by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Critical Thinking, Encouragement, Inspiring Quotes, Parent-child Communication, Parenting, Personal Strength, Programs, Teen Success
Epictetus (c. 55 – 135) was born a slave in Turkey nearly 2,000 years ago and then lived in Rome until he was banished to Greece. He was one of the Stoic philosophers. Epictetus taught that philosophy had to be more than theoretical; it had to be the way you lived...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Adolescent Brain, Critical Thinking, Education, Mentoring, Parenting, Parenting Books, Peer Pressure, Teen Culture, Teen Success
I have a 15-year-old nephew. The last time I saw him he was doing what most kids his age are doing: sitting on a couch browsing his smartphone. At the time I was thinking that a lot of unused brain cell connections were in the process of being “pruned”...
by Dennis Coates | Guest Blog Posts, Parenting, Personal Strength, Uncategorized
This guest post comes from parent coach Fern Weis. After teaching middle school for 13 years, she trained as a life coach and founded her business, Your Family Matters, in 2008. Since then she’s been teaching and supporting parents on the parent-teen relationship....
by Dennis Coates | Behavior Change, Encouragement, Inspiring Quotes, Parent-child Communication, Parenting, Personal Strength, Self-Esteem, Teen Success
Is your child resilient? Do you want your child to be more resilient? A non-scientific definition: Resilience is the ability to recover or “bounce back” from loss, stress, or disappointment – setbacks that can cause someone to doubt his or her self-confidence and...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Education, Parenting, Parenting Books, Self-Esteem, Teen Success, Work
How to Raise an Adult: Break Free of the Overparenting Trap and Prepare Your Kid for Success (Holt, 2015), by Julie Lythcott-Haims, is the best book ever written about the kind of overparenting that has produced the struggling young adults of the Millennial...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Parenting, Teen Success
On the occasion of my 50th class reunion, I remembered some of my West Point classmates. One in particular, I’ll call him Joey Sheed, graduated near the top of our class. As a freshman, I was in awe of him. We attended several classes together, and he never...
