Alexander Kopelman on Raising Whole Children: Why "Tell Me About You" Changes Everything | Paper Napkin Wisdom

we tend to think of childhood as a waiting room for the stage of being a complete human being when we're quote unquote adult. and in the process we miss so much important stuff about what makes us human. you know I think that kids have such amazing perspectives and such so much knowledge and wisdom that if we pause and and ask them about that I've never never ceased to be amazed at at what they have to say. they they're really amazing, amazing people.

Hi, I'm Govindh Jayaraman and this is Paper Napkin Wisdom, episode number 375. And here is a show where every week I sit down with leaders, builders, founders, creators, and people who've carried one small idea long enough for it to become wisdom. And this week's napkin may stop you for a moment. Alexander Koppelman wrote, Let's stop asking children what you want to be when you grow up and instead ask, please tell me about you.

Now, at first, this may sound like a conversation about children, and it is, but stay with it. Because the more you sit with that question, the more it starts to reach into every part of how we lead, how we parent, and how we build companies, and even how we understand ourselves. So many of us were shaped by questions that pointed us toward the future. What do you want to be?

What are you gonna do? What's the plan? What's the outcome? And somewhere along the way, without even noticing it, we may have learned to treat ourselves in the same way, as something unfinished, something to be improved, something that only becomes value once it valuable when it's it becomes useful or successful, clear, impressive or complete.

And Alexander invites us into a different question not what are you becoming? Not how can I shape you or what can I shape you into, not even what role will you perform for the world, but something, tell me more about you. And that question does something different. It slows things down and it gives the person in front of us the permission to exist before they perform.

It reminds us that children are not raw material to be shaped, they're people. And maybe as we listen, we may begin to notice where this applies beyond childhood. Maybe to our teams, or with our family, or the next generation of leaders around us, maybe even with a part of ourselves that has been carrying an old story for a very long time. Alexander Koppelman is a writer, social entrepreneur, advocate, coach, and the founding president and CEO of the Children's Art Guild.

His work focuses on really helping children remain connected to their real selves in a world that often teaches them. To fit, comply, and become something someone else recognizes as valuable. His work, For Real, helping children remain their authentic selves in a limiting world, asks us to consider what happens when adults pause long enough to listen differently. And this conversation is not about being a perfect parent.

It's not about having the right answer. It's not about fixing every system at once or even noticing. Anything in in particular that needs to be fixed. It's about paying attention to the small moment in front of us, the pause before we correct, the breathe the breath before we advise, the question before we shape.

Because sometimes the most powerful thing we can offer another human being is not direction, it's recognition. So as you listen to this conversation with Alex Koppelman, notice what shifts when the question changes. And maybe somewhere along the way. Ask it of someone else.

Or ask it quietly of ourselves or yourself. Please tell me about you. So let's dive into my conversation with Alex Coffee. Alexander Koppelman, welcome to Paper Napkin Wisdom.

I'm excited to have you here with me today. Thanks very much for inviting me out. Yeah, so ~ look i I I said this in the green room before we began, that your paper napkin was a little different. And I'm interested in asking you where you got or how you got there.

So it said, let's stop asking children, quote, what do you want to be when you grow up? Unquote, and instead ask, please tell me about you. Why did you share that with me? ~ you know, I think that that's ~ where we ~ fail kids in in many ways.

And and by we we mean I mean adults and I and I mean that fairly globally. I think that different cultures vary ~ of course, but I I think as a whole we tend to think of childhood as a waiting room ~ for ~ the stage of being a complete human being when we're quote unquote adult. and in the process we miss so much important stuff about what makes us human. ~ you know I think that kids have such amazing perspectives ~ and such so much knowledge and wisdom ~ that if we pause and and ask them about that ~ you know, I I've never never ~ ceased to be amazed at at what they have to say.

they they're really amazing, amazing people. I think you're really deliberate about using the word people at the end of that. And and you know, you and I think that you set it up well by saying and I think you're right. I think we look at childhood as a waiting room.

You know, they're they're becoming something. And it's very obvious that the changes that happen in childhood, the amount of change that a child goes through in every one year of their lives is far more dramatic than anything that happens in adulthood. So I think it's easy to get caught up in that change or the rate of change and only think about it as a waiting room, but there's much more to it than that. How did you stumble on this idea?

