Can I teach my child about their brain? {EP 114}

Anyway. Here's today's question. “I've been listening for a while and the watchdog and possum brain ideas have really helped me. Is it okay to teach this to my kids? I'm worried they'll start using it as excuses”. Okay, I totally love this question. Because it is such a normal thing to be a little or maybe even a lot worried about back when I was seeing clients and I was a play therapist, and I was seeing kids all day long, it was a question I would get in some form or another from the parents in my therapy practice, too. So totally normal, to be expected question. The short answer is yes, please, please, please teach this to your kids. And also, yes, many of them will go through a period of using this information as a excuse. That's going to sound something maybe like, “I can't help it, I hit my sister because my watchdog brain”, you know, something like that. 

The excuse stage is just a stage. I promise. I promise, I promise, I promise. And the reason that I know this with such certainty is that owl brain doesn't make excuses. The owl brain takes responsibility. It doesn't make excuses. So when I'm with somebody who is making excuses for their behavior based on how they just couldn't help their watchdog brain, or they couldn't help their possum brain, all I know is that they haven't really fully engaged their owl brain yet. That's it. That's all that information is telling me. 

So let's go a little deeper into this question. Okay? There are a lot of benefits, so many benefits to teaching our kids about their own brain. Dr. Dan Siegel of books like Whole Brain Child, Parenting from the Inside Out, those books, Dr. Siegel, in his field of interpersonal neurobiology calls this way of kind of knowing ourselves, knowing our brains, understanding our neural processes, having some reflection on our own inner world, he calls this mind sight. Okay? And what we know is that when folks understand their own, like neural processes, what's going on inside their brain and what is happening because of that, people feel more empowered to do something to make changes, if that would be appropriate. They feel more empowered to make those changes, not less empowered. So they aren't inclined to make more excuses and just say, “oh well”. Actually, the opposite is true. They feel more capable of being able to do something. What happens when we have some idea of what's happening inside of us is that our behavior doesn't seem random doesn't seem like just this random neural firings that are totally out of control that we can't do anything about. When we understand what's happening, understanding isn't enough to change, but understanding what's happening inside and having some self reflection and being able to kind of turn our attention back towards ourselves and towards our own mind and our own, again, neural processes that is engaging our brain that's building kind of the the muscle of the owl brain. It's going to create more pause in between sensation in the body and a behavior. Okay, so it is good to understand our own neural processes and yes, I do this through teaching about the owl, watchdog, and possum brain. We also know that mindset increases what Dr. Siegel refers to as integration and the entire, kind of, field of interpersonal neurobiology recognizes integration as the path towards mental wellness. And mental wellness is definitely not about having perfect behavior, not by any means. But without question, the ability to reflect on ourselves and our own behaviors, and our own experiences, make repairs and amends with others when possible, or- or when needed, right? When something has happened when we've done something that's harmed a relationship, and then to take steps toward doing better in the future. Those are all important parts of mental wellness. 

We also know research is really, really clear on this, that knowing about our brain and our brain processes and how brain relates to behavior, only increases self compassion. And this is such a key tenant of the work that I do. That understanding the neurobiology of behavior invites us to have compassion for our kids. And we can have compassion and set boundaries, right? We're learning all about that right now in the podcast in other episodes. And then that invites our kids to have self compassion for themselves. Compassion, you've probably heard me say this, compassion is the neurobiology of change. Compassion is when our neural networks have the opportunity to kind of metaphorically but less metaphorically than you think, to like, open up, unlock, and reconsolidate, reorganize themselves. It actually creates neural change, which then will of course lead to behavior change. I have never ever, ever, seen something not good come out of getting to know our brains. And I use the owl, watchdog, and possum metaphor with kids. That tends to be how I introduce these different parts of self and these different kind of pathways in the brain and in the nervous system. And with some kids, I end up dropping the metaphor and just get real brainy. And we talk about different parts of the brain. It really depends on the child I'm working with and their age, and kind of just what interests them. How I talk about the brain, but I've never ever, ever had it be bad to teach kids about the brain. Will they use this information as an excuse for their behavior? Yeah, probably. That's just basically being human. 

But let's look at this making excuses as just like a stage, a part of the journey. It's like a pit stop on the journey. Right? I mean, would you not take some sort of trip you really wanted to take out a fear that you might get stuck at the gas station you have to stop at? No. You're not gonna get stuck at the gas station. It's just a part of the trip. It's part of the journey. This is a similar idea. Making excuses isn't a place we're gonna get stuck. Making excuses is about still really, really needing to grow the owl brain. Making excuses is a part of the journey. It's a pit stop. It is not the end of the journey. And so if you end up hearing your kid make an excuse, like, “oh, it was my watchdog brain that made me hit my sister. I just can't help it”. Right? You can respond with something that sounds maybe something like “I'm just so grateful for your watchdog brain. It works so, so, so hard to keep you safe. I also know that watchdogs only need to attack when you are in serious danger. I'll bet it felt like you were in danger when your sister wouldn't give you a turn on the TV, or share her toys, or get you that snack or whatever. And it makes total sense for your watchdog to feel frustrated, or disappointed, or even mad at your sister. But your watchdog brain is working too, too, too, too hard. We have to keep working together to really grow and build those muscles in your owl brain so that when your sister doesn't give you what you want, you can be disappointed and frustrated but without your watchdog brain believing that you're in so much danger. You have to physically attack. Next time your sister won't share the TV and it's your turn, I want you to come ask for help. I will help you”. Right? 

