Your Expectations Are A Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

The Daily Dad

Daily Dad

Society & Culture, Dads, Relationships, Parenting, Self-improvement, Kids & Family, Ryan Holiday, Wisdom, Education, Fatherhood

4.8 • 602 Ratings

🗓️ 7 February 2020

⏱️ 3 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The writer Thomas Sowell once noted, sardonically, how sad it is that editions of Frederick Douglass’s memoirs, when provided for high school students, were forced to provide annotated definitions of many words. What does it say, he asked, that a slave in the 1800s was able—under the penalty of severe violence—to teach himself a vocabulary that privileged high school students cannot manage after a hundred and fifty years of progress? And what does it say that we have to spoon feed them the answers to these vexing problems—how could they possibly look up a word without our help!—instead of expecting them to figure it out themselves?

We have talked before about why it’s important not to baby your kids when it comes to reading. We have also talked about teaching them that “everything is figureoutable”—that is, giving them the skills to learn what they don’t know.

But it’s also important that, as a father, you provide the expectation that they are capable of doing things. If you treat your kid like a helpless idiot...they’ll stay one. If you assume that certain ideas are beyond their comprehension, it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Your kids will not learn that which you expect them not to be able to learn. Equally, they will grow and strive and struggle to meet the expectations you do have.

If Frederick Douglass could do it, your kid can definitely do it. He had to fear for his life. He had not only to steal time to read, he had to steal books and newspapers too. Your children have far more advantages. So expect, encourage, inspire them to seize this. Expect great things from them, expect progress, but most of all, expect them to try.

They’ll be better for it.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Welcome to the Daily Dad podcast where we provide one lesson every day to help you with your most important job being a dad.
0:16.9	These are lessons inspired by ancient philosophy, by practical wisdom, and insights from dads all over the world.
0:24.5	Thank you for listening, and we hope this helps.
0:33.1	Your expectations are a self-fulfilling prophecy.
0:37.3	The writer Thomas Sauer once noted sardonicly
0:39.7	how sad it is that editions of Frederick Douglass's memoirs when provided for high school students
0:45.1	were forced to provide annotated definitions of many words. What does it say he asked that a slave in
0:51.4	the 1800s was able under the penalty of severe violence to teach himself
0:56.4	a vocabulary that privileged high school students cannot manage after 150 years of progress. And what
1:03.4	does it say that we have to spoon feed them the answers to these vexing problems? How could they possibly
1:08.7	look up a word without our help instead of expecting them
1:11.9	to figure it out themselves? We have talked before about why it's important not to baby your kids
1:17.7	when it comes to reading. We have also talked about teaching them that everything is figure outable,
1:23.1	that is, giving them the skills to learn what they don't know. But it's also important that as a father,
1:28.7	you provide the expectation that they are capable of doing things. If you treat your kid like a
1:34.6	helpless idiot, they'll stay one. If you assume that certain ideas are beyond their comprehension,
1:40.5	it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Your kids will not learn that which you expect them not to be able to learn. Equally, they will grow and strive and struggle to meet the expectations you do have. If Frederick Douglass could do it, your kid can definitely do it. He had to fear for his life. He had to not only steal time to read, he had to steal books and
2:02.1	newspapers too. Your children have far more advantages. So expect, encourage, inspire them to seize this.
2:09.5	Expect great things from them. Expect progress. But most of all, expect them to try. They'll be
2:15.2	better for it. Thank you for listening to the Daily Dad podcast.
2:19.3	You can also get an email version of these podcasts at Daily Dad.com.

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Daily Dad, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Daily Dad and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.