Somebody talked to me about being bilateral with your dog. And sometimes, for example, if you're holding it, the dog's going to run up to somebody and bite them. Am I a leash? You're restraining them. It's not really bilateral. They want to go, and you don't want them to attack the person. It's not really bilateral. You're both being unilateral. The dog's wanting to go without talking it over with you. And you're restraining the dog. You're talking to the dog, but the dog's not agreeing to be restrained. And so it's kind of like both parties are being unilateral. And so you're saying, OK, I'm going to be unilateral because I want to stop you.

[01:04]

And you're not agreeing to talk to me about this. To let the dog go would also be unilateral. You'd be deciding to let the dog go. The dog would be going without you your support, you're supposed to say, OK, go ahead. That's also being bilateral. But I was talking to this person, and I said, an example of being bilateral with dogs is like teaching them to fetch. And you have to get into the fetching thing with the dog. That's an example of bilateral and intimacy. A lot of dogs like to chase stuff. And so you do the service to them to throw it. But they don't naturally instinct that they want to bring it all the way back. They want to bring it back a little ways. And then when they get tired, they drop it. And then they want you to go pick it up and throw it again. I don't know if they want you to go get it. They don't understand that part. But they do know that they do want you to throw it.

[02:04]

But that's, again, it's kind of unilateral. Unless you're willing to go, it could be still unilateral because The dog wants you to do it. They don't want to do it, bring it all the way back. And you're willing to go along with it. So when you're being codependent with the dog, you can . Because you're not talking it over with the dog. Now, if you would actually change your mind and want to do it that way, I guess then you could be bilateral. Except the dog's not making any compromise. So when the dog actually brings it all the way back, they're not doing this. They're actually taking into account what you'd like them to do. And you're being patient. Tell them. And you have them learn that. So when you actually get into that fetching thing, I know some people who throw things for dogs, and it is a great joy for both them and the dog. Great joy. But it requires some training. And we have a dog that goes after pine cones. But also she wants to choose when to do it.

[03:08]

You say you want to do pine cone, she says no. She wants to initiate the pine cone. And one way to get her to initiate it is to start having a conversation with another human. And suddenly she wants to speak like this. There were some things left over from this morning. One was the character Ro in Roshan. Yes? I heard something today that I don't remember hearing before, that Ro basically just means old. It's like the Ro in Roshan. Which is old. that because of that, hearing that, and we usually translate it as, you said, kind and parental and grandparents and stuff. And I kind of started thinking, well, why don't we just translate it old? Old mind?

[04:10]

Like, do we have a problem with old? But then you went on, and you were talking about when your daughter was born, suddenly having your parents' mind. And then I've related that to this idea of the old mind. And it sounds like the old mind is the mind, like your parents' mind is also your grandparents' mind, and it's their parents' mind and so on. So it's like the old mind seems like it's the mind of the lineage. And I wondered about that. That's what I just wanted to do. Is there some way to relate that to the idea of role, old? I think so. Yeah. And do you, I guess it's, in Japanese, or would it just seem like old? Or would it include all those ideas in the word old? Well, it's a Chinese character. And kids call their school teacher in China, they call the teacher ,, they call the school teacher .

[05:15]

So I think in China, when you pay respects to your teacher, you're very much part of the whole system of respecting elders and previous generations and the culture. So I think probably it does have those associations, but I'm not sure what the Chinese person would say about that character. And the Japanese probably shared that. Is it that we, as Americans, have a kind of generally a worse notion of old, that we don't use old for the mind? Or just to carry in that familial quality that's not in our world? Some people translate it as elder mind. Elder. Yeah. But old mind is a little bit funny, because it's not just old minds. It's a mind of an old person. You can say old person's mind, but that's similar to grandmothers. I kind of like the feel of old. I guess that's why. You can go ahead and enjoy it. I don't have any problems. But if you translate that way, some people might think it's a little dull.

