I get the same thing when I get people now they asked me a question and I give
them the answer next I know you're gonna say that yeah one of those people go
away he does that from time to time yeah also how you're talking about kind of
breaking the loop in your behavior like oh I want to make a change to that one
thing you know to break the loo and then you start with something small and then
it ends up affecting one thing and you mentioned sometimes it's hard because
you don't get Pat's on the back for those little things you know yeah well
they're often so small the rest humiliating that you even have to do
that yeah yeah but in a lot of time like to yourself it's like kind of big like
um like oh I'm gonna drink eight glasses of water a day now you know and then
it's almost like you're seeking that pat on the back like you want to tell your
friend like eh I drink eight glasses of water now and they're just like yeah so
yeah right and you're like why do i party use gonna like why do I even do it
then if no one's gonna care you know well you know there's a lesson to be
drawn from that too in terms of relationships that's really useful
psychologically is and this is a big mistake that people won't make it's like
if you want to have a good long term relationship with someone then you watch
them constantly and when they do something that you like you let them
know yeah even if it's a small thing yeah because they're way more likely to
do it again you know and so sometimes personal have kind of an inkling about
what they might do that's good or that would be good for you relate their
relationship with you or that might even just be pleasing to you but they won't
say anything they're like afraid because maybe they
won't get attention for it and but then they do it and you notice it's like man
that's super powerful like you have to be really attentive though because the
good things that people do don't stand out the mistakes they make stand out and
then you say well you made a mistake it's like yeah yeah but to watch and to
reward someone for doing something small right that's that's a step in the right
direction yeah he's a killer strategy I found that to be true with my daughter
she's four and a half now oh yeah some kids really like some kids are tough and
they don't respond to punishment at all yeah you just can't you can't you can't
you can't intimidate them my daughter if I just pointed at her she would stop huh
but my son it was like that was just laughs he just laugh and run away yeah
so but he responded to reward like mad if I watched him and he did something
that was good and I told him that it was like he was just yeah yes so that's good
yeah yeah it's reward is harder to use but it's more effective if you come an
Ajith yeah and then that's not like kind of how you say where you're like be
careful with the reward when you give like too much reward for these small
things you know and then they can think that's problem with the self-esteem
movement you know oh yeah every every kid gets a trophy day ya know it's like
inflating the currency okay if everything is good then nothing is good
because their house there has to be a distinction so yeah you want to watch
and you want to see when the person's made an effort and you want to see when
they've gone beyond the call of duty and then you want to say hey I noticed that
that was really good yeah and yeah and it is scarcity really matters in those
situations because otherwise it just turns into noise yeah yeah yeah
patronizing noise even which is even worse it's like oh you're doing well
really well it's like leave me alone yeah yeah it's such a lie yeah I have a
fun time with that actually I'll be like um if I have to judge and go all through
my kids lives if I had to judge them and their friends and I have three daughters
in one son usually it was the daughters I was being some kind of a judge I'm
gonna judge the dance I'm gonna judge the little play that they put together
I'm gonna judge the acrobatic routine that they're doing in the backyard and
always be judging these things and I would have so much fun because I would
say they do their little performance their 1 minute performance and they come
out table how was it and I'd say okay first of all presentation overall I'm
giving you a four point two I didn't see one smile until you actually got on
stage that's wrong and I would just go through and give them this really strong
critiquing words yeah and and they loved it yeah they loved it damn shit mad they
would be happy to didn't it go try to go and try to raise that four point three
to a four point five maybe smiles like you could see them a mile away oh yeah
yeah yeah I just got done at a pool party with a bunch of little kids
running around and I ended up judging the diving competition and all the
parents were watching and and they were aghast at what I was doing
yeah that wasn't my house by the way oh I did it there - no I do it already this
is what I did it at your house - right yeah you've seen it in action yeah I
give the kids a little nicknames and then and then I say you know you were
completely unbalanced when you left the board it was almost embarrassing for me
to watch you go try it again I'm giving you a two-point - yeah go try it again
and see if you can bump that up a little bit yeah
and the kids get up there now yeah but you treated them like someone who could
improve right so that's a big deal that's that's better than that's better
than a pat on the back it's like because everyone's flawed and everyone needs to
improve well so when my kids were little I taught them how to speak in public it
took about an hour that was it so I had them they had to read something you know
and so they'd read it and I was across the room and say well that's not loud
enough it's like I can't hear you it's like belted out and they get a little
louder it said no no no right that is what I mean
read it way louder than you think you should and so they did that I said lots
about right because there's nothing more appalling than listening to some speaker
that you can't hear it's like there's just no excuse for that then like make
it clearer put some passion into it you know and it was it was unbelievable how
