#112: Helping Families Prioritize Human Connections Over Screens - An Interview With Daniel Sih

And these apps are actually changing our kids brains as their brains are trying to develop and it's making it really hard for them to focus and to concentrate and to sleep and all the symptoms that we're seeing in terms of behaviour. So the good news as you mentioned is we can rewire our brains, our kids brains, we can reset their habits and guide them again. It's the tough love thing. They will hate it. Hey, thanks for coming. Welcome to the love shack.

Hey, welcome to this love shack. It's a little old place where we get to get together, explore fresh perspectives and eavesdrop on juicy conversations to discover the things that really matter in life and having a little bit of fun along the way. This is episode number 112. We're going to be talking about raising children because let's just face it, raising children has some significant impacts on our relationships. And I just got to ask you, how you holding up? If you're new to our show, welcome. It's great to have you here with us. I'm Stacy Bartley and I'm the co host of the host of the show and I am here with my cute little co host and lover Tom. And welcome. It's great to have you here with us.

How are we holding up with raising our tribe?

Well, you know, we're into grandparents now and I would say that road is earned. But it's also a lot easier than the day to day life of raising children, wouldn't you say? And I don't have to worry about homework and cleaning your room and if you're brushing your teeth and you know, some of those things. And I think today for sure, don't think I know today raising children is more challenging than ever. In fact, there's some staggering statistics as we step into our conversation today that school age children ages 2 to 8, you can expect that one out of every six children will struggle with a mental health challenge. Among them are anxiety, depression, ADHD and what we call in my world behavioral development disorders, which that's a terrible name, I just got to throw that out there. But one in six, like that's staggering. And when it comes to young adulthood, let's talk about 12 to 18 for adolescents again we've got anxiety, depression taking the front runners there. But substance abuse begins or becomes a way of them coping with this and, and of course suicide as a result of that is climbing at an alarming rate especially you know, according to the CDC and this material. So I know in my work it's always a topic of conversations with My colleagues and at conferences. It is a problem that we are facing right now. And now we're starting to understand a little bit about why. And we know that a lot of the culprits there are many things. And we have brought a very important guest, a a good friend, an incredible person that does a lot of great work in the world of productivity primarily. And he surprised us by writing a book. So let me take a minute and introduce our incredible guest today. He's been in love shack with us once before from his first best seller. But as I already said, Daniel is a productivity consultant. He's a professional speaker and he's also an award winning authority. He's passionate about helping busy people make space and the whirlwind of digital life by shifting the way people look and work at life. So Daniel's first book as space makers, and if you want to check that out, we've done an episode. I should have looked up what number just so I could give you a shortcut. But it's on unplugging, unwinding and thinking clearly in the digital age, which is such a contribution to our relationships and to ourselves. This book won the Australian Business Book Award for personal development in 2021. And now his latest and greatest book is called Raising Tech Healthy Humans. And it's a practical handbook to help parents reset their children's tech habits in an effort to help parents provide a great start to their children's lives. Daniel lives in Tasmania, Australia. He joins us from down under today and he also has a wonderful wife, Kylie, and three beautiful children. So, Daniel, welcome to the show. It's so great to have you back in my love shack with us today. And we're going to talk a little bit about not productivity, but raising those wonderful babies that sometimes cause us to pull our hair out. So I gotta ask you initially, like, what inspired you to write this book? You're a productivity consultant, primarily in corporate America. How in the world did you come up with the inspiration to write a book about parenting?

Yeah, great question. The book kind of just happened, I think a little bit by accident. But I, I speak a lot to adults, to leaders, executives, professionals who are using technology as part of their role, maybe working in hybrid or remote environments and wrestling with digital overuse. So they're uncomfortable with how much time they spend online and the impact that technology is having on their heart and their head and their habits and their relationships. And yet when I speak and then have a Q and A segment, the number one question that almost always comes up first or second is what about my kids? Can you help them make space? Because they're always on their devices and doing TikTok. And you know, we have this great way of pointing outwardly and rather than pointing inwardly at our own habits. And yet, you know, it just became more and more apparent. And obviously I have kids, you know, my oldest is 15, my youngest is 11, and, and they're surrounded by technology. And I can see the wrestle that I have in my own life with tech and kids and, and because I spent seven years researching the first book, I just knew a lot about tech and kids and I thought actually it's time for me to put some things to paper.

I have my, my mind, when we start talking about technology always rewinds to the late 90s and early 2000s when I had two teenage boys in my home. And I remember technology just kind of starting to overtake our lives. And honestly there was nothing written about it. We weren't necessarily cautioned or know certainly what we know now, you know, more than a two decades later. And I just remember a tremendous amount of conflict happening inside of me because I truly didn't know what to do. I didn't know if it was okay or not okay or how to approach it, how to limit it. All I knew was it was something that instead of us skiing or hiking or climbing, which was so familiar to us in our adventures, my son wanted to play on video games and I even drug him to Moab, Utah where it's just like the Mecca of rock climbing and rafting and for an entire summer. And I cannot even tell you how many, you know, pieces of fighting and conflict and such that we would go through and just trying to get my then 16 year old boy out of the condo that we were renting down there. And so, gosh, I think we're so blessed to live in a time when we understand so much more about technology and social media and the impacts that it has on our children. And I just think more and more we're becoming empowered to, to do things differently. You know, as we say, we progress as we go, right? That's how evolution happens. So I think your book is so important. I loved reading it. There was a several times where I would think to myself, reading it, like, yes, this is. Oh, I'm so glad you're saying this. Oh, this is so spot on. So let's share it with our audience today and so glad that you were inspired. I can't think of a better person to write a book on technology than yourself. So thank you for the contribution that you've made to us all. Maybe we ought to start with. You mentioned in the book the importance of tough love. And sometimes that's a really tough place to go with parents. We're not quite sure how to handle it. You know, we don't want to be controlling. We want to let the kids to express and gosh, if they want to choose to do, you know, a whole entire day on the iPad or the PlayStation or. I'm trying to think of some of those remote devices now. I mean, they're getting smaller and easier to pack and you can pull them out anytime, I thought. I feel like the benefit looking back was that it was, you know, it was a console, you know, it wasn't easy to take anywhere and I had that in my favor.

You're dating yourself.

