Pod Insights Good Inside with Dr. Becky The Cost of Compliance for Our Kids About this episode We often think of “good” kids as those who listen and follow rules, but what if constant compliance comes with a long-term cost? Dr. Becky talks with Dr. Sunita Sah, author of Defy: The Power of No in a World that Demands Yes, about rethinking defiance, the downsides of over-compliance, and helping kids balance cooperation with self-respect.
Transcript Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:00 Dr. Becky Kennedy? After my first baby was born, I treated my own recovery like a complete afterthought. If the baby needed something, I showed up immediately. If I needed something, well, it would wait. But research shows that when parents have the support they need, they're better able to care for their children. Taking care of yourself isn't separate from parenting. It's a huge part of parenting. That's why I love Frida's mission to prepare women for the realities of pregnancy, postpartum, recovery, and feeding. Frida creates solutions for the moments that often catch moms off guard. The Postpartum Essentials Kit and Breastfeeding Survival Kit help women feel more prepared for those early weeks of motherhood. Be motherhood prepared and shop Frida at Amazon, Target, and Walmart today.
0:43 Speaker 01 If you're a parent, you know this moment. You look at your kid after making a simple request and they just say, "No," or they escalate and say, "You can't make me." You're just trying to brush their teeth. You're just trying to leave the playground. You're just trying to have a simple transition moment of getting out the door, and instead, it is a power struggle. And then maybe you start telling other people, "I have a defiant kid. My kid is so defiant." I love thinking about this word defiance. And look, as a parent of three, I know these moments. They are so inconvenient. They are so exhausting. And I think a lot of us also think, "I would have never done this when I was a kid. I was terrified
1:27 Speaker 01 of my parents. I really felt this pressure to be good." You're going to love this conversation, and it's going to turn on its head so many of the things that we tend to accept as true. I'm talking today with Dr. Sunita Sa. She's a professor at Cornell, and she wrote the book, "Defy: The Power of No in a World That Demands Yes." Together, we rethink defiance and compliance, and we give you some totally new tips that you're going to find really helpful in your everyday life. I'm Dr. Becky, and this is Good Inside. We'll be back right after this.
2:12 Dr. Becky Kennedy? Here's a question parents ask me all the time. How can I help my kid take ownership of their routine? I love this question because owning a routine is such a good way for kids to build independence and confidence. It's why I'm excited to tell you about Yodo, the screen-free audio player for kids. In the mornings, your kid can wake up with Yodo's alarm clock. When your kid gets home from school, Yodo has focus tracks, audiobooks, music, and learning content. One of my kids really likes to write and record their own stories with the "Make Your Own" cards. Then at night, your kid can build a wind-down routine with Yodo's toothbrush timer, white noise, and nightlight. With the right sounds, stories, and a bit of structure thanks to Yodo, mornings feel more manageable. Homework time feels calmer, and winding down before bed becomes something kids can run themselves,
2:57 Dr. Becky Kennedy? making the whole school year feel a little easier for everyone. Use the code DRBECKY15 for 15% off your order at Yodoplay.com. New customers only, ends October 31st. Terms apply. Offer valid on select products only. I don't know about you, but by the time September rolls around, I am ready for cozy season. That's when I start thinking about Thanksgiving plans and travel that allows me to spend quality time with my family. I'm thinking board games, changing leaves, maybe even a living room with a fireplace where we can read our books together. Maybe you're the kind of family that loves an adventure and wants a cabin in the mountains somewhere. Or maybe you're dreading the end of summer and need to look forward to staying at a home on the beach with the view of the ocean. Or maybe you love to cook,
3:41 Dr. Becky Kennedy? so you want to stay in a home with your dream kitchen. Wherever your travel plans take you, it's the perfect time to get a little reset, together as a family, before the holiday season and craziness begins. But here's something you may not have considered. If you're planning to go away this year, leaving your own space empty, you can list it on Airbnb while you're away to give another family some quality time in a home away from home. You get to make use of your space, and you can earn some extra income to put toward your family's future travel plans. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com/host.
4:21 Speaker 01 Hi, Sunita.
4:22 Speaker 02 Hi, Becky. It's wonderful to be here.
4:24 Speaker 01 So happy to have you. And honestly, it's just so rare that someone I'm talking to has written a book about the word, essentially, that I think I'm asked about most from parents. Right? Oh, my kid is so defiant. I have such a defiant kid. Why is my kid having this need to defy me all the times? And so I'm just so excited to take so much of what you wrote here. And I know it's not just about the parenting world, but there's so much overlap in how you think about defiance. And so tell me, let's just start with the title, "Defy." You wrote a whole book about this, and you really redefine what it means to, or give us a new framework. So let's jump in there.