Okay, so how do we teach our kids about their owl, watchdog, and possum brain? So we actually do have a full on masterclass about the in The  lub. I taught it to the like just general public once and now it just lives and is stored in The Club. And it's something we talk about a ton in The Club and in the forum and our live meetings is, you know, how do we take what we're learning in The Club and teach our kids about it so they get this experience of self compassion that all the parents in The Club are getting like they're watching their own compassion grow, and they want to really give that to their kids. So without question, the best way to do this is to just start incorporating owl, watchdog, and possum ideas into your language, into the way you talk about behavior, and especially your own behavior, right? You can say like, “oh, when I was at the grocery store, my watchdog brain went a little extra on high alert when they didn't have what I wanted. And I felt so mad. I wanted to yell at somebody when they were out of my favorite chips”. I don't know y'all, I'm making this up. “And what I noticed is that my watchdog brain felt like this was a really, really big problem. And I wanted to yell at somebody. So I had to use my owl brain to say like, oh my gosh, I'm so disappointed. They don't have what I want. And that makes perfect sense. Yelling at somebody about being out of my favorite chips isn't really fair to the grocery store workers but it makes perfect sense that I would be so disappointed and I really had to work to calm down my watchdog brain and let my owl brain stay in charge so that I didn't hurt somebody's feelings, unnecessarily”, something like that. I don't know that was a little long winded. I just totally made that up. My point is, reflect on yourself. 

My guess is that if you're listening to this podcast, you have a child who has some challenging behaviors. And kids with challenging behaviors have learned that their behaviors are bad, and their behaviors get them in trouble, and they're at high alert for this, and have a lot of shame. And sometimes too much shame to have us talk about their behaviors even in this owl, watchdog, and possum way. So we can teach these concepts and also teach the concept that we all have a watchdog brain. This isn't about our kids being bad. We all have watchdog and possum brains, right? And we all are spending a lot of energy, all day long, keeping our watchdog and passive brains in check, right? Like if we just let our watchdog and possum brains all day long do whatever their instinct was to do, we would hurt relationships, we would hurt ourselves, that would not be good. So our kids really need to know that we also have these struggles, and we also have to work hard to keep our owl brain in charge until not just let our watchdog and possum brains run wild all the time. Right? So start by reflecting on yourself and reframe your own behaviors as you talk out loud as parts of your watchdog brain or parts of your possum brain. I found that to be one of the best ways to get started. 

I also have owl, watchdog, and possum coloring pages. They're brand new. I just finally had them like finalized and created by my illustrator. And those are available to all Club members, there probably will come a time where those will be available for download over on my website. For now, they're just available in The Club. We also have kind of like what I would call fridge sheets kind of things we can hang up, or download, or post you know places that we can help remind ourselves about the owl, watchdog, and possum brain. And I find that kind of having some of that stuff up in our homes really helps kids learn about their own owl, watchdog, and possum brain. Again, those are probably things that will eventually be available, especially probably after my book comes out in September. But for now all that kind of stuff is available inside The Club. 

If you are new here, you can go to an episode called Focus on the Nervous System to Change Behavior. It's episode 83. It originally aired July 12th, 2022. That is a great introduction to the owl, watchdog, and possum brain. You can also sign up for the Start Here podcast, which is just ten- ten episodes you could find right here on this podcast, including the focus on the nervous system when I just told you about. So they're all episodes that are available on my public podcast, but I kind of put them in order and curated my top ten episodes for where people can start if you are brand new to learning about the nervous system and behavior in this way. So that's at RobynGobbel.com/StartHere. 

I also do have, if you're listening to this around the time that it's airing, I am redoing the masterclass that I had that introduced owl, watchdogs, and possum brains. I'm just updating the science, I'm updating the graphics and the images. And I'm going to be teaching that live on February 28th. You can sign up to come and attend live. It's totally free. I'll be updating the ebook that goes along with that. And everybody who signs up even if you can't come live we'll get that video download and the ebook download. So go and sign up even if you can't come live totally, 100% free. It's essentially, the What Behavior Really is masterclass. If you've seen that it's just- it's due for an update, that's almost two years old science changes. So I'm updating that. 

And if you're a play therapist or child therapist, and you want some ideas about how to incorporate these owl, watchdog, and possum things into your work in the office and with kids and play therapy, you could come to an online workshop that's being hosted by the Theraplay Institute. It's on April 13, and 14th, three hours both days, called All Behavior Makes Sense working with- or play therapy with kids with vulnerable nervous systems, or something like that. And you can find out information about that at Robyn gobbel.com/TheraplayWorkshop. There is a fee associated with that, of course, that professional development, but that's another way you could learn about owls, watchdogs, and possums incorporating that into the work you do with kids. 

Okay, so that was a lot of information. I hope that fully answers the question of is there any risks to teaching kids about their brain? The answer is no, no, no, no, no. And hopefully you feel like you've got lots of information now lots of ideas about where to go to learn more about the owl, watchdog, and possum brain so that you could also teach your kids about the owl, watchdog, and possum brain. I will see you next week, Friday. Well, Tuesdays, my normal episodes come out on Tuesdays. And then these Q and A's are coming out on Friday. So I'll be back with at least one more next week. And then I don't know, I might turn this into a regular occurrence on the podcast. I haven't decided yet. If you'd like to have these episodes, stick around send me an email and let me know. Alright y'all, bye.