Ashley Chandler (00:00)
Real quick before I get into today's episode, I want to share two resources with you that you don't want to miss. Because if you clicked on, yes, I do want to listen to this, yes, I do want to watch this, these two free resources are gonna really help you.
The first one is my free executive function 101 guide, which is a video and a workbook guide where I walk you through what executive function really is. I take what's inside this episode, I go a little bit deeper, and then I share the top five problems that I see on repeat inside my private practice and with my clients.
And then the top five solutions that I recommend. So you definitely want to check that out. The link is in the show notes. And then the second thing is that if you already know what the challenge is and what executive function is, even if you don't, if you are ready for a real plan, not just more information that you're consuming, but a real plan and a real guide for the next 30 days
to solve the top challenge that you andor your teen are facing right now. You do not want to miss my
confident and connected the blueprint live class series.
October 5th, 6th, and 7th is the next cohort. You get live access with me 30 minutes each day. You can make it happen no matter what is happening. you walk away with a real, tangible, you know what-to-do 30-day plan where you get real results. It's confident connected the blueprint. Check it out. The link is also in the show notes. And I'm gonna remind you about this at the end of this episode.
So on that note, let's get into today's episode, Executive Function 101, What Most Parents Don't Understand about Executive Function Skill Building. Let's go.
today I'm going to be covering one topic that most parents kind of misunderstand what's actually going on.
Executive function skill building.
You've probably heard about this term. Maybe you have a kiddo who is neurodiverse, maybe ADHD, because there's always a little executive function dysfunction when your kid has ADHD or some different way of processing and perceiving the world. And most parents misunderstand what it actually is, even if your kid is not technically quote unquote neurodiverse.
Through the teen years, they are building executive function skills, and the part of the brain that is in charge of them is under construction, which means that most teenagers have a little bit of executive dysfunction and an opportunity to build the skills. On top of that,
Which is again what most parents don't realize and most people aren't talking about. In midlife, our brain and nervous system and body is also under construction. And for example, perimenopause kind of pours gasoline on symptoms or dysfunction and lack thereof, lack of skills that aren't actually there, right? So it has a very real impact on our day-to-day life.
lack of executive function skills is oftentimes what keeps parents and teens feeling stuck.
I first want to start off with what executive function skills are not.
It is not just managing time better, being less impulsive.
It is not just about getting the right planner or having a better consequence system.
Those are external things, external kind of scaffolding or support, but it's not actually supporting the internal system at work.
And the internal system is what we're actually building towards.
So I wanna illustrate this with an exercise that I walk all my clients through that now you have a front row seat to. And I take them in depth in this because my philosophy is that every single human on planet Earth is a leader in some way.
Whether
that's creating a positive ripple effect, maybe a negative ripple effect, maybe a neutral ripple effect. I like to say everyone's a leader, everyone has impact. We are all impacting each other all day long. And so I want you to think about yourself as a leader and think about your teen as a leader. And executive function skills enable them to become an even stronger positive leader in.
your own lives. So an illustration of this is I want you to think about a leader. Think about one person. Get one specific person in mind. They may be someone that you know, they may be someone that you don't.
And
I want you think about the qualities that they have. Why did you think about that person?
What
was it about that person that made you think, yeah, they they are definitely a good leader?
And
say them out loud, write them down, I've had many different answers over the years. And I love the brilliance that comes out of so many clients. I had one kid one time say, and he has severe ADHD, and his wisdom is off the charts. And he said, a great leader is someone who stops a war before it starts.
And
if you think about someone who stops a war before it starts, think about what kinds of skills they have. It's a great example. Chances are, in this exercise, some of the qualities that you thought about or wrote down included someone who was able to manage people well. And what's beneath managing people well?
Well, it is someone who can listen to different people's ideas and make them feel heard. Someone who can be discerning and critical thinking. So they're not just taking information as is, they're able to filter through it and think through what's the best for this particular moment or project or challenge that we're facing.
someone
who is not reactive. So I like to give an example. I'm I'm an absolute goofball. And I like to give an example of like, what if someone's running a company and with every single challenge? Think about how many challenges us parents, because basically we're running companies. We're running the companies of our lives.
And with every single challenge, imagine the CEO of a major organization and think about how many challenges they face every single day from the moment they wake up. And if every single challenge they faced, they were reactive to. my gosh, what are we gonna do? I can't do that. No, I can't. No, I'm not talking to that person. Absolutely not. Well, they're in the wrong, right?
Between me and you and the rest of the world, I think we can see that playing out on a global stage right now. And it's not a sign of strong leadership.
We
cannot react
in
that way every single time something comes up.
We
have to have the skill.
Of emotional regulation, meaning we can feel stressed or triggered on the inside because that's part of the human experience, but we cannot react harshly or snap or lose it or run away just because we're triggered, This is the sign of emotional regulation, getting into balance. So a great leader has emotional regulation.
