The Anxious Generation

• Fatherhood: The Anxious Generation — social media and your kids

• Fitness: The beauty of the Get-Right Day

• Focus: Surfing quiet time

• A book, a quote, a dad joke

Fatherhood: The Anxious Generation — social media and your kids

There’s a new book out co-written by Jonathan Haidt (author of The Coddling of the American Mind). I’ll link to a review in the final section. I think that we consider the risks of social media for our kids very seriously. However, I also think that there is a common tendency to act as if every problem is rooted in a single factor… And that if we fix that factor, we fix the problem. If only. In reality, I find this kind of idea to run on a parallel track with conspiracy thinking. AKA shouting the same thing over and over again through a continuously moving set of goalposts.

Social media has deep problems, to be clear. However, the track record for abstinence is not a great one. Maybe if you can keep a given genie in the bottle. However, once that genie is at-large, we need better tools. In our last call, we discussed more useful tactics, including combining early exposure coupled with media education and the kinds of constraints. For some practical tips about screen-time and other issues, I suggest checking out this episode of The Dad Strength Podcast.

Fitness: The beauty of the Get-Right Day

I think that we are often in a hurry to extract whatever we need out of our workouts — and that this kind of rushing can get us into trouble — or otherwise suck the joy out of things. So, if you ever feel like you’re spending too much time playing catch-up or are too constrained by injuries to work out the way you want to, consider adding a Get-Right Day.

A Get-Right Day asks only one question: what do you need to do to end the workout feeling great? It is not about your ideas of productivity or intensity. The part of your brain that wants to extract maximum value from a workout will hate it. Let me ask you a question, though: who should be the boss of a workout, your brain or your body?

Focus: Surfing quiet time

At some point, I realized the futility of pursuing focus-intensive activities within a busy house. However, when I was able to let go of my ideal timing, I found that I could surf waves of quiet within the home… Whenever they happened to come by. These days, if my son is reading, I will often quietly join him with my own book. It can be short-lived but, just like surfers don’t get mad when the tides aren’t in their favour, I don’t sweat it when things get boisterous again. I just try to be in position to catch the next set.

What I'm reading

As mentioned, here’s the review of the The Anxious Generation

Some new (excellent) advice from Kevin Kelly, including, “If you want to know how good a surgeon is, don’t ask other doctors. Ask the nurses.”

Tik-Tok and Civic Activity Among Young Adults

Also...
Parenting workshop: my friends at Fully Feeling Parenting are hosting a workshop on emotion-focused parenting this June. I’ve attended and can recommend.

Check out our book list

Submit your own recommendations here

Quote

“The foolish reject what they see, not what they think; the wise reject what they think, not what they see.”

— Huang Po (Huangbo Xiyun)

Dad joke

What did the pirate say on his 80th birthday?

“Aye matey”