S3 Episode 5: How To Get There…The Road To Raising An Awesome Adult // Julie Lythcott-Haims JD, MFA

“Over parenting basically sends a message: I don't think you can,  so I will do it. We need to do the opposite; send the message with kindness, empathy, but also empowerment. 'How do you think YOU’RE gonna handle it?'”

-Julie Lythcott-Haims

Healthy Screen Habits Takeaway

Show Transcript

Hillary Wilkinson (00:02):

You're listening to Season 3, Episode 5 of the Healthy Screen Habits Podcast. My conversation today is with an author, speaker, and activist, focused on helping humans, finding their true north. At its core, her work is about the obstacles that prevent people from being our most authentic selves and how to overcome them. She's a New York times bestselling author of the anti-helicopter parenting manifesto, How To Raise An Adult, which gave rise to a popular Ted Talk and is also the author of Your Turn - How To Be An Adult. Julie Lythcott- Haims served as Dean of freshman and undergraduate advising at Stanford university before becoming the associate vice provost for undergraduate education at Stanford. She next went on to pursue opportunities in writing and advocacy and has so many real life connections to young adults. In short, she’s got the experience that we are all looking for. And I have so many questions. I can't wait to dive in. Welcome to the Healthy Screen Habits Podcast, Julie Lythcott- Haims!

Julie Lythcott-Haims (01:23):

Hillary, thank you so much for having me on and I wanna thank all the listeners who've decided to go on a bit of a journey with us today in this episode, if I may say so thank you for the fabulous intro. You left out one piece, which I think is super important for folks to hear, which is I am the mother of a 22 year, year old and a 20 year old. And while I have written about the harm of over-parenting, along the way I discovered I was one of those parents that I was basically critiquing. So I'm here with some form of expertise, uh, from my professional life, but also with the expertise we all have as parents trying to do our best raising our kids. So I wanna be sure that folks know as they listen to me, I tend to be strident and blunt and frank that folks know I'm not judging anybody more harshly than I'm judging myself and I'm in this to help all of us, um, live better lives. So, um, my own kids are very present in my mind as I have this conversation with you and your listeners today, Hillary.

Hillary WIlkinson (02:26):

Oh thank you. So we're in this time of kind of unprecedented access to information, but yet we seem to struggle more than ever with the challenges of over parenting and screen time management and because your path in life and  experience has led you sort of into this realm, you have this superpower of being visionary in the long game of raising, not a child, but an adult. And so you living in Silicon valley, you have a very interesting perspective on technology. And can you talk a little bit about how your experiences may have affected your own path in parenting your two kids or how you have seen it affect others?

Julie Lythcott-Haims (03:23):

I think, um, the intersection of over parenting and technology for me is when we're over parenting, particularly if we're the type that's trying to be our kids' best friend. So we're just trying to, you know, we wanna have a great relationship with them and we wanna always say yes and we wanna be their best friend and we wanna just help them out wherever. Uh, we possibly can. All of this very animated by love. We are failing to set boundaries, rules, expectations, um, hard lines that we want our kids not to cross. We're so worried about them liking us and uh, kind of just showing up and being helpful and useful that we're failing to show up in our authority as the elders in their lives, who are supposed to be articulating values, expectations, boundaries, using good judgment and all of that. And this is where technology and, and screen time comes in.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (04:20):

If we are so needing our kids to like us, that we're trying to just smooth the path and we never wanna say no, it's impossible for us to set expectations around screen use. I am a case study in this. I can tell you that. I know the experts have said don't charge your phones in bedrooms at night. You know, there are people who have written about this extensively, Tiffany Shlain, Common Sense Media, you know, all kinds of people who are experts in this area will say it's a healthy family habit to have the phones charging outside of the bedrooms for everybody. I know this and yet I was not the parent who could set that expectation in my own house. Why? Cuz I didn't want the blow back. I just was trying to make things easy and smooth. And therefore I didn't say folks, we need to not have phones in your bedrooms or our, or your dad's in my bedroom at night.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (05:19):

