# 5 Secrets to Raising Resilient Kids Who Can Handle Hard Things

An episode of [Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1082244480), 18 Oct 2026, 20 min.

Audio: https://mgln.ai/e/187/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/fa326977-3de5-4283-9b8b-af3500c58607/b69b2795-5503-4de1-ac91-af460017906e/69e26912-c798-45fa-b9a2-b4e201899a31/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=a05f1702-0c0e-4b0f-8014-af460017907c

When your child is anxious, overwhelmed or afraid, should you step in or let them work it out? The answer could change how you parent. Justin and Kylie Coulson share five research-backed ways to build resilience in children, from listening without rushing to fix things to letting kids tackle challenges, take safe risks and discover what they're capable of. Because raising resilient kids isn't about toughening them up. It's about giving them the support and confidence to face hard things. KEY POINTS • Why feeling cared for and listened to is the foundation of resilience • How staying calm helps children manage big emotions • When to support your child and when to resist the urge to rescue them • How family identity and purpose help kids through difficult experiences • Why independent activity and safe, risky play build confidence QUOTE OF THE EPISODE “Resilience is built as much inside a child as it is built around a child.” RESOURCES MENTIONED • Happy Families: https://happyfamilies.com.au • Andrew Fuller, Australian psychologist and resilience researcher • Steve Biddulph, parenting expert • Anne Masten, resilience researcher • Peter Gray, play researcher ACTION STEPS FOR PARENTS • Put your phone down and give your child your full attention when they want to talk. • Take a slow, audible breath before responding to your child's big emotions. • Encourage your child to try something difficult before stepping in to rescue them. • Find small ways for your child to contribute to your family and feel part of something bigger. • Give your child age-appropriate opportunities to explore, play independently and take safe risks. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:05] Speaker 1: Resilience is the most requested topic of all the topics
[0:08] Speaker 1: that I talk about, whether it's on the podcast, whether
[0:10] Speaker 1: it's my talks in businesses, in schools, it doesn't matter
[0:14] Speaker 1: where it is. Resilience is what every parent wants to
[0:17] Speaker 1: know about. It seems statistically that the numbers are going
[0:20] Speaker 1: in the wrong direction and that too many of our
[0:21] Speaker 1: kids are struggling with this resilience thing. And it has
[0:25] Speaker 1: been the same for a number of years. However, today
[0:28] Speaker 1: we're going to talk about the five secrets to raising
[0:31] Speaker 1: a resilient child. Stay with us. That is next. Hello,
[0:37] Speaker 1: welcome to the Happy Families podcast. Real parenting solutions every
[0:40] Speaker 1: single day. It's Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast. We're Justin
[0:43] Speaker 1: and Kylie Coulson. I want to talk about resilience, but
[0:46] Speaker 1: before we do that, I'm not trying to pick on you, hun,
[0:48] Speaker 1: but I saw you on your phone a little bit
[0:50] Speaker 1: earlier with Christmas carols blaring out of your telephone speaker.
[0:56] Speaker 1: It's Christmas.
[0:57] Speaker 2: There's like 67 days till Christmas.
[1:00] Speaker 1: And you're counting.
[1:01] Speaker 2: Six, seven.
[1:05] Speaker 1: I love that you did it with the hands and everything.
[1:08] Speaker 1: You're so bad. If you're a parent, you should do
[1:10] Speaker 1: that tonight. If you're a parent with the kids listening,
[1:12] Speaker 1: I know they've just grown and rolled their eyes, but
[1:13] Speaker 1: if your kids are not listening while you're listening to
[1:15] Speaker 1: this podcast, you know what you can do tonight now?
[1:17] Speaker 1: Dining table. Hey, kids, guess how many days till Christmas?
[1:20] Speaker 1: They're not going to know. You can say it's just
[1:22] Speaker 1: over two months. It's two months and one week, 67 days, six, seven, six, seven.
[1:27] Speaker 1: You'll be the coolest parent on the block. Yeah, milk
[1:30] Speaker 1: it for all it's worth. Brilliant.
