Supporting Teen Interests: As parents, we should really get behind our teens’ passions, even if they don’t fit the typical school mold. It’s about encouraging what they love and finding ways to make learning meaningful for them.
Valuable Skills Outside School: Look at what happened with Ashley’s son! He found success flipping dirt bikes, cars, and other stuff. It just shows that there are different paths to building skills and confidence beyond what’s taught in classrooms.
Focus on Personal Growth: I’ve learned that it’s crucial for us parents to focus on our own growth too, especially when our teens aren’t vibing with school. It’s okay to seek support and figure out how to navigate these challenges together.
Shift in Perspective: Ashley’s story really hits home. When she changed her outlook, her relationship with her son improved big time. It’s all about showing respect and support, even when their choices might not be what we expected.
Embracing Different Paths: We need to realize that there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to success. As parents, we should be open to embracing the unique paths our teens take, even if it’s different from what we imagined.
Want to Master the Inner Game of Parenting?
Step 1 – Go take the parent trap quiz!
It’s free, easy, and will take you less than 3 minutes.
Step 2 – Use your quiz results to focus your energy on growing in the area indicated by your quiz results.
Listen to How to Help my Teen Who Hates School Part 1
If you haven’t yet listened to Part 1, go listen HERE!
In part one I talked about understanding current school myths, like:
Myth #1 Your Teen NEEDS to be Successful at School to Succeed in Life
Myth # 2 Your Teen Needs to Go to College
Myth #3 If Your Teen Struggles in School, There’s Something Wrong with Them
Myth #4 School is the One and Only Answer for EVERYONE
Myth #5 School is Preparing Kids for the Future
It’s Time to Empower Your Teen
If your teen hates school, it’s time to empower them.
Often times teens simply blame school, their teachers, or even their friends and this is disempowering.
Sometimes they make excuses like, “it’s boring” or “it’s pointless”.
Bottom line is, if your teen’s blaming or making excuses, they’re in the victim mentality, and one of the best ways to get teens out of the victim mentality is to empower them.
The problem is, we often just tell teens that, “School is what it is, and you can’t change it, so just deal with it.”
This is disempowering.
I want to share the message that, if you have a problem with something, you have a responsibility to do your part to try to fix it.
Maybe your teen could talk to their teacher and tell them, “Hey, I’ve noticed that I learn better when I get to interact with others.” Or “I really enjoy your class when it’s more interactive.”
Bottom line is, one of the reasons the teens hate school is because they feel powerless about it.
Have Empowering Conversations
One of the most empowering things that you can do for your teen is to give them a voice and help them process their thoughts through conversation.
This is why I’m such a proponent of having empowering conversations with your teen. Treat them like an adult, who can think and problem solve, and they will start to act like an adult who can think and problem solve.
If you want to have empowering conversations, you’ll need to listen to your teen. A lot of parents struggle with this. I’ve heard that because you have 2 hears, and only one mouth, you should listen twice as much as you speak.
If you want to have empowering conversations with your teen about school, here are some great questions you could ask.
What are the disadvantages of school?
What are the benefits of school?
What might be an alternative that you could do, rather than school?
What might be an unseen cost of this?
What might be an unseen advantage of this?
Bottom line is, teens are way more capable that we give them credit for.
Help them activate their capability and their creativity by empowering them through conversations.
There ARE Alternatives when it Comes to Education
This might come as a shock to some people, but there ARE alternatives to school.
Your teen could go get a job. They could travel the world, with you probably, they could focus more on trade schools than traditional schools. They could sit at home and play video games.
Bottom line is, there are lots of alternatives when it comes to education.
I personally feel that teens benefit and learn more from being out in the real world, working, playing, traveling, and/or providing service.
Put the Burdon on Your Teen’s Shoulders
We’ve created a bad habit of adults taking care of teens and doing all the work. The problem is, this is disempowering to teens.
Instead of figuring out an alternative for your teen, but that task on their shoulders. Let them be responsible for their education and choices.
When my kids tell me that they hate school, one of my favorite answers is, “If you present me with a better alternative to school, I’m all ears.” Another favorite response is, “What’s something productive that you could be doing instead of school?” I also like to ask, “If you didn’t have school, what would you be willing to do with your time?”
It’s okay if your teen doesn’t have any ideas when it comes to coming up with a better alternative to school. If they can’t come up with any alternatives, they can keep going to school.