Um, and I, and I'm telling you this because I know I, I did not feel confident that I could stand in my spot as a couple of writers with a forthcoming book put it, um, stand in my spot as a parent and say, this is the rule in our house. I was afraid to set the rule. I think I was afraid my kids wouldn't listen or my kids wouldn't like me or things would be, you know, challenging in the house. So for those raising kids who are younger, um, ask yourself, what am I so ask yourself, this, this is how, um, Ole Jorgenson and Sherry Glucoff Wong put it in their forthcoming book, uh, which is about parenting from your spot. They say, you don't compromise on seatbelts. You make your kid wear a seatbelt. If they refuse, you're not gonna move the car.  Period.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (06:11):

We are clear, this is our authority. This is a rule. We have to ask ourselves.  We know the research about how excessive screen time is harmful to kids and how they need to have their sleep and how they need to have a good hour of no screen time before sleep. If they're to have right. We know this. If we could treat the imperative around healthy screen habits, the way we treat imperative to wear a seatbelt, we would do it. It's we simply don't feel we have the authority over that topic. And it's our inability to claim the authority. That's the real problem there.

Hillary WIlkinson (06:49):

I could not agree with you more. And that comparison between cars and technology is one that gets used often. So I love that you access that because it's one that we, we do reference and we wouldn't hand a 15 year old keys to a Ferrari and say, make good choices, you know? So we need to approach it with the same eye for safety that we do with driving these thousands of pounds hunks of metal that we drive around. Right, right. Yeah. I also appreciate that you, uh, used the phrase elders. We need to become elders for our children. I think that's such a beautiful term that doesn't get used enough because it connotes wisdom and time spent in life that we can draw from. So you're, you're just a wordsmith!

Julie Lythcott-Haims (07:45):

<laugh> I love it. And we're cause when we're trying to be the, uh, hip, I'm just going with the flow, I'm your best friend. I'll show up, handle and help. We're  trying to actually be younger. And that of course appeals to our own quest for the fountain of youth and our midlife crisis and so on. And so I love that you reflected back to me that I use the word elder. Can we embrace the fact that we are older? That we have lived more of life, that we do know more things instead of feeling somehow saddened by that, you know, how about we champion that and say, you know, I don't have all the answers, but I have lived more of life and I do have a sense of how things work, you know, bring humility to it, but also bring some confidence to the fact that we're the grownups here and need the grownups to say no, no, no, this is the, this is the boundary.

Hillary WIlkinson (08:32):

Yes. So I quote you honestly all the time in presentations, there's one phrase that honestly, and I always give you credit <laugh> that's great. But in How To Raise An Adult, you use a phrase that I think speaks uniquely to parenting in the digital age. Yeah. And that is you call the cell phone, "the world's longest umbilical cord". People immediately know what that means. Can you talk about like a little bit more about that phrase and what it means to you?

Julie Lythcott-Haims (09:17):

Sure thing. And I you've given me credit, which I appreciate, I need to give credit. Uh, I put it in my book and I, I say in my book that actually there's a set of researchers that came up with that term. And so I was quoting them. Um, and unfortunately I don't have their names handy. In fact, I probably just said in my books were researchers now call it. Um, but it isn't a term that I originated. Um, but I'm certainly happy to amplify it. And here's why I use it. I was a Dean on a college campus, as you said in the intro, um, in an era that was before the smartphone and after, and I will tell you that, uh, before the smartphone, we certainly had parents who were trying to be very involved in their college students day to day lives. We were seeing as early as the late nineties parents who felt they had to fill out forms, register their student for class, argue about a grade, do the things that a we'd expect a student to be able to do.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (10:14):