Into their iris.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. So tell us a little bit about tough love and how you see that and how maybe you implement it into your own home so we can learn from.

Thank you. So I originally started the book with a very practical framework which I'll talk about later, called the starter framework, which is really about how do you actually make good decisions about tech with your kids and start them up well, so they grade up as they grow up. And. And yet after writing that, the main section of the book, I realized actually there are a lot of things and assumptions or parenting assumptions that actually underlie the way in which I see parenting all up. Because, I mean, there are so many different approaches to parenting parenting. Right. And some work really well and some work less well or some fit different personality types. So I wanted to be a little bit honest by reflecting on what's the thing behind the thing? You know, what, what are the beliefs or assumptions that I come with as a person or as a parent that under gird the way in which I approach parenting full stop. Because those things will then impact the way I shape technology around my kids. And I wanted to put that on the table, just to be honest. So the first one I realized is actually tough love parenting, or the expression I use is raise adults, not children. And so when I was, when I first had a child, my very close friend and mentor, and he's a bit older than me, he already had probably about a 6 year old child at the time. So he said, I don't forget, your role isn't to raise a child, it's to raise an adult. And that really stood out to me. And he wasn't saying that we don't want to let kids be kids. And Let them muck about and have fun and, and have no responsibilities and be playful. Because play is such a critical part of what it means to be a human and to develop safety and a healthy brain, a healthy sense of self and a healthy sense of relationship. So he wasn't saying don't let kids be kids, but what he was saying is when you make decisions day by day, whether it be how you teach them to sleep, how you teach them to eat vegetables, how you play with them, how you teach them to say sorry, or what you expect of them when they, when they make mistakes, you know, what type of jobs that they might do around the house all the way to how, how might they engage with screens and what type of content might they see? Start with the end in mind. I mean, that's my productivity background, you know, the old Steven Covey and, and really what we're saying is they're going to be adults one day. And our role as, as parents is to raise healthy, wholehearted, loving adults who have good moral fiber and who can contribute to the world around them and who have healthy mental health. Hopefully healthy mental health and a sense of self and a love for themselves and others. And that doesn't come by accident. In fact, I think if you say to a child, you're the expert on life and I want you to make all the decisions, whatever you feel you want to do in life is right, which is actually the drift in Australia, at least to the type of parenting that we're doing. I mean, then literally it just doesn't work. You know, I feel like ice cream. Okay, you're the expert on health. I mean, no, you're not. You actually need to eat vegetables. I want to stay up because mom and dad stay up. Well, no, you need to get some sleep because you're not the expert on sleep. Like, we need to train our kids to be healthy adults. And that's really what tough love is. It's recognizing that actually a lot of the time we need to say no or not yet, set healthy boundaries and limits with, with a lot of relationship and kindness and, and invitation as part of the mix. I'm not talking about top down.

Management style. Right?

Yeah, you know, like legalistic rule based parenting. I mean, there's a lot of fun and creativity and some flex in our family, but ultimately we are the parents and they're the children and we want to teach them how to be adults. And that is really, really important. If you want to be able to then get to the stage where you just don't you don't feel guilty by saying they can't be online all the time because, you know, it's for their mental health, their happiness, and their character development. It's good for their soul, it's good for their mind. But it essentially starts with that idea that I'm the parent, I have parental authority, and my role is to give you tough love and to train you in things you don't want to do so that you become the child and then the adult you want to be. Does that make sense?

Absolutely. And I totally, 100%, wholeheartedly agree with you here. I like to think of it as we all need limits. And if we don't learn how to wrestle with those limits when we're children because our parents set those healthy boundaries for us, it's going to be really difficult as adults to regulate ourselves and to set healthy limits later in life. And I think we all kind of wrestle with that. And I think the more permissive sometimes we get without those boundaries. It's a huge problem in my work with couples and families is there is no boundary setting like there is. And I like to think of a boundary as where I end and you begin. And that's physically. Right. Adaptive as well as emotionally adaptive. And if I don't have the ability to identify where I'm at and, and how I feel in this moment and be able to discuss it, that I'm either trying to override you or I'm trying to please you. We're gonna, we're gonna run into a problem there, and we all need limits. We all need somebody to say, hey, now, wait a minute. I feel like you're overstepping, you know, my boundary or the way that I feel here. Could you please listen to me? And so I think, I think that's where we learn it ideally is in childhood because it's, it's a bigger struggle to learn when you're an adult. And at some point in time, it's going to wreak havoc in your life.

And I think it's also, I really appreciate down to your, your context around your. This tough love, because just in, in most of these types of. I would say these are triggering type words and modalities, if you will. And so everyone has a massive differences of interpretation. But I always like to say, like, look, look at the most effective leaders, you know, and my experiences is those leaders, you know, their ability to lead and relate and make those around them better. You know, I mean, to me that's the demonstration. So we want to be led by someone that not only demonstrates that, because I would say that's the highest level of actualization. Actualization is the demonstration of what it is. Then not too many words are needed, but then, you know, we're drawn to that. You know, that's an inspiring energy that we want to, you know, the best athletes, the MVP are the ones that make everyone around them better. You know, I mean, so I think so as I could not agree as a parenting role and I don't, unfortunately, I don't think there's a lot of families that have, you know, and children that are now adults maybe didn't have that presence in their own life. So that's why it's a confusing, you know, com construct to get their, their head around, their mind around and certainly the implementation of it.

Absolutely.