How did you trip into this? Or did you trip into it? Well, you know, I think it was like like most work I think that this is this stems from my own experience. ~ you know, when I was a child, ~ I I felt like a piece of clay to be shaped.

You know, my mother was very concerned that we were ~ cultured in a certain way. So we went to concerts and museums and we read the right books and you know, made sure that we were getting ~ decent grades in school. the society where I grew up was preparing us to be ~ engineers and nurses and whatever else the society needed. so my my own experience was being invisible as a person.

I you know I I didn't know how to even think about my own ~ wishes and needs. ~ never mind talk about it. and as I've pursued my my life and you know grown and done a lot of interesting professional ~ work, I I've realized that that continues in pretty much all societies, that we we still see children as as ~ you know these sort of raw materials to be shaped. ~ and then you know that those kind of nascent felt ideas ~ you know, I've I've done quite a bit of reading and some very interesting research ~ in childhood studies and identity development.

what happens to us as people if that's our experience in childhood? ~ you know, there's a particular study that comes to mind by ~ researcher ~ Kate Bacon, who's based in the UK, ~ it's called who do you think you are? And it's it asks children about their conception of childhood. ~ and you can imagine the you know the answers were stunningly fascinating ~ of what children think makes a child and whether according to that definition they see themselves as a child or not.

~ you know, a lot of it is about agency and being able to have some modicum of power in one's own life and ~ in one's society. And not surprisingly, you know, kids mostly feel disempowered. It's striking how similar that is to a lot of, you know, adults. It it's almost the same as an i you if if we didn't set up that we were talking about kids, Alex, I mean, I think that we could apply that perspective equally to adults.

Isn't that interesting? And and I think that's sort of at the center of what you're saying, right? Yeah, and it's at the center of our work and the book for real, you know w what we end up doing is just repeating the cycle. because we grow up with this idea of becoming something in the future rather than being in the present.

And then we pass that along to our kids. And ~ we all know that there's something wrong with that. We we feel it, we we ourselves often suffer the consequences of it. We simply often don't know how to get out of that the cycle.

~ so the my hope is that what I can contribute is to encourage people to take some what I believe are fairly simple steps to pause and to reflect and to do a little something different. So this idea of being shaped, this idea of and I and I I think this is really interesting. You said invisible as a person and they you know, that you were felt invisible as person, you didn't have even a sense of your wants and needs, even though I think if if you were to ask your mom, and I think that you talked about this of her intention Her intention was to expose you to all of these options, right?

Alex, look at all of these things you can be and see and feel and hear. Which one do you want? And you're hearing, no, I'm invisible. That's that's a pretty that's pretty stark contrast, Well I I think there was one isn't it?

missing element, w which was at the end of what you said, you said the question was, which one do you want? I never heard that question. What what I heard was, this is what you must have to be the kind of person I want you to be. That it's important to be.

Yeah. Right. And we do that right as ~ we do that inadvertently because we forget to ask the question and or even infer that hey, we're these are just options. They're not mandates, they're not a blueprint, these are just options, aren't they?

Like we've I think as parents, sometimes we get so caught up in providing these avenues and opportunities that we forget to say, hey, you know. Are you enjoying this? Right. And I think that w what tends to happen is that we become so attached to become being good parents and feeling like we have to live up to some standard that comes from the outside that it doesn't occur to us to ask the child about whether we're being a good parent to that particular child.

And you know, ironically, I've ended up loving classical music. and poetry and literature and you know, all the things that my mom was exposing me to. And I would have loved to have been asked, like, which ones of these are you enjoying today? Right.

You know, it's so true that we see the world as we are and not as it is. And we it we we project this idea of our own identity onto others. And I think this is the core of what you're saying, because we're trying to to grab this identity that may or may not be consistent with who we really are. And we're trying to shoehorn ourselves into this so we we can only give people our own experience, right?

We we we can't lead in people in a way that we haven't let ourselves. So is part of this work something that we can do with our kids and they can do with us? Or is this something we have to do first before we do it with them? you know, it's funny, we work with a lot of educators and educators have the hardest time starting with themselves because they want to immediately go to to doing something for the children and with the children.

~ I think it's impossible to talk to children about authenticity and being whole without practicing a little bit of how to do it yourself. ~ because what what what's important about it is that there's an energetic component ~ to all of this ~ that children pick up on. And you know, if I'm just standing and talking to you about being real, chances are if you're eight you you know exactly how to call my BS. now.