But the rate of the, those things dramatically increased with the arrival of the smartphone, which was 2007. Um, and my hypothesis as to why is, and why the, the cell phone does in fact, or the smartphone does in fact function as an umbilical cord, if you recall it, we, parents could not figure out how to text before the smartphone. Kids were texting with flip phones. But just remember with a flip phone before there was a smart keyboard you had to push numbers. You had to, to push 3, 3, 3, 4, 4, 7, 7, 7 in order to get to the letter that belonged to number. I mean, this sounds very wonky, but just remember: that's the way it was. And it was impossible. Kids could fly their fingers across flip phones and text each other, but we didn't know how. It was a technology that alluded us.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (11:10):

The smartphone enabled parents to text. And once that happened and our kids had a phone and we had a phone, then we could constantly be interacting with them in this fun. Let's face it texting when it was new, certainly was fun. Like email was fun once a fun a time. Okay. We began doing it. And I saw college students constantly sending and receiving texts from home throughout the day. You know, after class text text parent, before class text, in a meeting with me, you know, where I'm the kids come,  to see me about some big question they have about their lives and their phone buzzes. And they look at it and they shrug their shoulders and they say, "It's my mom." And then they respond to her! So the etiquette and the courtesy of "I'm in a meeting with somebody, I probably shouldn't look at my phone."

Julie Lythcott-Haims (12:06):

All of that was out the window. And I was just observing all of this going, "What the heck is going on?!" And, uh, so that's my take on the umbilical cord. Basically. We're always there. We're always there always. So when a kid is lost or feels, they're lost, they go to a job in a new city. It's a summer internship or a summer job. They're a college student, they're in a new city. They come up outta the subway. They don't know where to go, to get to their building. They text a parent, Instead of using the map app on the phone or going into a store and saying, um, excuse me, I'm looking for eighth street, right? None of that happens anymore because mom, dad, parent/parent is accessible by this device and that feels loving and tender and wonderful and close. But we just have to ask ourselves what's gonna happen to these kids when we can't answer? When we have gone to, uh, to our demise, we're no longer here. If we are constantly their source of information, problem solving, handling via the cell phone, the smartphone, what are we doing? We're setting them up for a huge, huge cliff to fall off of when we're gone. Exactly. They got to learn to access the people in their environment and their own ability to problem solve rather than let that smartphone be an umbilical cord back to the womb to us.

Hillary WIlkinson (13:34):

Right. And remove our ego from their path forward, you know, become their cheerleader from the side, but not be the person who is funneling them.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (13:49):

Right. Because when we funnel them, it looks like we're getting them somewhere. And we sort of are cuz with our help, they're getting there. But again, ask yourself when you're not there. What do you think your kid's gonna be capable of? Very little, right? Because you've been this enormous support that was always there. You have deprived them of developing the skills to do stuff and think through stuff and solve a problem and so on. So it's all of the this over help ends up undermining. The, the more loving thing to do is to say to ourselves, you know what? I'm parenting for the long term. One day I'll be dead and gone. And this kid needs to be able to do everything for themselves one day, not today, but one day. So the loving thing is to give them opportunities to learn and grow. So when they text with a problem, whether it's a fourth grader, who's like, "oh no, I left my backpack at school!" Or a 20 year old in college.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (14:43):

Who's like, "oh no, I lost my backpack." <laugh> neither of those circumstances is our problem. Right? We should empathize and empower - to the fourth grader and the 20 year old we should text back. Oh no. I'm so sorry. That must feel awful. I love you. Empathize,  the next phrase is "how do you think you're gonna handle that?" That implies it's the, to handle it also implies. I know you can and you know what, that's what they need to hear from us.  Over parenting basically sends a message. I don't think you can. So I will do it. We need to do the opposite, sending the message with kindness, empathy, but also empowerment. How do you think you're gonna handle it? You know, I'm always here. If you need advice, right. But you're not gonna say, oh no, I need to go deal with that.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (15:35):

I need... No, it's their life! It's their responsibility. It's how they learn to be accountable. It's how they learn to remember. Okay. The more loving thing is to let them experience that consequence. In most instances, if it's the big day of the big test, the big recital, the big sporting game, you know, that's not the day to teach the lesson. That's the day to rescue and show up and be helpful. But if there's a consistent pattern of them forgetting or they're, you know, not being able to be responsible, we have to hold those lines. Yes. And let them experience those consequences and learn from them.

