Shownotes
Ken Dolan-Delvecchio, licensed family therapist, author, speaker and corporate health and wellness leader, wrote the book "Simple Habits of Exceptional (But Not Perfect) Parents."
In this conversation we talked power dynamics, about how parenting changes as our children grow up and become parents themselves, how to maintain close family bonds once they move away. We learned about the importance of role modeling from the very beginning and continuing throughout our children's lives. We discussed how to impart critical thinking skills and how to speak to children about social injustices.
Parenting isn't a one-size-fits-all gig, especially when we’re talking about being an exceptional but not perfect parent. In this chat, we dive into the nitty-gritty of what it really means to be an exceptional parent—without the pressure of perfection.
Ken Dolan Del Vecchio, a seasoned family therapist, sheds light on the difference between ‘power over’ and ‘power with’ in parenting. It’s all about how we guide our kids through life with a supportive hand rather than a heavy hand. Think of it like this: instead of just barking orders, we’re here to help them navigate their own paths, learning and growing as they go. Ken shares anecdotes that make these concepts relatable, like how to prepare your kids for new experiences—gentle introductions rather than shock therapy at the dentist, you know? We also touch on the importance of role modeling; as parents, we’re always on display, and our kids are taking notes. It’s a wild ride of laughs, reflections, and some serious insights into how we can be there for our kids as they grow into their own individuals. Trust me, you don’t want to miss this one!
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Transcripts
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Speaker B:Down.
Speaker B:30 Seconds to go.
Speaker B:Before we really go live, I just wanted to come on, say hello.
Speaker B:I'm excited about this show.
Speaker B:It's going to be so interesting.
Speaker B:So many questions.
Speaker B:Okay, so if you're here, put a comment, let me know.
Speaker B:Say, hi, Wendy.
Speaker B:Hi, Ken.
Speaker B:Let us know you're here.
Speaker B:And we are live.
Speaker B:So let me shut this down.
Speaker B:Okay?
Speaker B:So, hello.
Speaker B:Hey, Boomer listeners.
Speaker B:I am Wendy Green, and welcome to the 14th episode of hey Boomer.
Speaker B:Today we're going to be talking to Ken Dolan Del Vecchio about being an.
Speaker B:Being an exceptional but not a perfect parent.
Speaker B:And so I want to find out what that means to be an exceptional but not perfect parent.
Speaker B:I want to find out about being a grandparent and being a parent to adult children and being an adult who is a child of an older adult.
Speaker B:So lots of questions for you today, Ken, and I am really looking forward to this conversation.
Speaker B:I am very passionate about hey Boomer.
Speaker B:I love it.
Speaker B:It brings me so much joy.
Speaker B:And building this community is such a rewarding thing.
Speaker B:And it is a community.
Speaker B:So a community of people that are interested and relevant and excited and want to be involved in life and want to be involved in these conversations.
Speaker B:And so we want these conversations to be something that you really feel a part of.
Speaker B:And writing your comments in the comment box, asking us questions makes this conversation even more alive.
Speaker B:I mean, Ken and I have a ton to talk about.
Speaker B:We're not going to have any problems with that, but we really want to be sure we answer your questions now if we get a ton of questions because we all want to know how to be better parents, and we can't answer them all right away.
Speaker B:Don't worry, we will get back to you.
Speaker B:I will either put you in touch with Ken or I will get back to you.
Speaker B:So be sure and ask your questions.
Speaker B:So let me introduce Ken Dolan Del Vecchio.
Speaker B:Ken was introduced to me by a mutual friend, Kathy Secreta, and he is a licensed family therapist, the author of several books, a speaker, and has had a long corporate career as a health and wellness leader.
Speaker B:Ken now lives in Massachusetts, where he retired from corporate America to move towards fulfilling the following two life goals.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So as Boomers, we are all going towards new goals.
Speaker B:One of his goals is that he is creating a business that allows him to do the work he loves most.
Speaker B:Speaking, advising, coaching leaders and writing, and devoting time to building a permaculture landscape at his home in Massachusetts.
Speaker B:And permaculture, I'm telling you, you could do A whole other program on that.
Speaker B:Ken Permaculture is where he builds landscapes that produce food for people and other living things while building, rather than destroying the topsoil.
Speaker B:What that means in practice, and these are Ken's words, it means he gets really dirty planting fruit trees, berry bushes and vines, all kinds of perennials, caring for what he's planted, as well as caring for chickens and rabbits and making compost.
Speaker B:So I need to schedule you for another show on that.
Speaker B:Ken recently founded Greengate Leadership, where he provides coaching and consulting for organizational leaders, as well as keynotes on exceptional parenting, healthy relationships, leadership skills, diversity, power and privilege in the workplace, and workplace violence prevention.
Speaker B:Ken, I am so glad to have you on.
Speaker B:Hey, Boomer.
Speaker A:Well, Wendy, it's such a pleasure to be with you.