[1:31] Speaker 2: Brilliant.
[1:32] Speaker 1: Thank you. Let's get serious.
[1:33] Speaker 2: Okay.
[1:34] Speaker 1: Resilience.
[1:34] Speaker 2: You said you want to talk about resilience.
[1:36] Speaker 1: Yeah, I do. I want to talk about five ways
[1:38] Speaker 1: that we can raise resilient kids. Why? Because the data
[1:40] Speaker 1: shows that our kids are not resilient. They're going in
[1:42] Speaker 1: the wrong direction and have been for a couple of
[1:44] Speaker 1: decades now. And there is not a more requested topic
[1:48] Speaker 1: that I get than the topic of resilience.
[1:50] Speaker 2: Well, I had a really proud moment a couple of
[1:53] Speaker 2: weeks back. You and I went away to Melbourne for
[1:56] Speaker 2: the weekend and our two youngest, 16 and 12, were
[2:00] Speaker 2: going off to girls camp. So for our 12-year-old, this
[2:03] Speaker 2: is her first girls' camp. She's never done this before.
[2:07] Speaker 2: And our 16-year-old has had a couple of mixed experiences
[2:12] Speaker 2: when it comes to girls' camp.
[2:13] Speaker 1: So enthusiasm on both their parts was not high.
[2:17] Speaker 2: And because we were heading off, times ….
[2:20] Speaker 1: We needed them to go to girls' camp because we
[2:22] Speaker 1: were going. It's like, you don't have a choice. You
[2:24] Speaker 1: actually have to go.
[2:26] Speaker 2: Coordinating getting them there was a little bit tricky. So
[2:28] Speaker 2: one of the older sisters dropped them off. And we
[2:31] Speaker 2: were waiting at the airport when I got the first
[2:33] Speaker 2: phone call. And our 16-year-old was having a pretty full-blown
[2:38] Speaker 2: anxiety attack as she talked me through what was happening
[2:42] Speaker 2: for her and the fact that she really just didn't
[2:45] Speaker 2: want to go. And so I took some deep breaths
[2:48] Speaker 2: with her and we talked through it. And I just
[2:51] Speaker 2: said to her that she had proven time and time
[2:53] Speaker 2: again that she was more than capable of dealing with
[2:58] Speaker 2: tricky situations. But more importantly, that she was utilizing past
[3:03] Speaker 2: experiences and bringing that forward into this experience, knowing and
[3:09] Speaker 2: understanding that not only is she not the same person
[3:12] Speaker 2: that she was back then, but nor are the other girls.
[3:16] Speaker 2: And there's different dynamics now because they're not all together
[3:19] Speaker 2: like they were last time. And now she's got a
[3:21] Speaker 2: younger sister coming along. So that changes the dynamics. And
[3:24] Speaker 2: she gets to decide what this one looks like. But
[3:27] Speaker 2: if she carries the past into the future, then she's
[3:29] Speaker 2: going to create the past all over again. And she
[3:32] Speaker 2: was so good. Like she was so scared and she
[3:35] Speaker 2: was so worried about it. But by the time we
[3:39] Speaker 2: got off the phone, she was calm. She was collected.
[3:42] Speaker 2: She recognized that she could do this and she's done
[3:45] Speaker 2: hard things in the past. And I told her that
[3:47] Speaker 2: outside of airplanes and a concert, I was available. She
[3:51] Speaker 2: could call me anytime she needed to.
[3:54] Speaker 1: And the best thing is.
[3:55] Speaker 2: We didn't get a phone call.
[3:56] Speaker 1: Not for the entire weekend. And when we chatted with
[3:59] Speaker 1: them about it afterwards, they both just had a really
[4:01] Speaker 1: good time.
[4:02] Speaker 2: They had an amazing time.
[4:03] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[4:04] Speaker 2: They had an amazing time. And I just, I'm really
[4:07] Speaker 2: proud because it was so hard for her. It was really,
[4:11] Speaker 2: really big.
[4:12] Speaker 1: So getting kids to do hard things and to be
[4:14] Speaker 1: resilient in the face of difficulties is such a trick.