Hillary WIlkinson (16:09):

Yes, The rule in our house is everybody gets one hall pass. Everybody has a bad day, but two tells me there's a behavioral pattern starting and we have to work to change that. Nice.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (16:23):

So yeah, I like that one hall pass.

Hillary WIlkinson (16:24):

I'm really interested to hear more, but first we have to take a little break.

Hillary Wilkinson:

My guest today is Julie Lythcott-Haims. Julie currently serves on the board of common sense media and the black women's health imperative and on the advisory board of LeanIn.org and parents magazine.

Hillary WIlkinson (17:09):

Since publishing How To Raise An Adult in 2015, our world seems only to have kind of increased in this swirl of tech involvement in all areas. And that being said, I do believe there's just from the work that I've done. There's a greater awareness for the need for intention around parenting and our digital life. Um, somehow the term "hashtag adulting" <laugh> got associated with all like negative things in life <laugh> mm-hmm <affirmative> and it, it speaks to like just what we were talking about prior to the break about this phrase adulating.  How did that come to be?

Julie Lythcott-Haims (18:03):

Oh, I have a lot of thoughts. First is compassion, frankly. Um, a bunch of millennials quite some time ago now began saying, I don't know how to adult, I don't wanna, adult adulting is scary. They were the generation to turn the, the noun "adult", um, into a verb, um, that they expressed fear around doing or inability to do. Um, I, uh, can only presume that our having raised them with such, close, hovering by us, resulted in them emerging out from 18/19 into the world of college or the workplace or trade school or community college, less equipped to do stuff. Why? Cause we had handled too much, we had tracked their deadlines. We had brought them their backpack when they forgot it, we had, um, tied their shoes too long. We cut their meat too long. We didn't teach them to cross the street cuz we were so afraid.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (19:02):

We just constantly looked both ways for them. We did all of these things to be loving and protective, but then they are grown and they go out and they're like, "Whoa, I can't handle any of this!" Childhood was supposed to be this lovely gradual on-ramp to adult life. And instead it's been this very protected care taking period of life. And then we're like, "Hello! Now you're an adult." Well, of course they're terrified. So, um, I think it is in part in response to the way in which they were perhaps over tended in childhood, making them less prepared for adulthood. Let's let me be clear on the definition. "Adulting" is simply being more or less responsible for yourself. Whereas in childhood you are more or less the responsibility of someone else. Assuming your parents are able and capable. Okay. That's the shift. It's like you go from being in the car seat where someone else is driving you through life, to being in the driver's seat, to get back to our car analogy, which is perfect for so many reasons.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (19:59):

Okay? Doesn't mean you don't have a community and people who love you, but you're more or less responsible for what I call the four Bs, your body, your bills, your belongings, your business, okay. You gotta be responsible for yourself. So that's, there's a whole generation of folks who felt "I don't want to. I can't I'm terrified." And for reasons I've said another reason is frankly, to be really honest, I think we've managed to make adulting look just boring and awful. The adults in our kids lives. If you think about it, when we're hovering, when we're always there, when we always have to know how'd you do on the quiz, what happened on this test? You know, why didn't your play date with so and so happen? You know, when we're just obsessed over every moment, imagine the child looking into the face of a grownup parent today, parents look stressed, parents look, anxious, parents look worried, or parents are constantly just there, like watching your life.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (20:59):

It, we have not modeled a healthy, balanced adult life. When I was a child I'm Gen X, I'm 54, the adults looked like they were having so much fun. I couldn't wait to be an adult. Right. You know, they, they drive a car, they hung with each other. They went, you know, they had dinners and they went to concerts and they went to ball games and they, they, they didn't, we weren't their everything.  We mattered to them, but they also had other things going on, which frankly, as the healthy balance, we wanted to grow up and be like, like, look how free they are. You know, I think the way we've parented has made adulthood look unattractive.