Speaker A:It's just a great opportunity.
Speaker A:I'm looking forward to our conversation.
Speaker B:Thank you.
Speaker B:Me too.
Speaker B:Let me show everybody this book.
Speaker B:It's called Simple Habits of Exceptional but Not Perfect Parents.
Speaker B:And I tell you, I mean, it's all marked up as I was reading it, lots of things for me to reflect on.
Speaker B:And what I wanted to start with, though, is to have you define, you use two terms, I think, that help you talk about the exceptional parent.
Speaker B:One was power over and one was power with.
Speaker B:So can you kind of elaborate on that a little bit for our audience to get us started?
Speaker A:Sure.
Speaker A:And I think that this distinction between power over and power with is fundamental to every relationship, whether it's between individuals, whether it's between parents and children, whether it's looking at leadership or whether it's looking at our relationship as human beings to the natural world.
Speaker A:And we have lived for most of civilization, particularly in the Western world, under a power over model.
Speaker A:And in this model, power is essentially the right to dominate.
Speaker A:It's to tell you what to do and when to do it.
Speaker A:It's to make judgments if you have more power than the other, to define what's right, what's healthy, what is holy.
Speaker A:And it comes with a way of looking at differences that's all about ranking.
Speaker A:If we encounter a difference, the questions are, which way is better, which way is healthier, which way is the right way?
Speaker A:And it also comes with the idea that there is only a fixed amount of power.
Speaker A:And so if somebody is gaining power, somebody else must be losing it.
Speaker A:And so, for example, in the broad picture, if women are gaining power and presence in the world of work, in the political world, then people with a power over frame will feel like men are losing power.
Speaker A:Now, power with is different in that Power with sees power as the responsibility to create shared success, shared health, shared benefit.
Speaker A:Power over is about domination.
Speaker A:Power with is about communion.
Speaker A:It's about understanding that my role, the more power I have, is to facilitate your growth, your development, our collective benefits in many different ways.
Speaker A:And so power over and Power with, when it sees a difference, says things like, wow, what can I learn from this different way of being?
Speaker A:Or this different way of understanding the world?
Speaker A:How can we all gain from sharing our different approaches?
Speaker A:It doesn't rank.
Speaker A:Instead, it embraces and appreciates and uses as a platform for development differences.
Speaker A:It doesn't presume to have the answer to what's right and what's wrong and what's holy and what's unholy and what's healthy and unhealthy.
Speaker A:And in a power with way of looking at the world, there is a growing amount of power.
Speaker A:So if women are gaining power in the workplace, if queer people are gaining the rights of marriage, then that means that we can all learn more about how to do these things.
Speaker A:Like, women will bring a different kind of leadership.
Speaker A:People who have different ways of loving and different family structures bring new ideas about parenting, about relationships.
Speaker B:So the question, though, is, as a parent, if I want to do this power with my children, I'm not just completely dominating them, but there's a lot of things I know better than them.
Speaker B:How do I do that?
Speaker A:Yes, absolutely.
Speaker A:You start with the idea.
Speaker A:And this is an idea that was given to me by a colleague of mine.
Speaker A:Her name is Dr. Beth Umans.
Speaker A:And she once remarked kind of off the cuff, you know, kids don't misbehave, they just behave.
Speaker A:And if we keep that in mind, we understand that our role as parents is to teach our little children everything.
Speaker A:Everything.
Speaker A:They don't know how to do anything.
Speaker A:And so the way we do that, if we're thinking of power with, is we think about how they are new to the world.
Speaker A:And I'll give you an example.
Speaker A:So you.
Speaker A:You are understanding that your child has kind of got a little bit of a timid temperament.
Speaker A:And you know that when they have to do something like go to the dentist for the first time or get their hair cut for the first time, that that's likely to really rattle them.
Speaker A:So you think about that, and you think about the way that they experience the world, and you prepare them in a gentle way.
Speaker A:So you take them with you when you're getting your haircut.
Speaker A:You have them sit on your.
Speaker A:And you talk about, hey, it's really fun, you know, cutting My hair.
Speaker A:Look in the, you know, look in the mirror, see how it's going.
Speaker A:One day you will.
Speaker A:You'll have this too.
Speaker A:You don't take them to the, to the hairstylist for the first time.
Speaker A:And when they're in the chair and the scissors start going and they start screaming, you then try to dominate them.
Speaker A:You've prepared them in a way that's gentle and loving and hand anticipating who they are, where they are at this stage of their development.
Speaker A:And so you're ready to help them understand the world from their perspective.
Speaker B:Okay, all right, that makes sense.
Speaker B:Another thing that you talked about was this role model situation of parenting, which I know I thought a lot about that.
Speaker B:I mean, I was a single parent for most of my children's life, and I tried to think about, you know, what is the role model I'm presenting.
Speaker B:But now most of us on this call are boomers.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So how does that, how do we role model now to our children and our grandchildren even?
