Default to Yes
Week #34
Hello! I’m Aaron Kardell. In my Sunday newsletter, I pick one random topic to go deep on and have some disparate quick hits at the end.
I’ve been trying harder recently to “default to yes” with my kids.
Put simply, if one of them asks to do something, I try to find a way to respond with yes.
One of them may want to do an additional after-school activity. It may mean more trips back and forth to the school for me at a potentially inconvenient time. But I try harder to make that work.
The other one may want to go for a bike ride on the weekend. After a long week, I might be tired and want to chill. But I find a way to prioritize it.
Maybe they want to stop at Dairy Queen on the way home from school. There are many times I don’t have time to stop, and I’m also not going to say yes every day. BUT- that brings all the more joy for us both when I’m able to say yes.
Recently, my son asked me to build a game together. It’s going slower than I’d like because I need to learn to be a better teacher and collaborator. But I hope we have one to show off together by the end of this calendar year.
It’s not always easy to say yes. And the reality is, sometimes I can’t say yes, and other times I say no for no justifiably good reason. But for me, the main thing that has helped is understanding my “North Star ‘Why.’” I recently did a mid-year revisit of my Plus, Minus, Next list from the end of last year. A few family-related things from my “Priorities for 2023” stood out as still needing more attention. So here I am working on that.
What strategies work for you in being available to your kids?
This Week’s Quick Hits
I’d be honored if each one of my subscribers responded to this email on one question I have this week. As I’m going through the process of building a game with my son, I’m curious…
What are your go to favorite games on your phone or desktop?
How often do you play them?
Photo by Aziz Acharki on Unsplash
I 100% default to yes as a mum. There are many times when we have to say no for solid reasons and I like those to stand out as reasonable exceptions That said, I have a well behaved, straight A student, so my causes to say no are few.
We don't play games here anymore, sadly. Hard to find games for 2. We have an entire closet full of them, however, if anyone comes over!
I love this challenge to my thinking about how saying ‘No’ is important in my journey of learning to set better boundaries and overcompensating as a parent to raise kids who don’t get everything they want.
Joy is important and why should I keep such a lid on theirs?
Azul is one of my recent favorite tabletop games. The New York Times suite of games are the ones I’m drawn to most often: wordle, mini crosswords, and connections in particular