They can manage time and priorities. They can listen well. They can take action on something even when they don't really want to. They can prioritize, right? They don't necessarily just do the thing right in front of them. They are able to figure out what is urgent, what is not urgent, but I still need to get it done. You are doing this all day long as a grown adult, and sometimes you're not.
And we got to be honest about that. Just because we're a certain age doesn't mean we have certain skills. And going back to what's happening neurologically for teens and for midlife parents raising teens, the part of our brain and our nervous systems conditioning that is in charge of executive function skills is not often online. It's the emotional part of us that is.
It's the reactive part of us. It's the conditioned part of us to carry everything and not ask for support.
Or
assume that it's our responsibility to fix everyone's problems. A great leader can discern between what's theirs and what's not, what is not mine to carry.
A great leader can be in the presence of other people and realize it's not that they are in charge at the top of the mountain as some you know magical majesty and you bow down to me. No, we are a team. This is a collaborative effort. I am in this position because I know how to elicit the best response.
From the people around me. This is a great leader. And this is what executive function skill building is all about. It is an ecosystem of skills. It is a web of skills. The foundation is emotional regulation, and we build from there. This is what I want you to understand as a parent.
It
starts with you. It starts with the conditions that you create inside your own home. It starts with how you take care of yourself, how you show up when you're triggered and stressed, because we all are. No one is a Buddhist monk walking around their house all the time. In fact, great story about this. Last night, my husband is reading my brother-in-law's book. Noel, if you see this, this is for you.
And
he's got a great book. I'm gonna link it in the show notes. You gotta check it out. And he's reading it, and he thinks,
This
is so good. And then you go into real life, and he says this. He says, This is so good. And then I go into real life, and how do I apply it? Like, how do I do that? And I'm like, that's why there's whole
courses and
Things and teachers and books and people out there who teach you how to bring that into real life. This is my platform to be able to show you how to bring those skills into real life. That's what the Teenage Guide is all about. It's just another entry point for you to be able to access how to become a guide inside your own home.
How
to embody a true leader that you admire out here, how to become that within yourself.
How
to model that for your teen, how to build the awareness and the skills they need to become a leader in their own lives. That's what executive function skill building is all about.
That's
why just try harder never works. It's not just you're lazy and not motivated. That's not the problem in and of itself. It's an ecosystem problem.
And
the piece that almost always gets missed is that you cannot build those leadership skills, the executive function skills, from a dysregulated nervous system. So if you inside of you, the nervous system that's running the show, your operating system, aka your teen's operating system, if it's dysregulated, what that means, it's out of balance.
A
teen who is chronically stressed, sleep deprived, not eating a great diet.
carrying invisible emotional weight that they are not processing.
or
living in your home where tension is running high.
They
do not have the foundation internally. It's not a mindset thing. the nervous system cannot get regulated to focus, prioritize, and manage their time better.
The
brain, the nervous system,
It doesn't have access to the prefrontal cortex, this area of the brain right behind the forehead, that is in charge of executive function skill building.
When
it is in a chronically stressed survival state. This is why when you are stressed, you're reactive. It's not I've got to be better. Shame on me. No. This is why this work starts with you.
This
is why regulation work always comes first. In my teenage tree framework, it's the soil, the relationship with yourself, it's the roots, the relationship with them. then it moves to systems and tools for skill building.
When
a teenager feels safe, not just physically safe, Or basic needs, like if they're hungry, they're tired, all those things, right? we want them to feel safe in those ways, physically safe, but it's also emotional safety, where we don't make emotions mean something bad or wrong with them long term. So when they feel safe,
emotionally,
relationally, psychologically, and physically. Their nervous system.
can settle.
And
when their nervous system settles, the prefrontal cortex, it's like a switch. Bing! Online. And when it's online, yay, skill building becomes possible.
That's
why the relationship that you have with them, it's not just like a nice to have, or maybe when they're older, we'll be close again. It is a key part of them becoming a leader in their own life and not feeling like they're swimming upstream on their way to it.
I think we've all overcome a lot from our teenage years. This is part of why I do this work, is my relationship with my mom.
But I'm 47 years old. Had I had this then, it probably would have afforded me a lot of skill building back then. Who knows where I would be today? It's part of my journey. I don't believe it's an, you know, an accident or coulda, shoulda, woulda anymore. I've released that. What I am enabling you to do is to see the gift that having this knowledge and this wisdom and this practice gives you now.
Where it saves time and enables you to maximize the time that you have right now so that they're not repeating the patterns when they get into their mid-20s, 30s, and 40s. A regulated teen can build skills.
