I'd like to start off by just asking for all of us, are there some simple or perhaps not so simple questions that we can reflect on that give us a sense of, you know, how good a parent we are or would be based on, I don't know, our previous parent-child relationships, our relationship to self, you know, like what kind of things come to bear when we think about really healthy relationships?

I can, you know, start rattling off a list of what I imagine they could be. But what are your thoughts? Like, what are the – what's the parameter space, as we say? How should we think about relationships besides just, oh, you know, I either like this person or don't, or I feel good around them or I don't, or separating how I feel about them versus how they make me feel, you know, maybe we can drill a little deeper below the kind of more superficial stuff that we often see out there.

The first thing that comes to mind when you say that is this word "sturdiness." And to me, when someone says like what is good inside is an approach, and that's always the first word that comes to mind. And I know that's like an odd word. It's not a word we like use a lot, although I do think most people when you say that person's like a really sturdy person, I think we all have some connotation or feeling at least of what that means.

And I use it a lot, being a sturdy parent, being a sturdy leader. I talk a lot about the similarities to parenting and kind of being a pilot of a plane. And that word "sturdy" always comes up. And so I remember a little while ago, someone pushed me, they're like, what's your definition of what that means?

And at that point, I thought, wow, I should probably have a definition given I use it a lot. But what I think it really means is an ability to be connected to yourself and to someone else at the same time. And I think that is really the definition of sturdy leadership.

And that is the key thing that's present in a healthy relationship, that at once I kind of know my values, what I want, what I need. I feel like I can be true to that. And at the same time, I can kind of connect to someone else who probably has different wants and needs and maybe even slightly different values at the same time.

And the thing that that leads me to next is what I think about is like family jobs and a parent's job. So in almost any other place, you could assume if I'm getting a new job at this company, like there's just no way I could do my job well if I don't know what my job is, right?

If you go to your desk and your boss is like, have a good day, do a good job, and there's no job description, you'd be like, I think that's impossible. But over and over with parents, if I say to them, well, what is your job with your kid? Or when your kid is having a tantrum or they hit or they're rude or they lie to your face or anything, what is your job in that moment?

Most people, very well-intentioned, educated people who would never, ever take a job if they didn't have a job description, they look at me like, I have no idea. So how can we do it well? How can we then perform it to a place to get to the outcomes we want if you don't have the foundation of what your job is?

And to me, I've thought a lot about it. I think parents actually have two jobs, and it relates to sturdiness, so you'll connect it where one of our jobs is boundaries. And to me, boundaries are things we tell people we will do, and they require the other person to do nothing.

And that's really important, because a lot of times we think we're setting a boundary when actually we're making a request. And boundaries keep us connected to ourselves. They represent our values and our wants and our needs. And in a parent-child relationship, they also keep our kids safe. I just know, in a simple way, my kids watched enough TV today, and they really have to get to bed.

And I know that. I don't want them to stay up late. I kind of know what my family needs. I have to set a boundary. But the other part of my job is empathy and validation, which is a way of connecting to someone else, where you see someone else's feelings and experience as real.

You don't agree with it, probably. You don't necessarily condone the behavior that's the representation of the feelings. But the feelings themselves, you need to connect to. And I feel like those are our two jobs as parents. And that's really the way to be a sturdy leader and to be in a sturdy, healthy relationship with your kids.

Wow. So much there. And I love it. And here's one of the reasons I love it. This notion of sturdiness, something that I don't think we hear enough about. We hear about resilience, grit, also important terms. But sturdiness, as you've described it in the job of parenting, really seems to include a lot of verbs, not just nouns and adjectives.

And I'm a huge fan of verbs because biology and to some extent psychology, yes, also psychology, is all about verbs. And so the labels often are mysterious. But sturdiness just sends a clear message of something that doesn't budge easily. But then as you describe the job of being a parent, having boundaries, and I'd like to drill into that a little bit more, how you view boundaries.

But also empathy, it's not a walled off picture. It's one that is semi-permeable. Also, and I confess I'm a bit obsessed with old school psychoanalytic theory, not as the be-all end-all of psychology, but it also suggests this other relationship. Like I'm a person, I have a self, you're a person, you have a self.

This is the opposite of codependency, where obviously dependency and two people being "codependent" can be healthy in the context of relying on one another. But as I understand it, when one person has a self and another person doesn't have a self or this notion of merging, not just in romantic relationships, but child-parent relationships, you know, I'm best friends with my mom or dad.

Is that a good thing? I don't know. But this notion of other-other relationships, it's like I'm a self, you're a self, and we each see each other as another. Anyway, I think there's so much to explore here, so valuable. Thank you for tuning in to the Huberman Lab Clips channel.

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