Hillary WIlkinson (21:36):

Recognizing that, that is kind of a, a millennial trademark, have you seen a shift in the pendulum at all? Idon't even know are gen Zers old enough to be entering into that phase yet?

Julie Lythcott-Haims (21:56):

Gen Z is a whole new kettle of fish and I'm so excited for gen Z because they are fed up. They are fed up with all of it and um, they have to technology plus voice. Um, they have a clear sense of right and wrong and that the gro, the elders have failed them around gun safety and climate and socioeconomic stuff and race. They just fed up and I love them. Um, and many of them have been over parented and are still, and are also saying, I don't know how to adult. I don't, you know, I'm scared. Um, so we shall see, we shall see. I think that the very interesting question is : how are millennials if they're choosing to have kids... And of course, many of them aren't, but those who are, how are they parenting? Are they amping it up? And are they Uber over parenting to degree so that they've got the Instagram comparable, perfect child, perfect toddler, perfect everything.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (22:56):

Or are they saying, oh my gosh, my parents were so hovering over my life. I'm gonna give my own child more room to grow more room to fall and fail and learn lessons and become healthy and whole. I mean, cuz I think what, what I'm really trying to say is the research is clear that there's a correlation between over parenting and undermining mental health. And a lot of millennials are coming to terms with the fact that, oh, my anxiety might have something to do with my parents always making sure everything was fine. Always, you know, not letting me have my feelings, but like smoothing the path. So I never experienced anything bad there's research that shows that contributes to anxiety in young people. So if they know that if they've learned that lesson through their own journey, maybe now they're pivoting and are behaving in a more healthy way with their own kids. Um, so the children of millennials, we shall

see who they become. Uh, are they gonna be over parented or is the pendulum swinging back?

Hillary WIlkinson (23:53):

Mm. Okay. So what areas of digital life and screen habits do you see as being the most problematic for young adults today?

Julie Lythcott-Haims (24:02):

When I talk to young people, they say I've never had any downtime. I'm afraid of downtime. Oh, I'm afraid if I'm not constantly doing something I'm flawed, something's wrong. And I think this is where technology sort of feeds the, you have some downtime, you're waiting in a line you're um, you've ordered some food and it's not here. You know, look at the phone, right. You always have to be sort of, I don't know, experiencing new information. You always have to be scanning. You always have to be checking. You always have to be looking, uh, for your notifications and what are your friends doing? And so on there, there isn't this space anymore to breathe, to just be alone as a human in nature in your own home space where we just us do nothing. Mm-hmm <affirmative>, there's been this, all of this language around that being, um, non-productive or a waste of time when people who study what makes us well insist that no, we need some downtime.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (25:24):

We need some time when we are not doing any of these things. Um, uh, in order to create, feel, create, relax, regulate all of that. So, so that's what I think is it's the omnipresence, it's the it's and I'm guilty of the I'm as guilty of this as anyone I've just said to myself, God, Julie, put the phone down! I can get into this endless loop of checking. I go from my email to my Instagram, to my Twitter, to my Facebook, to my, to check how my Ted talk is doing to check how my books are selling. I just can go on this loop. And then when I'm done checking in on how my books are selling, I can go back to my email. I can just, I can just do this loop for hours <affirmative> and um, I know if I'm guilty of it, we can all be guilty of it. Oh yeah. You know, we, we've got to figure out, I mean, this they've built these things to be, uh, addictive.