Trust Your Teen
Trust your teen. They are the key. They know what they need. They know what they love. They know what interests them the best. They know what they are passionate about.
Unfortunately, most teens are taught not to trust themselves and to look to the adults for the answers.
If you trust your teen, they will start trusting themselves.
When you teen learns to trust themselves, they will have access to their own wisdom. They will get better at trusting themselves and fixing their own problems.
Let Them Fail
I know it’s hard, and I know it’s scary, but it’s VITALLY IMPORTANT!
Sometimes you’ve got to get out of the way and let your teen fail.
This might be letting them fail at school. This might be letting them try something that YOU know won’t work, just so they can fail and find out for themselves.
Let Them Try New Things
One of the problems that teens have is that they don’t know what they want to do. They don’t always know what they like and don’t like because they haven’t been allowed to try new things. I have a client who desperately wanted to learn how to play the guitar. But, after years of guitar lessons, and even thought they are pretty good, they decided that they didn’t want to pursue the guitar anymore. They would have never learned that if they hadn’t been allowed to try it out.
I have another client who wanted to fix and flip dirt bikes and create a YouTube channel around that. After a few months, they found out that wasn’t what they wanted to do and moved on.
It’s okay. They don’t have to knock it out of the park on their first attempt.
Let them learn from their own experience.
Let them engage in some good old fashion trial and error.
Want to Master the Inner Game of Parenting?
Step 1 – Go take the parent trap quiz!
It’s free, easy, and will take you less than 3 minutes.
Step 2 – Use your quiz results to focus your energy on growing in the area indicated by your quiz results.
Step 3- Come work with me to help you up level your parenting!
This is actually one of the questions I get asked the most often . . .
. . . “My teen hates school. What do I do?”
If your teen hates school, you’re not alone, and neither is your teen. Most of the teens that I talk to tolerate school at best. Quite a few teens HATE school, and I don’t think I know a single teen that LOVES school.
This is a problem.
Especially because school is supposed to be preparing you for the workplace, a career, and your future.
Well, if you are developing the habit of hating school, or at least tolerating it, what do you think your habit will be after school?
Look no further than yourself, your spouse, or your friends and family. Do they love their jobs? Do they tolerate their jobs? Or, do they HATE their jobs like the majority of adults.
This is sad, and it’s a shame. We live in a time when you could do anything, be anything, and most people feel stuck in their job and wish the could do something more exciting, fun, and/or fulfilling.
Can you blame your teen for feeling the same way?
I Have Experience in This Area
When I was a teen I HATED school.
If it weren’t for football, I probably would have dropped out.
Not only did I hate school as a student, but I often hated it as an adult, and I was disappointed in myself for not making school more fun like I always promised that I would.
Fortunately, as a high school principal, I adopted the mantra, “Party with a Purpose”.
You see, I wanted to make school more fun, for me, for my students, and for my staff.
But, you’d be surprised how much resistance I got around this. Teachers, and leaders at the state level, would tell me, “School’s not supposed to be fun.” Or, “Kids can’t learn and have fun at the same time.” One teacher even told me, “These kids are going to leave school and get a job they hate, they might as well get used to it now.”
Seriously, this is sad.
But, here’s a secret that I learned. On our controversial “fun” days, our attendance went up and our behavior issues went down. Eventually, we found that the more fun we made school, the better our students did.
Empower Your Teen by Understanding These School Myths
One of my biggest problems with the way we handle teens who hate school is that we usually blame the teen without ever seeking to understand our teen or ever trying to validate their feelings and perspective.
If you or your school leaders are blaming your teen for hating school, this is disempowering you and your teen.
If you want to help and support your teen that hates school, find ways to empower them.
Nobody seems to really know how to do this because we are stuck believing old myths and lies.
When you believe the following myths, they are your reality. If you want to help your teen who hates school, question these old myths about school.
Myth #1 Your Teen NEEDS to be Successful at School to Succeed in Life
I’m probably going to get some angry emails about this next sentence, but that’s alright–it needs to be said. . .
. . . Your teen doesn’t need to be successful at school to succeed in life!
I graduated with something like a 2.0. Just enough to play sports. I know several people who have dropped out of school and they are perfectly successful. I have clients who have dropped out of school, withdrawn from school, and been kicked out of school who have all gone on to be very successful.
Of course teachers and administrators are going to tell you that you have to succeed at school. That’s their reality. Most of them believe that their success is do to their success in school.