Cult culture shifts in, in as we understand, you know, and what tends to happen is we go from one like extreme of maybe culture which isn't healthy. And in this situation it's probably no children are to be seen, not heard. The adults are always right that the importance is to make them follow the rules. And that's the kind of institutionalism that we see from the 1950s and 60s. And then what we do is we push back against that. We have the flower power movement, the free love movement and all that kind of stuff, the anti institution movement. And we basically say no, actually rules are actually wrong. And the way to find freedom is and joy and health is to follow your heart and to use your gut and to experience your emotions. You know, the typical anthem of our day, which came from America, thank you very much, you know, is no right, no wrong, no rules for me. I'm free. You know, like if I get rid of all the rules, all the constraints and follow my heart, that's true freedom. And that is flipped into parenting. Now there's some truth in that in the sense that of course we want people to be able to experience their emotions and not repress them and to be guided by their gut to a point. But not as a two year old when all you want is oh, chocolate yum. Following your heart is not going to lead to good character development. So we need to rebalance it. All of our culture's gone too far. And like you said, in terms of leadership, I mean it works for adults. If you follow your heart and spend what you want, well, then you'll be in debt. Not financial freedom. If you follow your heart and eat whatever you feel like and don't force your body to be physically active and to stretch beyond Its capacity in ways that feel uncomfortable. Then you'll be sedentary and obese and you'll end up having less freedom, less energy over time. It happens in relationship. If I follow my heart, I guarantee I would have had affairs by now. Do you know what I mean? I don't follow my heart because I committed to love my wife. And so it's the same with tech, it's the same with all of life. And we want to train our kids into, yes, being in touch with their emotions, knowing where their boundary stops and where it starts to be able to express themselves and be individuals, but not to follow that kind of crazy, I don't know, binary expression that actually rules and regulations and structures and discipline will limit freedom. In fact, that's what gives life. In our current cultural context.

We are touching on what I call our human navigation system, where we have the ability to think and to strategize and to understand and make good decisions. And we have the ability to feel, follow our hearts and have that emotional expression side. And there's a whole discussion about which one is superior, inferior. And what we don't realize and understand is that we need both to rudder ourselves, to find balance, to govern ourselves. And one is not superior, inferior to the other. That's why you have the ability to do both. And when you start putting it on the board, you can start to see their counterbalances to each other. Right. So if I get lost in my emotions and I just let that run willy nilly as you've described. So, so, well then of course that's not going to take me to the place of freedom or well being or thriving. And if I'm just logical, logical, logical, and I'm running from my emotions, that can, that can set me up too to where I'm now emotionally falling apart. And I see the need for us to understand those principles and to better rudder ourselves by the utilization of our navigation system so that we can navigate through the ups and downs of life through logic. Yes, strategy, knowing, understanding, good data, good resources, scientific research, et cetera, learning. And then there's going to be an emotional throw off of that and that counts too. My mom, when I was growing up as a kid, used to have a time timer. And I don't know how she learned this or where she came up. It was just sheer inspiration, but it used to really make me angry when I was a kid. And when something difficult would happen, she would come in and we talk about the emotional side of it and then she'd bring in this Timer, it was just one of those old fashioned white ones. And she'd crank on that thing and whatever you got was what you were left with. 20 minutes, 35 minutes, 40 minutes. And the rules were always the same. You cry and you, you know, throw your fit and do whatever you got to do. But when that timer goes off, we're going back to life. You're going to come out, we're going to do homework, we're going to go for a walk, we're going to cook, you know, we're going to get back to living. And I think you obviously don't understand how serious this is. Right. Like I should be, you know, flat on my back crying and able to piss and moan for days, right. Like, this is big to me. No, no, it didn't matter. She'd just crank on that thing and say, I noticed this tough. It's really difficult. And she literally taught me not how to get stuck in one side or the other. And so when we start talking about anxiety and depression, right. And places emotionally where we get hung up and we get stuck, it's really difficult for us to go to do those things, have those adventures, move our bodies, breathe, you know, take care of the tasks at hand. And we can get so lost in the tasks that we forget the emotional experience as well. And so it's a tool that I use for my clients even when they have a difficulty, difficult time kind of navigating, you know, themselves in that system to just, you know, set the timer. There's, there's a place in time for both and both have a role to play in who we are as human.

Beings, which I think you could be a productivity consultant.

I'll let you do that. I, I think you're much better.

Emotional productivity consultant. There you go. I mean, I, I have a, I have a close, yeah. Relationship with, with someone who their, you know, their teenager argues constantly and won't follow anything they say. You know, it is a typical teenage behavior. But what's interesting is they'll often say, oh, they'll put a boundary down and then the teen will push back against it and they'll say, oh, we better have another conversation about it. I'm like, well, you've had five hours of conversations about it. It's not about the conversation. It's about the fact that your child refuses to accept your decision, which is, which was reasonable and well communicated and good for them. So I'm like, no, it's like, probably the timer thing would make sense. It's time not to have Another conversation, it's done. And you have to learn to accept that.

Well, sometimes it's great, especially when you're dealing with teenagers, to flip it back on them, like, why do you think I'm doing this? Why do you think that this is a boundary or something, that I'm willing to go to blows with you around? Right? Does that make sense to you? So tell me what the difficulty is for you in keeping it, like, what's the resistance? Let's talk about that. And then you start to have a deeper conversation and it doesn't become the focus of are you going to do it or not? You know, which kind of gets us all into a power struggle. It's like, okay, wait a minute, you know what's supposed to be done? We've talked about it five times now. Now you need to help me understand why there's such tremendous resistance here. Right? Let's have that conversation. Let's dive a little deeper into that. Because, you know, teenagers are becoming adults and they want to make their own autonomous decisions, and that's part of what we run into. And sometimes it's like, okay, if you are handleband on this and doing it your way and you think you've got this all figured out, in spite of my counsel here, I'm going to let you try and fail, you know, so. Okay.

But that brings me to an important distinction. Daniel, share with us. And I know I saw this in your book as well. The primary age of child in your book is what ages?

Oh, yeah. So I'm aiming this at preteen, well, preteens and youngest. So I would. I originally was aiming for, let's say 4 to 12 years old because it's more about helping set up your children with healthier tech habits and a healthier brain. From the beginning, I'm not an expert in child psychology. I'm not an expert in addiction or neurodiversity. So once children are experiencing challenges in many ways, you know, because of tech addiction or tech overload, well, then there are other books that are better than mine. But my heart was to help parents with younger children really start off well. The reason I started with that and then I've realized, actually I'm handing it out to, to parents and recommending parents buy it when they have their first child or when they have their, you know, a young baby is because we're giving our kids iPhones and iPads to play with when they're six months old. And despite the recommendations, it's already shaping their brain at that young Age. And so by the time many of our kids hit three or four years old, their mental development's already been shaped and changed by how much time they spent online. So we actually need to start earlier and earlier. But the heartbeat is. Yes, before they are teenagers, before they are developing all the, all the complexities and wonders of becoming adults. Like you mentioned, it's more about trying to get them, well started so that they have healthier boundaries, a healthier brain, healthier emotional control, healthier empathy, so that they have the ability to then self regulate and have the types of conversations you're having with them. Because I've been set up well and.

