So many of us are struggling in the role with our teenagers and with no idea what do do about it.

Most of us spend a large percentage of our time at work, in the evenings and at night, with minds full of these kinds of questions about our teenagers (or younger):

• How come they’ve got so little drive and interest in school? 

• Why do they do the bare minimum when it comes to homework and revision?  

• Why have they become so distant to us, lost to their bedroom, peer group and devices?

• Where’s their natural enjoyment and purpose in life gone?  

• Why are their interests and passions seemingly limited to friends and screentime?

• Why are they now giving up hobbies they’ve enjoyed for years?

• Why has our household become a battle ground for nagging, petty recriminations and boundary enforcement?

• How come they can’t organise themselves, take responsibility for their own homework and show up willingly for family meals and other commitments?

• Why can’t I help them feel less anxious, more confident and happier in life?

• Why won’t they listen to my advice and suggestions any more?

The world has changed, and continues to change so rapidly, but parenting hasn’t really.

We’re still trapped in the reflexes our parents had 30 years ago and their parents before them and their parents before them.  We’re still stuck on systems of control, coercion and top down management  - albeit subtler these days and with a liberal ideology - when these approaches could not serve ourtselves or our children worse, both in the short and long-terms.

Are you shocked to hear your own parents’ words - which you hated being on the receiving end of - coming out of your own mouth now that you are a father or a mother?

It’s shocking to all of us, not just because many of us do not like the idea of becoming our own parents (usually not so bad once we’ve got over ourselves).  But most of all it alarms us and troubles us so deeply these days because we just know, instinctively, that these old ways of parenting are completely out of date, utterly unproductive, truly painful and, what is more, they are fundamentally self-defeating.  The results are awful.  Huge efforts, titanic struggles to completely shoot ourselves in the foot.

We all need to learn how to step back, how to relax, how to empower, how to teach, how to lead by example and, perhaps most of all, how to trust our children to step into their own self-leadership, find their own purpose and grow into their own natural maturity in these challenging school years; to help them build a foundation for life, not just survival in a harsh schooling system.