by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Mentoring, Parent-child Communication, Parenting, Peer Pressure, Self-Esteem
For many young people, low self-esteem comes with the territory. They don’t want to be thought of as children anymore, but they know they’re not adults. They lack the knowledge, skills, judgment, experience, resources, authority, confidence and maturity...
by Dennis Coates | Parent-child Communication, Parenting, Parenting Books
Over the decades, a lot of bad advice for parents has been published. Strategies such as false praise, helicopter parenting and permissiveness may have played to parents’ fears of losing the love of their child, but the consequences have been horrendous. After...
by Dennis Coates | Critical Thinking, Education, Parenting Books, Personal Strength, Teen Success
It’s amazing what you see when you step outside the box. I’ve been focusing on the special challenge of raising teenagers for several years now, and I’ve been outside the box the whole time. Inside the box, you understand that you need to sacrifice...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescent Brain, Critical Thinking
I consider myself a serious thinker. But to be honest, I’m not an intellectual. I’m biased towards action. I have a Ph.D., but 95% of what I know today I learned on my own after earning that degree. So seemingly my head is full of knowledge. Some people...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Adolescent Brain, Parenting, Teen Suicide
Not long ago I was sitting at a table drinking coffee and talking with Johann Eyfells, the world-famous Icelandic sculptor. At some point, I used the word “luck.” He quickly seized on the word. “Luck. What is luck?” From a man who has been on...