I, I just want to give a shout out if by chance you're a listener right now and you're going, great. So it's over for me. You know, I've got this child that's earlier and like I'm, I'm, you know, I'm doomed. It's just, it's just going to be a problem from here on out. I want you to know that's not the case. There's some really good news in this. If you understand the brain, there's always a way to turn it around and rewire it. Yes, it's going to take some time, but there's no better time to start than right now. So not all is lost. And that goes for us as adults too. You know, that's understanding our brains and how they work is something that we're starting to understand more and more thanks to science and the ability through technology to test and to explore some of those understandings of the brain. But what we do know is it is very, very flexible. And yes, there are some things that are set as we are children, but as we work with those, you know, I've seen even in my own clientele and even inside of myself, quite frankly, changes that come about over time. And with my children that were absolutely. Those two boys I talked to you about, you know, absolutely addicted, I thought, oh gosh, especially as they got into raising families and having babies of their own. But, but they're continuing to expand and grow and change too. So it's never a set it and forget it and it's never too late, I guess, is what I want to say. So, and, and the reason why I love your book, Daniel, is there are things that start to spark creativity in regards to how we can approach this conversation around tech, regardless of how old your child is. And assuming that parent role is an important first place to start. And that's why I thought let's talk about tough love for a minute, because you are the parent, and at any point in time you can step in and go, okay, you know, I've been a little. Right. I've been tied up in, you know, making money, being a single parent, you know, going through a divorce or going through some challenges with life myself. As I like to say to my kids, I could be a great mom if I didn't have to deal with myself at the same time. Like, that would have been so easy. But that's not the case for us as adults. Right. And so many times we're so busy wrestling with ourselves, we don't have the bandwidth sometimes. And then we wake up and come back around and begin to have the bandwidth as a parent and go, hey, wait a minute, what's going on around here? So there's always a great time to be able to step in and be that parent that, you know, you have the desire to be. And it's never too late to do that. So I just want to throw that out there as giving some hope to our listeners. Which brings me to the next thing I'd love for you to touch on from your book is there's a wonderful study that you cite from Dr. Victoria Duckley, and I would love for you to tell us a little bit about that and how you stumbled across that, because the results of what you're sharing with us here kind of coincides with what I just said. You know, there's ways to turn this around and do it differently and begin a new path. So tell us about your findings there with that study, Dr. Duckley.

Yeah, and she would be one of those books I would recommend, if you're finding that. Yeah, I'm uncomfortable already with the types of patterns and behaviors that are in my family, and they're getting to the point where they're becoming quite disruptive, and I'm not sure what to do about it. So she's a fantastic. I mean, she wrote a fantastic book and she's in the States and she works a lot with, I think she's not a psychologist, maybe a. Anyway, she's a professional. She's a doctor in mental health and she works with kids. And she worked with a lot of kids with pathologies and very significant issues, from depression to even psychosis, et cetera. But she started to recognize that again and again, kids had the same types of patterns and the irritability and lack of emotional control, the lack of regulation, the inability to sleep, the scattered thoughts, they seem to cross over across multiple different types of diagnoses and they didn't seem to match the traditional patterns. And therefore she started to come to the conclusion, she called it electronic overuse syndrome, but basically kids using too much technology and it impacting their mental health in a significant. So she started to take kids off of technology, having an electronic fast over a graded and sensible four week way and actually without extra medications or even sometimes withdrawing medications and swapping it for stopping technology. She got I think more than a 50% reduction in symptoms in 80% of her clients, which is incredible. And we're seeing this again and again. The explosion of diagnoses of ADHD is actually often to do with and an incredible amount of time using highly scattering dopamine dysregulating devices like playing games online or using TikTok constantly. And these apps are actually changing our kids brains as their brains are trying to develop. And it's making it really hard for them to focus and to concentrate and to see sleep and all the symptoms that we're seeing in terms of behavior. So the good news as you mentioned is we can rewire our brains, our kids brains, we can reset their habits and guide them again. It's the tough love thing. They will hate it at first because you're actually taking away something that they're addicted to in some cases or at least really dependent on. And yet at the same time to go through that process of helping them unwind and experience the best of life outside of that constant churn is actually something that they need and that they want ultimately. She describes electronic overuse a bit like an amphetamine hit, that when your kids are on the iPad, they feel happy, they concentrate, they're focused, they're quiet, they don't move very much, which is lovely for a parent. But then if you take away their screens, if they've got to the point where they really, really are quite dopamine dysregulated, well then they have the low of an addict and then they need to get back on it and everything else stops actually creating joy in their life. Because the only way to get the dopamine hit is through the flashing lights and the intermittent rewards and the types of addictive designs of these devices. And so once you see those types of patterns, yeah, there is a process of helping take kids offline. But again, my book is about raising humans. So I think even as you maybe do a fast with your kids and please do it in a sensible way, not just take the devices away and say you're bad kids, this is where I would recommend books like hers rather than mine. But if you are taking your kids away, you also want to add in what does it look like to have real life? Because I think ultimately this is not as addictive as tech is. I think it's ultimately not a question of tech or screen time or cyber safety or all that stuff. It's actually a question of humanity and the type of human that you want your kids to be and the type of human that you want to be actually and to have a vision of life which is bigger and broader and richer than time on a screen. That, of course, involves the online world, but also involves climbing trees and riding bikes and laughing together as you drop spaghetti Bolognese on the floor and, and not having to take a photograph of it and post it on Instagram, you know, and. And being able to play board games and read books or just enjoy the beauty of silence and watch nature, you know, or. Or even experience the painful emotions of life which are really necessary to process without then having to pull out Google and actually say, you know, what do I do if I feel sad? Like that. There's, there's this sense where we are losing our humanity by worshiping the glowing rectangle. And we want to put. We want to put life back into its context, which is big and broad, and then allow screens to fit within that. And so part of the process of taking a child who is already struggling with overuse is not just taking their screens away, that is part of the process, or reducing their screens and educating and having conversations, but it's trying to experience, giving them experiences of a bigger and better humanity, which is what you actually want for their lives. That was a long explanation.

