By Seth Godin, an American author and former dot com business executive.

At the top tier of just about any sort of endeavor, you’ll find that the performers have coaches.

Pianists, orators and athletes all have coaches. In fact, it would be weird if we heard of someone on stage or on the field who didn’t have one.

And yet, in the world of business, they’re seen as the exception.

Part of the reason is that work feels like an extension of something we’ve been doing our whole lives. Figure skating isn’t like school, but showing up at work seems to be. “I’ve got this,” is a badge of honor.

And part of the reason is that a few coaches have made claims that stretch belief, and we’re not actually sure what they do. It doesn’t help that there’s no easy way to identify what sort of coach we need or what we’re going to get…

It turns out that the people with the potential to benefit the most from a coach are often the most hesitant precisely because of what coaching involves.

Talking about our challenges. Setting goals. Acknowledging that we can get better. Eagerly seeking responsibility…

And yet we avert our eyes and hesitate. It might be because having a coach might be interpreted as a sign of weakness. And what if we acknowledge our challenges but fail to overcome them? It could be that we don’t want to cause change to happen, or that we’re worried that we will.

One company I admire believes in coaches so much that they’ve put several on staff, ensuring that their leadership all benefit from one. But mostly, it’s something we have to pay for ourselves.

And so, paying for a coach, for something that’s hard to measure, which might be socially awkward, to get better at something that feels normal—combine that with a hesitancy to ask for help—it’s a wonder anyone has a coach.

The paradox is that the very things that hold us back are the reasons we need a coach in the first place.

There’s a Name for the Blah You’re Feeling: It’s Called Languishing

The neglected middle child of mental health can dull your motivation and focus — and it may be the dominant emotion of 2021.

Manshen Lo

By Adam Grant

April 19, 2021

At first, I didn’t recognize the symptoms that we all had in common. Friends mentioned that they were having trouble concentrating. Colleagues reported that even with vaccines on the horizon, they weren’t excited about 2021. A family member was staying up late to watch “National Treasure” again even though she knows the movie by heart. And instead of bouncing out of bed at 6 a.m., I was lying there until 7, playing Words with Friends.

It wasn’t burnout — we still had energy. It wasn’t depression — we didn’t feel hopeless. We just felt somewhat joyless and aimless. It turns out there’s a name for that: languishing.

Languishing is a sense of stagnation and emptiness. It feels as if you’re muddling through your days, looking at your life through a foggy windshield. And it might be the dominant emotion of 2021.

As scientists and physicians work to treat and cure the physical symptoms of long-haul Covid, many people are struggling with the emotional long-haul of the pandemic. It hit some of us unprepared as the intense fear and grief of last year faded.

In the early, uncertain days of the pandemic, it’s likely that your brain’s threat detection system — called the amygdala — was on high alert for fight-or-flight. As you learned that masks helped protect us — but package-scrubbing didn’t — you probably developed routines that eased your sense of dread. But the pandemic has dragged on, and the acute state of anguish has given way to a chronic condition of languish.

In psychology, we think about mental health on a spectrum from depression to flourishing. Flourishing is the peak of well-being: You have a strong sense of meaning, mastery and mattering to others. Depression is the valley of ill-being: You feel despondent, drained and worthless.

Languishing is the neglected middle child of mental health. It’s the void between depression and flourishing — the absence of well-being. You don’t have symptoms of mental illness, but you’re not the picture of mental health either. You’re not functioning at full capacity. Languishing dulls your motivation, disrupts your ability to focus, and triples the odds that you’ll cut back on work. It appears to be more common than major depression — and in some ways it may be a bigger risk factor for mental illness.

The term was coined by a sociologist named Corey Keyes, who was struck that many people who weren’t depressed also weren’t thriving. His research suggests that the people most likely to experience major depression and anxiety disorders in the next decade aren’t the ones with those symptoms today. They’re the people who are languishing right now. And new evidence from pandemic health care workers in Italy shows that those who were languishing in the spring of 2020 were three times more likely than their peers to be diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Part of the danger is that when you’re languishing, you might not notice the dulling of delight or the dwindling of drive. You don’t catch yourself slipping slowly into solitude; you’re indifferent to your indifference. When you can’t see your own suffering, you don’t seek help or even do much to help yourself.

