Bike Works

 

Part of moving Aaron in freshman year at college was getting him some wheels. Kansas State is a compact campus, and Manhattan is a compact college town, so one can technically walk everywhere. But a vehicle increases your radius significantly. But a car is expensive, while a regular bike might be a bit much given how hilly and cold this part of Kansas can be. So Aaron asked for an e-bike, which let me tell you is a lot more expensive than a regular bike! 

But it’s proven to be a good purchase. Aaron has enjoyed the fun and mobility it brings. And, he’s parlayed this asset into a part-time job as a food delivery courier, which helps with spending cash. A promising sign of ingenuity and responsibility!

Skits Are a Great Way to Prepare for Your Career

 

Much has been made of the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence --5(AI) tools in the workforce, and the implications of this on higher education and career development. With two in college, I am following this trend with deep personal interest, for both Jada and Aaron are in a transition period from hitting the books in high school and living under my roof, to finding a job and living on their own. The question that awaits them has vexed many of their peers: do I have anything to offer to my future employer that would warrant their giving me a job and a salary and benefits? 

In addition to being a parent, I also run a consulting firm. So I view this topic from that perspective as well. I often tell our employees that if we as a firm cannot add value to our clients we will cease to be in business, just as if we as individuals cannot add value to our employer we will cease to be employed. Which means that, yes we have to learn how to use AI tools, just like past generations had to learn punch cards and spreadsheets and coding. But it also means we have to do what AI can’t do. 

And what is that? Some think that in a few short years the answer will be: very little. Which may be true. But there will always be a human element to our economy. I can give my restaurant order to a touchscreen, but perhaps part of the dining experience is interacting with wait staff. When buying a house, there’s so much information at my fingertips, but maybe when I’m making a huge financial decision that has emotional elements to it, I will want to access the advice of an actual human being. 

Additionally, even the most tech savvy pro-AI people will also say that, beyond the value of the human touch, there is the notion in which even sophisticated models lack the nuance of smart and experienced human beings in navigating a complex problem. To give a programming example, experts consistently say AI tools turbo charge their work by automating mundane tasks like troubleshooting bugs but are pretty far away from providing the initial framework for solving a problem. 

Which is why it is infuriating to me that far too many of our educational institutions and far too many of our young people view the classroom as a place to learn, memorize, and regurgitate rote content. Name the subject, and too much of the learning experience is digesting information and repeating it back in the form of homework and tests. 

Which is why work experiences, and more broadly life experiences like volunteering and travel and civic participation, are so important to gain the life skills that employers are looking for you to bring into their workplace, "life skills" being an umbrella term to represent "how things work in the real world" or even better "how to get sh*t done in the real world." Which is why the best educational institutions are figuring out how to bake those experiences into students’ time on campus, whether co-op placements, study abroad, or service projects. 

On that note, I am recalling my goofy high school friends of mine convincing our English teacher to convert our writing assignments into skits. She was an uncommonly good sport, and I think she enjoyed our humor, so we got many opportunities to do just that. I now realize that, in addition to the prep being much more fun – imagine the teen version of me and my guys figuring out how to translate a Greek tragedy into a modern-day tragi-comedy with contemporary cultural references – this is exactly the sort of applied learning that best prepared us for success outside of the classroom. (By the way, not coincidentally, perhaps this was the best way to learn precisely because it was fun, something today’s experts also espouse, which is that the best way to grow is to get into things that are enjoyable to you.) 

The worst situation is when students get A’s but do so by getting good at spitting information back to their teachers. A better situation is when students use school as a platform to gain and use skills in a real world format that is applied, complex, and results-oriented. Even better when you can do skits involving costumes, funny accents, and hidden inside jokes. Thankful for my own educational journey, and hoping that in 2025 my own kids are able to navigate their own paths to future career success.

Home for the Holidays

 

 

It was nice to have Aaron home from Kansas State for Thanksgiving break. I think he enjoyed having home cooking and catching up with high school friends. In a week, Jada will be home from study abroad in Taiwan, and later this month Aaron will be done with fall semester and home again too. Thankful to enjoy holiday traditions with the older kids back in the nest!

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone

 

Life is not always easy and sometimes hurts. But there is no dearth of things to be thankful for, so I hope that today you are with those you love and able to feel and express gratitude. Happy Thanksgiving from our home to yours!

The Explosive Child

 

Usually when you’re navigating a field strewn with landmines, the goal is to avoid them. Who wants an explosion in their face? But with parenting a pre-teen with behavioral challenges, sometimes we have to step right into it. 

I look to the Bible for guidance on how to live, which includes how to parent. Nestled in Hebrews 12, a chapter of the Bible of great significance to my faith journey, is this line: “For the moment, all discipline seems not to be pleasant, but painful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterward it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.” 

Here the author is speaking of God as Father, disciplining us His children towards a life of righteousness. But the author employs the analogy of earthly fathers and their children. And in doing so they are taking as given that earthly fathers discipline their children, that discipline is not pleasant but painful, and that discipline yields positive outcomes. The use of this analogy proves that these are unassailable observations, rather than ideas that require explanation or justification. 

