Teenagers aren't lazy, they're just really efficient in how they use their
time. How do you motivate a lazy teenager?
So I'm guessing that since you're the one watching this video, you're not the
lazy teenager but you know one, don't you? Probably got one in your house with you,
okay. Parents? Is that who I'm talking to here today?
Now if you are a teenager and you're wondering what I'm telling your parents
and that's why you're watching this video, awesome, glad you're here because I
think this can help you as well. Now let's take a look at where we're going to
start. What is your job as a parent? Alright, if you've worked with me very
long, you know I have one answer to that and we're going to reiterate that right
up front. Your job is to love them no matter what
and even if, okay. Now most parents they're like, well duh, yeah, of course, I
love them. Yeah, don't lose sight of that, your job
is to love them no matter what and even if. When you realize your job is not to
make sure that they're not lazy or to make sure that they're productive
citizens or to make sure that they make sure that they make sure that they, do you
see how burdensome that is and you can't even do it, I don't think it's possible
because of something that we'll get to in this video. Now keeping that
perspective, your job is to love them no matter what
and even if, couple that with what we talked about in this video right up here
about the influencer quadrant and how to get someone to open up to you, you want
to be in a green space. If you don't know what that means, click on that link, it'll
queue it up for you so that we can review that, okay. I won't spend the time
in this video to go over that but it's powerful because your focus shifts from
all about you as a parent to all about your child
and because you love them, in this case your teenager, because you love them, you
know that it's not good for them to stay lazy and non-productive, right? You know
this as a parent, life has taught you a few things so from that perspective,
let's take a look at control. Now for that we'll go to the white board, as we
make a little tea chart, you've probably heard of those before where we draw a
big capital T right here and at the top of this one is your teenage son or
daughter. At the top of this one, we will put the parents, parent or parents,
sometimes you have a nice parenting team, sometimes it's you. Either way, this is
the parents' column. Now what we're going to do is just brainstorm together for a
moment, a few things that we can put on each list. This is a list of things that
are relevant to your teenager's life and we're going to put it on the side of
whoever controls that thing, alright? So how about working, who controls that?
Your teenager does. How about attitude? Yep, it's over here.
Okay, how about behavior? Yeah, do you see a common theme here/ How about how your
teenager handles school? Who controls that? yep, once again. How about language
How about music or other media?
How about schedule? How about how they handle church? What about what they're
doing with their friends? Gee, looking a little lopsided, don't you think? Who
controls all of this stuff? They do, alright. Now I'm not saying that's right or
wrong, I just want to acknowledge what it is and we have to face the harsh reality
sometimes because you don't control this stuff, parent, and if you don't believe
that, I bet your teen will prove that to you and it won't take very long, will it?
Okay, so let's be clear about that. What do you control as a parent? What do you
control about your teenager's life? Well none of that but what do you control? Now
let's start with probably the most important one. I've already mentioned it
to you and that's why I wanted you to review some other videos. Your own
attitude.
Your own attitude, your own position, your own perspective, you control that, not
your teenager. This is important because I have a lot of parents that I've worked
with in the past especially who will come in and say oh, they're just driving
me crazy, okay. No, we can appreciate why you say that but on your emotional life
here for a moment. What if you could get to the point where you're good either
way, no matter what your teenager's doing?
That's what I'm talking about, you get to control your own attitude. I shared an
example in another video that might be helpful to review here. Let's say you get
a new car, brand new car, it's your dream car, you love it and you're driving down
the road in your dream car and your teenager is standing right over there on
the sidewalk and your teenager waves you down says, "Hey, dad. Nice ride." and you're
like, oh boy, what's going to happen here? You pull over, yeah, roll down the window
and you look at it and say, "So uh, what are you doing?' He says, "Oh dad, I just love
you a new car How about if I drive it for a while?" Man, I was afraid this would
have happened and get out of the car and you hand him the keys okay and then your
teenager hops in the car, fires it up, drives it right into a foam pole, totals
the car, he's fine thankfully, but he gets out and he looks
back at you and says, "Oh sorry." Now what's wrong with this story people? First of
all, why are you giving the keys to someone that you don't trust to handle
the vehicle appropriately? What if our emotional life were the car?
