Things You Learn in Therapy
Things You Learn in Therapy
Dirty Socks and Good Deeds: Growing Kids Who Step Up
What separates those who merely notice problems from those who actually solve them? In this enlightening conversation, Leslie Bolser and Dr. Beth Trammell tackle the powerful concept of initiative—defined as "seeing what needs to be done and doing it"—and why this two-part skill proves challenging for people of all ages.
The discussion moves through developmental stages, offering practical advice for nurturing initiative from preschool through adolescence. For the youngest children, initiative begins with explicit instruction and modeling, teaching them to notice when someone's crying or playing alone and giving them the words to respond. Elementary-aged children benefit from increased accountability and conversations that highlight the hundreds of small initiatives we take daily that often go unnoticed.
While adolescents often have brilliant solutions to problems, they may wait for permission or struggle with anxiety about taking action. The hosts share strategies for empowering teens to overcome "analysis paralysis" and act on their insights, while acknowledging that even as adults, they're still working on modeling initiative consistently in their own families.
This episode emphasizes initiative beyond household chores. While picking up after yourself matters, we explore the deeper relational aspects of initiative—noticing someone in need, including others who feel left out, and addressing community concerns.
This podcast is meant to be a resource for the general public, as well as fellow therapists/psychologists. It is NOT meant to replace the meaningful work of individual or family therapy. Please seek professional help in your area if you are struggling. #breakthestigma #makewordsmatter #thingsyoulearnintherapy #thingsyoulearnintherapypodcast
If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health concerns, please contact 988 or seek a treatment provider in your area.
If you are a therapist or psychologist and want to be a guest on the show, please complete this form to apply: https://forms.gle/ooy8QirpgL2JSLhP6
Feel free to share your thoughts at www.makewordsmatterforgood.com or email me at Beth@makewordsmatterforgood.com
www.bethtrammell.com
Hey everybody, welcome back. We're at the end of the school year, which is a very, very exciting time, and this is a great word to wrap up the school year with. So we're going to jump right in. Welcome to the Core Essentials podcast. I'm Leslie Bolster. I'm the creative director for Core Essentials. The creative director for Core Essentials. We are a curriculum company that works with schools and communities and families to help kids live out these words each month that we talk about and apply them in their families and their schools and in their communities, and I'm always here with my friend, dr Beth Trammell. Beth, can you introduce yourself?
Speaker 2:Yes, I'm so glad to be here and it's actually kind of an interesting word for the end of the school year. But really summer be here and it's actually kind of an interesting word for the end of the school year, but really summer, yeah. So yeah, I'm a psychologist, I'm a professor of psychology at Indiana University East in Richmond, indiana. I'm the director of the master's mental health counseling program and I love to help whoever I'm with or talking to, and I try to practice this in my own world of using words for good and so, yeah, making sure we can make words matter for good.
Speaker 1:Excellent. Well, let's help some parents do that today. Let's talk about it. So the word that we're talking about this month for May is initiative, and the way we're describing that is seeing what needs to be done and doing it. So it's kind of a two-parter right. It's noticing or seeing something that needs to be fixed or done or taken care of or helped with, and then taking action after you've noticed it and doing it. So lots of people are good at the first part. Yes, children and adults alike. Yes, second one, that can be when right.
Speaker 2:I think they're good at doing it when it when they can be, when right. I think they're good at doing it when it when they assume they don't have to do the second part. Uh, yeah, yeah. So it's like oh you, brother, left your shoes on the floor. Yeah then, doesn't recognize that his hoodie is in the middle of the dining table.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure, yeah. So it's pretty easy to see what needs to be done. The trick is then doing what needs to be done.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I mean, I think about kids of all ages for this one, and particularly with chores, right?
Speaker 2:So we're kind of starting in this kind of idea of chores or really just like living in a space with another person, right?
Speaker 2:So I think chores for kids are brilliant, and I am constantly talking with parents about really encouraging your kids to do more chores, not less, because they have to develop these skills of independence.