5:07 Speaker 02 Sure, absolutely. Well, I mean, I've been so fascinated by what that single powerful word "defy" means for like, so long. And it was really because of the way that I grew up, which might sort of account for why I went into research into this, in this particular area. And like, I was raised to be good. Like, in fact, my father, when I was little, he told me that my name, Sunita, means good in Sanskrit. So I mainly lived up to that. I did what I was told. I went to school. I did all my homework. I did what was expected of me. I even had my hair cut the way my parents wanted me to, right? I was good. And these were the messages that I received, not just from parents, but from teachers,
5:52 Speaker 02 the community. What does good mean? It means doing as you're told, listening to other people, pleasing other people, being polite, obedience. And so I really started to equate being obedient and compliant with being good, and defiance with being bad. And we know that defiance has this negative connotation. So the parents that are writing to you that, yeah, basically saying, "I don't want my kid to defy."
6:20 Speaker 01 Yes.
6:21 Speaker 02 And as children, we get so much training in compliance, you know, that essentially, I had a masterclass in compliance growing up. And then when I got older...
6:33 Speaker 02 I began to realize as I delved into the research that there's some real problems with this. I mean, in my own life, I did what was expected of me. I became a physician. That was my first career, largely due to expectations. And I'm now an organizational psychologist, which I love. And if you look at the research, sometimes it is bad to be so good. So in medicine, for example, there was a survey that found that on average nine out of 10 healthcare workers don't feel comfortable speaking up when they see their colleague or a physician making a mistake.
7:09 Speaker 01 Oh.
7:10 Speaker 02 So there are situations you want people to be speaking up, you know. Another survey of over 1,700 crew members on a commercial airline, about half of them don't feel comfortable saying something when they see a mistake. So it can be these life and death decisions, but even if they're not, if you're constantly doing what other people tell you to do all the time, and you don't develop the skill for defiance, it can create some real problems as you become older.
7:39 Speaker 01 There's so many directions I think we can go in, but I think those are such amazing practical examples of where anyone listening would say, please speak up. I'm sorry, there's an issue on the plane. I'm sorry, you see someone making a mistake on another human's body? Speak up. That makes sense to speak up. But I think what's so powerful to kind of zoom out on is, well, of course, it makes sense to speak up when someone's making a medical mistake. But if nine out of 10 people wouldn't, where does that come from? Because it must mean that for so many of the early years of our life, it was adaptive to kind of smile and go along with things and almost ignore a signal in your body that was probably
8:24 Speaker 01 saying,
8:25 Speaker 02 Exactly.
8:25 Speaker 01 "I'm not so sure about this."
8:27 Speaker 02 Right.
8:27 Speaker 01 "I'm not so sure about this." And that kind of difference between an internal signal And what you imagine or really is the demand of your environment leads us to to kind of get into those habits, even play them out in a life or death situation.
8:45 Speaker 02 Yeah, absolutely. That internal signal, first of all, is really important. I actually call it, that's the stage one of defiance.
8:52 Speaker 01 Right.
8:53 Speaker 02 And it can manifest in different ways in people like so. Some people will feel so unease in their stomach. Some people will feel a dry mouth. Other people will get a headache. So it's different for every person, but it is a signal. And what's unfortunate is that a lot of people try to sweep it away that, oh, this isn't worth my anxiety. It's not worth my doubt. The other person probably knows better. I'm not going to say anything in this situation, or I'm not going to do anything. I also discovered in my research, a powerful psychological force I call insinuation anxiety. And this is a distinct type of anxiety that people feel when they become concerned or worried
9:36 Speaker 02 that saying no or rejecting somebody's advice and not following their suggestion indicates that they don't trust the other person. So it implies that the other person is untrustworthy, incompetent, or there's something wrong. They don't want to give a negative evaluation to someone else. So when we think about anxiety and all the things that we feel when we have anxiety, a lot of people might be familiar with social anxiety.
10:04 Speaker 01 Yeah.
10:05 Speaker 02 Or performance anxiety, where you're worried about how you are going to be judged. Insinuation anxiety is kind of the reversed. It's like, I don't want to give a negative signal to someone else.
10:14 Speaker 01 Huh. So is insinuation anxiety like, I don't want this doctor to think I don't trust them.
10:19 Speaker 02 Exactly.
10:19 Speaker 01 I don't want this doctor to think that I don't think they're a good doctor, or I'm thinking parenting. Someone asked me to be on a committee. Let's say I just know I have no time to do this. I don't want them. I don't want to make it seem like the committee's unimportant, right?
10:35 Speaker 02 Right.
