We don't have to get right in there. And I think

normalizing the pain without trying to pathologize

it or, you know, create a prognosis

for it. Like, here's a plan. It's like, we could just be okay. What do

you guys think? It just makes me think of one of our favorite books, and

it's called Permission to Feel. Yes. Right? And it's,

Mark what is his last name? Thank you. Mark Brackett. He's

a PhD. He is at Yale, the emotional intelligence director

at Yale. And in the front cover and the back cover of his

book are all of these different colored squares, and

it's all feelings. And I think we have done a really

good job of not wanting to feel our feelings to a

point where we can identify which feeling we're actually feeling.

Yeah. So we do a really good job of wanting to label

these blanket terms of I am, and we say that all the time.

How do we shift the language just a little to where you're not

almost introducing yourself as that? Mhmm. Hi. I am anxiety, and my name

is Mary. That that's how we introduce that concept to girls

because, personally, I struggle with procrastination.

And I used to say, I procrastinate. Like, right? That's like putting

on a coat of identity that that is who I am, that's what I do,

that is how I will operate. That hinders me from

being able to separate who I am from the tendencies that I have because I

can improve on the tendencies that I have. Yeah. Simply because

I am anxious some of the time doesn't mean that I have to always

identify with that as being who I am. Mhmm. Yeah. So

even if it's just a little shift in the way that they say the

things that they feel like they are or the things that they feel like they

have, that will do them such a great service moving

forward because they won't always revert to those things. Right?

Because we we don't often hear them say, I'm gritty. Like,

I might have anxiety every once in a while, but I'm gritty and I'm

perseverant, and I can find my way through the problem and feel good on the

other side. We often refer to or overthink about the

negative things in our life. When have you ever heard anybody

overthink about the positive things in their life? Mhmm. Right? I'm

just so content. It's, like, crazy. I just feel so much

good. Oh my gosh. Did you just see my success? Oh

my gosh. Wow. And we do. We we overanalyze

it in a negative way. Like, oh my god. If I make too much money,

then this is gonna happen, and this is gonna like, we do that, but we

don't often just sit here and stew on

great things happening to us. It's funny. Yeah. I you're gonna

have to chime in because I I was trying to scroll and find it on

my phone, but Mary sent me something. It was a Doc Eamon clip

a couple days ago in terms of what

parents in this generation is doing to our children's self

esteem. And it was around, like,

parents are essentially, like, taking They're robbing

kids of their ability to problem solve,

critically think, and they're boosting their own self esteem by doing that. By

doing that. And my mind was like, oh

my gosh. Like, I'm getting my needs met by being very

productive and problem solving and doing such a good

job as a parent and, like, a job to feel better. But you're robbing

theirs. Yes. Where's my participation trophy? Somebody pat

me on the back because I confronted the teacher about my

child's poor grade. Mhmm. Mhmm. Or I finished my

kid's science project, and, oh, look at me. We're

turning it in on time. But it's like, did I overtake

the production of that so that he could turn it in on

time? For a feel good grade? For right. Where it's like,

could I have taught him a lesson around

prioritizing your time? Time management. Time management. So it's

really interesting. That was very profound for me, not only

as, you know, an educator in this

space, but also as a parent. I was like, I need to check myself because

I want to be a guide in my child's

success, but am I kind of towing the line

sometimes? And and the answer is yes. I'm like, there are

times that I am taking my children's

self esteem and boosting mine, and this was a reminder

of, like, it is okay to watch them fail in a very

safe container and environment because I want them

to do it here and now versus when they are

in the in the world by themselves, and I'm not

around. Yeah. I think of it like previous

generations maybe failed or struggled alone, And then we had

to convince ourselves that we could figure it out or just

go figure it out because the adults didn't seem available or

reliable or are interested possibly. Or wanting.

Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Desirous of the role. Yeah. And

so then you were kind of forced to go figure it out. And then

on the other side, it's like, the adults are

available. And that's wonderful. Like, we want people

we want our kids to not struggle alone or to have

failures, like not turn the thing on in time or whatever the thing

is, and have that be that be the safe landing

for them. But we're uncomfortable with

any of it. We're uncomfortable with their discomfort. And

also, I think for parents, it's hard to gauge, we've decided that the

outcome like the way that children act and perform

is directly result of parenting.

It reflects who we are as a person. Yeah. Yes.

And how good of a job we're doing. Now the the problem

is the premise itself that I'm supposed to do a good job at this. I

don't know, like, that this is a job. There's a performance aspect to parenting

and that we have to decide, oh, I've hit all these

boxes based on the fact that my kids always on time

has great good grades. It does all the sports, whatever it is, we've

decided in our head are those checkboxes. But in

the society itself, we've kind of overemphasized parenting a little

bit, in that we think we can control the factors

so much and that we're supposed to. So it's like, yeah, I get a boost

from that self esteem thing. I like that perspective. And there's

just a misunderstanding of the role of what it means

to be a parent. Yeah. Well, and it's funny because who set the standard?