Hillary WIlkinson (26:21):

We've had lots of talks on persuasive technology <laugh> so, so it seems like there are a lot of negative statements about tech and teens. And do you say, what are some of the things that you might see are positives happening with our digital natives? I love how you focus on that gen Z perspective of they have tech and a voice.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (26:49):

Yeah, well here's an example, uh, folks who have some kind of chronic disease and autoimmune disease, a disease that is perhaps considered invisible quote unquote, but nevertheless is present and very, um, problematic, um, have a concept called spoons, which is the notion that you have a certain set of spoons to use in a day. And spoons are basically the energy. It takes to do anything to shower, to eat, to go to the grocery store, to do whatever. And if you use up all of today's spoons and even borrow some of tomorrow’s spoons - tomorrow, you'll be very depleted. And this is, um, a wonderful concept for people who have such struggles and they can find each other more easily globally. Thanks to technology. There are all kinds of communities of folks who have certain conditions, diagnoses, challenges, entities, ways of being in the world. Um, and folks can find one another thanks to technology and social media in a way that was impossible until 10, 13 years ago. Right. Right. So what a huge upside, right? If you're a queer kid and you're living in a town or a state where being is really, um, because people are prejudice against you, you can find support and community thanks to technology.

Hillary WIlkinson (28:11):

Yeah. Yeah. That's great. Do you have any favorite resources for teens or young adults or somebody looking for something like that?

Julie Lythcott-Haims (28:21):

I think hashtags, Okay. You know, figure out the hashtags that relate to your particular, uh, identity or life circumstance I know on, um, people are, uh, using hashtags quite effectively to curate content, frankly, I like to watch TikTok videos. Um, I have learned so much about, about anxiety around mental health, more broadly from TikTok. Um, if you decide to follow certain hashtags, your TikTok videos will be curated for you. It'll deliver the content you're looking for. And, um, so I think whether it's TikTok or Instagram, um, these are places where you can start to discover and follow and contribute to the experience of others around communities and topics that matter to you

Hillary WIlkinson (29:34):

Using hashtags. Hmm. Yeah. That's great. I'm positive. I, I would not have thought of that.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (29:40):

<laugh> well, let me put it this way. I thought TikTok was just a bunch of people dancing. When I first learned about TikTok, it was like dance, dance, dance, this dance trend, follow it. And I was like, what, what don't these people have jobs? My first thought, what I've come to appreciate is yes, there are a lot of people who like to dance and they do that on TikTok, but there's all of this information. People share stories of struggle of loss, of recovery from all kinds of situations on TikTok.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (30:06):

I mean, my TikTok feed is this incredibly empowering set of stories from humans who have opened up and decided to be vulnerable, which is exactly what I'm about in my writing. So, um, what a lovely thing to discover that this new tech technology that I thought was just like where the 12 year olds hang out and dance is actually a place that can deliver through video content, really, really meaningful stuff.

Hillary WIlkinson (30:32):

And you, if you know, your kids are, are utilizing that platform, you also have a more effective voice then in talking with them because as you also are using the same platform that they're at.

When we come back after the short break, I'm gonna ask Julie Lythcott-Haims for her healthy screen habit.

-------Ad Break – HSH website----------------

Hillary Wilkinson:

I'm talking with Julie Lythcott-Haims parenting expert and advocate for humanity who is on a quest to bring anti-racist decolonized and inclusive approaches to publishing by normalizing and centering underrepresented populations. As we enter Black History Month this year, I encourage listeners to check out her memoir Real American, as well as - continue to pursue and promote black artists, content, creators, and business owners. Now Julie, on every, I ask each guest for a healthy screen habit. This is a tip or takeaway that our listeners can put into practice in their own home. Do you have one for us?

Julie Lythcott-Haims (32:14):

I do. The first thing I wanna say though, is thank you for, uh, letting your listeners know about Real American. This is my offering as a black biracial person, uh, around what life has been like in this skin with these features and this hair, um, dealing with micro aggressions and racism. And this book is saying basically, aren't we all real Americans? Ain't I real American? So if anyone resonates with that on their own or you know, on behalf of people they know and love, I hope they'll check it out. Um, here's my, my healthy habit. It's a bit of a twist on your question, but um, I like to say folks, "it's not Kuman it's the vacuum." Okay. We think that our kids need all of this enrichment, technological enrichment, um, academic of make enrichment more broadly and yes, enrichment is good, but we've become so obsessed with that.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (33:03):