10:36 Speaker 01 And so, and then does that lead us to shut down that first feeling?
10:40 Speaker 02 It leads us to comply. Keeps us silent and it leads leads us silent and compliant when we would rather say no. And so it is a very powerful force and you know, it is there for a reason. We want harmonious relationships. We don't want to be implying that the person next to you is stupid and considerate. You know, your boss doesn't know better. We don't want to be sending those signals out too much. But sometimes if we only think about the person that's standing right in front of us, we miss the bigger picture.
11:16 Dr. Becky Kennedy? I don't know about you, but by the time September rolls around, I am ready for cozy season. That's when I start thinking about Thanksgiving plans and travel that allows me to spend quality time with my family. I'm thinking board games, changing leaves, maybe even a living room with a fireplace where we can read our books together. Maybe you're the kind of family that loves an adventure and wants a cabin in the mountains somewhere. Or maybe you're dreading the end of summer and need to look forward to staying at a home on the beach with a view of the ocean. Or maybe you love to cook, so you want to stay in a home with your dream kitchen. Wherever your travel plans take you, it's the perfect time to get a little reset together as a family before the holiday season and craziness begins. But here's something you may not have considered. If you're planning to go away this year, leaving your own space empty,
12:01 Dr. Becky Kennedy? you can list it on Airbnb while you're away to give another family some quality time in a home away from home. You get to make use of your space and you can earn some extra income to put toward your family's future travel plans. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com/host. Here's a question parents ask me all the time. How can I help my kid take ownership of their routine? I love this question because owning a routine is such a good way for kids to build independence and confidence. It's why I'm excited to tell you about Yodo, the screen-free audio player for kids. In the mornings, your kid can wake up with Yodo's alarm clock. When your kid gets home from school, Yodo has focus tracks, audiobooks, music and learning content.
12:43 Dr. Becky Kennedy? One of my kids really likes to write and record their own stories with the make your own cards. Then at night, your kid can build a wind down routine with Yodo's toothbrush timer, white noise and nightlight. With the right sound, stories, and a bit of structure, thanks to Yodot, mornings feel more manageable. Homework time feels calmer and winding down before bed becomes something kids can run themselves, making the whole school year feel a little easier for everyone. Use the code DRBECKY15 for 15% off your order at Yodoplay.com. New customers only, ends October 31st. Terms apply. Offer valid on select products only.
13:25 Speaker 01 Let's just say that it is someone asks me, hey, do you want to be on this committee? We are really looking for another person. And the first signal in my body is Becky, like you already feel run to the ground. You have this other committee you're doing, or maybe I'm not, but whatever. The season of my life does not allow for this. And I have this first stage, like you say, the first stage is tension.
13:45 Speaker 02 Yes.
13:46 Speaker 01 And then maybe through this insinuation anxiety, I think, oh, Sunita, if I say no to her, is going to think that I think her committee is stupid, or something like that.
13:56 Speaker 02 Or unimportant.
13:57 Speaker 01 Right, or unimportant. What's really interesting about that is I'm taking my signal in my body and kind of making it about what you might think.
14:07 Speaker 02 Right, right.
14:08 Speaker 01 Instead of taking my signal in my body and thinking about what it means in terms of what I think.
14:15 Speaker 02 Exactly, exactly, right? So we're missing, like, the stage two of defiance is really acknowledging that tension to ourselves and figuring out what does it mean? What does it mean for me? You know, why am I actually experiencing the tension? What is the conflict between what I really want to do and what is expected of me?
14:35 Speaker 01 And so let's just go with this example. The acknowledgement might be, hold on a second, I have this gut feeling, or I have this butterfly feeling, whatever it is. Let me take a moment and just wonder what it's about. And maybe my brain's saying, Sunita's going to be so mad and she's not going to want to be friends with you. And, you know, I don't want to make her think her committee is unimportant. But then, because I know these steps, I say, hold on, what does this just mean? What might be going on for me? Because I'm probably not having the signal in my body because I think Sunita's committee is unimportant. Like, no, it might have something to do with me. And then I might think, I wonder if the signal is telling me... This is just not the season to commit to that, you know, committee.
15:14 Speaker 02 Right. It could be you're feeling overwhelmed that day and you've been feeling overwhelmed maybe for a long time.
15:20 Speaker 01 Yeah.
15:20 Speaker 02 And this is not something you can take on and do well. Or maybe you just don't have the skill set for it, right? It could be, that's a fantastic committee and so and so would be really great on it. Wouldn't be great for me. So there's a lot of reasons why we could feel that way. And I do wanna distinguish between like just having an emotional reaction to it, to so feeling this tension between what somebody else expects and what you think is the right thing to do. So that aspect of really holding up that tension to the light rather than a knee jerk reaction, but thinking about why is it that I feel so uncomfortable? What is this telling me? And so really connecting with what it means for you.