Speaker A:Well, I think this is one of the most important points for us to keep in mind.
Speaker A:From day one and even before that, we are our child's primary role model, certainly from the beginning.
Speaker A:And then we continue to be a primary role model throughout life.
Speaker A:And so they're watching us and they're seeing the ways that we approach challenges in the world and the way that we approach stress and the ways that we approach relationships.
Speaker A:And I believe that once you become a parent, this responsibility is a definitional.
Speaker A:It's who you have to be for the rest of your time on earth as long as your child is alive.
Speaker A:And so it means that we do things like we compliment our child about the things that we see them as being competent at doing.
Speaker A:We don't give them undue unrealistic praise.
Speaker A:We demonstrate for them that we are doing what we need to do to take care of ourselves.
Speaker A:An example right now would be we are wearing masks when we go out in public.
Speaker A:We are keeping our distance.
Speaker A:We are always being watched by our kids.
Speaker A:We interact with our partner in a way that's civil, that's respectful.
Speaker A:We interact with our child in a way that's always civil and respectful.
Speaker A:And as we, as we grow older and they move from being a small child of seven or eight to a 13 year old to a 15 year old, to a 17 year old, we more and more allow them, I had a horse at one point in the past, for a number of years, we allow them to have their own head.
Speaker A:We allow them to make their own decisions and to make their own errors.
Speaker A:And we don't tell them.
Speaker A:We don't give unsolicited advice.
Speaker A:We're always there.
Speaker A:We're always ready to answer a question, but we don't tell them what to do and how to do it.
Speaker A:One of the things we have to keep in mind is we're raising an adult.
Speaker A:We're not raising a dependent.
Speaker A:We're raising a person who will ultimately be an adult.
Speaker A:And I'll tell you a quick example.
Speaker A:So my son was maybe about 16 or so, and I decided while I was still in New Jersey that I wanted to start doing the kind of thing that you talked about I'm doing in.
Speaker A:In Massachusetts.
Speaker A:I wanted to get chickens.
Speaker A:And so I, I, I got three hens, and I got, you know, I learned all about them.
Speaker A:I went and visited people who had chickens.
Speaker A:And my son said to me one day, he said, he said, dad, a couple friends of mine have said that their parents are thinking about getting chickens, but they said to me, your dad actually got chickens?
Speaker A:And I said to him, and this is kind of a refrain that he.
Speaker A:And I mean, he's now 27.
Speaker A:I said to him, eric, this ain't no dress rehearsal.
Speaker A:And he said, and he said back to me, no, dad, this ain't no amateur hour.
Speaker A:So we got to do.
Speaker A:We got, got to do our lives, and we cut a path for our, for our child.
Speaker A:And they're watching us.
Speaker B:And so, you know, it's.
Speaker B:Some of this is hard, right?
Speaker B:So I think I, I told you about my children because my family loves to give advice, right?
Speaker B:And so I think I told you that my children have taught me they are now 41 and 43.
Speaker B:If, if I'm listening and I'm, you know, oh, that's a.
Speaker B:And then if I say, well, you know, what about this?
Speaker B:Have you tried this?
Speaker B:If I start going down that path, they're so quick to say, mom.
Speaker B:Unsolicited advice, like, oh, right, okay.
Speaker B:But it's so hard sometimes, Ken, how do you stop yourself when you think you know best?
Speaker A:Well, I think it takes practice.
Speaker A:And I think that everything that we do, and we talked about this a bit previously, Wendy, Everything that we do builds on everything that we do now and in the future.
Speaker A:And so we want to put in place the sense that I do not own my kid.
Speaker A:My kid is not mini me.
Speaker A:He's not my last, best hope for my own success in the world.
Speaker A:This is a new soul who I will support and.
Speaker A:And I will increasingly let them be their own person, be Their own adult, face their own dilemmas, face their own consequences.
Speaker A:I think we have to have an ongoing conversation with ourselves and with other adults who we love and respect on how to keep that boundary.
Speaker A:I'm a therapist, I love to give advice.
Speaker A:I advise people on all kinds of different things.
Speaker A:But I know that if I try to give unsolicited advice, here's what it communicates.
Speaker A:It communicates that I don't believe in my kids competence, that I don't think they can handle it, that I feel like I know better.
Speaker A:And none of that is true.
Speaker A:None of it is true.
Speaker A:I certainly don't want them to feel like I don't think they're competent.
Speaker A:I don't want them to feel that I know better about their life.
Speaker A:It's their life.
Speaker A:And so if I want my child to be strong and flexible and be able to think things through, I won't give unsolicited advice.
Speaker A:Now I think it's fine to say, would you like to hear my advice on that?
Speaker A:And it's fine for your child to say yes or no.
Speaker A:That's where it should be.
Speaker A:That's where that boundary should be.
Speaker A:How would you like it if somebody were constantly giving you advice that you didn't ask them for?
Speaker A:You'd feel like they don't believe in you.