Right? Yeah. We're we're trying to hit the standard of

who, because each child's needs are incredibly

different, which I don't have children. I am

around a lot of children given our work, obviously, but even just

being directly related to Jill who has two boys, her two boys are

vastly different in what they need and how they need to be spoken

to, tended to, reacted to. They

are polar opposite. So it's like Yeah. To what degree are

we performing, and who are we performing for?

It seems funny that there's this auspicious pie in

the sky standard that we're all trying to meet. Yeah. Yeah.

And that like, go to college, look us look good, have a

good CV when you graduate from high school, get into like, we've created some

standards as a society. Yeah. And it doesn't make any sense.

Like, it doesn't there's so many other paths, and that's not even really maybe possibly

the best one. That's right. Well Yeah. And what's so frustrating is, yes,

this path to go to college. Right? We've we've built that up over

years and years and years, and I think the pendulum conversation

is very relevant here as well because millennials who did all the

things right, we're starting to see a lot of content around that just in terms

of how PO'd people are. Like, you told us to take this path and

get good grades and go to school and pick the right school and pick the

right degree, and then we get a great job and be able to afford a

house. And now we're all sitting here complaining about the price of inflation

around everything, and none of us are really able to afford the house that we

were, quote, unquote, promised. Right? None of us are happy. And Yeah. And

we're not satisfied. And we're not happy. Happiness is at an all time low. I

think the I don't know who runs these

surveys, but The United States fell to, like, you know,

27 or 28 in terms of the happiest countries in the whole world.

And that sucks because it's the land of the free. It's the home of the

brave. The the American dream is made here. And and

seeing that the the population in general is just not

happy because of these, quote, unquote, standards that we're trying

to meet, that sucks because it feels like we're doing it wrong. On top of

that, we're telling kids still that they need to go to college in order to

be successful. And according to recent research, kids only

know about of about, like, 10 careers in

total. Right? Your doctor, your lawyer, your nurse, like, your

standard careers, when we should be talking about blue

collar careers or trade schools that they could go to where they can work hard

and be just as happy and make just as much money as what they're perceived

to make doing the traditional careers. And I think that part sucks

because we're not doing a good enough job of exposing our kids even with the

amount of information that comes to them to say, hey. You

could literally do whatever you want. And what does whatever you want mean?

Boom. All of these things. Because I I say that. I'll I'll

land the plane. We're working with a girl right now who is a sophomore in

high school, and she's got it all together. Right? It's all buttoned up. Great

grades, lives in a great home, two successful parents.

She is all over the place. Beautiful. Oh, absolutely drop dead gorgeous.

She referees for the little league. She's got a job here. She runs,

her own business. She is not happy in any

way, shape, or form. It is coming paper. Yep. It is coming

undone for her at a very quick rate, and their family reached out

to us because they were scared for what was going on in her in between

her ears. And it's like, we have told our kids that this is what's important,

and we've held them to that standard so much so to their

own detriment. Mhmm. Because really the truth of happiness,

I think, or contentment is that I can be unhappy and figure out

how to get back. Right. I think that's what I loved about your program. And

I want to talk about it because it's a lot about confidence, and a lot

about your internal narrative of how you speak to

yourself and how you think about yourself in the world. And

I think about like, okay, well, I'm quite happy. Why is that? And

it's not because I have a house and a job and a car and a,

you know, husband and kids. I don't know. None of that. It's like,

because I know how to find it inside. I

can like, it's sometimes like grappling in the dark,

just kind of, I don't know, just pushing towards

some sort of light and keep working at my own belief

system inside. Like, what do I okay, this is hard, what's hard about it? What

can I do? Like all those questions and just finding, oh, this is the little

piece of pain that I want to make a small change around or

actually, why don't I go to gratitude? Like we have all these tools. And I

think that's what you're really helping these girls with is learning the

tools so that they don't have to keep externalizing. Their

happiness does not need to be found outside. And if they keep looking for

it on a piece of paper, I look this way. I have these

achievements. I'm from this type of community, whatever it

is. It's not it's gonna land flat. It sure

is. And I know we're gonna chat about our

programs, but that's one of the biggest things that pains

Mary and I when parents do seek out our services is

that they are so parents are so ready because their

daughter is just she's changed in some way, shape, or

form, and they don't know what to do. So they are

searching, and they're trying to do what's best for her. And they're

doing the best that they can with what they have. And a

lot of times, they think it's like a one it's like a one

and done. Right? Oh, let's try therapy. That should fix her. Well, it

didn't work, so let's try now medication. Well, shoot. That

didn't work either. It's like we we can't look at

our own lives and our children's

lives as like a, we're gonna try one thing, and

then the it's either gonna work or not work, and then that's

it. It's like this like, the work that we do and

what we will die on a hill saying

over and over again is that this work is life's work.