16:02 Speaker 01 Yeah. Okay. I like to complete things. So I'm counting the stages of defiance so far. So there's tension. There's acknowledgement.
16:10 Speaker 02 Yes, to yourself. The third stage, which is a really critical stage, is vocalizing to somebody else. And the reason this is a critical stage is because the research shows if you can get to this stage, you're more likely to get to the end stage of defiance, right? And there's a couple of reasons for that. The main one is if you tell someone else that you're not comfortable with this, then you can't go back in time and say, oh yeah, actually it was fine. I think I could do it, right? You'd have too much cognitive dissonance. So that's why it's really great to to say something. And then also, if you say something, you've changed the environment around you, even if it's something like, I'm not comfortable with this, or could you tell me more?
16:54 Speaker 02 Or ask for some clarifying questions? You can still be in a subservient position at this point. You could just have some of these scripts in your back pocket, like, I'm not entirely sure. Let me get back to you. You know, taking a pause is really great.
17:08 Speaker 01 Yeah.
17:08 Speaker 02 But just getting that to that point where you're not complying immediately.
17:13 Speaker 01 Yeah.
17:13 Speaker 02 You're just basically saying, tell me more. Tell me more about this, or I'm not quite comfortable with this.
17:19 Speaker 01 It's one of the first things I say when parents tell me I'm always saying yes to things when I know internally I want to say no. I'm like, what should I say in the moment? And I would say to expect yourself to go from saying yes immediately to having some beautiful script as a way of saying no, like no human can do that. By time, by time, I'm going to just one line in your head. Let me get back to you. Thanks for asking, let me get back to you because time can allow us to do.
17:45 Speaker 02 It's time and physical presence. If you can take some time away from the person in front of you, then you can see the bigger picture. You can see how it's going to affect you, your family, other people that you might not even know. So rather than a nurse just thinking about how the physician's going to react, you can think about the patient and the larger environment. So there's a lot of things with having both physical distance or maybe even psychological distance, if you can't get away to get yourself that distance from the person asking.
18:16 Speaker 01 I love that. Okay. And then what are the final stages?
18:19 Speaker 02 So stage three is that vocalization. Stage four is that this is now where you're going to say you can't comply. It's your threat of noncompliance is just say, I can't, I can't do it. And so just sticking to that, rather than being like burdened down to going back to stages. I used to hover between stages two and three a lot in my life, you know? And then try and dismiss the tension and go back and forth. So it's not always linear. You can jump as well. Like if you're defying for someone else, definitely I learnt to defy a lot when it was for my son, because I found it easier to take responsibility in those, you know, and not maybe follow completely the doctor's order. Maybe I'll get a second opinion, you know?
19:04 Speaker 02 I would like to wait. I don't want to jump into that. So sometimes it's easier to defy for someone else. But stage four is that threat of noncompliance. And then stage five is the final act of defiance, is implementing it. And what's wonderful about that stage is that. If you can get to that stage and actually follow through, that tension that I mentioned right at the beginning in stage one, that dissipates, it melts away. So you're, it's actually more joyful, more honest, it's more authentic. You are sort of living in alignment with who you are and your values and what you can manage. So it's really important to learn that skill because if we don't,
19:48 Speaker 02 if we think of defiance, if we think of saying no as being such a negative aspect of ourselves, we are just going to continue to comply. And in the end, let other people down is not always the safe option. So let me talk about like the different definitions a little bit. So when I talk about compliance, like what do we mean by compliance? Compliance is something that's externally imposed. So something that somebody else wants, an order, a suggestion, or maybe even society's expectations, right? It's something that's coming from outside us that we're complying with. Having done medicine, I love contrasting compliance and consent and how they are actually different. Because in medicine, we have informed consent.
20:32 Speaker 02 And for informed consent, you need five elements. So first of all, capacity, you need to have the competence to do it. So you're not under the influence of alcohol or drugs, you're not too sick. Then you need to have knowledge. So you need to be given information about the decision. So you need to be informed, but it's not enough just to get the information. You need to understand it. So that's the third element, a thorough understanding of the risks, the benefits, the alternatives. And then the fourth element is the freedom to say no. Because if you don't have the freedom to say no, then it's merely compliance, it's not consent. And if you have those four elements, then the fifth one is your authorization,
21:15 Speaker 02 which is either what I call a true yes, which is consent, or it's your true no, which is defiance. It's, and both of those things, consent, dissent, or defiance, are something that's internally driven, something that's a thoroughly considered decision based on your own values.