[4:18] Speaker 2: But the biggest proud moment for me was when I
[4:20] Speaker 2: spoke to the leaders a few days later. And they
[4:24] Speaker 2: just shared that our 16-year-old Lily had taken her 12-year-old
[4:28] Speaker 2: sister under her wing and had just made sure that
[4:31] Speaker 2: she had the best weekend. And I actually think that
[4:34] Speaker 2: that was the change that was needed. Yeah.
[4:37] Speaker 1: Yeah. When siblings are kind to each other, we should
[4:39] Speaker 1: do a podcast on that. When siblings are kind to
[4:40] Speaker 1: each other as a parent, just like, oh, okay, it's working.
[4:43] Speaker 1: This is good. And we're seeing, for those of you
[4:46] Speaker 1: who have children who are not always kind to each other,
[4:48] Speaker 1: we're seeing as the kids have gotten older that they're
[4:50] Speaker 1: getting better and better at it. Yeah. they see the
[4:53] Speaker 1: value in having good relationships with one another. They want
[4:55] Speaker 1: to have good relationships and they've got the maturity to
[4:57] Speaker 1: figure it out. Like, there have been times where we've
[5:01] Speaker 1: thought this family thing is not going to work. We've
[5:05] Speaker 1: clearly failed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's been working pretty well.
[5:10] Speaker 2: So you hinted, you've got five things that you want
[5:13] Speaker 2: to share with us that will help our children.
[5:15] Speaker 1: Be more resilient. And I'll go through them pretty quickly.
[5:17] Speaker 1: They're fairly self-explanatory and we'll give everyone an early mark
[5:20] Speaker 1: because sometimes our pod can go a little longer than
[5:22] Speaker 1: it should. First two and then the break and then
[5:24] Speaker 1: three after the break. So the first one, the research
[5:27] Speaker 1: seems to indicate that children need to know that you
[5:31] Speaker 1: care and that you listen. So this is based on
[5:33] Speaker 1: some work that Andrew Fuller, you might have heard of
[5:35] Speaker 1: Andrew Fuller, a really respected Australian psychologist, used to run
[5:39] Speaker 1: something called Resilient Youth Australia. And Andrew Fuller did this questionnaire.
[5:42] Speaker 1: He found that with 16,000 Australian young people, the most
[5:46] Speaker 1: resilient kids agreed almost universally with two statements and the
[5:50] Speaker 1: least resilient kids disagreed with both of these statements. The
[5:52] Speaker 1: first one was, I have a parent who cares about me.
[5:54] Speaker 1: The second one was I have a parent who listens
[5:56] Speaker 1: to me. So at the very core of resilience is
[6:00] Speaker 1: it's actually not the child. It's the supports around the child.
[6:03] Speaker 1: It's the quality of the relationships. It's the fact that
[6:05] Speaker 1: if I'm falling, someone's going to catch me. Or if
[6:09] Speaker 1: I'm a little bit too scared to try the thing,
[6:11] Speaker 1: I can have the confidence that I can try it
[6:13] Speaker 1: because if I fall, somebody will catch me. And I
[6:16] Speaker 1: often share the story when I'm doing my presentations, a
[6:18] Speaker 1: bit of a personal one, but when I was a
[6:21] Speaker 1: university lecturer, think by then I was 36 or 37
[6:25] Speaker 1: years old, something like that. We had five kids. We
[6:27] Speaker 1: hadn't had Emily yet, but we had five of our kids.
[6:30] Speaker 1: And I wanted to leave university and start this business,
[6:33] Speaker 1: this happy families thing. And I was so scared. All
[6:37] Speaker 1: those kids, a mortgage, a family relying on me. And
[6:41] Speaker 1: so I rang my dad after you and I'd had
[6:43] Speaker 1: many conversations. I rang dad and said, here's what I'm
[6:45] Speaker 1: thinking about doing. If it doesn't work, can my family
[6:48] Speaker 1: come and live in the garage? Because mom and dad
[6:50] Speaker 1: have got a garage with some downstairs space. And Dad said, no,
[6:56] Speaker 1: you can come and live in the house. We've got
[6:57] Speaker 1: space in the house and you don't need to live
[6:59] Speaker 1: in my garage. I'm going to have my son and
[7:00] Speaker 1: his family living in my garage. And we never had
[7:03] Speaker 1: to go on with mum and dad. And we were
[7:05] Speaker 1: really fortunate. While they did provide some support to us
[7:07] Speaker 1: while we were students from time to time, we didn't
[7:11] Speaker 1: actually need to call them for support once I started
[7:13] Speaker 1: the business. But simply having him there.