I love it.

And I just wanted to frame that way.

I do too. And I just want to let everybody know that in the back of your book, you give a hundred plus ways that you can have some fun with your kids to serve as that replacement when you do take that device away. So don't miss it. I would say the book's worth just the creative stimulation because. The stimulation, the stimulation of ideas, simply because when we, we as parents are working on our devices and our children have been on devices and everybody pulls the devices away, if we haven't been engaged in some of those creative ideas, we go, oh my gosh, what are we going to do? I don't even know, you know, and so it's wonderful to have a list that you can use and go to. And go, oh yeah, that's right. We can climb a tree and we can go to the park. We can't. Oh, yeah, yeah, I forgot all about that because that's what we do as human beings. So I really liked that you included a list in the, in the back of the book story on that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, please.

So my kids found that and I printed it. I've also got a free lot of, you know, downloads on my website. So we, we printed it on our fridge and I must admit, we haven't done all hundred of them yet. Okay. So our kids this holiday, they say self generated, they said, let's go through it one by one. But even before that, what was funny is I, I wrote one that said, pick a bouquet of wildflowers. And I don't even know why. I think it was just an idea I had as I was kind of brainstorming ideas and they laughed and laughed and they paid me out. They say a bouquet of wildflowers. They just thought it was so funny. And then, but then the next day I was working in my office and all three of them came home from school with this big bouquet of wildflowers for me and they go, we made your bouquet. And it was, it was funny, but it was sweet and it was like, oh, the book was worth writing just for that moment.

Yeah.

Heck yeah.

Yeah. And I think those are the beautiful outskirts that we miss sometimes when we're stuck in our homes on our devices. It's, as you said, humanity. It's, it's a challenge of and question of humanity or we're losing that. And tech is here to stay. So we've got to learn some better ways to dance with it and raise healthy children. So that brings me to the idea of your starter framework. Tell us about that and if you would kind of just give us a little synopsis us about your protocol. Because I, I think it's worth and serves all of us when we start thinking about how to engage with this idea of being a human being and being able to express and experience what that's like and know that tech is here to stay. And how do we find some balance with that?

Yeah. And the whole framework isn't to say that tech is bad in any way. I mean, it's part of life, It's a wonderful part of life. But the way kids engage in it needs to be very different than the way adults engaged, mainly because their brain is developing and their adult devices designed for the adult world. And therefore we need to treat it quite differently as their younger kids. So the framework is an acrostic. So starter, the first One is, start with self, take it slowly, age appropriate, setup, regular talk, healthy, take healthy rhythms, encouragement, and rely on others. I do know it, but it's easier for me to read.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And if we have notes, if we have notes, it's always easier to go to the notes than try and rely on memory. Right.

I'll make something up otherwise. And, and what it is, it's, it's a number of principles that can really help you set your kids up well from, you know, all the way through the ages. And it's not just about tech. It's partly about the imagination of life beyond a screen. Like, how do you have adventures? But the first one, I think is actually the most important. And if you're. And this, this relates to all parents, irrespective of where your children are on the journey, irrespective of where you are in the journey, or even as a grandparent, irrespective of where you are in the journey. So I think it's the hardest of all the habits, but in some ways it's the most encouraging because it's within our locus of control. You know, it's completely and utterly within our circle of influence as a productivity. You know, again, as Stephen Covey would say, and that is to start with self. Because the technological habits, the digital habits that we pass on in our family and the culture we create in our family will have a tremendous impact in shaping the habits of our kids. And so therefore, our own behaviors will impact the behaviors of our families full stop. So, I mean, if, if every time the kids open the toilet door and they see you on the toilet scrambling your phone, well, that's going to pass on something in terms of a value. You know, if every time you're at the table and someone texts or phones or your smartwatch goes off and, and you suddenly stop the conversation that you're having with your kids to give attention to a random stranger. You know, sometimes it's like I did it once and I never did it again. You know, I was having a coffee with a client. I was listening to them. They were having some emotional response and explaining something really deep. And I had my phone vibrate and I just couldn't concentrate on them anymore. I just kept thinking, I need to check my phone. But I also have to do it in a way that makes them feel like I'm listening to them. And I pulled it out and my phone said, congratulations, your screen time is down this week. The very technologies trying to stop me being addicted are the ones that are distracting Me. So my point, my point with Start With Self is that almost all of us are struggling with tech if we're really honest and we're not modeling the types of behaviors we would want to model ourselves. And then we point the finger and say to the kids, get off of TikTok. And you're spending too much time on your screens. And then you lie on the couch and you start scrolling email and it looks exactly the same. And so I think it's really important for us to examine our own heart, our own beliefs around technology and in particular to examine our relationship with the online world and the health of that relationship. And I know this is a relationship so podcast, you know, so, so like any relationship, we have a relationship with technology. That was really the foundation of my first book. And like a relationship, it goes up and down. You have good times, you have bad times, you have times where you codependent and times when you're arguing and times where you're spending too much time together. I remember being in bed with my wife. You know, this is a PG kind of podcast. So any further? We were lying in bed and I was, I was scrolling like, I don't know the news and she was playing Candy Crush or Merge Dragons or something and I realized actually we've just spent half an hour in bed with each other, not talking to each other, having a relationship, making love with our phones instead of each other. No more pillow talk anymore. And it's not that it was once, it was actually becoming an every night thing. And I'm like, this is, this is not the way I want to live my life and this is going to damage my relationship with my spouse. And my kids are seeing it. They come to say goodnight, mom and dad, and then we're in bed, you know, talking to a device and having a relationship with Google more than ourselves. And so it's that kind of self awareness that I'm asking for, for parents, because that's how you start the conversation and that's how you start creating a better culture at home. Yeah, actually one more point on that. I hope it's okay, but in a really constructive way, practically. It doesn't mean, it doesn't mean that you have to have it all together. You know, Richard Bach says, I teach, we teach best what we most need to learn. And for me that is absolutely true. You know, I'm the space maker and I wrestle with space more than I feel like anyone. However, the beauty is when you have the honesty and the ability to self examine your own tech relationship. And your tech habits and discover things that you're unhappy about, the way you live. Don't beat yourself up. But it's an opportunity to shape your kids as well. Because there are times that I've said to my kids, you know what? I have been checking my phone first thing in the morning and doing emails when everything's going crazy. I'm meant to be helping you with your lunch. I should be touching base with my wife before we leave. And instead we all yell at each other and we scream and you run out of the door because you're missing the bus. And I'm frustrated. You know, this is my fault and I'm sorry about that. How can I want to change my own behaviors with technology in the morning? But I would love us to do it together because I think it's something that I haven't modelled well, but I would love us to change as a family. And so how can we shift the way in which we do screens in the morning? Maybe no screens until we've all left the school and work, for example. How can we do this together? So it's not so much about your problem, but it's actually our problem. And in that way, your vulnerabilities and your mistakes can actually help disarm your kids and help them find solutions in a. In an open way. As long as you're willing to follow through, of course, and be genuine in that. In that kind of digital repentance.