And you will ~ so I think it it is i And what you said about this you know, the stories, so we we get caught up in our own stories, you know, that's where we live. And what the suggestion, the invitation is is to pause and to step back from the story, not to give it up, but to create a little bit of space between the voices in my head and what's actually going on with other people in my life. and ~ to to to allow to hear them, to see them, and to you know, possibly interrogate the story itself.

you know, sometimes we carry beliefs and behaviors that aren't us ~ simply because that's how we were socialized. I want to go back again to something you you shared in the green room. You you actually offered it as a a little note. Hey, here's something about me.

I may pause, I may stop and contemplate your question and consider it, and even look away while I'm doing that before I answer. ~ you haven't lost me. I'm still here. I'm I'm just thinking.

And and then you just now said. You know, we need to create space between the stories in our head versus what's happening in reality, what's happening for the other person and with the other person. And and so you've intentionally built this into your life. You you're you're walking this talk and creating that space.

And even I I think it's really interesting that you were vulnerable enough to let me know, hey, this is this is just a little bit about me. Here's a little note. Isn't it so true that we try to put on these veneers about what we need to be? And you talked about being a good parent or being a good educator or being a, you know, ~ an eloquent speaker or or being charming or engaging to the kids in any way, shape, or form without really creating the space between the story that you're trying to create and who you really are and who they are.

And that's really what this all starts with, is doesn't it? Yeah, absolutely. you know it's funny that you experience me as being vulnerable in saying that. What I'm actually addressing is the potential discomfort that you might experience when I go silent.

And the reason for that is that I I felt that for years. ~ I've been a part of a men's group for twenty five years and s There were many times where men would kind of come at me and say, you know, you haven't said anything. Like, what's going on? ~ and you know, simply being uncomfortable with someone being silent when I don't have anything to say or I'm composing myself.

Same thing with the looking away. You know, men would say to me, you know, how come you don't look me in the eye? And I had to explain myself that, you know, when I Tune into what's happening for me in my body and in my in my soul and my brain. I I need to be in a private space.

And then I can talk to you and I'll look you in the eye when I'm ready. But you know, it it so it it makes people uncomfortable. ~ silence makes people uncomfortable. ~ as parents and educators, you know, as adults in general, I think we we have this belief that we're supposed to have the answers.

And when kids present in a way or ask us something that we don't have an answer to, most of us get very, very uneasy and we kind of turn it back on the kids. Right. You know, it's like you know, why are you asking that? W you know, why are you being this way?

You know, you're always this. You're ~ you know you know all the the the the tricks, right? Yeah, I may have said one or more of them to my kids over time. And and and you you said this, Mm-hmm.

you know, that we believe that we must have the answers. We believe that we need to s to guide steer motivate whatever, insert word here. But really that's not a belief. It's a decision, right?

We decided that this was going to be the case. And and as we've created that limiting decision, we can decide something else. It's it it is just a choice. It is not more complicated than that, is it?

It's not. I think most people don't realize that it's a choice they're making. I think that it's so programmed in that we believe that it it is just w the way it is. Part of this you know, pausing and stepping back is is recognizing how many choices we have in all of this.

~ and it's it's extremely liberating because once once you take back that control of how, you know, we walk through the world. It's it's i it's a different way of experiencing everything. Right. So let let's let's talk about how how this empowerment movement that you've that you've believed in, that you've decided is important, that you've acted on and and pursued for years, right?

For now decades, w what have you seen change? In the real world. W i in the faces, in the lives, and the in the and and the stories of the people that you've influenced. Well, you know, probably the the people I've observed for the longest time ~ and most closely have been the men in my men's group.

~ and you know, this is a group of men when we started twenty-five years ago, who were, you know, we were in our some of us in the late twenties, thirties, forties, some older men. And we were struggling with the most basic of human emotions. And both feeling the emotions and ~ expressing the emotions. And over the years of meeting once a week, sitting together, supporting each other, telling each other our stories, challenging the beliefs, what I saw was that change of ~ going from being at the mercy of what is to Having the power to make decisions.

