#82 "WTF-Parenting Teens: Focusing on Character Over End Results"

 #ParentingTeens #TeenParenting #CharacterBuilding #LifeLessons #GolfAndLife #ParentingAdvice #WTFSeries #WelcomeToFriday #CherylPankhurst #PodcastCommunity #ParentingJourney #LoveYourHumans

 Welcome to the second episode of our new mini-series, "WTF: It's Not What You Think, It's Welcome to Friday." Join your host, Cheryl Pankhurst, as she dives deep into the art of parenting teens, sharing personal stories, insights, and reflections. In this episode, Cheryl reminisces about her father's love for golf and how it taught her valuable lessons about character, patience, and the journey of life. Discover how these lessons can be applied to parenting, focusing on the importance of character-building over end results. Are we raising our teens to love themselves and others, or are we too focused on achievements? Tune in to explore these questions and more.

Cheryl
00:05 - 00:51
Welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome to the Parenting Teens Advice Redefined new mini-series, WTF, It's Not What You Think, It's Welcome to Friday. And I am your host, Cheryl Pankhurst. If you have been hanging around my podcast for a while, you know that I go deep into parenting teens, their struggles, our struggles, and all things in between. But sometimes I just need a space to kind of share my thoughts, react to my latest conversations with expert guests, and talk about what's going on in my world. Maybe overshare just a little. So here we are. This is uncut and unedited so you can count on me effing things up just like in real life.

Cheryl
00:52 - 01:22
It's a new mini solo series. I want to keep it real. I want you to get to know me on a whole other level. And I want to get to know you. I want your questions. I want you to share your perspectives. I want you to engage with me directly. I would love to dedicate episodes to just answering your questions on air. And so please engage with me on social media, email, website, however you want to get a hold of me. And you can tell me, this is an anonymous question. Please don't say my name.

Cheryl
01:22 - 02:09
No problem. But this way, we are really sharing our struggles and our wins? And how does that, you know, allow people to feel like they're just not on their own, that they're doing things in a group, in a group of parents who know exactly how you feel, have been there, have done that, and really don't want to make the same mistakes or want to collaborate on mistakes. And so anyway, let's kick this off. And I was going through my live stream of this weekend's events and I thought this is going to be brought to you by Masters Week.

Cheryl
02:10 - 02:48
Yes, I am a golf fan. I love to golf. I love watching golf depending on who I'm watching and I was introduced to golf when I was very, very young by my dad and I still remember when I was too young to golf. I would hear him up at five o'clock in the morning, getting his clubs ready, sitting at the end of the driveway, waiting for his friends to pick him up, all growing up. And, you know, his tea off time would be like three hours later, but he was just so excited, he couldn't sleep.

Cheryl
02:49 - 03:30
And to have a passion like that for something I think is already admirable. And when I was old enough to start going golfing with my dad, it was a really amazing experience. I mean, my dad totally raised the bar because he was my only golf partner for years. And there was just something about walking around with him. One thing we never did, we never took a cart. It was always the walk for him. And as I started getting older and golfing more and golfing more and golfing with different people, I started realizing what it was for my dad to golf.

Cheryl
03:32 - 04:16
And he loved the game and he was a phenomenal golfer. Although he would never ever tell you that there are trophies all over his house from when he used to win all these tournaments. And he was so humble, he would never talk about the win, but he would just talk about the day and the weather and the people he golfed with. And he always came home so calm and happy and settled. And my dad was always calm and happy and settled, but you could tell that he was just doing something that he absolutely loved. And my memory is him always coming home and always having one course light when he got in the house, which I thought was so cute.

Cheryl
04:17 - 05:03
But on the golf course, what I started to really notice is it was never ever about the actual game. It was never about the shot. It was never about the bunkers. It was never about what kind of clubs you had or what kind of shoes you were wearing. It was just about the game. It was about the walk. It was about the connection. It was about, he always noticed the beauty in the nature, the robins and or if there was a deer or the smell of grass. When we went to pay for our green fees, he was always so kind to everybody in the golf club and to the greenskeeper.

Cheryl
05:03 - 05:51
And it was just all about this character that he was all the time, but especially on the golf course, doing exactly what he loved to do. And even when he retired, he wound up joining a club and he golfed every day, like Monday to Friday, every single day. And he never got tired of it. It never got boring. It never, and he golfed on the same golf course with the same three other guys. And, you know, when he came home from the golf game, he never said, oh, I made this terrible shot, or I made a great shot, or on hole seven, I used my iron and I, you know, chipped in for a birdie.

Cheryl
05:52 - 06:28
It was never about that. He would come home and he would talk about the three other guys he was golfing with. Joe, who's, you know, a phenomenal tutor and worked with kids all the time. And so we would have those conversations knowing I worked with kids all the time. Or his other buddy whose wife was really sick and every morning after golf, the nine holes, he would go to the extended care home to look after his wife. And who bought a new car and who was going on what trip? It was never about the game.