[7:17] Speaker 2: It's that safety net. It's knowing that I can jump.
[7:22] Speaker 2: with the confidence that if I miss.
[7:25] Speaker 1: He cares.
[7:26] Speaker 2: There's somebody there to kind of catch me.
[7:28] Speaker 1: Yeah. The critical thing here, though, and you made this
[7:30] Speaker 1: distinction a while back on the podcast, is that it's
[7:32] Speaker 1: not about having a parent who's going to carry you.
[7:34] Speaker 1: It's having a parent who cares about you. Because I
[7:36] Speaker 1: don't need to be carried. I just need to have
[7:38] Speaker 1: somebody who will stop me from falling too far and
[7:41] Speaker 1: getting all banged up.
[7:42] Speaker 2: Well, you share the analogy in your talks about a
[7:46] Speaker 2: child walking a balancing beam. And as a parent... As
[7:51] Speaker 2: they start to lose balance, you don't grab them. You
[7:54] Speaker 2: kind of just put your hand out and you just
[7:56] Speaker 2: give them a little gentle nudge in the right direction
[7:59] Speaker 2: to correct their balance. And that's essentially what your mum
[8:02] Speaker 2: and dad have done for us from time to time
[8:04] Speaker 2: when we've taken those big, scary leaps. We've kind of thought,
[8:08] Speaker 2: I don't know if we've got this.
[8:10] Speaker 1: But you don't have to– it doesn't always have to
[8:11] Speaker 1: be the big stuff. This is my key point. It's
[8:13] Speaker 1: the little stuff. Like when your child wants to talk
[8:15] Speaker 1: to you, stop, look, listen. Stop what you're doing. Look
[8:19] Speaker 1: them in the eyes. Listen to what they're saying. Don't interrupt.
[8:22] Speaker 1: Just be there. Turn your body towards them. Put the
[8:23] Speaker 1: phone down. If they bring you a problem, hear all
[8:26] Speaker 1: of the problem and then say, well, that sounds pretty tough, huh?
[8:31] Speaker 1: What do you think you should do about it? You
[8:33] Speaker 1: don't have to solve it. It's not your job to
[8:35] Speaker 1: carry it. It's your job to care about it and
[8:37] Speaker 1: to show it. So that's the first big thing.
[8:40] Speaker 2: I think back to the conversation I had with Lily
[8:42] Speaker 2: literally a couple of weeks ago while she's standing in
[8:44] Speaker 2: the car park waiting for her ride to go to camp.
[8:48] Speaker 2: And she was trying to be so big. And I
[8:52] Speaker 2: literally just rang to say, hey, mom and dad, just
[8:54] Speaker 2: about to get on the plane, just checking in, make
[8:56] Speaker 2: sure you're all there and you're ready to go. And
[8:58] Speaker 2: she was kind of like, uh-huh, uh-huh, just giving me really,
[9:01] Speaker 2: really short answers. And just as I went to hang
[9:04] Speaker 2: up and she had literally said goodbye to me, I
[9:06] Speaker 2: could hear the tears. And I just said, hey, Lil,
[9:09] Speaker 2: is everything okay? And then she broke down and we
[9:12] Speaker 2: were able to have this beautiful conversation, which I wasn't
[9:15] Speaker 2: expecting to have. Yeah.
[9:16] Speaker 1: So they know you care and they know you listen.
[9:18] Speaker 1: That's the number one thing for resilience. The number one
[9:21] Speaker 1: thing where kids go, okay, now I can go on.
