Vishen describes his "daddy time" routine of documentaries and chemistry sets, which his son now rejects for Netflix and Minecraft. Dr. Shefali points out his activities sound effortful and purposeful rather than genuinely joining what his son actually wants to do.
Chapters
If the child gets a C grade. Right, we can be chill with that. Now there are times when I come back and I know as a dad, no, I seriously don't look at my kids report cards, but there are times when I come back as a dad when my kid was 7 and 8 and 9 and I would ensure that I would spend half an hour to 45 minutes one on one daddy time with him and we'd watch a documentary or we'd read an encyclopedia. Then when he turned 9 and 10, he just told me he didn't want to do that. Right. What he wants to do is maybe watch a movie on Netflix or play Minecraft with his friends. And I don't know if I'm doing the right thing. Should I really let him do that or should I kind of pull him to play the chemistry set with me or to read an encyclopedia with me? Am I doing something wrong? In a way, I'm kind of relieved that he wants to do his own stuff because then I can do my own stuff. But I don't know what's right and what's wrong.
Well, first, since you're putting yourself out there so bravely, we'll use you as a little bit of an example so you know I can tease you.
I know.
So you know, when you said I spend time with my son or when we spend time with our children, we're thinking it means that we're going to be together, spirit with spirit, just joining, just being, just chilling. But when you describe what you do with your son, it sounded very like effortful and purposeful. Chemistry. Said I heard, then I heard. What were the other things?
Reading an encyclopedia.
Reading an encyclopedia. And then what else? What was the third thing you said?
Watching a documentary.
Watching a documentary. I wonder why this kid now.
Oh God, I am so glad Hayden is not in the room. Thank God he went home.
Yeah. Another thing I never let my child do is listen to my talks.
