Key Messages
Key messages in the book include:
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You are strong when others feel safe around you.
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It’s not okay to make your emotions someone else’s problem.
- Self belief, not self esteem, is the gift.
Below is a brief description of each.
1. You are strong when others feel safe around you.
Too often our youth see adults portrayed as strong when they intimidate or dominate those around them.
This is not a healthy message.
Others never fear our strength, they only fear our weaknesses. They fear our lack of self control, our lack of boundaries, our lack of respect for others, our selfishness and our lack of insight into the impact of our behaviour.
It takes strength and maturity to have others feel safe around us. It is this we must inspire our youth to strive for and the standard to which we must hold ourselves.
2. It’s not okay to make your emotions someone else’s problem.
It is entirely normal and indeed appropriate to have emotions, they are central to our lives. It is also to be expected that our emotions will run the full range from joy and delight to anger or resentment.
No matter what our emotional state is, it is our responsibility. It is up to us to share our emotions in a way that does not allow them to be someone else’s problem.
It is never okay to assign others responsibility for how we feel. “You make me angry” is an attempt to attribute responsibility to others for our lack of emotional regulation.
If we behave in a manner which obliges others to tip toe around, then we are the problem.
This does not mean we should not share how we feel!
It means we should do it in a manner which does not burden those around us.
3. Self belief, not self esteem, is the gift.
There is a very big difference between self belief and self esteem.
Self esteem can too easily become self importance and lead to a sense of entitlement, “I am important, I deserve this.”
People with a sense of entitlement have a tendency to attribute failure to others, “Well I deserved that, obviously there is something wrong with those people.”
If we deserve something, then why try?
Self esteem does not foster resilience or determination.
Self belief, or agency, is a belief in our ability to achieve something, not whether we deserve it. Self belief leads to a sense of accountability, “Darn, I was really hoping to get that. I will have to try harder next time.”
Self belief suggests a relationship between effort and outcomes. In other words, if you want something you need to make an effort to get it.
When giving feedback to youth, tend toward statements that suggest a link between effort and outcomes, such as, “Well done. You have worked hard for that.”