[9:23] Speaker 1: It ties in a lot with the second one. I
[9:25] Speaker 1: said two before the break, but we need to take
[9:26] Speaker 1: the break after the break. We'll do the last four.
[9:28] Speaker 1: Stay with us. We're back. It's the Happy Families podcast.
[9:38] Speaker 1: All right. Here's the second thing that Kylie's just demonstrated
[9:41] Speaker 1: that helps kids to be resilient. And And I've actually
[9:43] Speaker 1: picked this line up from Steve Biddulph, the legendary parenting
[9:47] Speaker 1: expert from– he's still around doing stuff, but really in
[9:50] Speaker 1: the 80s and 90s, he was Australia's biggest parenting expert
[9:54] Speaker 1: and was even exported overseas. He just did such a
[9:57] Speaker 1: great job. Steve Bidoff says a parent's main job is
[10:00] Speaker 1: to always remain calmer than their child in those big moments.
[10:05] Speaker 1: And I just love that phrase. I love that idea.
[10:07] Speaker 1: And often in the little ones as well. So a
[10:10] Speaker 1: child's nervous system learns to settle by borrowing a settled
[10:14] Speaker 1: nervous system. So if you meet a meltdown with your
[10:18] Speaker 1: own meltdown, You've essentially taught your child escalation, and you've
[10:21] Speaker 1: probably created fear and anxiety. So your example, Kylie, is perfect.
[10:28] Speaker 1: You rang. We had a child who was not well regulated.
[10:31] Speaker 1: She was holding it together. And when you asked how
[10:33] Speaker 1: she was doing, you stayed calmer than her. She got
[10:35] Speaker 1: really worked up. And you didn't say, you're being silly.
[10:37] Speaker 1: Calm down. Stop it or anything. You just listened. You
[10:39] Speaker 1: cared and did that for her. It asks a lot
[10:44] Speaker 1: of parents. It really does. Sometimes we don't have it.
[10:47] Speaker 1: But it's what builds the support that's needed for their
[10:51] Speaker 1: resilience and for their regulation.
[10:53] Speaker 2: Well, in complete transparency, just in case everybody thinks I'm perfect,
[10:56] Speaker 2: and I clearly am not. Number one, I actually didn't
[11:00] Speaker 2: want to make the phone call. You and I were
[11:02] Speaker 2: going away for two nights of solitude, and I was
[11:05] Speaker 2: so excited about it. We had said goodbye to the
[11:08] Speaker 2: kids in the morning. They packed their bags. I was
[11:11] Speaker 2: done and dusted. I'd wiped my hands of them for
[11:13] Speaker 2: two days.
[11:14] Speaker 1: I pine. I'm like, oh, shouldn't we just call? Can
[11:16] Speaker 1: we just check in? And you did it.
[11:19] Speaker 2: And I did it. Yeah. I did it. And then
[11:23] Speaker 2: when I did hear the quiver, I was almost like, oh,
[11:25] Speaker 2: let's just, she'll be okay. She'll be okay.
[11:29] Speaker 1: See, this is a much better story now that you've
[11:30] Speaker 1: added this.
[11:32] Speaker 2: But in that brief second, as I was ready to
[11:36] Speaker 2: hang up, I was like, you know what? Clearly she
[11:38] Speaker 2: needs me. And I was able to tap in. But
[11:42] Speaker 2: it requires intention and effort. Yes. It's so easy to
[11:46] Speaker 2: just kind of turn a blind eye because we're dealing
[11:47] Speaker 2: with our own stuff as well.
[11:49] Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, very much. I have a technique that can
[11:52] Speaker 1: be useful here. If you want to stay calmer than
[11:54] Speaker 1: your child, before you respond to your child, take one
[11:58] Speaker 1: breath that you can hear. Like, not a sigh. No,
[12:04] Speaker 1: I didn't say sigh. I didn't say roll your eyes.
[12:06] Speaker 1: I said, you take a big breath because when you
[12:08] Speaker 1: breathe in and you slow everything down, you're going to
[12:10] Speaker 1: do way better. You're going to regulate yourself better.