Speaker A:Right, right.
Speaker B:I would not like that.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And you're right.
Speaker B:I think that it's a lot about understanding and accepting that their life, their reality is different.
Speaker B:I mean, they have made different choices, they have different friends.
Speaker B:It's different life than what I had.
Speaker A:And you know what, Wendy?
Speaker A:One of the things that I think it's most important to support our child developing is critical thinking skills.
Speaker B:Yeah, tell me about that.
Speaker A:So critical thinking skills cannot be inserted into another person.
Speaker A:They have to be experienced.
Speaker A:They have to be experienced.
Speaker A:So it's kind of like riding a bike.
Speaker A:You have to experience that yourself in order to gain competence at it.
Speaker A:It's like falling in love.
Speaker A:You can't experience that vicariously.
Speaker A:Critical thinking is the same.
Speaker A:So as your child is growing up, it's very important, I believe, to ask them questions about the things that are going on in their lives and to show them and demonstrate to them that you have questions.
Speaker A:So for example, I know the story of parents who are driving home and their minister had been talking about Muslims, had been talking about how Muslims, how Islam is a faith that is violent, is a violent faith.
Speaker A:And they were talking in the car with their children in the back and they were saying, we don't agree with that.
Speaker A:We don't agree with that.
Speaker A:There are violent threads, there are violent traditions in all cultures, including all religious cultures.
Speaker A:But to label any particular faith violent, we don't agree with that.
Speaker A:And we're not.
Speaker A:And we're going to talk to our minister about it, and we're going to.
Speaker A:We may move away.
Speaker A:We may not continue to be in this community of faith.
Speaker A:Having a child be a party to that conversation is once again role modeling for them.
Speaker A:So, for example, you're another example.
Speaker A:You're watching television and you're watching one of these contest shows.
Speaker A:So let's say you're watching the Voice or America's Got Talent or something like that.
Speaker A:And you talk with your.
Speaker A:You have a conversation with your kid afterwards and you ask, what are the values that are being praised and displayed here?
Speaker A:And so maybe things like talent, discipline, what do you think about that?
Speaker A:How do you think about those things?
Speaker A:What are the things you like about what you see and what are the things that you don't like?
Speaker A:And they might say things like, well, I'm not sure everything should be a competition.
Speaker A:And so how do you.
Speaker A:Let's talk about the value of competition, the value of collaboration, how these things weigh out.
Speaker A:You help your child to evaluate what's going on in the world so that they will go forward and they will continue to do that.
Speaker A:And they'll read.
Speaker A:So you read a lot of different things.
Speaker A:You don't just watch the cable news because those are just very narrow pieces of information.
Speaker A:You read other sources of information.
Speaker A:You read in depth about the things that are important or happening in the world today.
Speaker A:And those.
Speaker A:When you do those kinds of things and you talk with your kid about it, you inspire them to do the same.
Speaker A:You inspire them to have a critical perspective on the world.
Speaker A:The world is a very complicated place, and it's getting more and more complicated with what's happening today.
Speaker B:Yeah, I was wondering about, have you had parents reach out to you to ask about how do I talk to the kids about coronavirus?
Speaker B:How do I talk to the kids about social justice?
Speaker B:I mean, there's a lot of stuff going on today.
Speaker B:And parents, grandparents, I don't even know if grandparents are supposed to start in those conversations or if that's a conversation just for the parents.
Speaker A:I think those are conversations for everyone.
Speaker A:I think they're conversations for everyone.
Speaker A:And I think it's very important when it comes to particularly the issues of racial injustice and all kinds of injustice.
Speaker A:They're all interwoven.
Speaker A:They're all expressions of power over, whether it's sexism or racism or homophobia.
Speaker A:But to get really as knowledgeable as you can about it, and, for example, to know that black lives matter is an important statement, an important declaration, an important movement, because history demonstrates in this society that black lives have not mattered.
Speaker A:That we have a history of slavery, and then we have a history of the black codes, which were essentially a reimposition of slavery.
Speaker A:And then we have a history of laws and judges conspiring to disallow black people from even moving north instead arresting them for vagrancy in the train stations and putting them into convict leasing and all of that defunding, never funding the schools for black children.
Speaker A:All of this.
Speaker A:All of this history and the extraordinary history of lynching and racial violence which we see right to this day with Eric Garner, who was lynched in public, with George Floyd, who was lynched in public.
Speaker A:This is important to talk about.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:Should be talked about, and particularly it should be talked about by white people.
Speaker A:Because we have been, throughout our schooling in the public school system, in the university system, we have been taught all kinds of myths.
Speaker A:I mean, things that are extraordinary distortions.
Speaker A:The story of Columbus is an extraordinary distortion.
Speaker A:Columbus was a genocidal maniac.
Speaker A:He came to Hispaniola, and after a short while, he was telling the Arawaks, if they didn't bring a.
Speaker A:A certain amount of gold every month, he would cut off their hands.