quickly they would pick that up you know and and that also made me sad because
because it took so little time to get them to do that and then they had it you
know and so and that that like a critic is your best friend if the critic isn't
destructive because it what a critic does is say look you did 10 things and
like these five things you need some work on those they're not good and
here's some things you could do that would make them better and here's two
things that you got alright and here's three things that you did pretty well
out and so then well what's the message the message is hey you can handle some
actual criticism so you're not some little you know useless wimpy thing
that's gonna die just because someone isn't
telling you that your already wonderful plus you're not already what not nearly
as wonderful as you could get so let's keep that in mind and then you know you
lay out a pathway for improvement and then you treat the kid with some respect
and and you also show that being an adult means that you know more than
being a kid because you know the kid does something you say oh that was
really good it's like what are you saying well as an adult I don't know any
better than you do and that's pretty dismal message because the kid is going
to be an adult for a very long time and one of the things we do really badly in
our culture is model why being an adult is better than being a child because it
is better you have freedom and you have responsibility and you have autonomy and
so we're always so concerned about making our kids feel good about
themselves it's like they should be feel good about becoming responsible adults
because they're gonna be adults for like 80 years and they're gonna be kids for
like 20 years so the adults the goal so yeah that was interesting when you
started doing that because the kids are like 7 years old in under by the way
yeah and he's like letting them have it but you it's funny you have this kind of
tone about you though when you talk to kids that it's like it's almost like Liz
that much over theatrical just that much so you can tell he's like playing a
character right right right and the kids love it it's so funny my daughter like
loves him and the kids are just scrambling around wanting to do it again
and like let me do this let me do it your daughter's all used to it you she's
like okay okay sure so fun so funny kids though you know ordering these kids love
attention yeah it's their currency and yeah they
want attention because adults actually know more than they do and so if you pay
careful attention like I get along really well with little kids and it's
because I pay attention to them and if they do something good then we had this
kid over at our house once this is a sad story I told it in my new book so this
kid was vote for a really cute kid really nice-looking kid and his nanny
had been hurting at car accident so he was kind of being shuffled around the
neighborhood for daycare for like a week or so away and I'd heard some not some
rumors about this kid and so I was kind of curious and so
anyways he came over to our house my wife was also taking care of some other
kids at this time and I came home and he was standing the other kids were playing
in the like living room and he was standing in the porch sort of in the
corner you know kind of just wandering around back and forth and I looked at
him and I thought that's not so good so I kind of poked him a bit you know and I
was poking him and trying to get him to play and he had this like really mask of
a face on unhappy and I poked him and he kind of jerk away and all that and I
couldn't get him to smile I couldn't get him to play it I thought that's not good
that's not good because he's four like I he should have you know acted unhappy
for two or three pokes and then kind of laughed and then we would kind of get
into it you know so so that that wasn't so good so then we had lunch and the
rule at our house was eat your damn lunch and say thank you to the person
who made it because otherwise they'll cook you horrible things and and you'll
die so so it's like it's hard to cook lunch for you have some gratitude you
little monsters and so you ate what what was there and so his mother when she
dropped him off said he probably won't eat anything all day but that's alright
and we thought well actually no that's not alright because he needs to eat and
and it's and it's not alright that he doesn't eat wrong and so we'd learned
how to feed recalcitrant children by that point and so all the kids were at
the table and they were eating and my wife had made some chicken stew and he
wasn't eating and so she was trying to feed him and so we were watching him
very carefully and so she bring up the spoon to his mouth and he like move his
head back and forth you know to refuse it and it was just like about a nine
month old would do that a when you're trying to that's their their first trick
and so that's a nine month old trick and we thought okay well something happened
when he was nine months old and he never really got beyond that and so you know
my wife was fairly persistent with the spoon and he'd get annoyed and you know
squawk a bit and she'd put some food in and then he'd swallow it and then and
then as soon as he took a little bit of food
Eva and she powdered him and tell him that he was being a good kid and she
meant today it was not a game like she was really intent on getting this kid to
have lunch and so that's fine and he's moving his his head back and forth but
what was cool as she kept patting him on the head and telling me was good kid he
was opening his mouth more often even though he was still moving his head back
and forth and so it took about 10 minutes or so and she'd fed him the
whole bowl of chicken stew and she said she showed him he said look you're a
good boy you ate all of it and that horrible mask that he was wearing you
know that mask of unhappiness it just fell off him and he had this great smile
it was just it just made the hair on the back of my neck stand up because you
could see that was the first damn thing that he had been allowed to succeed at
you know and so he was thrilled