21:32 Speaker 01 Yeah, and I, it's really helpful. And I think just for people listening, right? And we'll talk about kids next, that when you say no to somebody, right? You are often saying yes to yourself, like I know I can't commit to this committee. And so I guess I'm saying no to Sunita, but I'm also really saying yes to myself because if I say yes to Sunita, I'm in some ways I'm acting in defiance or I'm saying no to something that actually feels really important to me. And I think so many of us were brought up, especially as girls, to do that all the time. We are so well-practiced. We are expert in saying no to the things that we might want for ourselves. And we are so good at
22:17 Speaker 01 noticing what the world wants of us. And this framework tries to, you know, help us take steps to rebalance that.
22:23 Speaker 02 Absolutely. I mean, this is why I really got involved in this research is why do we find it so difficult to say no? And especially like a lot of my experiments I've done in the US, also in the UK. So they're two countries that pride themselves on independence and free thinking and agency. And yet even in really simple experiments, people comply at shockingly high rates. So when I talk about distance in private, they choose like what they truly want. But in public, under pressure, they're doing something very different. And the results are really quite dramatic as to why are we doing this? And a lot of the time, it's that we haven't been trained in how to defy. We find it awkward. We find
23:04 Speaker 02 it uncomfortable. We find it confrontational. And so if we haven't learned how to do it, we end up saying yes a lot. We end up saying either being silent, being compliant, and getting ourselves in situations that we would rather not be in.
23:19 Speaker 01 I think that's right. And it is something I talk to a lot of parents about because a lot of families, especially with multiple kids, right? They'll say like, this is kind of my defiant problem kid and some version of why can't this kid be more similar to his brother, his sister, who's always so good? And right? And I think this idea of like especially a good girl, I was that too, growing up, no longer, watch out. But all we're really saying is it's like a coded way of saying compliant to external expectations.
23:52 Speaker 02 Right. Exactly. I mean, what do we mean by good? Oh, she does. She listens to her parents so well.
23:58 Dr. Becky Kennedy? Right.
23:58 Speaker 02 And she did everything that I asked her to.
24:00 Dr. Becky Kennedy? Right.
24:01 Speaker 02 You know, she's looking after other people. She's, you know, all of these things mean good means compliant.
24:07 Dr. Becky Kennedy? Yes.
24:08 Speaker 02 And what does it mean to be defiant? Well, you know.
24:12 Dr. Becky Kennedy? Yeah.
24:12 Speaker 02 That could also be good. If everybody else is being mean to a particular child, are you going to be the one that says something? You know, especially like children, they care about kindness. They care about fairness. It's not like they don't know their values and what's important to them. So how can they feel more comfortable in those situations to act the way that they would hope to?
24:39 Dr. Becky Kennedy? Here's a question parents ask me all the time. How can I help my kid take ownership of their routine? I love this question because owning a routine is such a good way for kids to build independence and confidence. It's why I'm excited to tell you about Yodo, the screen-free audio player for kids. In the mornings, your kid can wake up with Yodo's alarm clock. When your kid gets home from school, Yodo has focus tracks, audiobooks, music and learning content. One of my kids really likes to write and record their own stories with the make your own cards. Then at night, your kid can build a wind down routine with Yodo's toothbrush timer, white noise and nightlight. With the right sounds, stories and a bit of structure, thanks to Yodo, mornings feel more manageable. Homework time feels calmer and winding down before bed becomes something kids can run themselves,
25:24 Dr. Becky Kennedy? making the whole school year feel a little easier for everyone. Use the code DRBECKY15 for 15% off your order at Yodoplay.com. New customers only, ends October 31st. Terms apply, offer valid on select products only. I don't know about you, but by the time September rolls around, I am ready for cozy season. That's when I start thinking about Thanksgiving plans and travel that allows me to spend quality time with my family. I'm thinking board games, changing leaves, maybe even a living room with a fireplace where we can read our books together. Maybe you're the kind of family that loves an adventure and wants a cabin in the mountain somewhere. Or maybe you're dreading the end of summer and need to look forward to staying at a home on the beach with a view of the ocean. Or maybe you love to
26:07 Dr. Becky Kennedy? cook, so you want to stay in a home with your dream kitchen. Wherever your travel plans take you, it's the perfect time to get a little reset together as a family before the holiday season and craziness begins. But here's something you may not have considered. If you're planning to go away this year, leaving your own space empty, you can list it on Airbnb while you're away to give another family some quality time in a home away from home. You get to make use of your space and you can earn some extra income to put toward your family's future travel plans. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.com/host.