Speaker 2:You know, it's like kids can do their own laundry, they can put dishes away, they can learn how to use the vacuum, or you know a dusting, you know a dusting wand, but these are things that are like. This is just how to like live in a space with someone, and so if they get a job, if they're in the classroom, like teachers are constantly asking kids to notice what things need to be done, and then if you notice something needs to be done, you don't have to come tell me that this needs to be done if you can also help do it yourself, and so I think it's setting a culture or setting a standard, and if your kids at home aren't meeting that standard, then how can you continue to be explicit and telling them here's the standard, right, when the trash gets to this point. It's your job, when you open it and you see the trash is to this point, to then take the trash out, not wait for somebody else to do it.
Speaker 1:Not just set the milk carton or the box next to the trash.
Speaker 2:Not next to the trash precisely.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's great. So we kind of jumped right in on this and kind of went across all ages. But is there anything specific when we talk about the very youngest of our kids? Is there a way that you help them notice things that need to be done and then just take the initiative to do it?
Speaker 2:I mean, I'm always, always talking about our preschoolers and just how much training they need and how much clarity and instruction they need from us, and so they're really learning. That's when we're really setting the tone for what, what kind of culture or what kind of standard we're going to have for them again, not just at the house, but everywhere they go. So you know, I think it's determining what do you want them to know about the world in terms of like, seeing what needs to be done and then doing it. So you know, we're talking about like things around the house, but let's talk about, you know, when somebody in public is crying.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Do you want your kids to see something that should be done about that and do you want them to do something about that? What do we do when you know there is a person who is homeless at the stoplight? You know a person who is homeless at the stoplight. You know what is your philosophy around that and our kids, even at a very young age. That's when we're training them, that's when we're having conversations with them about. This is what our family believes about these kinds of things or these relationships with people, and this is what we want you to do about it yeah, yeah, that's.
Speaker 1:that's a great point, because you know what one family, what their values are or what their um understandings and expectations are around taking initiative, might be different than another's, and that's okay. Um, it's just kind of important as a parent to know what those are and to be able to talk to your kid about them, because for some people, the initiative is the most important thing, and then for other people, they may have values that supersede that, that they want their kids to know about, that are important a little bit different.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean. So I think about our preschoolers and like teaching them about sharing, for example, and teaching them about including. So you know, your four and five year olds if they're not in school, then you know learning those skills of sharing and including other friends to sit with them at the table. Or hey, do you want to come play with me with the Legos, like those are. Those are perfect examples of like noticing that something needs to be done. Yeah, this is how I'm going to do that, so they might need the words to say hey, do you want to come play with me? Or hey, can I play with you? Right? So sometimes it really is like actually giving them those words and then putting them in a situation. Maybe it's a play date, or you go to you know a community center where there's something going on, and then you're you're like explicitly training them on how you want them to behave in these situations.
Speaker 2:That's what initiative really is all about at that age.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's great, and you're using really relational examples, right? Not pick your sweatshirt up off the dining room table so much as when you see someone in this kind of state or someone who's alone and maybe one should come eat with you or whatever. That's an important spin on initiative too. Okay. So as kids get older elementary school, early middle school anything that changes there? Is it just more conversation around it, or is it kind of similar to when they're younger?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I think it's more conversation and it's more accountability. Okay, so it's just the continued accountability around those things that we've been talking about. And if you're a parent who's like, I've never had those conversations with my preschooler and now my kid is 12. Great, now we can start. You know, now we can start. You know now we can start. And so anytime as a parent you feel moved to do something, your kids may not actually see your initiative and it gives us an opportunity.
Speaker 2:Now, look, I do like 100 things a day. You know, it's like I'm getting up and I've got to get the broccoli out of the freezer so that I can put it in the casserole. You know my kids aren't seeing that as initiative. Oh, I see something that needs to be done and I do it. But I think it does give us opportunity to use any of those moments as teaching moments toward initiative. I think sometimes we think about initiative as this like big word or this big thing that, well, I have to wait until there's something. You know, I have to wait till we have this experience that I can teach them about initiative. Well, you gotta take initiative to talk to your coach because you're not getting enough playing time. It's like initiative happens hundreds of times a day.
