Achieving the impossible: living with teenagers Archived article from Nov 3, 2000 By Douglas Frank   Relationships between parents and teenagers are not always easy, acknowledges Maurice Elias, who enjoys talking to his daughter, Samara (far left) and her high school friends. Photo by Nick Romanenko Just when you think that you have all the answers to raising your children, they become teenagers, complete with raging hormones, peer pressures and identity crises, to name a few afflictions of the pubescent ilk. A new book by Rutgers psychologist Maurice Elias and school psychologists Steven Tobias and Brian Friedlander may help mothers and fathers contend with what they consider the toughest parenting job of all -- raising teenagers. "Raising Emotionally Intelligent Teenagers: Parenting with Love, Laughter, and Limits" (Harmony Books), published this fall, provides strategies for dealing with adolescents by applying and extending the insights of Daniel Goleman's best seller "Emotional Intelligence." And like Elias' earlier book, "Emotionally Intelligent Parenting," which deals with youngsters, the new volume combines practical advice and real-life scenarios. The material, recounted with warmth and humor, is drawn mainly from the authors' professional practices and personal experiences. "Both Dan Goleman's book and ours have found their way into numerous international editions," notes Elias, professor of psychology at the Faculty of Arts and Sciences-New Brunswick, "bespeaking what seems to be a universal recognition that human behavior and relationships must be informed by both the head and the heart." Elias says parents of teens wonder if it's too late to do something about their young adults' emotional development. "But the science of emotional development doesn't have a point of closure in adolescence. In fact, it's not too late," Elias asserted in a recent interview. The book calls the teen stage a process, not an end product or even a stop along the highway of life. And parents' job is to make sure their teenagers reach the real goal of being an emotionally intelligent adult. "Adolescence is for learning how to become an adult, not for learning how to become a successful adolescent," the authors believe. The authors point out that the turn of the millennium is a very demanding time to be a parent of a teenager and that the only thing more difficult is being a teenager. The parent-child relationship, they say, has been altered by the fact that more information than ever before -- from peers, the media and the Internet -- goes directly to children unfiltered by adult caregivers. "It means that parents are now in serious competition for the attention of their children, and our attempts to influence them are constantly being diluted by numerous messages encouraging them to do and think differently from ways we would like them to," the authors say. "If we are going to win this competition, we are going to have to be very effective, and we have to be tenacious," comments Elias. "And we can't take for granted that just because we're the parents or just because we're the teachers, our kids are going to cut us a lot of slack and be understanding with us if we don't do a great job. I think we need to do a better job than ever before." Elias thinks that parents, particularly those of means, should not contribute to their teens' sense of entitlement by providing too many material possessions. Rather, they should encourage their kids to make contributions and have a sense of responsibility to their families, their communities, their schools and their neighborhoods. He encourages his own daughters, 17 and 21, to play leadership and service roles in various groups in addition to their academic work. Early in the book, the authors provide a review of the principles of emotional intelligence and emotionally intelligent parenting, including the 24-Karat Golden Rule: "Do unto your children as you would have other people do unto your children." The book also contains various questionnaires, quizzes and questions most frequently asked by parents; anecdotes and stories of teens, peers and parents; a "toolbox" of emotionally intelligent parenting techniques; advice on the when, where and how of parental apology; and an appendix telling readers how to establish emotionally intelligent parenting circles and networks for mutual support. In addition to teaching and writing books to get his message across, Elias has been writing a column for New Jersey's Star-Ledger for almost a year. At Rutgers since 1979, he teaches clinical, school and community psychology and is also affiliated with the Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology and the Allen and Joan Bildner Center for the Study of Jewish Life. No-brainer "Raising Emotionally Intelligent Teenagers: Parenting with Love, Laughter, and Limits" describes several encounters between parents and children. These sample dialogues cry out for a healthy dose of emotional intelligence. Here's one example: DAD: I see you have an English assignment left to do and a test to study for tomorrow. SAMARA: Yeah, I'm gonna take a break now. DAD: You've been working for fifteen minutes! What kind of break? SAMARA: Dawson's on (referring to "Dawson's Creek" or any other teen show of the moment) and I have to watch it. DAD: Hold on. We have a VCR for just this purpose. Tape it tonight and get your studying done and you can watch tomorrow. SAMARA: No way! Everyone in high school is watching tonight and everyone will be talking about it first thing in the morning. You must have no brain if you think I'm going to tape it and watch it tomorrow." The four Ls As the book's subtitle suggests, the authors believe that successful parenting requires a balance of love, laughter and limits. For good measure, they throw in an extra "L" -- linkages. Here's how they describe these four Ls: Love: Caring relationships form the foundation of family life and cooperation. Without this, parents often have only economic and punitive leverage to use with their teens. And these are not ideal strategies. Laughter: Emotions affect how and what we do and are willing to do. Positive emotions are essential for healthy adolescent growth. Humor is not frivolous; it's the ultimate psychic vitamin. Limits: Limits are not about restriction as much as they are about focus and direction and boundary-setting. The skills parents and children possess in goal-setting and problem solving help keep teens on course and turn good ideas into constructive actions. Linkages: Teenagers need to be contributors more than consumers, and to belong more than to buy. In a world of increasing complexity and sophistication, parents cannot expect to "do all" and "be all" for their teens. Our ability to help them make healthy connections will be at least as important as things we do for them and with them directly.

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