I want to talk to you today about the idea of having an influence over your child's choices instead of having control over their choices. I work with parents all the time who are very frustrated that their teenagers never seem to want to take their advice about anything. And we all know the stereotype about teenagers that they think adults are out of touch, they don't want to listen to anything that we say, they think that our advice is outdated and irrelevant. And they're not going to listen. And really we see that in so many movies, so many TV shows, it's all over social media, it's in a million memes. And so this is the image that we have of teenagers — that it's normal for them to reject any advice or input from adults.

But I want to tell you that as a teen therapist, I've worked with dozens and dozens of teenagers over the years who actually tell me something different. What they tell me is that they really do want input from their parents. They really do value their parents advice. But what happens is that every time they approach their parents, or at least in their mind, every time they approach their parents, they feel like they immediately get told what to do. Or they get lectured. Or they get some kind of life lesson. Or they get a story from 30 years ago that doesn't feel very relevant.