Speaker 1:Like that's all really really good points and it's making me think, as we move on to the older kids, about the same conversations or same examples with them.
Speaker 1:And I think you know, today, just today, I was meeting with a group of high school students and asking them their opinion about some issues in the community and ways that we could address it, and at the end they were kind of a little indignant and they were saying no one ever asks us. You know, would would just be so great because we have really great answers, but adults just don't ask us. And I fell into the trap of being like, yeah, you're right, we need to ask you more, where I should have just said why do you need to be asked if these things, you're aware of these things and you have the answers which, by the way they did, they had fantastic answers to some of the problems that we're facing I should have just said, hey, go for it. Find somebody who will back you and go for it, because you do have answers, you do have good ideas and you don't need permission from an adult to take advantage of something that you see that needs to happen.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love that. That empowering our teenagers to see something, take initiative, take action, I think is great. And then I think the other side of that is our teenagers then might also start to become a little more aware of anxiety around taking initiative towards certain things, and so then we might fall into you know kind of analysis, paralysis, sort of scenarios where oh gosh, I really know I need to apply for those scholarships or I need to apply for that job, or, you know, I need to have this conversation with this person I'm in a relationship with.
Speaker 2:I know it needs to happen, I see what needs to be done, but I'm afraid to do it, and so.
Speaker 2:I'm just going to pretend like I don't have to do it. And so I think those moments where we have done our job and training our teenagers, we've encouraged them to see what needs to be done and then kind of guiding them along how to do it well, I think that's kind of the bigger piece is, you know, they're still trying to learn how to navigate so many things in their lives, as we're pushing them towards more independence, that they may need more guidance on the doing it well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's really great. All right, anything else to close out today before we wrap up?
Speaker 2:I mean, I kind of always come back to this, but I think we always have to be aware of how we're modeling all of the words we're trying to teach. And so when I think about how do I model initiative just last night I was kind of grumbling about how my teenagers don't ever ask me what do you need, mom? What do you need today, mom? They're like well, we don't ask you because we already know. You know, they already know they do. You know, one teenager does dishes one night. The other teenager does dishes the next night.
Speaker 2:The little boys unload the dishwasher together every morning. You know they all like have the chores they're supposed to do and they've been doing them. And they're like well, we don't have to ask you because we always just do it. But there's 100 other ways that I, you know I could use this word initiative where I see things that need to be done and then I do them. Yeah, it'd be nice if you could just be like hey, I see that this needs to be done, I see all the junk on the counter and I am just going to do it. So I'm still working on this, leslie, I'm actually still working on it personally.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I mean, isn't that?
Speaker 1:The beauty of these conversations, though, is that other people get to listen in on you and I doing this with our own families and with our own kids, because I don't think the reason I love these words and I love this work is because you can never be good enough at any of it. There is never a moment where you think, yeah, I can check initiative off the list because I'm great at it and my kids are great at it. It's always something that we can be growing in and it's always something that can challenge us a little bit to learn more about ourselves and about our parenting and about our kids and our family dynamic and our family's values. So that's why the conversations are so cool, and hopefully, our listeners get as much of a benefit out of it as you and I do. Just chatting once a month, absolutely Well. Thank you again For our listeners. If you want to know more about Core Essentials, we are on social media at CE Values, and you can check out our website at coreessentialsorg. And how about you?
Speaker 2:My website is bethtramelcom, two M's, two L's or makewordsmatterforgoodcom. I also have two other podcasts that folks can find on my website and I just look forward to the summer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome. I hope everybody has a relaxing summer where some initiative is taken, but also some sitting around and doing nothing is taken as well.
Speaker 2:Right there by the pool or by the backyard, just living Whatever it is.
Speaker 1:Whatever it is, that's great, all right, thanks, hey. We'll see you all again in the fall In August.
Speaker 2:All right, everyone. Ciao, thank you.