~ And I've also seen, you know, men for whom that didn't work, who still struggled with that. So, you know, that's that's that example, and that's the inspiration for my work. What I hope for is that when we plant those seeds with children, that by the time they're in their late teens and twenties. That they will have the tools to know that they have choices, to to know that ~ they understand their inner compass, that they know that they can grow with it, that it'll be there for them regardless of the changes that they're going through, ~ and that they'll have their own internal scaffold.

~ unfortunately, we haven't been doing the work long enough yet. that any any of these kids have reached the age of about twenty five, which is when I think is you know sort of harvest time. but I I I I look forward to being around to see that. Yeah.

~ my my kids haven't reached harvest time yet either, so the jury's still out on what they'll decide for themselves. ~ so I I understand that that need to wait. I I I I was gonna ask you about your men's group later, but you know, y since you came back to it, ~ since it's a peop group of people that you've seen over so long, first of all I wanna say that, you know, ~ lately and I'm sure you've been seeing lately there's there seems to be more of a resurgence of sort of dialing back or or reclaiming a healthy form of masculinity.

That that that that that there's been a period, I think, of very vocal toxic max masculinity. And even saying the word masculinity evoked naturally the the toxic prefix even before you got anywhere into the sentence, but there's been recently a change, I think, in how men want to better understand a healthy, contained form of masculinity. And and and I think that the majority of of men would desire and would identify with that kind of thing. ~ so so this recent resurgence makes me curious as to how this men's group came together twenty five years ago at a time when ~ maybe there was less momentum, you know, societally to create that.

~ tell me about your group. ~ well so the the the group came out of ~ The mid eighties in the States there was a little movement of kind of this mythopoetic return to healthy traditional masculinity. So Robert Bly is often invoked as kind of the face of ~ that that time where men were thinking about the ways in which we have lost ~ the traditions of passing along healthy masculinity to the next generation. ~ and they were thinking about ~ initiation ceremonies and and so on.

And there was a group of men who came together and started an organization called at the time they were called New Warrior, it's now the Mankind Project, ~ and they organize essentially initiation weekends for men. ~ it's been going on for all these years and it's international now. ~ twenty thousand men, over twenty thousand men have gone through these trainings. ~ and what was transformative for me, the weekend itself was was important.

What was particularly important to me was that after the weekend, ~ the organization helped put together these groups of men who had just done the weekend. And that's how our group came together in the first place. and then we we just continued. and it's you know, you you mentioned toxic masculinity, and you know, people of over the years that more recently have asked me about that, you know, and and I think that What I've seen of toxic masculinity is when men are not able to ~ rise above the socialization and are not able to confront and deal with their feelings.

Because what then happens is that all of that stuff curdles and becomes toxic for the man and the way that he walks through the world. Yeah, I mean I I think we can have a really long conversation about that. But what I'm really curious about is how did you moving through your initiation and your reconnection with health healthy masculinity inform this work and and really, you know, move you into not just children ~ i promoting agency around children, not just working in this area, but you've done a lot of work in in girls empowerment, like helping girls feel empowered and powerful in that environment.

So how did that inform that work? Well, it was you know, we as I said, we were all, you know, men kind of in different stages of life, but we were all well into our adulthood. And I kept looking around and sort of you know, we were like literally struggling with things like, How do I say I'm sad? You know, and at a certain point I said, This th you know, this is great that we're doing it, but what we really need is prevention.

And so the idea was that I wanted to create an organization, ~ a program, a movement that began to work with children at as early age as possible to insulate them from the gender stereotypes that all the all the shoulds and the oughts and the you know must must do's ~ and help them understand their own story and write their own story. So that that was really the the connection for me is seeing how difficult it was when you were an adult ~ versus the idea that, you know, maybe we can do this a little bit easier when we start.

And it and it really does start, I think, maybe with that question, right? ~ please tell me about you. Well when when you confront children for the first time with that very open ended question, because you're not even saying, tell me about what you like. I I I think that's really interesting that there's nothing in that question other than meeting them where they are.

D do kids so I I think here's what I think. I think you go to ten adults, they're gonna have a hard time responding to that question. They're gonna say, What do you mean? What are you interested in?

What do you wanna hear? What are you after? Like what's your angle? I'll bet you kids don't do that.

No, and depending on the age, they'll tell you very different things. You know, the little kids will tell you about, you know, I'm this tall and, you know, I have a a dog named, you know, Fluffy and whatever else. And then, you know, older kids might respond with their interests and and then at a certain point they will respond the same way you're describing adults responding. Like, what is it that you want?