Speaker A:And he did this.
Speaker A:Him and his men did this.
Speaker A:They decimated the population almost to the point of annihilation.
Speaker A:And so the history, the real history.
Speaker A:And I'll tell you, there's a wonderful book, and I've got.
Speaker A:I always have some books with me.
Speaker A:A People's History of the United States.
Speaker A:A People's History of the United States by Harold Copy, Howard Zinn, is one of the most important books that all Americans should read, I believe.
Speaker A:A People's History of the United States, we need to know these things and.
Speaker A:And we need to talk about them because we need our kids to be informed.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So, you know, I think as they get older.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So the little ones, I don't.
Speaker B:I don't know how.
Speaker B:I mean, you have to think about.
Speaker B:On their level and.
Speaker B:And what you just said about Columbus, I didn't know that.
Speaker B:So I would have to educate myself on that.
Speaker B:And then when you're talking about critical thinking skills, you know, so you can present some of this, and then how would you have the conversation?
Speaker B:So what do you think about this?
Speaker B:Or how would you do that?
Speaker A:I think I think that when kids.
Speaker A:I remember this from my own son when he would bring home stories about the Mayflower, and it would, you know, around Thanksgiving time, and we would talk about when the settlers came here.
Speaker A:How did they.
Speaker A:How were they greeted?
Speaker A:How were they greeted by the native people of Massachusetts?
Speaker A:And how did it go from there?
Speaker A:Do you know how it went from there?
Speaker A:They were welcomed, right?
Speaker A:They were welcomed.
Speaker A:They were given all kinds of supports, and they.
Speaker A:They presumed to own land that they were welcomed onto by a people who didn't really think of land as being owned.
Speaker A:Land was shared.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Land was something that belonged to everyone.
Speaker A:And so how did that go forward?
Speaker A:You can have conversations about that and say there are stories that were told about our history and that are part of the story.
Speaker A:And I think you just go on and you just continue to have conversations that help your child to not take any bit of information as the whole story when you know that there's a much bigger picture.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So let me just take us a little bit on a turn.
Speaker B:So many of us don't live near family anymore.
Speaker B:I mean, your son's in England, in Germany, and my.
Speaker B:In Germany.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:And my kids are, you know, an hour to six hours away.
Speaker B:So I'm wondering how you would suggest keeping those close relationships going when you're not in that close proximity anymore.
Speaker A:Well, what we're doing right now, I think, is a big part of the solution.
Speaker A:So my son and I Skype at least once a week, and so we have very long conversations.
Speaker A:And his wife, Christina.
Speaker A:My son's name is Eric.
Speaker A:His wife's name is Christina.
Speaker A:Christina, by the way, did the artwork for the COVID of the parenting book.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And so we talked.
Speaker A:We talk regularly.
Speaker A:We talk at length.
Speaker A:I was actually in Germany when the travel ban was imposed, and so was supposed to.
Speaker A:I was in Germany.
Speaker A:I was supposed to be there from March 1 to March 15.
Speaker A:We had to find a way.
Speaker A:It was quite an adventure getting back to the United states before the 13th.
Speaker A:But Eric's mom, who is a dear friend of mine, she and he are in touch all the time similarly.
Speaker A:And so I think it's about, thank God for this technology.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:I mean, that's how.
Speaker A:That's how we do it.
Speaker A:And it's also, I think, has to do with, you know, I think that, as I said, everything that is now grew upon what came before.
Speaker A:So we don't ever want to impose ourselves on our child.
Speaker A:I've had people who will say to me.
Speaker A:I've had clients who will say to Me, you know, my kid, I tell my kid that he never, never calls me and, and wish you would call me more.
Speaker A:And, you know, and I say to them, well, why should they call you?
Speaker A:What's in it for him or her?
Speaker A:You know, they should call you because you're trying to guilt them into calling you.
Speaker A:Like, how would you feel about that?
Speaker A:That's, that's not why you, you talk to somebody because you, you love and, and you get something out of the exchange that feels nourishing, that feels nurturing.
Speaker A:And so that's what you want to be thinking about is what, how do I, when I talk to my child over, over Skype, do I listen to him or her?
Speaker A:Do I know the story of their life at this point?
Speaker A:What's important to them, what they're doing?
Speaker A:Do I check in with them on the things that they're engaged in, or do I expect them to be only accountable to my desire, that they shower me with whatever gratitude or acknowledgement or whatever?
Speaker A:Because again, one of the things that it's really important to keep in mind is as your child becomes an adult, they become more and more what is similar to being a friend, they become more of a peer.
Speaker A:And you will never, you will never share.
Speaker A:Certain.
Speaker A:You're not gonna, there's some things you're not gonna tell your kid, you're not gonna tell them about your intimate life, you're not gonna tell them many, many things.
Speaker A:But, but there's a lot that you will tell them and you'll ask their guy.