Mhmm. When you when we are in this girl's presence

and care, it is because we are starting the journey for

her, but we are not the end of the journey for her. This this journey

is going to be until the end of time. And so that,

it really is like, that that's really hard to conceptualize because

when you hire a soccer coach to train your daughter to be

a better goalie, like, you can see the success in that. This work

is so it's complex. It's tangible. They can't touch you.

Super tangible. So we we need to get more

people to see the vision of that personal growth and development

will absolutely solve so many problems

that we are just kind of band aiding, but we want it to happen so

fast because we live in a culture that teaches us that

you can buy anything and it shows up on your own stuff. I have

a quote. Yeah. I just talked about in the podcast. It's from young Pueblo. And

he says healing yourself with love is a long term process.

It absolutely is. Yeah. And it's funny because you can see

a distinct difference between the parents who are at their wits' end

in wanting to help their daughter, and they buy into our programs and services,

and they buy into our programs and services on that other

level, not just paying us money, but they're onboard to help and support,

and they see the changes, it's it's astronomical.

It's incredible how much of a shift they see in their

entire family, in their perspective, in moms and dads and

brothers and sisters. It's like, oh my gosh. Wow. You had

her do this thing. And from yesterday to

today, I've seen a different level of confidence, and

I'm inspired by that. It's like it has again, I said this

at the very beginning, the ripple effect of what this work will do,

not just for the individual, not just for the family, but for a community

is vast. It's huge. Mhmm. Yeah. It's so true. I think

about when you have a young girl, and she's, like, the first

time I love that. Like, this is your first time figuring out what it means

to be a person and how to process emotion and think about yourself.

And that keeps going on and on and on. Even myself.

I'm been doing my own self help work

for I don't know, like two thirty years. Yeah,

something like that. And I'm still exploring the, you know,

nuance of it all. And I don't, I don't look at myself and think, oh,

man, geez, that one thing didn't work. Like, I don't know.

We give ourselves It's time to give up. Yeah. Forget it. And I do think

with I talk about this a lot with with parents that your kid

needs to look at you and see that you believe that they can

overcome. And that if you are a parent and you're,

like, biting your nails, like, oh, god. I hope this one works. What's the

or else? And then what are you giving to your girl with the or else?

It's like, it's so scary. Right? That kind of

nebulous, oh, we're in trouble. I also I wanna go

back to what you asked about how awesome girls are at the

beginning. Girls can see right through you. To your

literal soul, they see you in the

scariest of true ways. So if you

are not confident in what you're saying or if you're

bullshitting them in any way, shape, or form, even as their

parent, they will know they will sniff it out. You you cannot

pretend with them. And so if you

are kind of living on a prayer and you're like, oh, I hope this

works. Go get them, honey. And you're not confident in saying that, they won't be

confident in themselves because they know that your confidence is not there.

Yeah. I always say, like, I'm so glad that nobody looked at 12

year old Darlene and was like, boy, we're fucked, girl.

Like, how you are now is how you're always gonna

be. I just like, that's so so sad. That's why it goes

back to the I am anxious or whatever. It's like, you know, I have

I've been feeling that way lately or some sort of way to

see it as a stage or a phase or a moment.

And I think our kids need us to look

at them and with the eyes of like, oh, you'll you're

of course, you're gonna overcome this. Like, this is all part of it.

And it can be so scary when we see our kids struggle. A

lot of times a kid, especially a teen girl, she wants to

get feedback from her mom or from her dad and get coached to a

degree. But there is a little bit of

preserving it for them. I think they wanna

preserve that child mother relationship or that child

father relationship and allow there to be a little more mystery. Like, they don't need

to they don't wanna tell everything to their parent. They just don't. They want to

have someone else in their life that they can get feedback or tell

the truth or say the hard thing. Especially because as a

parent, I mean, I am a emotional coach for my kids. We do do

the work together. And I have to work really hard to not be

like, like, when they say something. Yeah.

You know, or, you know, struggle with something or have an out of

bound thought that they have or something that's really, really

sad that they think about themselves that my heart

is is tender towards them. I'm their mom. I have to keep

a pretty solid game face on and go into that mentorship

modality. And that is because I'm a trained life and

parent coach in many ways that I'm able to do it. I have all the

skills that it's hard to do even with the training and it's

hard for the kid to want to give that to their

parent Yeah. For a variety of reasons. Yeah. One thing I wish

we've done to this point over the last five years is just have a

recording of every parent who's ever said, well, she doesn't wanna talk to me

because I'm just mom or I'm just dad. Right? And have it in so many

different people's voices because it is consistent.