[12:12] Speaker 2: I think I actually did that.
[12:14] Speaker 1: I think you probably did as well.
[12:18] Speaker 2: What's number three.
[12:19] Speaker 1: Oh, this is my favorite one. Um, let them do
[12:21] Speaker 1: hard things. And again, this ties in with the camp school.
[12:24] Speaker 1: This was girls camp, but school camps are one of
[12:26] Speaker 1: the biggest issues for so many parents and so many kids.
[12:28] Speaker 1: School camp is a really big deal. And, uh, These
[12:33] Speaker 1: all count here, but let them do hard things. What
[12:35] Speaker 1: do I mean by that? You don't know you're resilient
[12:39] Speaker 1: until you've done something hard.
[12:41] Speaker 2: Well, it would have been very easy in that moment.
[12:43] Speaker 2: My child is literally having an anxiety attack to get
[12:47] Speaker 2: on the phone, tell her big sister she's got to
[12:48] Speaker 2: go and pick her up. She can't do this. It's
[12:50] Speaker 2: too hard. And she doesn't have anybody there.
[12:54] Speaker 1: And in 2026, school principals consistently ask for this presentation
[12:57] Speaker 1: because too many parents are rescuing their kids. They're saying, oh,
[13:00] Speaker 1: my child's having an emotion. My child's feeling challenged and
[13:03] Speaker 1: I need to rescue them.
[13:05] Speaker 2: The challenges as a parent is- You feel like a
[13:08] Speaker 2: good parent when you're doing it. Well, no, there's a
[13:09] Speaker 2: fine line between how much do I push and how
[13:14] Speaker 2: much do I need to rescue?
[13:15] Speaker 1: And I would even say there is a time and
[13:16] Speaker 1: a place to rescue. Like there is actually a time
[13:19] Speaker 1: and a place to step in and say, actually, this
[13:20] Speaker 1: has gone too far. I need to get you out
[13:22] Speaker 1: of this situation. That's fair.
[13:25] Speaker 2: Totally. And so as a parent, finding the balance between
[13:30] Speaker 2: when to step in and when to step out is
[13:34] Speaker 2: really tricky.
[13:35] Speaker 1: I would say that the default should be towards reducing
[13:39] Speaker 1: the rush to go and rescue and reassure. I would
[13:42] Speaker 1: say the default should be that we stop letting them
[13:45] Speaker 1: skip it. Research shows that when kids do hard things,
[13:48] Speaker 1: they actually become less anxious. When they take bigger risks,
[13:50] Speaker 1: they become less anxious. There was a Yale research team,
[13:53] Speaker 1: university team, that found that when you reduce those parental accommodations,
[13:58] Speaker 1: that's as effective at reducing anxiety as therapy, but way cheaper.
[14:05] Speaker 1: And I think it's also really important to remember that
[14:07] Speaker 1: every time you rescue a child.
[14:10] Speaker 2: The message you actually send to them is that they're
[14:12] Speaker 2: not capable.
[14:13] Speaker 1: Yeah, you can't cope without me.
[14:14] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[14:15] Speaker 1: That's the thing we've got to bear in mind. Let
[14:17] Speaker 1: them approach that new friend. Let them try out for
[14:21] Speaker 1: the team. Let them stumble a little bit. Let them
[14:23] Speaker 1: go on school camp. Let them stay in the hard class.
[14:27] Speaker 1: They've got to do the hard things. That actually builds resilience.
[14:30] Speaker 1: But of course, like you said, there's got to be
[14:33] Speaker 1: that discernment. Sometimes you have to step in. And I
[14:34] Speaker 1: can't tell you where that line is. I would just
[14:36] Speaker 1: say that the fault should be that You let them
[14:40] Speaker 1: go a little bit further than you want them to
[14:42] Speaker 1: and see if they're still hanging in there and then
[14:43] Speaker 1: let them go a little bit further again.