26:47 Speaker 01 It's so easy to think about it in terms of extremes. Do we want our kids sometimes to take care of other people? Of course, do we want our kids to listen to us sometimes? Yes, we do, right? And so no one has to be one extreme or the other. But I think what's interesting, and you and I are both kind of stories of this, is we worry a lot more about our kids who are defiant than our kids who are good and easy.
27:12 Dr. Becky Kennedy? Right.
27:12 Speaker 01 Right. But one of the things I always say to parents is, I don't know any parent of older kids who says, oh, my 25 year old daughter, she is so compliant. She listens to everything people say. I'm so proud of her. Like, nobody's ever said that. You're like, oh, that's so creepy. What? You don't even want that in your 25 year old. Her boss put her in an uncomfortable situation and she said, no problem. Like, obvious. We'd want our kid at age 25 to be able to notice their discomfort.
27:41 Dr. Becky Kennedy? Yes.
27:42 Speaker 01 And to say, I trust this enough to do something about it. But that...
27:49 Speaker 01 Ability isn't gifted to someone at age 25. It's not like here, here you have it. Now that you're out of my house. Here you go. Right? And so sometimes, and I don't want to be fear mongering here, but sometimes I worry, I don't want to say more about, but I worry equally, at least about the kids who I'm told, that kid's never had a tantrum. That kid's never put up a fight about a decision. Never? Right? That you want your kid, even if it's inconvenient when they're younger and we both know his moms. It is. But they need that practice.
28:23 Speaker 02 Yes, they do. And they sometimes need to be encouraged to state what they want.
28:29 Speaker 01 Same way.
28:30 Speaker 02 So if we think, if we're always telling them to obey us, how can they actually then determine what it is that they truly want? And if they're always disregarding the tension, then what do they learn? I'm going to swallow this in the future. Something seems wrong here, but I'm just going to hold my tongue. I'm gonna just maybe shake my head a little, but go along with what everybody else is doing. And we teach our kids to be maybe scared of strangers. But as you're saying, what if it's your boss? What if it's your friends? At what point are you going to be saying, that's not me? I would rather not do that.
29:11 Speaker 01 And I think this is where some of those inconveniences of childhood pay off in spades, right? Because I like to paint a vivid picture. This is the reality. Like, imagine you're now, I don't know, 20 year old daughter, let's say in college, and she's at a bar. Someone's approaching her and they're having a nice conversation, maybe a little flirtatious. And then things kind of quote escalate like, hey, come home with me. Right? She doesn't know this person. It feels exciting. And let's say there's this tension in her body, like. I don't know about this.
29:43 Speaker 02 Yes.
29:44 Speaker 01 And one of two circuits activate. One is I've gotten really, really good at having tension and turning it off.
29:52 Speaker 02 Mm hmm.
29:53 Speaker 01 And instead, looking to someone else and doing what they seem to want of me. Or I have learned to tune into that tension, honor it enough to be curious about it.
30:04 Speaker 02 Yes.
30:04 Speaker 01 And prioritize some of, you know, that feeling, even if it might be in opposition with what someone wants of me.
30:13 Speaker 02 Yeah.
30:14 Speaker 01 And when parents say to me, like, are you saying that the childhood experiences someone has, like, that relates to that moment? And I was like, I would bet my life on it, like 100%. It's the same circuit.
30:24 Speaker 02 It's the same. And you don't even have to be waiting till you're 25, right?
30:28 Speaker 01 Exactly.
30:29 Speaker 02 Like, I was speaking to a teacher, a middle school teacher, that was telling me all about, like, the eighth graders went on a trip. The year before, they had problems with what was being said on group chats. And so they did some of the exercises in my book, you know, what's the line that you wouldn't cross? Or what's a time that you've acted in a way that you wish you hadn't?
30:51 Speaker 01 Yeah.
30:51 Speaker 02 And it was all about, like, you know, I didn't speak up in this group chat, even though it got really terrible. The mob mentality that happened when we went on the school trip. I was part of that. I got into serious trouble. And it's why? Why are these things happening? Because it's difficult to speak up and say something in situations if you've never been taught how to do it.
31:13 Speaker 01 That's exactly right. And so, you know, I think about my own kids. I have three kids. And one of them is just more oriented than the others to kind of notice the environment and kind of what is, what do other people want of me? We actually had this conversation the other day and we were talking about that and just having an honest conversation. That could be an amazing thing. And that is a superpower in a way. And all of our superpowers can end up working against us too. Because as we tune into what people want of us so much, we can start to really tune out to the signals our body is giving us. And I think that's my kid, if I think about all of them, where that kid does need a little prompting. You know, no, you don't have to switch seats at the table right now, even though your sibling is whining.