Just because that was true for them, or maybe even you, doesn’t mean that that’s true for your teen.
I promise you, your teen doesn’t need to be successful at school to succeed in life!
Myth # 2 Your Teen Needs to Go to College
I don’t know exactly when or why this happened, but somewhere in the last several years, high school has began pushing college as the only “right” next step after high school. I’m sorry, but this is not true.
Again, I’m going to say something controversial.
College is not the answer for everyone. In fact, I actually believe that it’s less than half of people who actually need to go on to college to be successful.
A lot of our teens want to go to college, simply because they believe that’s the only option if they want to be successful.
There are so many options besides college. Let’s help our teens see the reality that there are indeed options and choices.
Myth #3 If Your Teen Struggles in School, There’s Something Wrong with Them
I’m sorry if this is sounding like a rant, but I remember struggling in school and being told that there was something “wrong” with me. I remember being told that I was “lazy” or that I had something wrong with my brain called ADD and ADHD. I was diagnosed with Dyslexia and told that my brain didn’t work “right”.
Let’s stop victimizing and villainizing our teens for struggling in school or hating school.
I could go way deeper in this, and I promise I will later, but for now, let’s just say that if you are blaming your teen for hating school or struggling with school, YOU are in the victim mindset. If your school leader are blaming your teen, THEY are in the victim mentality. If you and your school leaders are in the victim mentality, it’s very likely that your teen will also be in the victim mentality.
Instead of blaming your teen empower them by validating how they feel about school and by helping them take responsibility for coming up with solutions that work for them.
Myth #4 School is the One and Only Answer for EVERYONE
Let’s stop pretending that school works for everyone. School, for the most part, tries to educate everyone the same, or as close to the same as possible.
School, as it is for the most part today, does not work for everyone, period!
It’s silly that in today’s world, with so many recourses at our finger tips, that we refuse differentiate education based on individual’s needs.
School does not work everyone. School does not prepare students for what they individually need.
Myth #5 School is Preparing Kids for the Future
I’m sorry, but I’ve got to call it as I see it.
School is NOT preparing kids for the future.
Remember the thing our teachers used to tell us, “You won’t always have a calculator in your pocket”?
Look at us know! We have full blown computers in our pockets.
Why are schools banning the use of AI. Why are we not teaching our students how to use AI to improve their work?
Why are we not teaching them how to harness the power of YouTube?
School is trying to educate kids for the 1960’s or 70’s.
One of the things that I hear the most from teens is, “What’s the point in school? It’s a waste of time.”
Our teens aren’t dumb. They can see that what their being presented with as the answer to creating success in life is a lie. This is why they are overwhelmed, under motivated, and bored out of their minds.
Want to Master the Inner Game of Parenting?
Step 1 – Go take the parent trap quiz!
It’s free, easy, and will take you less than 3 minutes.
Step 2 – Use your quiz results to focus your energy on growing in the area indicated by your quiz results.
Step 3- Come work with me to help you up level your parenting!
This first video blew my mind when I watched it as a college student, learning how to be a teacher. As a principal, I had my staff watch it and we came up with ways to make school more fun and less boring so our students could experience more aesthetic experiences.
I just found this video the other day, and I really liked it, so here you go!
If you’re like most parents, you probably struggle with outdated parenting programming.
In fact, if you and your teen are struggling in your relationship, chances are this is a sign that you have some old programming that is no longer serving you.
#1 Don’t Be Ashamed
You don’t need to be ashamed of your old parenting programming.
Feeling shame about yourself isn’t going to help you create the change that you are looking for.
So, rather than feeling ashamed, be grateful that your old programming has gotten you this far. Understand that you didn’t choose to be programmed this way. Others in your life, parents, siblings, families members, neighbors, community members, friends, teachers, everyone has unintentionally added to your programming.
It’s not a problem, it’s simply a part of being human.
Our mind is seeking to create programs and patterns to follow. It’s okay.
When you can get past the shame, it will be easier to work through this process.
#2 Awareness
I love awareness. It’s easy and it’s powerful.
Have you ever heard someone say, “I can’t un-see that”?
Often that’s referring to a new awareness. It’s like those old illusion pictures of an ugly old woman or a beautiful young lady. In the beginning, you can only see the one that you can see, but once you’ve been shown the other image, you can’t unsee it. You always are aware that it’s there.
When I coach people on creating change, often awareness is the first step that I’ll walk them through.