Even if you’re not languishing, you probably know people who are. Understanding it better can help you help them.

A name for what you’re feeling

Psychologists find that one of the best strategies for managing emotions is to name them. Last spring, during the acute anguish of the pandemic, the most viral post in the history of Harvard Business Review was an article describing our collective discomfort as grief. Along with the loss of loved ones, we were mourning the loss of normalcy. “Grief.” It gave us a familiar vocabulary to understand what had felt like an unfamiliar experience. Although we hadn’t faced a pandemic before, most of us had faced loss. It helped us crystallize lessons from our own past resilience — and gain confidence in our ability to face present adversity.

We still have a lot to learn about what causes languishing and how to cure it, but naming it might be a first step. It could help to defog our vision, giving us a clearer window into what had been a blurry experience. It could remind us that we aren’t alone: languishing is common and shared.

And it could give us a socially acceptable response to “How are you?”

Instead of saying “Great!” or “Fine,” imagine if we answered, “Honestly, I’m languishing.” It would be a refreshing foil for toxic positivity — that quintessentially American pressure to be upbeat at all times.

When you add languishing to your lexicon, you start to notice it all around you. It shows up when you feel let down by your short afternoon walk. It’s in your kids’ voices when you ask how online school went. It’s in “The Simpsons” every time a character says, “Meh.”

Last summer, the journalist Daphne K. Lee tweeted about a Chinese expression that translates to “revenge bedtime procrastination.” She described it as staying up late at night to reclaim the freedom we’ve missed during the day. I’ve started to wonder if it’s not so much retaliation against a loss of control as an act of quiet defiance against languishing. It’s a search for bliss in a bleak day, connection in a lonely week, or purpose in a perpetual pandemic.

An antidote to languishing

So what can we do about it? A concept called “flow” may be an antidote to languishing. Flow is that elusive state of absorption in a meaningful challenge or a momentary bond, where your sense of time, place and self melts away. During the early days of the pandemic, the best predictor of well-being wasn’t optimism or mindfulness — it was flow. People who became more immersed in their projects managed to avoid languishing and maintained their pre-pandemic happiness.

An early-morning word game catapults me into flow. A late-night Netflix binge sometimes does the trick too — it transports you into a story where you feel attached to the characters and concerned for their welfare.

While finding new challenges, enjoyable experiences and meaningful work are all possible remedies to languishing, it’s hard to find flow when you can’t focus. This was a problem long before the pandemic, when people were habitually checking email 74 times a day and switching tasks every 10 minutes. In the past year, many of us also have been struggling with interruptions from kids around the house, colleagues around the world, and bosses around the clock. Meh.

Fragmented attention is an enemy of engagement and excellence. In a group of 100 people, only two or three will even be capable of driving and memorizing information at the same time without their performance suffering on one or both tasks. Computers may be made for parallel processing, but humans are better off serial processing.

Give yourself some uninterrupted time

That means we need to set boundaries. Years ago, a Fortune 500 software company in India tested a simple policy: no interruptions Tuesday, Thursday and Friday before noon. When engineers managed the boundary themselves, 47 percent had above-average productivity. But when the company set quiet time as official policy, 65 percent achieved above-average productivity. Getting more done wasn’t just good for performance at work: We now know that the most important factor in daily joy and motivation is a sense of progress.

I don’t think there’s anything magical about Tuesday, Thursday and Friday before noon. The lesson of this simple idea is to treat uninterrupted blocks of time as treasures to guard. It clears out constant distractions and gives us the freedom to focus. We can find solace in experiences that capture our full attention.

Focus on a small goal

The pandemic was a big loss. To transcend languishing, try starting with small wins, like the tiny triumph of figuring out a whodunit or the rush of playing a seven-letter word. One of the clearest paths to flow is a just-manageable difficulty: a challenge that stretches your skills and heightens your resolve. That means carving out daily time to focus on a challenge that matters to you — an interesting project, a worthwhile goal, a meaningful conversation. Sometimes it’s a small step toward rediscovering some of the energy and enthusiasm that you’ve missed during all these months.

Languishing is not merely in our heads — it’s in our circumstances. You can’t heal a sick culture with personal bandages. We still live in a world that normalizes physical health challenges but stigmatizes mental health challenges. As we head into a new post-pandemic reality, it’s time to rethink our understanding of mental health and well-being. “Not depressed” doesn’t mean you’re not struggling. “Not burned out” doesn’t mean you’re fired up. By acknowledging that so many of us are languishing, we can start giving voice to quiet despair and lighting a path out of the void.

