Welcome to the Daily Dad podcast, where we provide one lesson every single day to help you with your most important job, being a parent.

I'm Ryan Holiday, and I draw these lessons from ancient philosophy, modern psychology, practical wisdom, and insights from parents just like you

all over the world. Thank you for listening, and we hope this helps. The words to notice.

As a society, we have very attuned ears for what words are offensive.

There are words that religious people find offensive. There are words that collectively we have

decided are hurtful, as well as the words that various groups are trying to get people to understand

or potentially hurtful. And this is good, but it misses another type of language that we use as parents

that also has a tangible impact on our kids and on strangers alike.

Not swear words exactly, but words of judgment, loaded words, words that carry weight,

often in ways that we don't appreciate. We talked here at Daily

Dad recently about words that are better to shout than be careful when we're worried. We talked about

the kind of comments that those in older generations throw around, the ones that take note of how

much someone is eating, that shame or other, calling someone

your pride and not your joy. We talked about how easy it is to lapse into cynicism and

negativity, thus depriving your kids of hope or a belief in their own agency. As parents,

as people who live with impressionable people, we have to watch for

this. It's perfectly fine to protect your kids from vulgar language, but this kind of influence

is much more inappropriate. Like, what if instead of being concerned you were just aware? What if

instead of talking about behavioral issues,

you just talked about behaviors? How about instead of punishing your kid for cursing,

you looked at what language you use when you're angry? What if instead of demanding perfect grades,

you created an environment for them to best succeed.

...