[14:45] Speaker 2: So in the camp instance, for me, there were a
[14:49] Speaker 2: few things that made it easy for me to give
[14:50] Speaker 2: her the little nudge she needed. Firstly, we'd had another
[14:54] Speaker 2: experience recently where she'd had an anxiety attack. She sent
[14:57] Speaker 2: me a message and she said, Mom, I'm not doing well.
[15:00] Speaker 2: She talked me through what had happened and she said,
[15:03] Speaker 2: but I also know I've got this and I can
[15:06] Speaker 2: get through. So she has already got the mindset that
[15:09] Speaker 2: things are hard, but she can do hard things. So
[15:13] Speaker 2: that was the first one. The second one is I
[15:15] Speaker 2: knew the leaders and I knew that they loved her
[15:18] Speaker 2: and wanted her to have a good time. They were
[15:20] Speaker 2: ready to help her be successful.
[15:22] Speaker 1: So there's that support again. It's not just about parents.
[15:24] Speaker 2: And number three, she had her sister. She wasn't isolated
[15:28] Speaker 2: on her own and their relationship's good. And so that
[15:30] Speaker 2: enabled me to remind her that she had this. Like
[15:34] Speaker 2: she literally, and they're all my last words, you've got this.
[15:37] Speaker 2: You're going to have a great weekend.
[15:39] Speaker 1: You've got this. So good for resilience.
[15:41] Speaker 2: Number four.
[15:42] Speaker 1: So we're going to do the last two really fast
[15:43] Speaker 1: because our time is up. The fourth one is that
[15:45] Speaker 1: we want to give our kids a story bigger than themselves.
[15:48] Speaker 1: I love talking about identity when I do my workshops.
[15:50] Speaker 1: Our kids need foundations. They need roots. And that is
[15:54] Speaker 1: our family culture. It might be our faith. It could
[15:56] Speaker 1: be our family identity. It could be our racial or
[15:59] Speaker 1: ethnic history. It could be a cause. It could be
[16:02] Speaker 1: a tradition. Just some other purpose. It might be as
[16:05] Speaker 1: simple as somebody just saying, yeah, I depend on you.
[16:07] Speaker 1: So they know that they're contributing to something bigger than themselves.
[16:10] Speaker 1: There's a resilience researcher called Anne Mastin, and she found
[16:13] Speaker 1: that meaning making is as important as robust relationships and
[16:19] Speaker 1: as important as self-regulation when it comes to protective factors
[16:23] Speaker 1: and resilience. When kids are going through a hard thing,
[16:26] Speaker 1: but they can see a greater purpose to it, like
[16:29] Speaker 1: they can locate their suffering inside something much larger, larger
[16:31] Speaker 1: than them. If they start to see that hardship as
[16:34] Speaker 1: something valuable and something that gives their life purpose and
[16:36] Speaker 1: they get through it faster, they get through it better,
[16:38] Speaker 1: they're much more resilient.
[16:39] Speaker 2: Well, and I think the higher purpose in this instance
[16:42] Speaker 2: was Lily got to be the big sister.
[16:44] Speaker 1: She got to look after her little sister. That's the
[16:45] Speaker 1: higher purpose.
[16:46] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[16:46] Speaker 1: So she will suffer hardship and go through trials because
[16:50] Speaker 1: her little sister needs her.
[16:51] Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah.
[16:52] Speaker 1: Perfect example of that. When our kids have got something
[16:54] Speaker 1: to serve, when they've got a family story, when they
[16:57] Speaker 1: can see a bigger picture, they're really hard to sink.
[16:59] Speaker 2: And lastly, number five.
[17:01] Speaker 1: Yeah, in 2023, Peter Gray, who is a world-leading play expert,
[17:04] Speaker 1: wrote that the collapse in children's independent activity is a
[17:06] Speaker 1: central driver of rising anxiety and depression. Got other researchers
[17:10] Speaker 1: that have found that children with more risky outdoor play
[17:12] Speaker 1: have better physical and social outcomes. And there's also a
[17:16] Speaker 1: whole bunch of suggestions from scholars suggesting that climbing high
[17:21] Speaker 1: or moving fast or roaming out of range actually increases
[17:25] Speaker 1: What's the word I'm looking for? Calibrates the fear system,
[17:28] Speaker 1: the anxiety system, the emotional system. Short version of this,
[17:32] Speaker 1: risky play and other activities are good for your kids.