Adam Grant is an organizational psychologist at Wharton, the author of “Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know” and the host of the TED podcast WorkLife

A big thanks to “Wealthy Gorilla” for collecting these 29 quotes that inspired us from his writing.

It was nice to be reminded of some of the things you’ve written over the years. So I’m sharing them below.

1.) “Always say to yourself, I’d rather be healthy than right. Because the infection of someone so wounded will spread to you if you engage.”

2.) “Being grateful is the bridge between the world of nightmares and the world where we are free to say no. It’s the bridge between the world of delusions and the world of creativity.”

3.) “But business is just a vehicle for transforming the ideas in your head into something real, something tangible, that actually improves the lives of others.”

4.) “Excuses are easy lies we tell ourselves to cover up our failures.”

5.) “Excuses are leaks in a boat. When you cover one, another pops up, and it’s even bigger. It’s hard to keep the boat repaired and get safely to shore if you have an excuse mind-set.”

6.) “Forget purpose. It’s okay to be happy without one. The quest for a single purpose has ruined many lives.”

7.) “He took a survey of personal finance authors who recommend that people keep budgets, and he found that none of them actually kept budgets themselves.”

8.) “I have lots of ideas. How do I pick the right one? Execute on as many as possible. The right idea will pick you.”

9.) “If coming up with ten ideas sounds too hard, then come up with twenty.”

10.) “If we truly want to learn, we never learn when we are talking. We only learn when we are listening.”

11.) “Luck is created by the prepared.”

12.) “No matter who you are, no matter what you do, no matter who your audience is: 30 percent will love it, 30 percent will hate it, and 30 percent won’t care.”

13.) “Nobody wakes up in the morning and says, ‘I can’t wait to clean out some shit today.”

14.) “Only free time, imagination, creativity, and an ability to disappear will help you deliver value that nobody ever delivered before in the history of humankind.”

15.) “Only think about the people you enjoy, and only read the books you enjoy, that make you happy to be human. Only go to the events that actually make you laugh or fall in love.”

16.) “Only worry about your own happiness, which doesn’t have to be limited by anyone else’s stupidity unless you allow it to be.”

17.) “Perfectionism is the enemy of the idea muscle. Perfectionism is your brain trying to protect you from harm—from coming up with an idea that is embarrassing and stupid and could cause you to suffer pain.”

18.) “Someone who is reinventing always has spare time. Part of reinvention is collecting little bits and pieces of time and carving them the way you want them to be.”

19.) “Stick with the people who love you and don’t spend a single second on the rest. Life will be better that way.”

20.) “The best way I have ever found to fill that hole is not to seek external motivations to fill the emptiness, but to ignite the internal fire that will never go out. To light up my own inner sky.”

21.) “The only things that really matter in this world are the relationships you have with the people you love, and the meaningful things that you do.”

22.) “The only truly safe thing you can do is to try over and over again. To go for it, to get rejected, to repeat, to strive, to wish. Without rejection there is no frontier, there is no passion, and there is no magic.”

23.) “There is nobody you need to impress. There is nobody who is judging you. And there will be nobody who can stop you.”

24.) “This is about a new phase in history where art, science, business, and spirit will join together, both externally and internally, in the pursuit of true wealth. It’s a phase where ideas are more important than people.”

25.) “We all want to de-clutter. To throw things out. But a minimalist lifestyle is bullshit unless you can do it across every sheath in the daily practice: not just physical, but also emotional, mental, and spiritual.”

26.) “What you need to do is build the house you will live in. You build that house by laying a solid foundation: by building physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual health.”

27.) “When you get in the mud with a pig, you get dirty and the pig gets happy.”

28.) “When you give up searching for frontiers, inevitably you end up stuck in a swamp, sinking deeper into the mud the more you struggle to get out.”

29.) “When you rush to get to a mythical there, one day you will arrive and realize you missed all of the pleasures and mysteries along the way.”

~ James Altucher

I Don’t Want to Talk About it…Period!