31:58 Speaker 01 Oh, I wanted that seat. No, like, by the way, if it was a different kid who's very tuned into themselves, I'd be like, we're gonna switch your seat, okay? But this kid, this kid needs help from me.
32:11 Speaker 01 Helping keep that seat, you know, defying a little bit.
32:15 Speaker 02 Right, right. And all of those things and the way that we sort of parent for compliance and parent for defiance is really important because those lessons stay with us and we remember them and we remember how our parents act too.
32:32 Speaker 01 Yes, that's exactly right. And I think one of the things, you know, one of my favorite programs in our app is about these strong willed, classically labeled defiant kids. And they often do happen in families where there is this kind of very good compliant. There's like a binary. And I think one of the things that's interesting is that one of the things the defiant kids often need to, in some moments at least, be a little more cooperative in a way that often works for them because sometimes the defiance works against them, is the other sibling to take up a little bit more of the defiance space. You know, and it's almost this paradoxical intervention of families like, wait, the problem in the family isn't the defiant kid, it's the compliant kid. And neither one has
33:13 Speaker 01 to be the problem, but the problem is that your kids are so extreme. You have 100% defiance and 100% compliance. Let's rejigger, let's rejigger the percentages. Yes. I'd love to get practical. I know there's people listening here. What's like in your starter pack? Like, let's say there's a starter pack for people even in adulthood, not just with their kids, but probably for themselves, maybe like little acts of defiance. Like, how can you start?
33:39 Speaker 02 Yeah, how can you start? Well, the very first thing I would say is have a mindset shift of what we think about what defiance is. Like, we often think about defiance as being loud, bold, and aggressive, for rule breakers. And if we start thinking like that, you know, I was like, as a child, as a child and even like as a young adult, like, you know, defiance is for other people, it's not for, not for me. And that is really thinking of defiance as a personality trait. And it's actually just a skill and it's one that we can learn. So having this mindset shift, we can defy in a way that's natural to us, that represents a skill. It doesn't have to be loud. There's ways to be quietly defiant,
34:22 Speaker 02 where we can live in alignment with our values without having to be aggressive about it. So having that mindset shift, it's not loud, it's not aggressive, and also it's not just for the extraordinary or the superhuman, you know, it's not out of reach. It's actually available and it's necessary for all of us to to learn. It's a skill. It's not something that is a trait, it's a practice, not a personality.
34:49 Speaker 01 So someone doesn't say, okay, I guess I have to be a defiant person now. Like, no.
34:53 Speaker 02 You can choose to be compliant one day and defiant the next day. So that is really, really important. And then how do we get there? The practical aspect, it's practice, because we have been so practiced in being obedient. Kids are in the thick of being obedient. And we have really strengthened those neural pathways. How can we obedient, be obedient? How can we be compliant? So now what do we have to do? We can start off with those small acts of defiance. And we don't need to get it right every single time. We can just start rehearsing. So when you get asked to be on that committee, you can just say, I'm going to take some time to think about this. Let me get back to you. So taking a pause, that aspect, I call it the power of the pause, is just learning about that.
35:38 Speaker 02 Then having a few scripts, if somebody is saying something that you feel uncomfortable with in a conversation, then you could just say, what do you mean by that? I love that that sentence. I remember very clearly, and I can tell you about this. My mother, who was a very compliant person, she used that sentence once, and it has stayed with me for so long. So I can describe that to you in a minute. But these small acts of defiance, even just practicing, for example, if you get the wrong coffee order, like saying something about it, you know, you might not think these are particularly defiant acts, but they make a difference and they get you rehearsing. It gets your mouth used to saying those words and your ears used to hearing it. Because if we don't practice, we're never going to
36:22 Speaker 02 change those neural pathways.
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38:38 Speaker 01 You're talking about the coffee makes me think about a story I want to share too.
38:40 Speaker 02 Oh yeah, wonderful.
38:42 Speaker 01 I was traveling for work a little while ago and I got a coffee in the airport and I wanted just a little bit of milk in my coffee. And so I was pretty, you know, direct. I said, hey, you know, can I get a medium coffee, just a little bit of milk. I like it pretty dark, right? So I get my coffee and it looks like mostly milk and very little coffee. All right, very, very light. And I just know I'm not going to drink it. I don't like it like that. It's not what I asked for. So I got back in the back of the line, waited a couple of people and then I was up, I said, hey, all good. I know you're taking a lot of orders. My coffee came out very light. I'd asked for a dark. Could I get a new one? And the one behind the counter said something like, oh, like, no problem. Yep. I totally remember you saying that, you know, gave me a new one. And I shared this story on Instagram. And it was
39:27 Speaker 01 one of those moments, there are certain things I'll share in a story on Instagram. And the number of DMs that come in let me know, like, oh, I've hit something.
