So yesterday on the show, I was talking about how the other day Maley, she's my oldest she's five years old. We were at the pool and she'd made some new friends because she's a very social little thing, and she was off there.
Playing with these kids.
And then we saw them and we thought that they were all getting along fine. But then I heard the oldest girl turn around and say, does anyone even like this kid? Should we just run away from her? And it was so as a parent, it was so heartbreaking, Like I could see how this was going to unfold, and it was one of those moments where I was unsure whether or not to step in and to try
and fix the problem. Like Maley was not picking up on the social cues that these kids didn't want to play with her, and I could see her self esteem just getting crushed by the fact that they were swimming away and running away from her.
I think the biggest thing here was Laura came to us, Mitch, to people that don't have kids to ask us our advice on what we should do. And the answer is, we don't have kids and we don't know.
Yeah, you guys provided no good advice to me, but no, we did have the bigger question, which is how do you how do you build resilience in children?
Right?
And I think that that's the question that most parents ask themselves, like are you doing a good job? And how do you build good resilience in kids?
Now?
That question has definitely been loving the last day. And we have someone on the phone. Her name is Michelle Mitchell and she's a specialist in this field and she's written an incredible book which is called Everyday Resilience Journal, and it's four parents who have been asking this very question themselves.
Hi Michelle, Hi Michelle. Hello, Hi Michelle, Hi Michelle. How are you.
So? I need you?
What do we do in this situation?
I've got this blanket rule, Laura, tell me what you think about this. I say nothing with friendship issues for forty eight hours. And there's a reason for that. I think it gives our kids a chance for their intuition to kick in because they can take a little bit of time to notice what's going on, and if it's not an issue for them, then it's not an issue. And it sort of gives us a chance to come off the boil a little bit as well, so we might reframe we're approaching it.
I love that because you also sometimes you impose your adult thoughts and then she's five years old, she's like half the time, she's got no idea what's going.
On, And I work it out of self.
Yeah, and if I don't care, it doesn't matter in the sense that if it doesn't matter in their world. Like sometimes we, like Laura said, we impose what we're feeling on them. And by the time we've imposed that and they've sort of absorbed what we're feeling in our rejection and our pain and our trauma from when we were five, you know, their whole social life has just moved on and no one in their social scene cares about the issue anymore.
Yeah.
And I think a really good example of this is, like you see all these memes and videos going viral online of a kid falling down and hurting themselves and looking at their parents straight away to see how they should react.
They look to the parent, They're.
Like, is the parents scared, concerned and worried?
Should I be concerned? Yeah?
So I think that we see that all the time, where they look for you to learn how to react. So if you just play it down and don't make a deal about it.
It's probably not.
Going to be the into a ceiling fan when I was six months old by Harper and I think you can.
Tell now, but no one cared. No one cares. I asked Parta the other day. He's like, did I He doesn't even remember? Yeah? See, and no trauma from that, Well you still remember? You're talking about now coming back, Michelle.
I have a big question though, because it is it is something that so many people come back to, and it's how do you build resilience in your kids.
I think what they've got to do is fail, but within their fails, they've got to actually see themselves succeeding. I think that's so important, and I think that's got so much to do with us helping and getting beside them and actually helping them feel their success and feel their strength. But one thing I'd like to say, yes is making sure I keep having enough backup friends. And you wouldn't use that word with a five year old, Michelle.
I have got barely any friends, let alone backup friends.
No one play with the backup friend. Your cousin's over there. If Mitch and Laura busy, I'm like, what do I do?
If you said like and that the kids like, shall I tell them that they're my backup? You know?
Answer?
Yeah, I don't think they've got to have friends outside of school. They've got to have friends in different places.
Look, I don't want to brag, Michelle, but I gave that exactly Fi Laura. I literally said, let her fail, let alone, let her learn the social cues.
It was like, leave her on the curb, you'll have you get more sleep at night.
I do want to remind the audience that Britt said that this is why children have allergies now because they are not parented correctly.
And that is on record. If you want some facts.
Michelle Mitchell a brilliant author Everyday Resilience Journal. You can go buy it now. And thank you so much for joining us on the pickup.
Thanks so much, Michelle.
Are you going to awesome?
I want to get some backup friends. You need them? All right, We're done, Will and what are up next? To drive your home