Cheryl
06:28 - 07:15
It was always about my dad learning more and more and more about the people he was with and making those connections. And I always thought, this is really cool. So fast forward, I get into golfing with my dad, and lovingly, he decides he is going to get my kids into golfing too. They loved. And I remember one day, my son, on the golf course had a really shitty shot and the club went flying and everything just stopped. My dad just said, he didn't yell at him because of the clubs. He didn't tell him, you know, you should appreciate what you have.

Cheryl
07:15 - 08:11
And this is, this isn't what we do. And there was no yelling. My dad never yelled, but he just looked at Andre and just said, that's not who we are on the golf course. And I thought, even today, brought me back to think, how's that for parenting? How's that for not addressing the clubs or the shot? Or it is, this is how we build character. This is who we are on the golf course. And my dad always said, you really see someone's character when you're on the golf course because it requires patience and consistency and repetition And you know, if you're a golfer and not a pro golfer, but if you are a golfer, you know, not one game is the same as the next.

Cheryl
08:11 - 08:59
You could have the best game in the world and then get on the golf course and realize that you actually have never golfed before the way you were golfing again. So it was never about the end result. It was about who you became on the golf course. And that's reflected in who you become in life. And so when we're talking to our teenagers, Are we looking at their end result and having commentary on that? Are we looking at the report cards and looking at the A pluses or the Ds or the Fs? Are we looking at that and having some commentary about that?

Cheryl
09:02 - 09:46
Are we looking at the learning skills? Are we looking at the comments about who they are in the classroom? Are we commenting about how they relate to the teacher or how they relate to their peers in the classroom? You know, if we are looking at, if we're looking at the end result and they can't meet that end result, How does that make them feel about their character on the way to the end result? I feel like if we can address and talk about, is that who you want to be? Is that how you want people to see you?

Cheryl
09:47 - 10:33
Can you step back and say, hey, if somebody just looked outside and saw you do that, that one little act, that one toss the club, that one curse, that one temper tantrum, And that's all they know of you. Who are you? Can we, as parents, step back when our kids have an end result that we're not happy with? Can we step back and say, okay, do I want to talk about that end result? Or do we want to talk about the character they're building to get to whatever result? Do we want to talk about who you become on the way to the end result.

Cheryl
10:34 - 11:12
Not just get there, this is the goal. Because if they can't get there, then how do they feel about themselves? But if they're trying, How do they feel about themselves? If they can't get there and they're down on themselves, or they've had a really crappy day, can we stop and instead of just saying, it'll get better. Don't worry about it. Or, yeah, yeah, I don't think that was very good either. Can we stop and say, hey, wait a minute. Let's go backwards for a few minutes. Let's celebrate some wins. Let's celebrate when you did this.

Cheryl
11:12 - 11:51
Let's celebrate when you did that and who you became doing that. Who was the person that dedicated themselves to studying and reviewing and checking their work and then got a really good mark on their test? or didn't get a really good mark on their test, but they still became this person who studied and put their commitment to it and dedicated themselves to becoming the person that's trying to get that mark, that's trying to score that goal, that's trying to make that putt. I think we focus so much on the end goal sometimes that we forget that whole middle.

Cheryl
11:52 - 12:30
That's the goal. How we teach our kids and how we show our kids who we are becoming to be that person. What kind of character? Do we want somebody who looks up to us? Do we want someone who can come to us and say, oh, you know, I didn't get this, but I tried this and I tried this and I tried that on the way. Great, great. It doesn't matter that you didn't get there. This is what you did to get there. I feel like how we be is so much more important than what we get, what we achieve.

Cheryl
12:32 - 13:16
what our final goal is, because it's that being able to make a mistake, back off. OK, what did I learn from this mistake? What did I try before that I did really well on? What can I do next time, as opposed to, ah, I didn't make the goal. I didn't make the putt, I'm never golfing again, I'm never playing hockey again, I hate math. You know, all of those, all of these little steps in between is what is character building. And that's what we want, right? We don't want to worry about raising kids who get this so we can brag about a mark or we can celebrate the end result.

Cheryl
13:17 - 14:00
We wanna celebrate who they're becoming in between all of that. Because those are the little wins that become the big wins. Those are the wins that allow us to not just raise kids to go out into the world and go to university and start working and get great jobs. This is how we raise humans to go out in the world and love themselves and then love on other people. And that's the true success. Doing what you love. loving who you're with that you're doing it, and just celebrating, you know, who you are really, truly becoming along the way.

Cheryl
14:02 - 14:38
And I'm gonna leave it at that because Rory's up, his tea time's coming, but I wanna thank you. Thank you for being here for the second WTF episode. I hope this space feels like home for you, a place where we can be open and real and grow together. If any of it resonates with you, please connect with me on social media, check the show notes for ways to work with me through coaching or consulting. just tune in. You can tune in every week. Parenting Teens Advice Redefined drops on Wednesdays and WTF obviously drops on Fridays.

Cheryl
14:38 - 14:47
This is Cheryl signing off. Until next time, take a deep breath, be kind, love your humans, and I'll catch you next Friday.