Colman Noctor

Because I wanted to.

And that kind of formalization of adolescence is not what adolescence is.

It's about experimentation.

It's about getting it wrong.

It's about wrong turns.

And oftentimes young people, parents will be panicking now about a young person who maybe wants to take a gap year or they're not sure of what course they're doing or they might start the course and realize two months into it, it's not for them.

You know, U-turns and change of directions aren't failure.

That's oftentimes a measure of your success, knowing what's for you and what's not.

And not jumping into something if you're not certain is also a quality that

some people would think is a very good quality to have.

Do you know what I mean?

And so I'd be, as a parent, trying to be flexible and thinking about what moves they're making and not translating lack of certainty into panic.

I don't think there's a need for that.

Yeah, there's a guy, Russell Barker used to say, we are not engineers of our children, we're shepherds.

You're guiding them, not making them.

And many of us think we're engineers of our children when we're not.

So your role as a shepherd is to guide, direct, suggest rather than manufacture.

And I think there's a great liberation in that as well because

Takes a bit of the responsibility off you, too, from the bottom of your head.

But, you know, one of the things like I've had so many parents, Ray, and they've come to me in panic stations about the 17 year old who won't work or this kid that won't study or this kid that doesn't have a clue what they want to do.