Well, and, and then I think you give a wonderful gift to your kids. You're showing them what it's like to be human and that we do make mistakes and we don't have it all figured out, but we, we can figure it out together. And we're all on this journey. And so we don't teach our kids that at some point in time they're going to arrive somewhere, that they're going to get it all done and all figured out, that the process of being a human being continues and you're willing to share that journey with them and show them how to clean up at mess, how to overcome a struggle or a challenge, or show them that you struggle too. And we all have a place that we do, and that's okay. I think those are really great lessons because if we come into parenting thinking that we've got it all done and we've got to have all the answers and all figured out at some point in time, as our. Our children turned into adults, they figured out that we were lying anyway. Right? And then we set them up for expectations about themselves that aren't necessarily true and not true, not necessarily true. They aren't true. And that it's okay to make mistakes. And the best way to teach your children that mistakes happen as a part of being alive on this planet that we live on, is to show them that you make them too. And that's okay. And how. And then that demonstration of how eloquently you said, hey, I'm struggling with this. This is on me. I take full responsibility. What great principles to pass along to your children by demonstration, you know, so you can't expect kids to do things with tech that you're not willing to do yourself is kind of my net Net takeaway. Like, if you're going to point the finger and say you can't be doing this, you know, you know, look at your own relationship with tech and make sure that what you're asking them to do, you would be willing to do yourself well.

And I just think, you know, again, looking at my own mom, you know, like Stacy's mom, you know, small in stature but. And not a lot of words, but always, you know, I remember it's the demonstration at the end of the day, our children are going to remember far more what was demonstrated than anything that came out of our mouths. And they're again looking to the leaders. Daniel, like you, you know, those good. The leaders that have the, you know, that inspired energy about them take full accountability for when they fall down too. And they own it. And they're quick to share that because, yeah, they're human as well. I mean, so that's a powerful demonstration. And that's, you know, I've done my very best to, to do that to our daughter that's on the podcast with us and my son. You know, I'm. Hey, there's places where I fall down too. But to be transparent with that, that's what a good leader does. You know, I mean, that really does. And you know, I mean, we, you know, and so that's our whole body work is clean up your. Figure out how to clean up your messes quickly and get back to the good stuff. You know, don't hang out, you know, in a mess making machine. Learn how to clean it up effectively. And let's get back to the good stuff.

So that's the s. Start with self and starter. So let's go to the T. Take it slowly.

Yeah, take it slowly. And I might, look, I might even put both together because of the time. So take it slowly. And age appropriate setup. So take it slowly. Is the Idea that if we follow the Joneses, if we go with the flow of culture, then we're going too fast when it comes to kids in tech. Not only too fast because it doesn't follow the recommendations of the National Pediatric Society like the official recommendations, but just because it's not great for them because they're still developing their brain. And I've put all that kind of stuff in the beginning part. And look, one of the analogies I would say, say is, you know, like when I was in Vanuatu many years ago, one of my friends fell in the water and, well, we were swimming and he got caught in a riptide and it started to pull him out and it was really, really strong and he was a good swimmer, but he couldn't get back. And it took us about an hour to slowly coach and guide and support him back in. And we couldn't jump out because we didn't have the ability to kind of manage the riptide ourselves. So thank goodness he was okay and it was just a big shake up. But I feel like we're in a culture where the riptide is definitely swinging too fast, particularly for kids and commercially, you know, deliberately pushing kids too fast into interactive technologies. And therefore it's really important that we actually go against the flow to a certain extent. And it's not to reject the wonders and beauty of the online world. It's actually to slow kids down so that they'll be better at using technology when they're older. Because my heartbeat is that kids will develop a healthy brain, the ability to self regulate, to know themselves, to make eye contact with humans, to enjoy their bodies and to have a sense of self in order to then use technologies well, as they get older, but using some technologies too early, particularly iPads and iPhones and interactive technologies, online games, particularly when they're really young, they're designed to ramp up the lizard part of the brain, the fight, flight or freeze part. And the research is showing that when kids spend too much time using those types of leaning forward interactive technologies, it looks like they're learning, but they're not actually, they're ramping up their anxiety systems and they're reducing their ability to grow the prefrontal cortex, the parts of their brain that actually is needed to be a healthy adult. So, so basically the principle is there's no right age to give your kid a phone, or there's no right age to give your kid an iPad. I mean, there's a wrong age. Like, you know, don't, don't do it. Before the recommendations, which is like no screens before two and, and no more than a narrow day up to five years old, et cetera, if you possibly can. But, but, but the key is try to go slower than everyone around you. And that really sucks. Like as a parent, it really, really sucks to feel like you have to say no or not yet when actually most of the kids who are in year five, year six already are getting devices like phones for themselves. And that's really hard. That's the tough love bit. And in the end of the chapter, my last part of the framework is rely on others, which means do it in community. And one of the things I'm doing this book is I'm actually partnering with school communities and getting every single new parent a book so that rather than being the only parent whose child doesn't have Snapchat or TikTok by the time they're entering high school. Well, the principal, the teachers, the parents, everyone is saying actually the research says it's bad for our kids brains before really 16, but let's say 13 at and, and let's create a counterculture where you're the only kid who does have it, you know, when you were young. And that's going to set our kids up so that when they start using these highly addictive technologies, their brain has at least the ability to start to self regulate and reflect on the technologies they're using. So that the wrestlers are more like you and I have, where we know we get addicted and we're struggling and we hate the way we're doing it, but we still have a reference point to life before we became addicted. We have a reference point for what it looked like to actually have a conversation face to face or to actually be able to climb a tree or fall down off a bike and get back up again. And that reference point is very, very important to help kids then regulate later on.