For example, if you wanted to lose weight, we’d spend the first week or two simply gaining awareness. For example:
How much do you weigh?
What type of food are you eating?
How many calories are you eating?
What types of food do you like to eat?
Is there anything healthy that you could eat everyday?
How much sleep are you getting?
How much sleep do you need?
How active are you?
I would start observing and questioning everything when it comes to your old programming. For example, if you caught yourself yelling at your teen, you might say to your self, “That’s interesting. Why am I so upset? Why am I yelling? Where did I learn to yell? How do I feel when people yell at me? What are some alternatives to yelling?”
You see, the goal is to simply explore and understand.
This can be hard because most people to skip awareness and go straight to intention. It’s also hard to look at your life and see what’s really going on.
You’re not working on creating change here, just on gaining awareness.
It’s easier than creating change, and when you get to creating change, your efforts will be more informed.
#3 Acceptance
This is related to #1, Don’t Be Ashamed, but it takes it one step further.
You can’t go back in time and completely avoid your old programming. You can’t change your past, but you can accept your past as a necessary step that got you here.
Acceptance is HUGE. It will help you embrace your past experience, and even use it to help you let go and move forward.
When I was 13, I accidentally lit my school bus on fire with rubber cement. There’s no going back. I can’t undo that. In fact, I wouldn’t even if I could.
I’ve accepted that part of my past. I’ve embraced it, and I use it to help me move forward. It’s a part of who I am, and it helps me be who I want to be.
You’re not perfect. You’ve done things according to your old programming that you wish that you could take back. But, when you accept that that old programming was you doing your best, you can build on it and improve your current programming thanks to your old experience.
This is a powerful process that will help you accept who you are and start to grow from a place of love, compassion, and confidence rather than from shame, guilt, and disgust.
#4 Intention
With awareness under your belt, you’re ready for to practice intention.
This is hard and can take time. Be patient with yourself and accept where you are today as an important step to where you want to be tomorrow.
Part of intention is understanding and knowing where you want to go.
It’s important to understand your old programming and to know exactly what programming you want to replace it with.
For example, when I was young I was programmed to believe the following about money:
It’s hard to get.
There’s never enough.
You have to work hard to get it.
Once you get it, you need to save it.
Now that I’m aware of my old programming, I’m more intentional about how I choose to think about money. For example, I know intentionally practice the following thoughts about money:
Money comes to me easily.
I have more than enough.
I can simply do what I love to attract money into my life.
Having money helps me help others.
By being intentional about my programming, I can choose how I program my subconscious mind.
You might have old programming like:
If my teen gets poor grades, it means I’m failing as his mom.
If my teen doesn’t obey me, they don’t respect me.
My teen won’t be successful if they don’t get good grades or complete high school.
You might want to change the programming to be more like:
What my teen chooses to do in school is up to them, not me.
It’s possible for my teen to disobey me and still respect me.
My teen will be successful even if they don’t get good grades or complete high school.
#5 Practice Proving Your New Mentality
The last step is to practice proving the new programming. When you catch yourself in the old programming, find evidence disproving the old programming and proving the new programming.
Want to Ask Ben Anything when it comes to parenting?
Step 1 – Register for the live Ask Ben Anything webinar by clicking the button below!
Step 2 – Add the date and time to your calendar so you don’t miss out.
Wednesday, January 24th, @ 12:00 pm MST
Step 3- Show up to the webinar with your favorite beverage (mine’s diet Dr. Pepper) and enjoy hanging out with Ben!
It’s sad, but most people never reach their New Year’s goals. In fact, less than 10% of people actually achieve their New Year’s goals by the end of the year.
If you’re like the many people who have the goal of improving their relationship with their teen, or maybe you just want to up level your parenting this year, I want to help you win at your parenting goals.
And, if you want to be one of the 10% of people who actually achieve their New Year’s goals, I want to give you some tips on how to make that happen.
If you want to learn more about goals and habits, checkout these podcasts after you’ve finished this one.
#1 Habits are The Missing Key to Achieving Your Goals
Okay, sometimes I say things that go against the main stream narrative, and this is no different.
While most people are focusing on their New Year’s goals, I’m over here preaching about the importance of HABITS.
If most people fail to reach their New Year’s goals, that’s a pretty good indicator that we’re missing something. Well, I believe that what we’re missing is habit.
So, when it comes to your New Year’s goals, I want to invite you to shift your focus from the big future goal, to the little daily habits that you’d need to accomplish your goal.