We've completely forgotten chores. Okay. Chores are the way that kids build a work ethic. They learn how to be accountable and responsible, roll up their sleeves, pitch in, be useful. And that skill not only helps the fan family life function more smoothly and equitably, but when they get out into the workforce, they're gonna be the person who anticipates, how can I make things better? How can I advance the cause here? How can I help my boss? Right? Instead of just being these kids who are accustomed to constantly being enriched by the adults around them. So remember this, "it's not Kumon, its the vacuum! Chores build work ethic. Get your kids off their screens. <laugh> and helping out around the house, garbage, recycling, dishes, laundry, dusting, putting things away, cleaning the gutters, getting up on the roof and cleaning the solar panels. If you've got them like we do here. Right? All of these things. It's not, you're not being mean. You're asking your kid to be a part of a family to join the family club.

Hillary WIlkinson (34:11):

Building competence, which I absolutely, I think competence builds confidence. Exactly. And yeah, I love that. And uh, my kids do not enjoy that message so much.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (34:22):

<laugh> Look, I didn't know that chores were important, Hillary and everybody listening. You've got this expert me how to raise an adult. I wrote this book. It did very well. I did not know that chores mattered until I wrote that book. <laugh> okay. I love it. And I was like, oh no, the research clear. I'm supposed to be giving my, and I thought, well, how can I? I live in Silicon Valley. We're so busy here. They have to do their academics. They got okay. I had to shift myself. So anybody listening don't feel ashamed, How To Raise An Adult has three pages of chores lists, which you're gonna blow your mind. If you did not start early, the list shows what two and three year olds can do. And four, five year olds, you are gonna blow. It's gonna blow your mind. I was, my kids were 10 and 12 when I learned how important chores were. Okay. Yeah. So, uh, it's time. Very good. And in fact, you can say to your kid, if they balk you can say, they're gonna say, why are you giving us chores? Now, if it's so important, you'll say we just learned, it's important. We're gonna make up for lost time. Here's the vacuum, you know, know <laugh> exactly. Claim your authority.

Hillary WIlkinson (35:25):

Very Good. Oh Julie, thank you so much for being here today. I will link your books in the show notes to this episode, but is there anywhere else that you'd like to direct people to find out more information about you or merch or anything along those lines?

Julie Lythcott-Haims (35:42):

I love it. Yes. Thank you. I blog weekly, um, in a space I call Julie's Pod, which comes with a free sticker. If you, uh, direct message me or email me for it, I'll send you one Julie's Pod is found at Jlythcotthaims.bulletin.com. Subscribe, you'll get me in your inbox. I basically share pretty vulnerably about stuff I'm going through or noticing. And I invite you to comment to it comes with a hotline that you can call 1 8, 7, 7. Hi, Julie. If you're not comfortable, um, uh, commenting in public, you can call me and leave an anonymous voicemail, which I roll up on Facebook live every Monday at noon Pacific. So I'm really trying to create space and hold space for all of us to be our vulnerable, authentic selves. Cuz I know that's how we feel a sense of belonging and uh, less alone and how we thrive.

Hillary WIlkinson (36:36):

Just beautiful. You're making such a dent in humanity or I, I shouldn't say a dent in humanity. You're raising humanity to a, a higher level.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (36:47):

<laugh> I'm just a person who's imperfect and very, very interested in all of us knowing we're okay. And that when we can be kind to one another and treat each other with dignity, share the muck and goo of our actual experience we feel and actually are more connected. And that is everything.

Hillary WIlkinson (37:09):

I cannot agree with you more. Thank you so much for coming on today.

Julie Lythcott-Haims (37:13):

Thank you Hillary. And thanks to everyone who's who listened really want to encourage all to ask yourself why, what resonated, what do I wanna take forward for every listener it'll be different. Um, but for every listener, whatever it was, it matters.