Because they've already absorbed that message that what's expected of them is to respond to what other people want of them. And whether it's the right answer on a test or ~ certain behavior, but it's it's about the adults, it's not about them. You know, ~ there's a part of me that that wants to wants to go here too is is that you know, we tell kids in school, sit still, be quiet and do as you're told. And and that makes it easy for the teacher, that makes it easy for the education system, that makes it eas it really hard on the child.

And then in life that's not what gets rewarded. Like sitting still being quiet and doing as you're told doesn't work. Doesn't doesn't pay dividend later. So they're supposed to just naturally evolve into this other thing that works in the real world.

And ~ and and I think that your your your statement that even if they do give you the answer of, you know, I have a dog named Fluffy, I'm you know, four feet tall, or I'm taller, I'm I'm I'm the second tallest person in my family, or whatever they say, whatever relativity they bring to it, they eventually come around. to exactly what adults do because they've been conditioned to sit still, be quiet, and do as you're told. So, well, wait a minute, I'm not being I'm not doing as I don't know what I'm supposed to do here.

What am I supposed to do? How how do you get past that? Like how do you coach past that? that's tough.

I mean that's that's where you know starting early is really important. ~ there's what comes to mind there is there's there's this ~ kind of famous creativity test where you know a teacher puts a a a dot on a blackboard and the kindergartners will go on for a very long time telling stories of what the dot represents and you know making mak making all kinds of fun fun ideas out of it. And by the time the the children are in high school they say it's a dot on a blackboard. So we part of the the real cost both to us individually and to us as a society is that we socialize the creativity out of children.

And part of my invitation to adults is how do we help children hold on to that creativity while understanding that there are certain ways that we need to behave when we're in a group together. So, you know, for everybody to learn, we do have to be somewhat quiet. you know, we we might move, but we might not, you know, be running around all over the classroom. So it's a it's a negotiation in every community.

~ what we forget is that every community is different and we need to have that negotiation and you know create the agreements together in the beginning of a school year or in our family. ~ we tend to just take the factory approach and say, you know, we've got X number of widgets coming in and we're going to treat them this way for this number of years and we're going to spit out ~ you know a certain number of products and the ones who don't come comply with the standards are labeled as failures ~ even though very often they're the the most creative, the most you know innovative.

~ so it's it a lot of this is ~ signs of the the need for real systemic change and catching up With the way that we actually live and what we need in in the world right. So y when we talk about systemic change, especially when we speak about education, the I think the the weight of the system just feels daunting. People are like, we can't change that. You know, it's it's for those of you just listening and not watching, you won't see that Alex has got a shirt with ~ pink elephants on it.

And and you know, it's pushing an elephant up a hill, right? And and that's a hard thing to do. But I think that you're approaching it a slightly different way. 'cause I don't think you're trying to push the elephant up the hill, you've got a different approach.

And and so when you hear that systemic change, what's your approach to systemic change? All of us doing something very small in our own lives and in the way that we interact with children. because, you know, to to to belabor the elephant metaphor, if all of us, you know, sort of begin to ~ run our hands around the elephant, sooner or later as a community we'll be able to get our hands around it and to describe it. ~ you know, if each of us tries to push it, it's it's just not gonna happen.

And that's that's you know, if if people take nothing else away from ~ the work, it my invitation is that it doesn't take a lot. ~ there are very small shifts in perspective, sometimes in behavior, ~ but it doesn't take a lot. It does not have to be a a heavy, heavy lift. So give me an example.

What what can I do? Other other than asking kids to to tell me about themselves, what are what is what's another small thing I can do? I I and let's make it personal. I've got I've got a twenty year old, so he's still five years away from harvest.

I think people would say that he's he's an older kid, but he's still five years away. And ~ and and we can see that. The the I've got a a daughter who's who's eighteen and graduating high school next week and I've got a soon to be six year old sixteen year old. So three kids, two years apart, each of them.

~ what what's something I can do with them? have you shared a paper napkin with them? Yeah, absolutely. We do.

Okay. That's that's one thing that occurs to me. ~ have you shared with them something that's been a challenge for you? I wanna say I think I have.

