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Today we're gonna talk about resilience. It's one of my favorite parenting words. Although it may not appear to have anything to do with getting your child to do their homework or chores, it actually is the through line in everything we're doing as we raise our children. I often say we're not just raising children—we're raising adults.

Welcome to the Parenting Without Power Struggles podcast. I'm your host, Susan Stiffelman. You can learn more about my work at SusanStiffelman.com. We’ve got over 50 master classes on every topic under the sun related to raising kids and teens—from anxiety to chores to siblings to resourcing yourself when you're feeling overloaded or overwhelmed. The Resilient Brain features guests like Dan Siegel, Gabor Maté, Mona Delahooke, Janet Lansbury, Maggie Dent—so many wonderful people. I hope you’ll explore those offerings if you’re here to grow as a parent. And of course, we also have lots of free resources, including a great newsletter.

I want to start by exploring love and how it shows up with our kids. Most of us come preloaded with a desire to do right by our children—to help them feel happy and content. We each get only one childhood, and we want ours to be sweet for our kids. But sometimes that desire for their happiness gets in the way of the larger process that actually helps them grow. Life brings moments of unhappiness, disappointment, and frustration, and our children need to encounter—and survive—those moments.

We have strong instincts to protect, soothe, rescue, and fix. Those instincts are lovely and natural. But many of us also feel uncomfortable when our kids are having a hard time. When a friend doesn’t show up, when they’re excluded from a party, or when they’re overwhelmed by tough homework, something inside us longs to make it better. There’s nothing wrong with that longing. Humans come into the world deeply dependent, and we’re wired to care for them.

But as our children move toward adulthood—a slow, steady process—they need to develop their own capacity to cope. When our instinct to make everything okay becomes too dominant, it can interfere with that process.

Maybe your child isn’t invited to a party, and your heart breaks for them. You may want to drop a hint to the hosting parent. I’m not here to tell anyone what to do, but what I teach is that we first need to explore the part of us that cannot tolerate our child’s discomfort. That’s the root. We can’t change our behavior until we address what’s going on inside ourselves.

This is exactly what I focus on in my upcoming three-episode series on resilience. The series walks you through exercises to unearth and untangle the parts of you that want to intervene—whether it’s calling another parent to fix a situation or jumping in to help on a last-minute school project. Once we understand our internal reactions, we’re in a much better position to parent consciously.

It is hard to watch your child struggle. But when we rush in with advice, solutions, or fixes, we unintentionally communicate, “I don’t believe you can handle this.” There’s nothing wrong with being a loving, supportive presence while your child is sad or overwhelmed. That’s secure attachment. But when we take over and deny them the chance to move through frustration, anger, blame, negotiation, and sadness, they miss the opportunity to build resilience.

Just like building physical muscle requires micro-tears and strain, emotional resilience grows from being stretched and uncomfortable. One of the great responsibilities of raising a child is offering them thousands of opportunities to discover they are stronger, more adaptable, and more capable than they realized.

Last year, I did a class with Dr. Gabor Maté, and at the end, I asked him what he believed was the most important thing a parent can do. He said, “Work on yourself.” That deeply resonates with me. Our upbringing—what we inherited through experience and observation—shapes our parenting. Some of what we carry is beautiful and worth replicating. But some of it we do not want to pass along.

We may promise ourselves we won’t yell, shame, spank, or compare our kids. Yet in the heat of the moment, unless we’ve done our own inner work, we fall back into old patterns. That’s the heart of the work I do through Parenting Without Power Struggles and what I’ve written about in my books. This work is transformative not only for our kids but also for us.

To raise confident, compassionate, flexible, resourceful adults, we have to let them face obstacles—with us present, warm, supportive, and steady—but without taking over. This depends on a child’s age and developmental stage, of course. But ultimately, childhood is preparation for adulthood—the much longer portion of their lives.

We want our children to feel their disappointment and sadness without being gutted by it. To move through breakups, job losses, and setbacks without collapsing. To become empowered adults.

And again, it starts with us—what’s happening inside of us during those shaky moments when we’re tempted to jump in.

If you’d like more support, we have many affordable classes on my website, and scholarships are available. This new resilience series includes three roughly 30-minute episodes where I go deeply into this process—exploring the parts of you that get triggered and helping you stay present through your child’s challenges. There will also be a live wrap-up session with me to answer questions and reflect on what you discovered.

I’ve been doing this work for about 45 years with thousands of families—as a marriage and family therapist, educational therapist, teacher—and I love getting to share what I’ve learned. If this episode has meant something to you, I’d be so grateful if you’d share it, subscribe, or leave a rating or review.

And please acknowledge yourself for wanting to grow and become the best parent you can be. As we wrap up, reflect on one or two things you heard today and carry them into the week ahead.

No matter how busy life gets, look for those moments of sweetness and joy. Stay well, take care, and I’ll see you next time.