Speaker A:Son has some of the best guidance on what I should be listening to today and what I should be reading today to have a leg up on what's current in terms of information that is not corporate sponsored, let's say.
Speaker A:And he does an enormous amount of reading about financial realities and about economics.
Speaker A:And I mean, I defer to his knowledge all the time and I gain from him.
Speaker A:So I mean, that's what happens.
Speaker A:I mean, certainly I give him my guidance on lots of things too, but I never have this sense that I have to one up him or that I have to know better.
Speaker A:That's not what this is about.
Speaker A:When I leave this world, I want my kid to know that he's got it, he's competent, he wasn't ever in competition with me.
Speaker A:He had support from me and his mom and other adults who love and respect him.
Speaker A:There's no competition.
Speaker A:There's no sense that, you know, if he is, there's no sense of him getting too big for his britches or Anything like, I want him to be big.
Speaker A:I want him to have a big life.
Speaker A:That's a testament to what we did supporting him.
Speaker A:And that's the way it should be.
Speaker A:But I don't need him to be.
Speaker A:To be tied to me in some way that is dependent.
Speaker A:No, don't want that.
Speaker B:So your comment about I want him to have a big life is going to lead me to this next question.
Speaker B:Because we all want what we think is the best for our children, right?
Speaker B:We want them to have this happy, fulfilling, successful, independent life, however you define that.
Speaker B:But there was a story in your book where you talked about a very successful couple who had a son who just kind of worked enough to pay the next meal, get the next meal, and then he would take off for a while, his wife the same way.
Speaker B:There was really no big ambitions or anything.
Speaker B:And I.
Speaker B:And I guess they came to you as clients, is that right?
Speaker B:And they.
Speaker B:And you trying to help them.
Speaker B:Well, how do you accept him as who he is?
Speaker A:Right, Right.
Speaker A:Well, very successful.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:That is a personal definition.
Speaker A:Very sick.
Speaker A:So this couple made a lot of money.
Speaker A:They lived in a big house.
Speaker A:They had a lot of things.
Speaker A:And they had a daughter.
Speaker A:They have a daughter who in many ways is following in that kind of path.
Speaker A:And they have a son who doesn't follow that path at all.
Speaker A:He makes music, he works in orchards.
Speaker A:He's close to the earth, he makes poetry.
Speaker A:And he gets by economically.
Speaker A:And what I think is really important is to believe that success comes in many different visions.
Speaker A:That success is not mine to define for somebody else, even my child.
Speaker A:That success is for that person to define.
Speaker A:And what.
Speaker A:That.
Speaker A:What that child will benefit from.
Speaker A:They will never benefit from my judgment of them as a failure.
Speaker A:They will never benefit from that.
Speaker A:That will never help them.
Speaker A:That will only hinder them.
Speaker A:What will help them is your willingness and ability to affirm the things that you see in them that are good, that you see kindness, that you see gentleness, that you see a person who is concerned about relationships.
Speaker A:If you can acknowledge those things, if you can say that you see those things in your child and you value them, that will help them.
Speaker A:But you will never help another human being by telling them what you think they're doing wrong with their lives.
Speaker A:It will not help them if they ask you for guidance.
Speaker A:That's different.
Speaker A:That's always different.
Speaker A:But you don't want to impose your.
Speaker A:I don't want to impose my definition of success on anybody, least of all my child.
Speaker A:It will not do them any good.
Speaker A:It Will only make them feel that you see them as a failure.
Speaker A:And that will be a burden, a huge burden.
Speaker B:I see a couple of comments that have come through people that are saying hello to you that know you.
Speaker B:Heidi says.
Speaker B:Heidi says, I know.
Speaker B:I learned from many things that her mom and dad did.
Speaker B:They were great examples from living life, which is nice.
Speaker B:Comments about.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:It's important to respect differences.
Speaker B:And I. I think you talked about that in the beginning, too.
Speaker B:Whether you're in a partnership or whether you're in a work relationship or whether you're parent, child or adult.
Speaker B:Adult.
Speaker B:You know, respecting differences is really important.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And yeah.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Keep out of.
Speaker A:Don't.
Speaker A:Don't insert yourself in someone else's business.
Speaker A:Don't feel like you know better.
Speaker A:Mind your own business.
Speaker A:And certainly you're, you know, again, we have.
Speaker A:We're powerful in our child's life.
Speaker A:We loom large in our child's life.
Speaker A:We have to use that power in ways that are loving, that are supportive, that are validating.
Speaker A:We don't want to use our power in a way that's dominating.
Speaker A:And so that's always a question, you know, if what I'm thinking of saying or doing, is it loving?
Speaker A:Is it kind?
Speaker A:Is it respectful?
Speaker A:Will it likely be helpful?
Speaker A:Or is it me trying to superimpose my desires, my wills, my sense of what should happen on another person.
Speaker A:Never a good idea.
Speaker A:That's domination.
Speaker B:So what happens?
Speaker B:You know, you've had.