I
also want to speak to parents of humans with ADHD, and maybe you are one, and other diverse neurological profiles, because the way that executive function skill building shows up for you and your teen is going to be a little bit different.
oftentimes what I'm hearing lately with a lot of the leading experts is ADHD is not the greatest name for what's actually happening. They're calling it a system dysregulation disorder. So think about that in terms of what I just said. An ADHD brain and body processes dopamine differently.
The
prefrontal cortex, this part of the brain that's in charge of executive function skills.
It
develops on a different timeline in teens with ADHD.
Sometimes
three to five years later than someone who doesn't have it or who doesn't have any sort of different way of processing their world or neurodiverse profile.
That
doesn't mean that the skills cannot be built. It just means that we're looking at a different timeline for them to build them.
The
support that you provide needs to be intentional, it needs to be repetitive, and it needs to be sustained.
What
this looks like in real life is in things that you can control. Obviously you can't control everything they eat, but the meals, the food that you have inside your house, diet, sleep, exercise is the foundation.
neurodiverse
teens often need more support with task initiation. They get frozen by the whole task and are unable to see it broken down into smaller chunks.
That
very first step is the hardest.
They
need more interest-based engagement, meaning they need to feel like what they're doing is somewhat interesting in some way. There's always a little bit of a shortcut that we can take to get them interested or motivated to do it, even if it's not what they want to do.
They
are driven by what's novel, urgent, meaningful, or challenging.
They
need an environment that reduces decision fatigue. Another way to say that is they need an environment
that creates clear, predictable structure, less decisions for them to make, more routines, more predictability.
Not
rigid and anal and everything's gotta be perfect, but a rhythm that they can follow.
This
is true not just for ADHD, but it's true for sensory processing. It's true for
anxiety, learning differences, this kind of rhythm and predictable routine and structure reduces stress and helps them access executive function skills.
And
in every case the relationship and the environment come first.
So,
what do you do? Well, in every case, the role that you play is the relationship first. And regulation comes through attunement first. This is not saying anything. This is being the master of your own energy. I've talked about this a lot. This is really important stuff.
When
a regulated adult tunes in to the frequency of where your teen actually is, not where you want them to be, but where they are without absorbing it, this creates these mirror neurons start talking together, and you can shift the energy. They come down to your regulated state. This is where being the guide really starts to take shape, takes root.
They
develop through environment. So notice
The conditions inside your home that make it easier, not harder, for them to develop these skills.
And
follow through.
A
consistent after-school rhythm, a workspace that works for their brain, consistent time routines around tech, around availability, around focus, around mealtime.
a Sunday evening reset that preps them for the week ahead. I talked about that in a previous episode a few weeks ago. I'll link it in the show notes.
These
skills develop through co-accountability.
When
teens feel like you're just pointing the finger at them and what's wrong with them all the time, they are gonna resist that because their need for autonomy and independence and to be to be the boss of their own lives is king or queen 100% of the time. You have to master accountability yourself. If you are not strong in something, call it out. Develop co-accountability and consequences so that you become teammates inside your own home.
a
shared agreement, you're still the parent. You are still the parent when you're the guide.
What
does success look like this week?
How
will we know when it's not working? What does your teen need from you ahead of time?
And
what are they going to do to build it themselves? And how are we going to hold each other accountable? And what are the consequences if we don't? This is a co-collaboration.
Again, executive function skills aren't something like, my teen will get those one day. Especially if you're listening to this and your teen's getting ready to launch or they're in college and you're thinking, like, whoa, they've got to do this on their own now. I want you to understand it's never too late. This is still possible. Send this episode to them. I work with college-age humans all the time to support them too.
And
it's not something that a human either is born with or they're not. It is buildable through repeatable intentional practice in the right conditions with the right support over time. Might feel boring, but structure creates that sense of freedom. Like, I can actually have a dream and make it real.
And
as I mentioned at the top of this episode, I've got my free executive function 101 video and workbook guide that gives you a glimpse into this even deeper and walks you through the top five challenges and solutions that you can implement right away. It's linked in the show notes. You can also find it at theteenageguide.com forward slash EF for executive function EF101.
And if you are ready to have a real 30 day plan where you take that challenge you're facing.
You focus on what needs to shift inside the relationship in day one. You focus on exactly what skills need to be built using my SYSTEM framework in day two. We create a 30-day plan in day three. You have me as your guide, real coaching, real support. It's only 30 minutes a day, October 5th, 6th, and 7th. And by the time of this airing, it's going to be October 5th when this comes out. If you're listening to this and you're like, my gosh, I would love that. It's not too late. You can sign up right away.
And you'll get the recording from this first day if you're hearing this a little bit later. And then you can join me live on October 6th and 7th. And the link is theteenageguide.com/blueprint forward slash blueprint. And it's also linked in the show notes.
Remember, you're not behind and it's never too late. Never underestimate the power that you have as the parent. I'll see you next week.