Yeah, who are you going to give the keys to? I'm thinking hang on to the keys, you get
to drive this one, you're in charge of your own attitude, you are in charge of
your own emotions,
that's going to shock and surprise something. Really, I'm in charge of this?
Yeah, you're in charge of your own behavior. So these things you get to
control. Well you might be thinking but that doesn't have anything to do
with my son or my daughter who's venting out all day playing video games in the
basement. Really? Yeah, it has a lot to do with it because you're the parent that's
going to show up and this next part is going to empower you to have some more
influence. I'll put a star by this one.
We get to control what we provide. This is good news because what are you most
concerned about? If you look at these two lists as a parent, which list are you
more concerned about? Oh yeah, that one, right? But you don't control that one, you
control this one. Which list is your teenager most concerned about? Hmm..
They control this one but are they worried about this stuff?
No because they control it, they're not worried about it, you are but you don't
control it. Which list are they worried about? This one because they don't
control it but they're counting on a lot of this now before I suggest what I'm
going to suggest next, may I be clear about something.
You are a benevolent, generous, loving parent. There's all kinds of arguments to
support that. You are a benevolent, generous, loving parent. You're not going
to take anything away from your teenager, okay? But you may make some things
available that you provide, contingent on some transaction that we can set up.
You're with me? Okay, now before we go there, 5 freebies. 5 freebies, you
don't get to mess with these. Let's put them down. One, love. Your job is to love
them no matter what and even if, they don't have to qualify for it, they don't
have to do anything for you to give that to them freely. Love. Two, air. I know you
don't give them air but you have no business depriving them
of it so you'd think people would know this but I had a client whose daughter
died, you've got to have air. Okay so I'm putting it on the list even though
it's ridiculous. Now three, water. Do not withhold water.
Are we cool? Four, you see where we're going with this. Food. Now you can go a
little longer without food than you can without water but they're both necessary,
right? And you're not going to withhold food. Now it doesn't say preferred food, it
simply says food. You want to be able to sustain life, keep the belly button away
from the back dog. Number five, shelter.
You're responsible for this, you're a parent, there are legal and ethical and
moral responsibilities you have to provide all the freebies for your kids,
you don't get to mess with those. Now when I say mess with them, shelter
does not necessarily mean a bedroom, okay. You're with me?
It means protect them from the elements and in our society, it includes
appropriate clothing. Notice I said appropriate not necessarily preferred
because that happens to be a higher level privilege and we can reserve that
for the transaction. Now what about the transaction? Here's the transaction, we
agree as parents to control something on our list in a way that our teenager
likes in exchange for our teenager agreeing to control something on their
list in a way that we like, simply a business transaction in fact, we're going
to take all the emotion out of the discipline, put that back into the
relationship where it belongs, okay. Simply a business transaction. Now what
we provide can get pretty powerful. We provide access to certain spaces or
equipment or things in our home, we provide money, we provide transportation,
we provide telecommunications. This list goes on and on and on and as long as
it's not on the freebie list, it's negotiable, okay? So we agree to control
access for example to electronic equipment and side note, you have to be
able and willing to enforce this otherwise it doesn't work.
Access to electronic equipment based on how they choose to handle school or work
or whatever else it is that they're not doing because they've been so lazy.
Follow? Now one last comment here. Stay calm, okay. Stay in a good place, keep
smiling. When parents are smiling, kids are thinking more, there's a lot of
reasons for that, use it to your advantage. We want to
change the energy around this whole thing from shame to game. Think about
that, shame to game. No more shame, no more guilt, no
more you shoulda or I wish you would, simply turn it into a game. Hey, I would
like to offer you this in exchange for that, either way is okay with me.
You're smiling, kids are thinking. Turn it from shame into a game. Actually these
lazy teenagers, they're pretty brilliant and efficient but we know a little more
about the game. Let's turn it from shame to game.