Some of questions to ask yourself to help you identify the habits you need to make your goals a reality are:
What habits will make achieving this goal easy?
If I already accomplished this goal, what are some of the habits that I’d be doing?
What am I willing to do regularly (maybe every day, or 5 days a week, or 4 times a month, whatever regularity is needed) to achieve this goal?
When you understand this, achieving your goal becomes much more doable. In fact, sometimes you can even forget about the goal and simply focus all of your energy on the habits.
#2 Make Your Habits Simple, Yet Powerful
Sometimes it’s easy to go crazy with habits. Like, I want to play basketball Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and I want to life weights everyday, and I want to walk my dog, and I want to . . .
See how complicated we can make things?
If you make your habits simple, you’ll be more likely to do them. If you make them simple and powerful, you’ll be more likely to stick with them.
So, rather than the big long list of everything I want to do, I might make the simple habit of being active EVERY DAY. You could make a simple check list to make sure that you do at least one thing to be active each day. On days when you happen to do more than one, you could give yourself a simple reward.
One of my favorite and most simple and powerful habits is walking my dog. It’s simple because I don’t have to coordinate with other people. I just grab my dog and go. It’s powerful because it’s super rewarding. Walking my dog helps me feel good physically and emotionally. It’s fun. I enjoy hanging out with my dog. I get to do some of my best thinking while on our walk.
So, as you explore making habits to achieve your goals, make sure they’re simple and powerful.
#3 Find an Accountability Partner
I like this one because I don’t like doing anything alone. If you have an accountability partner, it’s going to be harder to give up when it gets rough. Plus, you’ll push yourself harder and your goals will be more top of mind.
There’s power in having an accountability partner that’s working towards the same or similar goals. So, maybe another mother or parent would be a great partner.
It’s also beneficial to have an accountability partner who’s already accomplished the goal your working for, so maybe a coach or a mentor.
But, there’s another kind of accountability partner that I think is underutilized, but super motivating, someone that your goal benefits beside yourself. For this, I often turn to my teens. If you have the goal of improving your relationship with your teen, and you’ve identified the habit of having 5 calm and interesting conversations with your teen each week, you might ask your teen to help you be accountable for that.
Maybe your habit is to do a thought download every night before bed, you could ask your teen to remind you and check in with you. Not only do teens make great accountability partners, they’re great at calling you our when you’re not doing something, right!?!, but it’s also an opportunity to model some powerful behaviors.
#4 Be Willing to Feel Uncomfortable
If you’re trying to create new habits, it’s going to get uncomfortable. That’s okay. Be willing to feel uncomfortable. Be willing to suck.
If you’re hoping a habit will help you accomplish a goal, it’s going to need to push you past your comfort zone.
This is exactly what you want.
When I start creating new habits, I often tell the people around me that, “I’m starting a new habit, and I might really suck at first, and I might even forget, but I’m going to struggle my way through this as long as it takes.”
That way I’m creating accountability, and committing to discomfort.
#5 Make it Fun and Rewarding
If you’ve followed me for a while, you probably have heard me say that things should be a PARTY With A PURPOSE!
This is no different.
I don’t know why so many adults want to make life so dang boring and dull.
If you want to make habits that you’ll stick with, make them fun. My favorite way to exercise is playing basketball. I like winning, so it’s fun when I’m winning, but it’s most fun when my friends show up and play.
Find ways to make your habits fun. It’s important. Not only will you stick with the habit longer, but you’ll also give it a better effort and energy if you’re having fun.
Also, when people have a hard time breaking old habits, one of the biggest reasons they struggle is because the old habit is benefiting them. Use this principle, that usually works against people trying to break old habits, in your favor.
Make your habit rewarding. If you’re getting a benefit from your habit in the form of a reward, it will be easier to stick with the habit.
Bottom Line
This is the year. Don’t put off your goals and dreams, especially when it comes to parenting, any longer.
Go all in on your dreams. You’ve got this, and want support, I’m here for you!
Want to Ask Ben Anything when it comes to parenting?
Step 1 – Register for the live Ask Ben Anything webinar by filling in the form below!
Step 2 – Add the date and time to your calendar so you don’t miss out.
Wednesday, January 24th, @ 12:00 pm MST
Step 3- Show up to the webinar with your favorite beverage (mine’s diet Dr. Pepper) and enjoy hanging out with ME!!