No, I totally agree. You're causing me to remember analogy that you used in the book looking back on history where we used to smoke in the hospitals and there was ashtrays that the nurse would bring you and you know, it was just a very common thing. And as we look back we would go that is crazy. How in the world would we be able to do that? And I, I love that you mentioned we're going to do that with tech too going what were we thinking? Right? There's so much that we're learning now as we go. Of course we're, we're bumping into problems and challenges with tech now with our Kids we just didn't know, you know, and that's, that really, truly is a limitation of a human being. We don't know what we don't know and we figure it out as we go. We truly do. So that's how evolution, you know, it always, it, it always evolves to a better place, but sometimes it doesn't look and feel like it, right as we kind of go through these ebbs and flows of our learning curves, you know, it's, it's things that seem so obvious looking back, just weren't, weren't that obvious while we were going through it, you know.

So I really feel for parents as well because we're caught in this in between state where everyone's using technology and we need to use it and take these interactive technologies and then AI is the future. And yet the research always takes 20 years to catch up. And so what we're trying to do is make informed decisions that aren't radical and overreactive. Without the research, the longitudinal research, to say actually there really is a good reason not to give girls social media before they're 13. There really is a good reason not to protect all of all kids from pornography, you know, for a lot longer, you know, like. But we, but I think there is enough research now to be able to start to at least make, put good guidelines in place, which is go slower than those around you. And the age appropriate setup is like when you do give your child their own device like a phone, well then don't give it to them out of the box, make it a dumb phone to start with. Take off games, use parental controls to make sure that they don't have, let's say social media, if that's what you agree with them, have a digital contract so you've got good boundaries in place to start with and good expectations and maybe put some screen time limits around it so that the Internet turns off at 9 o' clock or 8:30 at night and doesn't turn on until 7 o'.

Clock.

You can change the phone so it's not a fully fledged adult phone for the adult world and have the types of conversations and boundaries in place that you need so that your kids can learn to use these devices. Demonstrate a sense of control and understanding about how to use them. And then as they demonstrate that trust and maturity, you increase their freedom until they get to the stage where they have a fully fledged adult device that can access absolutely anything, just like you and I. And hopefully at that point they will be more equipped to be able to use Those very powerful tools.

Yeah, I think that's really great advice. The regular talks, I think is important. That's part of your starter framework sdr. And I think, you know, it's an ongoing conversation. In fact, as we're talking, I have to just be honest. What I continuously go back to is conversations about sex. You know, sex is something that's normal and healthy and natural and wonderful for us adults. But if we get exposed to it or don't know how to manage it, or we don't have regular talk to about it, we don't know how to meter at our side. You know what, it, it very much falls in line as we're teaching our children about their human sexuality and, and stepping into that and how to make good decisions around it. It follows suit when many of the dialogues that we have with kids and families. So I just, I don't know, I felt the need to, to say that.

Right.

It's, it's a very similar conversation. And I think even in our conversation today, I'm realizing that a lot of what you're talking about applies there too, you know, so you get a two for one.

Definitely.

Yeah.

Talked. I mean, we had in Australia, we have a campaign talk soon talk often, which is about sex and making sure that sex and conversations about sexuality and sex is part of. Yeah, like you said, everyday conversations. We absolutely need the same principle for tech at a young age and to help kids start to critique tech and to recognize the addictive nature if you overuse tech and to also enjoy the wonders of tech and to talk during family movie night and you know, shared interactions and co watching about the values that they're seeing in tech that actually align with your family values or that actually don't match reality. You know, like again, I'm. How hard is it being a parent nowadays? But tech is part of the talk soon talk often suite. And obviously you don't have to do it alone. You can do it with others as well, if you can.

Yeah. And I think you've touched on the T which is tech, healthy rhythms. But I don't want us to miss the opportunity to encourage adventures. Right. I think that's such an important thing, not only for kids, but for adults. You know, I think the older we get and we start to climb the ladder of age, the more we minimize the need for play and adventures and to continue to explore and express ourselves in those ways. We become, you know, all responsible and stuff. And we think that all of that stuff needs to fall away and, and absolutely research shows that's not good for us at any age, so we can't miss like encourage adventures. What are some thoughts you have around the adventure part?

Yeah, so look, it really came. It comes out of that vision. I have vision I think we all have for what a human can be. And you know, the, the whole creating a tech healthy culture in your family and in your kids isn't just about the tech. It's about what is the greater yes that you're saying the no to. You know, if you're saying no to more screens, what is the greater yes? And part of that is having adventures. And by adventures, I don't just mean skydiving and bungee jumping. I'm talking about anything that is unplugged, where you're pushing kids out of their comfort zone. You're experiencing fresh air and you're experiencing relationships and a sense of life together, whether that, you know, be jumping on the trampoline together or bushwalking or, or maybe going and playing laser tag. It doesn't have to be tech free, but it's about experiencing the breadth of life and the wonder of what can happen. And it's so funny because I'm often asked as a productivity consultant about the fact that if you disconnect from tech and unplug, it'll make you more productive. And that is true. The research definitely says that. However, I don't think we should have to justify having a coffee with our spouse or walking on the beach or reading a book that we enjoy. We shouldn't have to justify that by whether it makes us more economically viable or whether it's productive. And that's the same with our kids. You know, we need to recapture the vision of what it means to be a human and to be happy and healthy and whole. And that has to involve being offline because we become diminished if our entire existence is staring at a glowing rectangle. And so the glowing rectangle is part of what it means to enjoy life, but it can't constrain or define it. And that's what I mean by encourage adventures. When I asked my kids on a bushwalk once, you know what, what is the best experience of life you've ever had? I just thought I'll just ask.

Wow, that's a great question.