It is through and through. Every parent child relationship has

that period of time where you don't get the answers you want from your

child because they're going through their own journey. They're

discovering who they are to differentiate from you. Well, and I think

their job. Right? Said in terms of your poker face, it's like it

makes it harder for your kids to wanna share intimate details

about their life and what they're feeling, thinking, experiencing because they don't wanna

feel judged or shamed or guilted by your response to

what they're telling you. To think they want you to believe that they're

good, Like that they're okay. Yeah. They're working really hard to prove

to you as an adolescent. They're working hard to prove I'm I'm

capable because otherwise they would never launch into adulthood if they

didn't believe they were capable. So who are they launching from? Where are they

going? Right. They're leaving your nest and going out and to create their own

it's fits and starts and all the things, but they have to have a belief

system and they need to know that you believe that they can

do it. So they tell you some pain

that they're experiencing or some doubt, that you might go,

oh, shit. Yep. Thought that pretty sure you can't do it then. Like, we

get all it just is a weird relationship in that,

you know, sharing those intimate things. And it requires

the child to really truly deeply

100. And even still, they still may not want to, but, like,

believe, like, oh, my parent isn't gonna, struggle with this

information. They're not gonna make it mean anything about me or

my future. Yeah. %. Okay. So

how can everyone meet with you or connect with you or find you? Like, what's

the best way? What's the skinny? We are very

social on Instagram. We're the most social.

But come hang with us. We would love, love, love

to have your listeners drop in in our DMs just to

say, hey. I caught you on the podcast. I just wanted to say hi. We

genuinely read every single DM. It's the two of

us. We wanted to be well connected with you. Thanks, Tracey. Good

mamas. Yes. That's right. Yeah. Yes. Get this I I

I agree. Connect. Yeah. Just Connect with us. We are the

human beings behind Instagram. So you can find us at girls

mentorship, just spelled the normal way. And then

our website is girlsmentorship.com, and that

will have all the information around camp, our peer

leader program, and soon to come is our mentorship menu,

like, what what menu items we have and the offerings for

the one on one offerings outside of camp. Summer camp is our

Super Bowl. That is the number one way to work with us for an extended

period of time, and then individual coaching. So if your girl is

struggling with something and it has been a struggle for a while, we

would suggest our coaching program. We have a twelve week program

that we take girls through, or we just have calls. If she needs

needs a little support in the moment, that can be an option as well.

Oh my goodness. What a gift you are to to any

parent, really. Yeah. Thank you. I guess if

you could just leave us with one thing that you wish parents would know about

their middle school and high school girl, like, if you

just had a message for them or something that if they

were here, they would want their mom or dad to know. Like, mom, I would

just wish you understood this about this about me or I don't know. Some case

something like that. Some kinda takeaway. I'd love that. You can literally never

start this work for your kids too early. I

think the earlier you consider it, the earlier you enroll

her in conversations like this, the better off she's gonna be for the rest

of her life as opposed to just letting her fly the nest

and grapple with these situations as they come up through her

early twenties, early thirties. Like, save her

the time and the effort and the tears that you

experienced. We want our kids to be better than we were,

and this work guarantees that they have a head start on

that. Oh, that's great. I will add

that it is so crucial to

speak your kids' language. Mhmm. And so what does that mean?

It means maybe joining them on Snapchat because

that's where they're hanging out and communicating the most. It's sitting

down with them and watching them play a game of Roblox or asking questions

about their avatar, or it's joining in on a dance party

that even though you are pressed for time to get out of the door, they

want you to be a part of that. So the more that you can see

them without judging them or or tearing them down

or or their ideas are stupid, but, like, really being with them

and and joining in on their world, the

better the chance of that relationship

continuing to be solid. And that's all kids want is for

their parents to understand and not poke

fun at or judge. So that's the invitation to say do

it. Download Snapchat. Get involved. Ask

the the right questions without it feeling very pushy or judgy.

Finding that common language to to reconnect and build that

relationship. Well, thank you so much. I think you both have so much to offer.

Darling, thank you for the opportunity. Yeah. This has been wonderful. Use your

platform to spread the good word. Yeah.

Okay. Wasn't that wonderful? I'm sure you loved

meeting Jill and Mary and learning so many new things

about parenting, about the struggles of parenting this

generation, and the beauty of these

girls and some of the things that they're going through and

how best to support them. And this is not the end of the conversation

because we have a part two of this

interview, and we get into a little bit more

practical tools in part two in the next episode,

and that is gonna come out next week. But in the meantime, go

right now to Instagram, go to girls mentorship, go to their

website, and start following Jill and Mary,

connecting that with them, learning about their programs, and

especially if you have a teen or tween girl. Hop on that

right away, and I will see you next week with the part two

of our episode.