[17:34] Speaker 1: You should let them out of your sight. Need to emphasize,
[17:37] Speaker 1: as I always do on the podcast, risk and danger
[17:39] Speaker 1: are different. Danger means you've got no idea about the risk,
[17:42] Speaker 1: like a toddler playing near a pool. Dangerous. Risky play
[17:45] Speaker 1: means you can see the dangers and you have the
[17:47] Speaker 1: capacity to make decisions accordingly. So risky play. What does
[17:52] Speaker 1: that mean? It means that we want to send our
[17:54] Speaker 1: kids to the shops or let them go into the
[17:56] Speaker 1: next aisle if they're little to get the milk and
[17:58] Speaker 1: bring it back to you. We want to let them
[17:59] Speaker 1: ride to a friend's house or for little ones, let
[18:01] Speaker 1: them ride ahead to the corner and wait for you
[18:03] Speaker 1: without crossing the road. Let them climb higher than you
[18:07] Speaker 1: would like them to at the local park or on
[18:09] Speaker 1: your roof when they jump into the pool if you're
[18:11] Speaker 1: lucky enough to have a pool near a roof or
[18:13] Speaker 1: unlucky enough as the case may be. And watch how
[18:15] Speaker 1: big and capable it lets them feel.
[18:18] Speaker 2: Three years ago, you took Emily, who was nine at
[18:22] Speaker 2: the time.
[18:22] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[18:23] Speaker 2: Tubing on the back of your dad's boat.
[18:25] Speaker 1: And she was terrified. Absolutely terrified. And dad really wanted
[18:28] Speaker 1: to flip her and just get her used to it.
[18:29] Speaker 1: And I said, no, no, no, she'll never do it again.
[18:31] Speaker 1: So we gave her a lot of fun, but we
[18:34] Speaker 1: did not tip her. We did not flip her.
[18:36] Speaker 2: Three years later, we're at girls camp.
[18:39] Speaker 1: Oh, here we go again.
[18:39] Speaker 2: A couple of weekends ago.
[18:40] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[18:41] Speaker 2: And the consensus from all the leaders on board was
[18:46] Speaker 2: that our Emily, our 12-year-old, was the most.
[18:51] Speaker 1: Adventurous.
[18:52] Speaker 2: Adventurous. Little tuber there was. She wanted to be thrown
[18:56] Speaker 2: off at every turn. Just such a big change.
[19:00] Speaker 1: Yeah. I think parents misunderstand resilience. We need to wrap
[19:03] Speaker 1: it up. But a lot of parents think that resilience
[19:06] Speaker 1: means we have to say toughen up, princess. And when
[19:10] Speaker 1: hard things happen, kids have to be left alone to
[19:12] Speaker 1: figure it out, that they need to drink some concrete,
[19:15] Speaker 1: harden up, that kind of idea. And it's just not right.
[19:18] Speaker 1: The scientific research points away from that approach. Resilience is
[19:23] Speaker 1: built as much inside a child, that toughening up thing,
[19:27] Speaker 1: as it is built around a child in healthy, supportive
[19:31] Speaker 1: environments and usually in interactions that seemed too small to
[19:36] Speaker 1: matter at the time, except they do. There is no
[19:39] Speaker 1: triumph without the trial. We hope that this has been
[19:41] Speaker 1: a useful conversation for you about resilience. For more information,
[19:44] Speaker 1: visit happyfamilies.com.au. The Happy Families podcast, production, sound, audio, and
[19:50] Speaker 1: from justin rulon at bridge media and mim hammonds provides
[19:53] Speaker 1: our additional support later this week we talk with dr
[19:56] Speaker 1: joe winchester about fears parents have about kids and their
[19:59] Speaker 1: careers and tomorrow what do you do when your kids
[20:02] Speaker 1: are lashing out it's a tricky question on the happy
[20:04] Speaker 1: families podcast we'll talk to you then

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