When Failure Feels Personal: Helping Your Kids Navigate the Tough Stuff

Oh, that word failure, for some people it hits hard and can have lots of narratives and thoughts surrounding it. Others may use it as a drive to improve or do better. Failure is part of life, but how we talk and respond to failure can really impact how we feel about it and move forward through it.

The other day my kiddo told me they are so dumb because their grades are lower than their buddies at school. Oh man it is difficult to hear your kid be so hard on themselves. So, I did what I do, I tried to fix it by telling them all the things they are doing well; working hard, improving their grades, trying and that they cannot compare themselves to others.

Then I thought about how myself and my husband have made our kids feel this way. So yes, I tried to be a fixer and spiraled in anxious thoughts and blamed myself. The truth is, that is not the answer, well I mean yes as parents we do model and contribute to our kids’ behaviours and beliefs. However, they are their own person trying to navigate their world.

Understanding our own beliefs and narratives around failure and what we were taught to manage as kids, teens and adults from our various environments may assist in understanding how we show up when our kids fail at something or feel like a failure.  

It may be how we talk about failure with our teens, and how we look at it as a step in learning more about ourselves and what we can do with that failure in a positive way to help us grow and move in a direction of progress. We all make mistakes, and if someone follows us around pointing out all the ways we could have done things better, we may feel low or not worthy. However, by asking curious questions of our teens like “how come”, “what do you think happened there”, “how do you feel about” in a tone that shows compassion and grace, the response to failure may look more like growth and progress and can help to support them when they feeling like they are failing.

When the narrative of failure becomes a belief for your kid, or impedes them doing things they enjoy or becomes a part of their self talk, it is important to focus on this with them.

Failure doesn’t define our kids. How we help them respond to it can.