And yet for most parents, discipline requires some intentionality. For it isn’t pleasant, for parent or child, so our temptation is to avoid or soften it. In Asher’s case, it hurts him profoundly when we express our disapproval and render some negative consequence for some behavior he has exhibited. And, because his expression of this is usually pretty explosive, it’s no walk in the park for us either to decide on, communicate, and execute the punishment. 

But that’s why I hold that Bible verse so dear. Our goal as parents, my goal in being Asher’s parents, is not to be governed by what is easy and comfortable in the moment. Rather, what we want (and pray and live out on a daily basis) is that we are putting Asher on a journey where he comes more and more righteous. And, on that journey, there will need to be discipline, and that discipline will be painful, but yet it must be rendered still. 

I will not share details of where pre-teen Asher, in the year 2025, is in need of discipline. But any parent of a pre-teen and any parent of a special needs kid can probably relate. It is not pleasant but painful. But it is necessary, so we solder on. 

Growing Pains

 

Our kids are growing up in a world that is difficult to grow up in. It’s not just a mirage that people my age can look back on childhood as a more innocent time, because indeed it was. For better or worse, we didn’t have smart phones or YouTube or social media, with the attendant information overload and assaults to body image and emotional wellbeing. 

On the other hand, I’m lucky that my kids can live in relative ease. They standard of living is more comfortable than mine at the same age, growing up in an immigrant household that was pretty well off but lived below our means because it’s what my parents were used to and because it’s what enabled the foundations upon which my life is based, most importantly education. 

Parenting norms have, not coincidentally, also shifted dramatically. It wasn’t too long ago that kids were secondary in the family orbit, with very little catered to their limitations and interests, and most of their existence consisting of putting the labor to keep the family alive. Nowadays, those of us in upper middle class households very much center our family life around kids’ needs and activities. We are chauffeur and valet and bodyguard and cook and maid and assistant. 

I’ve written before that one of my great joys in life is making breakfast for my kids on vacation. It is a small act of love in the form of servanthood, which is to say I take delight and express affection by serving my kids, in this case literally serving them a meal. And while some of my more mundane parenting responsibilities don’t evoke as much joy, I do recognize the importance and preciousness of things like riding bikes with Asher to his boxing lessons or moving Aaron into his freshman dorm or reading Jada’s college entrance essays. I may be tired when I do these things, I do them willingly and joyfully. 

But I also do them because my kids need me to. They depend on me for their safety. They don’t know how to do things so I have to show them or in some case do things for them (more on this in a sec). They are still growing up in this world and have much to learn in order to navigate it. And it is a sober responsibility I bear to help them prepare. 

But there is a balance between helping and enabling. It is unfortunate to the point of neglect when we are unavailable to our kids or refuse to assist them as they stumble through their transitions from pre-teen to teen to young adult to independent person. 

But growing up involves struggle, for to not struggle is not to really learn. And struggle involves pain. As I often say to Amy, “sometimes it has to sting a little.” The sting of not properly preparing, falling on your face, and learning the hard way that you should’ve prepared. The sting of working hard towards something and still failing, and learning the difficult life lesson that very little is given to you and that sometimes you do everything right and still lose. The sting of doing the wrong thing and suffering the appropriate consequences for it. 

Imagine the opposite of these scenarios. If we stumble into an easy life even though we didn’t work towards it or actively did the wrong things, we age in time but don’t gain in life perspective. And it would not be loving of me as a parent to allow my kids to go down that path. Better to go through the necessary lessons, even and especially if they hurt a little. 

I hope I am not coming across as a masochist. That life stings sometimes is not meant to glorify the pain as good in and of itself. Usually it hurts to watch someone you love get hurt. But if you know it is a necessary pain for a greater good, then you don’t shield them from the sting, just like you would never withhold a vaccine from a kid simply because getting a shot hurts and they don’t like feeling that pain. 

We all seek comfort, including parents for themselves and for their kids. And yet we must have wisdom to know when comfort is in fact the absolute worst thing for ourselves and our kids, and accept the struggle that life gives us sometimes on our journey to adulthood and fulfillment.

A Kid and His Bike, Two Generations in the Making

 

 

It’s no coincidence that my rare personal days, when I check out of both work and parenting, always involve riding my bike somewhere. There are scarcely any greater pleasures than the feeling of freedom I feel when I ride my bicycle, and this goes for both familiar routes and brand new ones. This dates back to my childhood, when learning how to ride a bicycle allowed me to solo explore my neighborhood and beyond. I can tell you exactly what that feeling was like because I feel I am reliving it in the present when I get on my bike.

So it is delightful to see how much Asher has gotten into riding his bike. For him too, bicycling is both a physical activity and a gateway to freedom, and so he seeks and relishes every opportunity. That we can do this together pleases me to no end. For now, our rides are short, but maybe as he gets stronger and older, we can do long rides together, just two kids of different ages exploring our world together and seeing how far and how fast we can go.