Escaping the Endless Adolescence by Joseph Allen

Author:Joseph Allen [Allen, Joseph]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-345-51699-2
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2009-11-06T16:00:00+00:00

6

Finding the Inner Adult

BEYOND THE INNER CHILD

Making fundamental changes in how we think about our teens is going to require revisiting the ways we understand many of their behaviors. In this chapter we suggest a specific approach to this rethinking process: a shift in focus that we call “Finding the Inner Adult.” This new focus is a deliberate play on the recent “find your inner child” fad, which implied that adults sometimes simply need to let go of responsibility and return to the freedom and whimsy of their childhood dreams. Not surprisingly, we take quite the opposite tack regarding adolescents.

The overarching principle of finding the inner adult begins with a rather bold assertion: Beneath it all, adolescents are almost always pursuing adult goals even in their most disturbed behavior, and we help them most when we uncover and draw out those goals. This principle suggests that even though teens’ approaches may be highly problematic or even downright disturbed at times, their underlying goals are not so different from those of any of the rest of us: whether it’s maximizing a sense of control, competence, and connection in life, or minimizing pain and discomfort. The problem lies not in teens’ goals, but in the ways they sometimes pursue them.

We can use this perspective to redirect our approach to some of the most challenging, destructive, and seemingly irrational behaviors teens can throw at us. Our goal is not just to understand these behaviors, and certainly not to excuse them, but rather to change them. So let’s take a look at what this means in practice.

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