39:36 Speaker 02 Yes.
39:37 Speaker 01 And it was just that. It was, oh my goodness, I totally would have been angry, resentful, complaining to someone, oh, I didn't even have coffee today. Or, you know, I would have drank that coffee and, you know, I'm kind of lactose intolerant, awful stomach ache and been, you know, farting the whole plane ride and feel awful about it. All these like hysterical DMs were coming in and meaningful ones, like, wow, this story made me cry. Like, this is going to help me today. And kind of the ripple
40:05 Speaker 02 Yeah.
40:05 Speaker 01 of it's okay to tap into that tension and my own, whether it's what I need, what I want, my values, even in the face of kind of insinuation, anxiety.
40:18 Speaker 02 Yes. It's a small act of defiance that's actually very helpful. It might seem like an individual act, but it's actually a communal act. Let me tell you about the story of my mom, because I think this is so important in a way that we can role model for our children. And I have heard so many stories now from people telling me about when they once witnessed their parents defy and how it stayed with them. And it really has this ripple effect. So my mom,
40:47 Speaker 02 She to me was like, if at one point I thought of compliance and defiance as two binary things. And now I've reasoned, like, now I know it's like a scale, right? It's a series of steps. But I had put her very neatly in the compliance box. She did all the cooking, the cleaning, grocery shopping, everything. And that can leave people thinking, oh, this is what goodness looks like, you know, this is what we should aspire, like, to be so good. And she was quiet, she was deferential, she was conflict avoiding, very kind. She was also quite petite, you know, four foot ten. And I remember one day, we were walking home from the grocery store in West Yorkshire, England, and she was dragging
41:28 Speaker 02 behind her, our rickety shopping cart, like, just looks like, you know, wheeled luggage that had our groceries in it. And we decided to take a shortcut through a narrow alleyway. We call it a snicket in West Yorkshire. And I was always told never to go in the snicket on my own. But we were together, we wanted to take this shortcut. And we went down it. And we were confronted with a group of teenage boys. And they blocked our path and shouted out some racial things, said, go back home. And my reaction was instant. Like, I just did what I'd been taught to do, say nothing, avoid conflict, keep the peace.
42:10 Speaker 02 And I grabbed my mom's arm, and I just wanted to sort of maneuver as fast as possible through the boys. But she didn't move. Though my mother, who always kept her head down, she did something completely different. She stopped, and she looked at the boys directly in the eye. And then she said, What do you mean? And my heart started to race at this point. And I grabbed her arm even tighter. And I was basically saying, Come on, ma. And she said, No, to me. And she shrugged off my arm, and she pulled up the shopping cart up vertical, and she put one hand on her hip, like, and to me, she was like, taller than I'd ever seen her. And I was still only four foot ten, but somehow, like, she, she
42:50 Speaker 02 just seemed, yes. And she turned to the boys again, and she said, What do you mean? And they didn't answer. They were just completely silent. Wow. And she looked at them, and then she said, Oh, yes. You think you're so clever. Big, strong, tough boys, right? And I was just thinking.
43:11 Speaker 02 And it was still silent and the boys started looking at each other and then one of them said, let's go. And they just dispersed. And she grabbed the shopping cart and she just walked forward. And I was thinking, what just happened? I would never have thought that she could behave in such a way that she would be telling off these, these boys in the streets. And it made such an impact on me that it taught me that defiance isn't a personality, it's a skill set. We can choose to use it or not. And even the most compliant person can surprise us. The person you think are the least likely to defy, they may, they can completely surprise us because they've been quietly practicing.
43:55 Speaker 01 They have it in them.
43:56 Speaker 02 Yeah. So you don't need to be a certain type of person to defy. You just need to be connected to what matters.
44:02 Speaker 01 I really love that. And thank you. So many of us guests have had those missed opportunities. Your book allows us, like a roadmap from going from all the missed opportunities we've all had to some of these small acts and kind of taking those steps. So, thank you. I love this conversation and thank you for the really important work you're doing. I don't know about you, but my number one takeaway that I'm going to keep thinking about after today's conversation is how we look at our kids' behavior when they're growing up. There is some behavior that is short term convenient, compliance. It's easy to have a kid who's compliant. But long term, so many of the things we want for our kids
44:43 Speaker 01 involves them being a little defiant. And so that's what I'm going to be thinking about. Okay, let's end the way we always do. Place your feet on the ground and place your hand on your heart. And let's remind ourselves, even as we struggle on the outside, we remain good inside. I'll see you next week.
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