This is a tough one…the pandemic has left many of us with a questionable mindset or mental fatigue. Sure, many have become creative, increased their resilience, and feel much stronger because of the pandemic. To you I applaud and say KUDOS! You are an overcomer for sure!

This is for the rest of us whose mental muscles have been stretched beyond their elasticity and has affected our mental fitness far past our comfort zone. You think… “Am I losing it?” “Why is my fuse so short, and what about these anxiety surges? That’s not me! What’s up with that?” “Am I depressed? Is this what depression feels like?”

Hang on my friend, you are not alone – “Depression Has Skyrocketed During the COVID-19 Pandemic, Study Says” Three times as many Americans met criteria for a depression diagnosis during the pandemic than before it, according to The Journal of the American Medical Association.

This appears to be quite a dilemma for those souls that are experiencing some degree of depression, whether it be a loss of self-worth or confidence, feelings of despair with truly little hope, or just an energy drain due to job loss or insecurity. This is very real to these folks! This is serious and no laughing matter. They need HELP! And herein lies the problem…they are told by the “experts” to “ask” for help; We are ALL in this together…yeah right! Good luck with that lie!

You see, “I DON’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT! It’s too embarrassing and shameful! It’s a private matter; you think I’m going to show you my weakness? I’ll work it out myself. I don’t need anybody ‘meddling’ in my head or my business. It’s different with me. I’ve never really fit in anyway and have always been pushed by ‘them’ to be ‘like them’…it’s Bullsh..!” LEAVE ME ALONE, THANK YOU!

You see…we are a proud species and even though “Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.” ~  Proverbs 16:18, we ignore the warning signs and unwittingly hide them in the cellar of our minds.

Negativity has taken over the psyche. The thoughts are no longer pure. The self-talk is poison to the spirit and a downward spiral is in play. Everything looks different. The old healthy perspective is warped and has morphed into a disrupted being that has entered the realm of cognitive distortions.  Normal, pre-pandemic behavior and emotional reason has very quickly led us away from the path of reality. What good can come of it?

The short answer is – a lot! Thomas Paine said it best: “These are the times that try men’s souls.” It’s when one’s soul is tried that the most is learned. Inner growth comes from hard times. Help arrives whether we ask from “within” or from “without”. If you are too proud to ask “without”, humble yourself to go “within”, search your heart and your soul; trust that a promised answer will come and you will be rewarded…in full!

The long answer is – it depends! Things could go either way. They can be built up or they can be torn down and disintegrate. “Ugh!” you say. “How do I do this? How will I get through this? I lost my job, I’m too old… It’s too late…I can’t…” You see where this is headed? Yes, toward disintegration. It is “Decision” time! And that’s the best news yet because it is YOUR decision! Still scared? No problem, it happens to ALL of us. Yup, we have all been in the same dark place just at different times; it’s a universal human experience.

Maybe this will help. Depression is not a malfunction or a wiring problem. It is a signal. A message that is telling us something. The first step is to stop insulting these signals, by saying they’re a sign of weakness, or madness, or purely biological. We need to start listening to these signals. They are telling us that something is missing in our lives. They’re telling us something that we really need to hear. We need to honor these signals, respect them, and sincerely listen to what they are trying to tell us.

Something considerably basic in nature is now missing and we have to identify, recognize and reconnect to it. It is only when we truly listen that we begin to see liberating, nurturing, deeper solutions that are awaiting and available within us and all around us. More to come…

Dean Kloter – Self-improvement Junkie

I woke up to find my self transported and exiled to Someday Isle! It’s not an Isle that you would imagine it to be – like a Resort Isle in the Caribbean where you can relax and bask in the radiant sunlight, your toes melting into the cool white sand while listening to the endless lapping of the waves hitting the shore. It’s an Isle of struggle and disbelief. It’s an Isle that you alone have created and yet it is overwhelmingly crowed with millions of others that got here on the same boat!

Someday Isle is an imaginary Isle that appears very real. It’s an Isle within our imagination that we choose, sometimes unwittingly, to visit or even exile ourselves to. A place where we reserve our hopes and dreams for the future. It’s a little like the “back burner” we’re all familiar with. Life gets in the way and our most important issues seem too far off, just out of our immediate grasp thus we suffer at the hands of procrastination and commitment!

