The Best Advice I’ve Ever Gotten On Raising Teenagers

I got the best advice I’ve ever gotten on raising teenagers the other day.  I’ve read lots and lots of books with lots of good advice from many leading professionals in this area.  (The very best one: Running the Rapids, by Kevin Leman). But, the most succinct summary of all came from a middle aged cowboy with no agenda at all.  This 6’3”,  no nonsense, strait talking, cowboy was literally teaching me how to move a 2000 pound horse with a gentle touch of a finger, (thumb actually).  In my therapeutic riding volunteer position with ManeGait, he told me that most people try, with great frustration to move the horse, many times their size by pushing as hard as they dare.  The trick, he said, is to place your thumb very gently near the flank area, and apply pressure.  “I always say”, he told me, “to apply as little pressure as possible, but as much pressure as necessary.”  He winked at me a few days later, as I magically moved an enormous horse named Shades, to a position for tacking, for several frustrated volunteers who asked in amazement, “how’d you do that?!”

I knew as soon as he told me this, that there was other underlying wisdom to be gleaned.   It wasn’t until I came home to my 15 year old son later that day, who was procrastinating over several major personal and parental projects that I realized what that was.

I think it’s brilliant!  And I’m immediately incorporating this into my parenting tool kit!