But I think I I mean if I'm honest, I'd probably couch it like a lesson. I could probably wait for something to go sideways for them and then I relate to that with them as opposed to Just sharing for no reason. Like I I think I'm trying to mold the clay. Right.

Yeah, so maybe for each one of ~ you know, share something that you encountered when you were their age. That was a little difficult. That's that's interesting, you know. ~ tell you a story of something that happened in the last few days at home.

~ I'm I I like to cook. I made a a really tasty, spicy ~ Indian dish. And i if if you've ever cooked with Indian spices, you know, you start with the oil and you start with the spices and you s y you know, you you build you build the flavor profile from the from the bottom out. and it's not like most cuisine where you just dump some spices in at the end.

You know, the spices are are are are treated differently. And it was delicious. It was a delicious meal. Everybody loved it.

But my my my kids, some of the kids started and I'm not gonna name because they listen to the show every now and then, but we started to complain about the day after that the smell hadn't left the house. Mm-hmm. And the way they said it was really triggering to me. It didn't feel good.

And, you know, I I kind of let it go once or twice. And then I kind of got upset about it. And I don't think I really explained why I got upset about it. And why I got upset about it was when I was when I was young, Mm-hmm.

when I was little, I was the only brown kid in my school. And that was hard for me. And ~ and and to a certain degree in our In our home, I felt like for the first time for ~ in some way that emotion sort of lo came back and and I didn't I didn't come clean about that. Mm.

So that would have been an interesting opportunity that I got wrong, right? And that's the kind of thing that you're talking about. Well, except you didn't get it wrong. You didn't catch it in the moment.

and you thought of it now and you know, go home this evening and tell about it. Yeah. Yeah. Ma I mean it was just an i but this is the kind of opportunity that I think you're ~ you're talking about, right?

Exactly. Exactly. But and it does take sometimes it takes time to become aware of what's happening. And it's it's important to be gentle with ourselves first.

~ to to recognize that it yeah. Yeah. Okay. And by the way, I make a a mean chicken chema.

Well we we should we should we should ~ we should duel one day. Mm-hmm. the ~ that that that's that's amazing. Yeah.

The the thing that ~ that I'm I'm I'm sitting with in in this is your journey is really about self understanding so that we can understand each other together. And and because I think we underestimate the the wisdom of the children around us, even for those who don't have children, for the children around us, to be able to, you know, provide a really interesting opportunity for mutual self discovery. And I think you talked about this earlier on that that we can negotiate the rules of how we how we behave together.

And you talked about it in the school setting, you know maybe it's not best for everybody, you know, so each community has to have its own rules. And and, you know, a home is a community and a family is a community and we can we can do this. So so what do you think about there's a there's a recent study that came out and and it's been all over CPAC and everywhere else where people have been presenting about how ~ for the first time in history we've seen A reduction in cognitive ability generationally because ~ in cognition, not cognitive ability, cognition in children, in school-aged children, because technology's increase has gone up and human contact in leaning and learning has come down.

And the moment that that started to happen, we've seen this decrease in cognition to the point where SAT. SATs have even changed the way they do their tests. Instead of giving a large essay saying the comprehension is read the entire essay, get to the end, and answer these questions. Now it's breaking it off almost like Twitter pieces and saying, Okay, here's a tweet, what does this mean?

Here's a tweet, here what does this mean? And and and they're sort of adjusting what cognition even means in a modern era. Really what you're what you're suggesting, and maybe I'm getting it wrong, but maybe I th I feel like there's something here, where you're suggesting it's really important that we reconnect with each other and we sort of reset the rules under how we do this. We're not rushing to the finish line, we're jumping to the present as opposed to the future.

Yeah, I think that's right. And I think that you know, there are couple of responses that I'd like to make to that. there's some very compelling evidence that when you break the relationship between ~ the content, the learner, and the teacher, ~ comprehension goes down. ~ learning in general goes down.

So I think that that's one thing. ~ and technology certainly is playing a part in it. ~ the the Piece of this that I worry about is that we seem to have ~ To to want to forget that we just lived through what one ~ observer described as a species level stress event in the pandemic. And if we think about what that did to children, ~ it is ~ mind-boggling.

And we really have to think about how it affected children depending on how old they were at the time this was all happening. So, you know, if you had a a child who was one and suddenly learned to that he he had to be afraid of other children, ~ that's something that's going to take a while to repair, right? It it has an effect on worldview and behavior and learning abilities and so on. ~ you know, if you have children who were born during the pandemic and they didn't even know there were other children ~ or other adults besides who was in the in the home, ~ that has an effect.