Dreams like:

Someday I’ll write that book

Someday I’ll start my own business

Someday I’ll find my Soul Mate

Someday I’ll meet the love of my life

Someday I’ll be rich

Someday I’ll be happy

Someday I’ll be free

Welcome to Someday Isle (I’ll)

It’s a place where procrastination reigns supreme and pity parties rule the day! You’ve heard it said that misery loves company…welcome home! Your neighbors can’t wait to tell you their woes and how their hopes and dreams were stolen and vanished in unbelief; how unfair life is and how you can never catch a break!

There are no sandy beaches on Someday Isle; no view of the ocean only a view of an endless sea of people, hopelessly wandering to and fro. Not a pretty sight to behold. You ask yourself, “How did I get here?” “Where and when did I miss the turn?”

They say that the graveyards are the riches places on earth because it’s where you’ll find the best ideas, hopes and dreams that have never been fulfilled. Someday Isle is the last living vestige steppingstone to those graveyards.

Get off the Isle NOW…TODAY!

But HOW? There is no airport to fly out of. There is no harbor to boat out of. Heck, you can’t even find a compass! It’s an Isle that you cannot leave the same way as you came. This is bad…very bad! But hold up…NOT so fast…

There is Good News! Get this – almost as many people that come here every day, leave here every day! I repeat… almost as many people that come here every day, leave here every day! So, even though it is overwhelmingly populated, the overall number grows slowly.

OK, so how do people, how can I leave without air or sea travel? Where do I start?

Stay Tuned For The Answer…

9 Tips to Beat the Blues and Get Back on Track

By Mark Ford as printed in the Altucher Report

1. Acceptance

You need to accept that it is perfectly normal to feel crummy sometimes.

Despite your core strengths and your many accomplishments, you will occasionally find yourself down in the dumps. It’s natural for ambitious people (like yourself) to feel that way. As productivity expert Tim Ferriss says, “The occasional bouts of self-doubt and sadness are an integral part of building anything remarkable.”

2. Forgiveness

If you are upset because of something you did to yourself, forgive yourself.

It’s OK. You screwed up. What matters is what you do next, not what you just did.

I sometimes get angry when I feel pressured by work obligations. But when I examine the reason for all the work, it’s usually because I volunteered to take it on in the first place. When I recognize that my mood is being affected by my own prior actions, I remind myself that I’m lucky. “It’s OK that you are angry. But you don’t have to be. You can get through today. And you can have better discipline tomorrow.” That’s what I tell myself, and it helps me feel better instantly.

3. If You’re Upset Because of Something You Did…

Take a chill pill. Count to 10. Recognize that you can’t control the behavior of other people. The only thing you can control is your response to their behavior. Nobody can take that away from you.

Stephen Covey, the noted author and educator, popularized a quote, “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

I used to get upset when my family, friends or colleagues made a mistake. I realize now how stupid that was. It didn’t do me any good. And it made me unproductive, unhappy and unpleasant to be around. I changed by learning to turn the other cheek. The moment I stopped resenting others for their shortcomings, I began to feel better about myself.

It’s amazing how well this works. Somebody bumps into you on the street and you sprain your ankle. You have a choice. You can be angry at that person. You can be upset with yourself for not being more aware of your surroundings. Or you can forgive the person and yourself and change the way you think about your injury. Rather than rue the inconvenience of being laid up for a week or two, see the recuperation period as a gift — the chance to start a new project or catch up on your reading.

4. Reevaluate Your Expectations

Don’t allow unrealistic expectations to interfere with your relationships. (This is a subcategory of not allowing the behavior of other people to upset you.) Instead of being upset by your spouse’s habit of (fill in the blank), resolve to accept the fact that she won’t be changing and find a way to forgive her and even love her. Instead of being angry that your child is a slob, find a way to love him for his strengths while gently teaching him (by showing, not telling) the advantages of being orderly. Instead of being angry at your business partner because she didn’t perform as well as you expected her to, learn to appreciate what she brings to the table and negotiate a new deal with her out of love, not anger.

Accepting people for who they are does not mean allowing them to make your life miserable. On the contrary, it means being realistic — realizing that 90% of the time a person’s fundamental characteristics cannot be changed. If you find a certain behavior unacceptable, you change the way you deal with it (something you can do) instead of trying to change the person (which you can’t do).