Speaker B:I mean, I know we've all had this, right?
Speaker B:We've had this long day at work.
Speaker B:There's a lot of stress.
Speaker B:What am I making for dinner?
Speaker B:How do I pay the bills?
Speaker B:All of this going on at once.
Speaker B:And you come home and you snap at your kids and you say something that you're like, oh, I shouldn't have said that.
Speaker B:What do you do?
Speaker A:What do you do?
Speaker A:You immediately apologize.
Speaker A:You immediately apologize.
Speaker A:You say, look, that was not okay.
Speaker A:That was not okay.
Speaker A:I lashed out at you.
Speaker A:You.
Speaker A:And it was totally disrespectful.
Speaker A:And I'm really sorry I did it.
Speaker A:And I'm gonna.
Speaker A:When I come home, I'm going to.
Speaker A:I'm gonna take a deep breath.
Speaker A:I'm gonna get myself in a frame of mind where I'm not gonna take out my difficulties on you.
Speaker A:You don't deserve it.
Speaker A:And I'm just really sorry.
Speaker A:And apologizing to your kid is a really important thing to do.
Speaker A:Apologizing and then following through is, again, an extremely important modeling for every one of us.
Speaker A:We have now a President who never apologizes for anything, never takes responsibility for anything, blames somebody else for literally every error that he makes, and he makes them every single moment of the day.
Speaker A:It seems to me, although I won't go, and we are all paying, but we need to take responsibility.
Speaker A:I talk with leaders about this in business organizations all the time.
Speaker A:They'll say, you know, I don't want to, I don't want to reopen the wound.
Speaker A:I don't want to.
Speaker A:I don't want to say I'm sorry because then people won't respect me.
Speaker A:And of course, that's total nonsense.
Speaker A:You will not reopen a wound that's already open.
Speaker A:You will.
Speaker A:It won't happen.
Speaker A:It will not make you appear weak.
Speaker A:It will make you appear much stronger.
Speaker A:That you have the courage and the self awareness to apologize.
Speaker A:It will not bring you farther away from them.
Speaker A:It will bring you closer to them.
Speaker A:So our ability to be self aware, to be appropriately vulnerable, to take responsibility, to apologize, is extremely important and it's powerful in all the right ways.
Speaker B:Yeah, I love that.
Speaker B:I love that.
Speaker B:I have a question here that says, do we share what we think are or were our own failures along the way in our own lives?
Speaker B:Do we share that with our kids?
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:I mean, I'll tell you another story about my life.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker A:And this always brings a smile to my eye because our son was very conscientious about school, kind of too conscientious about school.
Speaker A:And so his mom and I told him, hey, Eric, you know, we didn't always do great in school.
Speaker A:We got B's and C's and D's and, and F's.
Speaker A:And the reason I smile is she, she's.
Speaker A:When she, she was the first one to read my book and she said, ken, I never got Fs.
Speaker A:Maybe you got F. But I told him, you know, we told him that.
Speaker A:We said so, you know, like, lighten up.
Speaker A:Like, don't, you know, look at us.
Speaker A:We're, we're reasonably competent, reasonably effective adults.
Speaker A:So don't worry about it.
Speaker A:And it really helped.
Speaker A:I mean, it helped a lot.
Speaker A:It helped a lot, actually.
Speaker A:Maybe too much.
Speaker A:He got much more relaxed.
Speaker A:And as he got a little older, I told him things about how when I went to college, my first semester, I smoked too much pot, I drank too much.
Speaker A:I was a mess.
Speaker A:And I had a, like had a reckoning with myself.
Speaker A:Like, I gotta get on the ball here.
Speaker A:Well, that made it so that was okay for him to talk with us about those Kinds of things in his own life.
Speaker A:They weren't taboo.
Speaker A:We need our kids to know that.
Speaker A:That we are human beings.
Speaker A:We have life experience.
Speaker A:We're nowhere near perfect.
Speaker A:But if they know that we have had some foibles and challenges.
Speaker A:My kid knows things about me that have really been difficult parts of my life because I think he should be aware in case these kinds of things ever trouble him.
Speaker A:And that's important.
Speaker A:I think you can't come across to your child as though you hold the truth of the universe in the world and do no wrong.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:They're not going to be open.
Speaker A:They're not going to be vulnerable with you if you're never vulnerable with them.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And you have to make it safe for them to feel like they can talk to you.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker B:It was really cute with my daughter.
Speaker B:She used to call my mother and tell on me.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Mommy was being so mean and mommy, dad, and my mother knew enough to, you know, ask her questions, questions and all of that.
Speaker B:And, you know, then I would know about.
Speaker B:But it was like, perfectly fine with me because she needed a place to vent, and that was a safe place.
Speaker B:So I think as long as you collect, can set a safe dialogue.
Speaker B:But they.
Speaker B:They would tell you.
Speaker B:They'll.
Speaker B:Then they'll tell you things that sometimes are uncomfortable for you to hear too.