And so, you know, what I've heard from ~ educators and child development professionals is that children on the whole are about three years behind ~ where we would have considered normative before the pandemic. ~ And you know, I think that we we still don't have enough information to understand ~ the emotional impact ~ on children and how that's playing out in their ability to pay attention and I think that that stress that was in our entire system, in the families, in the schools, in the in our individual bodies, is going to be with us for a very long time and disrupting a lot of things.

So, you know, we talk about ~ long COVID in ~ physical terms. I think we need to start talking about emotional long COVID and how that's affecting children. Yeah. ~ yeah, I I I I really like what you said about the your early comment about cognition and the interruption.

And ~ I have a a great friend who is an expert in in distance based learning. ~ her name is Annette Lavac and and she reminds me often that students need three things at all times connection with content, connection with peers. in connection with the instructor. And if they have those three things, they will learn.

And they will learn very well. If they're if they're not learning, look for a break in one of these things. And it's it's gonna be there. ~ and I think your comment around the species level stress event interrupted connection with all three of them in very different ways.

And and that's definitely had a result you know, a huge impact. I I think it's definitely had an impact on when I think about the cohort of people around my eldest son's age group, they relate to each other in a very different way than ~ than my previous experience has been with people of of their age group. It's it's really interesting to see them evolve ~ and then and then change. I I think my daughter's age group did a a little bit differently and yeah, each each cohort, even though they were e only two years apart, experienced that event differently.

And and that's I think something that you're you're indicating as well, right? Yeah, absolutely. I think that, you know, the even a year difference made a huge difference in how how the the kids experienced the the pandemic. It's incredible.

I I know that we can continue talking. There's so much value in what you have to say and I've got so much curiosity about it. But our our time is nearly at the end. I want to say thank you to you, but I also want to evoke a story.

many years ago a great friend of our show ~ gave us a napkin and it said what you appreciate appreciates and w what he did afterward was create a a mission of gratitude around the world. Unfortunately he passed too quickly. He passed away about eighteen months ago and since that day We've been paying forward his gift to us by asking every guest to appreciate someone or some people that were important along the way. Alex, who would you like to appreciate today?

Boy, you know, it's it's such a long list. I had a I had a lot of trouble with that when I was writing the acknowledgments in my book. ~ I want to say a special thank you to the men in my men's group who ~ have been in many, many ways a lifeline for me ~ and have shaped who I am. ~ and I also really want to thank my immediate family, my wife Sarah, my daughter Rosie, and our very tiny dog Gus, who kept me sane while I was writing the book.

~ and and also finally to you. Thank you. This has been a delightful conversation. I really appreciate it.

Thank you, Alex. That was Alexander Koppelman. And maybe as this conversation settles, you begin to notice the question that stays with you, not the question that demands an answer, not the question that forces a plan, but the quieter question. Please tell me about you.

And there's something powerful in that kind of an invitation, isn't there? Because when we stop asking children to explain what they will become, we may begin to see who they already are. And when we practice that with children, something else can happen too. We may start practicing it with the people we lead, the people we love, with the parts of ourselves that have been shaped for so long, they forgot they were allowed to speak.

Alex reminds us that children are not waiting rooms for adulthood. There are people, whole people, present people, people with an inner world, an inner compass, and a story already forming. And maybe that is true for all of us. Maybe the next chapter isn't always about becoming more.

Maybe it's sometimes about listening more closely to what is already there. So as you move through the rest of your day, you might find one small place to practice this. One conversation, one pause, one moment where the old question would have been easy. What are you going to do?

What are you going to become? What's the plan? And instead, you can choose to question that maybe opens the door. Please tell me about you.

So thanks for listening to Paper Napkin Wisdom. And if this conversation stayed with you, share it with someone who was raising, teaching, leading, or loving a person who needs to be seen before they are shaped. And maybe that person is closer than you think. Maybe it's someone at your table, someone on your team, someone in the mirror.

This is Paper Naprian Wisdom. I'm Govind Jay Rahman. And remember, the most powerful ideas. Are often small enough to fit on a napkin and large enough to change your world.

Make it a great day. I believe in you.