5. If the Circumstances Are Beyond Your Control…

Take a double dose of chill pills. If there’s one thing psychology has taught us, it’s that you can deal with your troubles more effectively if you define them as “problems” (which can be solved) or “predicaments” (which can be coped with).

Getting caught in a storm or catching a cold is not a reason to get mad at yourself. Neither, by the way, is being caught in a worldwide economic collapse.

6. Care for Your Career

If you are unhappy at work, find a way to care about what you’re doing.

As Albert Camus said, “But what is happiness except the simple harmony between a man and the life he leads?” You won’t experience happiness if you work at a job you hate or if you do poor work on a project you like. But if you learn to care about the work you do, you will find that your energy will improve and you will start to enjoy it.

7. Get Moving

Engage in some sport or challenging exercise — something that is so demanding, you can’t do it while thinking.

Walking, stretching, and yoga are great forms of exercise. If you do them with a tranquil mind, they will make you healthy and happy, too. But if you do them when you are sad and feeling sorry for yourself, they will give you no relief. You will forget about the exercise and focus on your negative thoughts. That will make things worse.

Bogged Down by Work Problems? If I am bummed out about problems at work, I do this: I compose a list of my five most pressing incomplete jobs. Then I break down each job into specific tasks that can be accomplished in an hour or less. I arrange those tasks in order of priority. Finally, I choose one. Just one. I put everything else out of my mind and get to work on it.

Immediately. No excuses.

I’ve noticed that when I dwell on the whole of my troubles, I stall. But when I clear my head and focus on just one problem, even the smallest problem, I can concentrate on it and fix it. When the problem is fixed, it gives me a good feeling. I feel one step closer to success. This feeling gives me energy. I attack the next problem or task with just a little more enthusiasm. And when I’ve finished with that, I am even more energized.

Steadily, problem by problem, task by task, I complete my work. And when I’m done, I feel great.

8. Recognize the Mind-to-Body Connection

The health of your body has a great deal to do with your mood. If you are feeling bad much of the time, you probably need to make a few lifestyle changes. To wit:

• Eat healthy. Eating too many carbohydrates will make you crazy, cranky and tired. To have consistent energy all day, use food like fuel. Eat six smallish meals a day, avoiding junk food and favoring organics, lean meats and plenty of protein

• Sleep and rest adequately. For me, adequate sleep is a major contributor to feeling good. Studies show that people who get seven good hours of sleep a night live longer, suffer from fewer illnesses and achieve more because they have more energy. If you get tired during the day, take a short nap

• Get the advice of a good doctor about antidepressants. I’m generally against putting chemicals in my body. I much prefer natural cures. But antidepressants have helped some people close to me and may help you too.

9. Prioritize the People Around You

Take positive steps to focus “outward” instead of “inward” — to pay less attention to yourself and more attention to others.

A few examples:

• Make your friends happy. Smile when you see them. Listen to their stories. Give them the advice they want and shut up when they don’t want any. Become the person they turn to when the chips are down. Learn to love their peccadilloes and encourage them to overcome their faults. Above all, be loyal

• Be a reliable and steady resource for your business colleagues. Help them achieve their goals — not because you want them to reciprocate in some way but simply because you care about them and want them to succeed

• Do something for someone you don’t know — a stranger you come upon, a foster child or a sick or poor person who can benefit from your help. Spend time and money.

Make this outward focus a natural part of your daily life. Do it purposefully and deliberately until it becomes second nature. You will know when that happens because you’ll be feeling happy most of the time — and when you become sad or angry, you’ll be able to get over it quickly and easily.

Not only will these tips make you successful in your personal relationships, but you’ll live a successful life by being a happier, healthier you.

Teenagers Are Not Happy, Just Ask Billie Eilish

There has been a spike in depression and anxiety among teens, with girls being hit particularly hard.

Article by: Rebecca Dolgin

Seven in ten U.S. teens said anxiety and depression are major problems among people their age in their communities, according to a Pew Research Center survey of teenagers. Let’s collectively let that sink in for a second. Most of the teenagers where we live are sad, depressed, overwhelmed.

The thing is, we know this, or at least we sense it. But for some reason, it’s not sinking in, not the stats or the stories like the one Eilish shared on The Gayle King Grammy Special. Eilish confided she didn’t think she’d make it past 17. “I was so unhappy last year. I was so unhappy, and I was so, like, joyless,” she said. Another example of the despair among teens and even tweens.