Speaker A:Right, Right, right.
Speaker B:As a parent, they'll share information about stuff that's happening in their lives.
Speaker B:And you're.
Speaker B:You have to figure out how to deal with that.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And better to know than not know.
Speaker A:Always take that as an extraordinary gift.
Speaker A:That signifies trust, and that's very important.
Speaker A:That's very important.
Speaker A:And be careful how you respond.
Speaker A:And it's even okay not to respond in the moment and to say, I'm really happy you shared that with me.
Speaker A:And I have to think about what's the best way to respond to that.
Speaker A:I think you can.
Speaker A:At certain points, you can insert time in a conversation.
Speaker A:It's very important to keep that in mind.
Speaker A:You can also revisit a conversation later and say, I was thinking about this thing that we were talking about, and I want to come back and tell you some thoughts that I've had.
Speaker A:That also, if you do that, it also tells your kid how important they are to you that you think about things that they've told you.
Speaker A:It really is something that you emotionally work on.
Speaker A:And then you come back to them.
Speaker A:Too many people feel like, well, that happened, it's over.
Speaker A:I don't feel so great about it.
Speaker A:But what are you Going to do well, you.
Speaker A:You reopen it, you revisit it.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:So that you can build that trust.
Speaker B:So, Ken, if there was one thing I know this is hard, one thing that you would like to leave the hey, Boomer listeners with today about being an exceptional but not perfect parent, what would that be?
Speaker B:I would say you could do two if you want.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:One of them is that it's never too late.
Speaker A:That if you have a difficult relationship with your child, that that doesn't mean it has to be difficult for the rest of your life.
Speaker A:There are ways to go about addressing that and approaching in a way that invites a change.
Speaker A:And then the other thing I would say is that there is nothing more important these days than to model critical thinking.
Speaker A:And one of the ways you do that is you read in depth and you don't just pay attention to the sound bites that are on the news.
Speaker A:And I'll give you some additional reading for the moment.
Speaker A:So there's a great book by Ibram Kendi.
Speaker A:It's called how to Be an Anti Racist.
Speaker A:You can see I've got like a million tabs.
Speaker A:A million tabs.
Speaker A:There's an incredible book which maybe you've heard about.
Speaker A:It's called White Fragility.
Speaker A:Crucially important, white fragility.
Speaker A:Robin DeAngelis is the.
Speaker A:Is the author.
Speaker A:And then this is what I'm studying.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:I mean, I've been studying this for decades.
Speaker A:But one more is, and this is one that is just really hard in terms of the knowledge, but I think every white American should know.
Speaker A:It's called White Rage.
Speaker A:It's a real history of where we've been as a society.
Speaker A:And I'll say also I'll do a little pitch for myself.
Speaker A:If you want to talk, you can get in touch with me.
Speaker A:I'll give you a consultation for up to a half hour and then we could talk about an advising engagement if you so desire.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So you can reach Ken, his website, right.
Speaker B:Is kendoland del vecchio.com or greengateleadership.com and that's very generous of you, Ken, to offer that, you know, free consultation.
Speaker B:Thank you for that.
Speaker A:Oh, great.
Speaker A:Great being with you today, Wendy.
Speaker A:This is fun.
Speaker B:Thank you.
Speaker B:So many things that we could talk about still.
Speaker B:So if you're enjoying this broadcast, please go ahead and like it, share it.
Speaker B:I know some people weren't able to join us today that you think would probably benefit from some of the wisdom that Ken shared.
Speaker B:So please go ahead and tag them in the comments and share it.
Speaker B:With them so they get to enjoy it as and next week, my guest, his name is George Jurgen.
Speaker B:He calls himself the Retirement Rebel.
Speaker B:George will challenge your beliefs about retirement.
Speaker B:He currently lives in the UK but he spent many years in the US And I will tell you about him, but he has this whole program to challenge our thoughts on retirement.
Speaker B:So it's, you know, he feels like retirement is deadly.
Speaker B:We have to move away from that whole term.
Speaker B:So please be sure and share it with your friends as well.
Speaker B:Thank you for all of these wonderful comments.
Speaker B:Good information, very helpful.
Speaker B:I really enjoyed this, Ken.
Speaker B:So thank you again.
Speaker A:Yeah, good to hear.
Speaker B:By the way, when I am not doing broadcasting, I am also coaching.
Speaker B:I work with individuals who are navigating transitions, like from work to retirement, who have unmet goals, things that they really always thought they wanted to do and they just haven't done it yet.
Speaker B:And just navigating some of the changes that are going through life.
Speaker B:So that's what I'm doing when I'm not doing this.
Speaker B:So you can reach out to me.
Speaker B:Hit on hey Boomer.
Speaker B:So we all have stories to share.
Speaker B:So let's continue these conversations one story at a time.
Speaker B:My name is Wendy Green with Ken Dolan Del Vecchio, and this has been hey Boomer.