And you know, is a 10 year old going to be an answer to that? I didn't know. And they had an immediate answer, which is amazing, right? I mean, adults would require longer to think about it. And one of them said, oh, I jumped on the trampoline once. With my neighbor, it was so fun. And another one said, oh, we went to Grindelwald, which was actually like, it's a bit like a National Lampoons kind of cheesy Swiss village. It was pretty cheap and pretty dirty and. As in, yep, dirty dirt. Yeah. And, and, and we played, I'm thinking the Australianisms, going to America. And we. And we played mini golf. And my wife hit the ball and my youngest son was running with a net because he was too young to play golf, and the ball landed in it and we yelled at him because he was in the middle of the green and he ran off with the ball and we thought it was so funny. That was her best experience of life. We took her to Disneyland in Paris. And the best experience was like National Lampoons. But when I think about it, they were all like that they were involved, being with people that they loved outdoors, usually doing something that was very simple and it was relational. It was those kind of, aha, spiritual kairos moments, those. Those beautiful moments where, you know, in my tradition I'd say the kingdom of heaven came to earth, you know, and so none of them were playing Minecraft. Do you know what I mean? And I know that when I think about my experiences and when I've asked parents, I do parenting seminars, and when I ask parents what's the best experience of life you can remember, it's never that I got my inbox to zero or that, you know, or that I happen to win the world championship of, I don't know, Minecraft. Like it? It, it's. It's just simple everyday stuff, which is either because you tried really hard at something and you achieved it, it was a spiritual experience or it was deeply relational. But. And the reason I want to finish with that with regards to encourage adventures, is you want your kids to have the experiences of life that will actually make them remember life fully and joyfully. And I guarantee it won't be the times that they have online. And therefore, we need to major in the things that they will remember as their best experiences of life, because that is the best experience of humanity. And mine are on some of what they really, really, really want for themselves. Social media, online games, you know, more and more time on a screen. They may want it, but Tough Love says that if I'm raising adults, not children, I want them to be rich, joyful, full, wholehearted humans who don't regret the life they live because they lived a real life, not just some commercial version of it that was packaged and given to them to make them feel Good for a time.

I love that. Well said. Gosh, I don't think there's anything I can add to that. I Daniel, thank you so much for being here with us and share with us.

Where can people find more about you and your awesome body of work?

Daniel so I have a website just for the book, so it's called RaisingHumans AU. The AU is for Australia. There's actually a whole heap of stuff there. In fact, sorry, if you go to raisinghumans AU gift I should have said that then. You can get a whole lot of stuff. You can get screen time recommendations as an infographic. You can get the hundred kind of fun activities to do outside of a screen for free. There's a whole lot of interviews with world experts around the things we've talked about and also a summary of the book as an infographic and a bunch of interviews and a whole lot of other stuff. So feel free to head there. If you're interested in my business work and productivity, then head to spacemakers.com I love it.

Daniel, thank you so much. It's always great to spend some time with you here in the love.

We'd have you over for dinner if you weren't quite so far away.

I will take that up. You know, Tom, I, I'm going to remember that. And when I'm in the States next.

You'Ll definitely, you absolutely better make it over here to California so we can, we can, we could go on for, on for wonderful, deep conversation. I know that for sure. Okay, thank you, Daniel.

Goodbye for now. We, we're gonna actually take a corner and we're gonna step into our Follow the Fun moment. And it was inspired by Daniel actually and his starter protocol for how to step in in and start thinking about these things around raising children in tech and, and even around governing ourselves with tech. And so today's Follow the Fun is Planet Adventure. Make it something that's outdoors, something that's physical and even maybe something that's new for you. A new activity or a new place to visit that maybe you haven't done but been thinking about for a while. I know for you and I, babe, it's, you know, snowshoeing. We haven't done any snowshoeing since we've.

Arrived in California and we got lots of snow. If you're listening live, we have been, boy, the heavens have opened with rain and snow here in northern or actually all all over California, but Northern California for sure.

And maybe for some of you it might be doing that hike or that zip line or try out some climbing or, you know, there's so many. And. And then it be something simple, too. It could be something that you've been intending to do. You know, in my case, spend some time with the grandkids. And I recently just went to a trampoline park with one of my grandkids and I was talking all big and bad, and then I walked in and went, whoa, I am scared. I am literally scared. I don't know if I can do all of this. And it was really good challenge for me. And it was an incredible moment for my grandson and I to share with each other. And I discovered so many things about my grandson and myself. So these are moments that, as Daniel said, make being human in the human experience beautiful, worthwhile, joyful. It creates those benchmarks where we're grateful to have the human experience. So I encourage you to take on an adventure this week with yourself, with your loved ones, and then tell us about it. I'd love to hear what you ended up choosing as your adventure. And as always, we have a song that we close the song with that.

Is Close the show with.

Or what did I say?

Close the song with?

Oh, close the song. Because I'm thinking of a song. I apologize. Close the show with.

Close the show with. With the song. Every. Every week, every episode.

Excuse me.

So today's song is Slow down, and the singer is Nicole Nordman, and she talks about just slowing down and enjoying the moments of being a human being and being a parent and encouraging our children to do that. And I just feel like it's so appropriate with all that we've talked about today. And parents, I'm going to say this as we close, you know, give yourself a pat on the back. Being a parent is the probably most challenging and most rewarding job that we have and that we face, and it does greatly impact our relationships with our lovers. And so if by chance you're struggling in that and you need a little support and you need some skills and ideas about how to better handle that and navigate that, that's what we do here at Stacey Bartley. So don't hesitate to reach out to us. We're here to support you in any way that we can.

We're going to talk about that inside the Better Love Club.

Yep, you can get that inside the Better Love Club, along with a whole host of other things that affect our relationships. So want to invite you to come and join us and be a part of our community over here at the Better Love Club, where we cheer each other on and support each other in these conversations that matter when it comes to ourselves and our families. So that's a wrap for today. If you have a conversation you'd love to hear us have in the love shack or you have somebody that you feel like we need to talk to, please don't hesitate to reach out to us. We would love to hear that. We're always looking to have the conversations that you value the most. Thank you so much for spending some of your time today with us here inside the love shack. A shout out to Daniel one more time. He's an incredible human being and has so much wisdom to share with us. It's always a gift when we have him here with us inside the love shack. So goodbye for now. Forward to connecting with you again soon, I'm sure.

Bye bye now.

Okay, everybody, time to go. We gotta close the doors to the love shack for this week. You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here. Come back next week, though, and join us for another edition of Love Shack live with Tom and Stacy Bartley.