The problem isn’t out there. It’s right here, right now. And, girls are overwhelmingly more at risk. One in five teenage girls had experienced at least one major depressive episode over the past year (based on research done in 2017).  For boys, the number was 7 percent.

And, it’s not just depression, anxiety is another issue. Almost thirty percent of teens said they felt tense or nervous about their day—every or almost every day. A third of kids are in a near-constant state of worry.

Psychiatrists and psychologists agree the reasons vary from the micro (tomorrow’s bio exam) to the macro (how the Trump era has altered civil discourse) to the existential (is our climate going to kill our planet). While all these factors play a role, academic and social pressures are the reasons cited most often by experts who specialize in teen depression. Pressure for good grades and to look good and fit in rank the top of the charts (61 percent and 29 percent, respectively).

But, why are kids so much worse off today than say 10 years ago? Often the culprit comes back to social media. But for almost any example showing the link between the time spent on social media and mental health issues, you’ll find a counterclaim: the existing research ‘lacks analytic techniques examining change over time’ or something similar hinting that the research methods are flawed.

The truth is, it’s complicated. Even when researchers are studying just one platform, Facebook, they say the scientific equivalent of ‘it depends.’ Here’s why: Some people use social media to connect; others use it to disconnect. So, how social media affects you, depends on your motivation in using it.

One thing is clear though. For tween and teen girls, self-esteem drops substantially during middle adolescence. It is possible that social media amplifies this because of the quest for perfect images. One study, for example, shows a decrease in self-esteem linked to selfie viewing.

There are things you can do to help a depressed teen. First, recognize the symptoms. Teens, in particular, have a bad rap, for being in a collective bad mood. See below for a list of symptoms that may signal more than the normal crappy day. Also, be supportive and listen without judgment. Well-meaning parents sometimes say things like, ‘What do you have to be depressed about.” Statements like that not only miss the point, they can add shame on to the depression.

Symptoms of Teen Depression

• Constantly feeling sad, anxious, or even empty
• Feeling hopeless or like everything is going wrong
• Feeling worthless or helpless
• Feel guilty about things that aren’t your fault
• Being irritable much of the time
• Spending more time alone and withdrawing from friends and family
• Dropping grades
• No longer interested in activities and hobbies
• Change in sleeping and eating habits
• Feeling tired or depleted
• Feeling restless
• Having trouble concentrating, remembering information, or making decisions
• An increase in aches or pains, headaches, cramps, or stomach problems without a clear cause
• Thinking about dying or suicide

Respond to comments about death or suicide with the same kind of urgency you would if you thought your child’s appendix burst. Here’s what to do according to the National Institute for Mental Health:

If someone is telling you that he or she is going to kill himself or herself, do not leave him or her alone or promise that you’ll keep it a secret. Get help as soon as possible. Call 911 for emergency services and/or take the person to the nearest hospital emergency room. Or call one of the suicide prevention hotlines.

The toll-free number for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (NSPL), is 1-800-273-TALK (8255), and it’s available 24 hours a day, every day. The service is available to everyone. All calls are free and confidential. You can also chat with the NSPL online.

The Crisis Text Line is another free, confidential resource available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Text “HOME” to 741741 and a trained crisis counselor will respond to you with support and information via text message.

Article Sources 

Teens and depression and anxiety: Pew Research Center (2019). “Most U.S. Teens See Anxiety and Depression As A Major Problem Among Their Peers.”

Teen anxiety in the Trump era: Psychoneuroendocrinology (2018). “Young Adults’ Psychological and Physiological Reactions To The 2016 U.S. Presidential Election”

Adolescent well-being and digital technology: Nature Human Behavior (2019). “The Association Between Adolescent Well-being And Digital Technology Use.”

Mid adolescence self-confidence dip: Journal of Research On Adolescence (2005). “Body Image and Self-Esteem Among Adolescent Girls: Testing the Influence of Sociocultural Factors.”Selfies and self-confidence: Telematics and Informatics (2017). “Let Me Take A Selfe: Exploring The Psychological Effects of Posting And Viewing Selfies and Groupies On Social Media.”

Stanford psychology expert: These are the top 3 things kids need—but most parents fail to provide

Published Wed, Feb 5 2020 Nir Eyal, Contributor@NIREYAL

Society’s fear of how technology is hurting our kids’ ability to focus and achieve success has reached a fever pitch — and many parents have resorted to extreme measures.

A quick search on YouTube reveals thousands of videos of parents storming into their kids’ rooms, unplugging the computers or gaming consoles, and smashing the devices into bits.

But here’s what most parents don’t understand: Technology isn’t the problem, and enforcing strict rules around tech usage isn’t the solution. Rather, it’s the root causes to children’s distractions that need to be addressed.

Kids have psychological needs

Just as the human body requires macronutrients to run properly, the human psyche has its own needs in order to flourish. Distractions satisfy deficiencies. So when kids aren’t given the “psychological nutrients” they require, they are more likely to overdo unhealthy behaviors and look for satisfaction — often in virtual environments.

If you want to raise highly successful and “indistractable” kids, these are the three most important psychological nutrients that need to be met:

1. Autonomy

It might sound like a horrible idea, but giving your kid freedom of control over their choices can actually be a good thing.

According to one study conducted by two psychology professors, Marciela Correa-Chavez and Barbara Rogoff, Mayan children who have less exposure to formal education show “more sustained attention and learning than their counterparts from Mayan families with extensive involvement in Western schooling.”

In an interview with NPR, Dr. Suzanne Gaskins, who has studied Mayan villages for decades, explained that many Mayan parents give their kids a tremendous amount of freedom. “Rather than having the parent set the goal — and then having to offer enticements and rewards to reach that goal — the child is setting the goal,” she said. “Then the parents support that goal however they can.”

Most formal schooling in America and similar industrialized countries, on the other hand, is the antithesis of a place where kids have the autonomy to make their own choices. In her study, Rogoff notes: “It may that [some American] children give up control of their attention when it’s always managed by an adult.”

What parents can do: Instead of being the one to enforce strict rules on things like tech usage, help your kids create their own boundaries. The goal is to get them to understand why their screen time should be limited. The more you make decisions with them, as opposed to for them, the more they may be willing to listen to your guidance.

2. Competence

Think about something you’re good at, like cooking a delicious meal or parallel parking in a tight space. Competence feels good, doesn’t it? And that feeling grows alongside your ability to achieve success in life.

Unfortunately, the joy of progress is a waning feeling among kids today. Too often, kids are given the message that they’re not competent at what they do. Standardized tests, for example, are a major contribution to this problem, because they don’t account for the fact that different kids have different developmental rates.

If a child isn’t doing well in school and doesn’t get the necessary individualized support, they may start to believe that achieving competence is impossible. So they stop trying. In the absence of competency in the classroom, kids turn to potentially unhealthy outlets to experience the feeling of growth and development.

Companies making games, apps and other potential distractions are happy to fill that void by selling ready-made solutions for the “psychological nutrients” kids lack. They know much consumers enjoy leveling up, like gaining more followers or getting likes. These accomplishments all provide the fast feedback of achievement that feels good.

What parents can do: Ease up on structured academic or athletic activities, as well as the pressures and expectations surrounding them. Have a discussion with your kid about what they enjoy doing, and encourage them to pursue it in ways where they can achieve a level of competence.

3. Relatedness

Like adults, children want to feel important to others — and vice versa. The opportunity to satisfy this need (and develop social skills at the same time) centers around opportunities to play with others.

In today’s world, however, the very nature of play is rapidly changing. Whereas previous generations were allowed to play after school and form close social bonds, many children today are raised by parents who restrict outdoor play, due to “child predators, road traffic and bullies,” according to a survey of parents in an Atlantic article.

“For more than 50 years, children’s free play time has been continually declining, and it’s keeping them from turning into confident adults,” the author noted. Sadly, this downward spiral leaves many kids with no choice but to stay indoors, attend structured programs, or rely on technology to connect with others.

What parents can do: Give your kids more free time to have in-person interactions with others of their own age. This will help them find the connections they might otherwise look for online or through social media.

Nir Eyal is a graduate and instructor at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. He writes, consults and teaches about the intersection of psychology, technology and business. Nir’s writing has been featured in Harvard Business Review, Time and Psychology Today. He is the author of, “Indistractable: How to Control Your Attention and Choose Your Life” (published by BenBella Books).