[06:18]

Like stale. Well, no, it could be that. But I mean, yeah, like old mind, right? That's nice to translate. Sweet, you know? Like stale church, stale mind. Stuffing mind. Yeah, but that's not what it sounds like. This other sense of all is really good. Thanks. And you had something to say about it. I had a question about the application of intimacy to adolescents who are spreading their wings a little bit, testing drugs. was using to get off the computer, that kind of thing, and how parental interaction might look intimately with those kinds of behaviors. Well, it might look a lot in a lot of ways, right? But like about drugs, if you live in this culture and you have a person approaching their teenage years, if you know that, you might say to them,

[07:26]

that drugs are going to probably be offered to them or available to them as they grow up in this culture. And you might tell them beforehand that you're available to talk to them about that, that you're not necessarily, that you understand that they may feel that they want to do these things, they want to work with these things, but that you would like to talk to them about it and help them even do the trust rather than having to feel like if they want to do these things, they have to lie to you. That's one thing you could do. What do you mean by help them do what you want them to do? Well, for example, I took LSD when I was a college student. And my wife said, if you ever want to take LSD, your father has taken it. And you could take it at home.

[08:29]

And he could help you. Because we thought she might do it. So she offered that. And we didn't try to stop her from doing any of that stuff. And I think she tried a lot of stuff. I don't know what she tried. But we didn't try to stop her. So while she was doing whatever she did, I don't know what she did, while she was doing it, she knew her parents knew about this possibility. And her parents were not saying to you, we don't want you to do that. And we're not going to try to stop you or anything like that. We were basically not exactly trusting her, but more trusting that we knew that we had to not try to control her.

[09:31]

She knew that. She knew that she didn't have to be good with us. So she could be bad, not because we wouldn't let her do that, but because she wanted to do that. She wanted to try it out. And therefore, when she made certain mistakes, she could come and tell us about her mistakes. And so, again, it was like she told us also, she said, you can't control me, so you might as well trust me. But it wasn't exactly that I trusted her, but that I agreed that I couldn't control her. I respected her. I respected her. I didn't trust her. And I respected her, and I thought she probably would make mistakes. I didn't trust she would make mistakes. But I respected her, and I let her know that I respected her. So when she made mistakes, she made mistakes under the umbrella of having parents that respected her.

[10:37]

And I think that helped her learn from her mistakes. So she got through Bay Area culture. She's 28 now. She got through that. she got through pretty much unscathed and i think she was like i think she got exposed to everything she even was like and she even worked and she's like you know one of her jobs to work in the rave scene in san francisco so she would go to these all night things and i know what she did but she didn't get hurt somehow she got through it and i don't know what she did but i And I didn't trust that she wouldn't make mistakes, but whatever her level of mistakes she made. She's a healthy person, and some of her friends aren't. And she used to like to party, but somehow the way she did it,

[11:42]

I mean, she was a professional party person, actually. She worked for the people who put these parties on. And then she's the woman who sits outside those clubs with, you know, decides who can go in, you know, that person. Something like a maitre d', I don't know, and the security guys are around her, right? She did that. And she made a good living with that. And that... But when she got pregnant, she didn't want to go inside the places because she didn't want to... And actually, you know, they have smoking and non-smoking sections at these parties. Are you kidding? Because they can't have no smoking, so they have actually smoking rooms. And these parties have thousands of people in them. Thousands. And so she went into that realm, and of course we were concerned, but we couldn't stop her. You can't stop these kids. I mean, you can lock them up in the house, I suppose.

[12:44]

But you can't stop them unless you keep them in the house. And also, what she did, her generation didn't go out on dates. The girls went out in groups. The boys go out in groups. And they get together. So you don't actually see the boy that's going to be with your daughter or the girl that's going to be with your son. They didn't do it that way in her age. I don't know if they do it now. Girls go out together, boys go out together, and then somehow they do their thing, which is actually much more clever for them, because then you don't have to show your parents who the guy is, and you have nothing to see. So it's a good way, obviously, a good thing to run around your parents. So I guess I would say that respect and realize you're dealing with something that's very powerful. And again, another thing about teenagers is that they've got a lot of energy and you're their main thing, right?

[13:48]

You've got a lot of stuff to do. You've got all your friends to take care of and you've got kids to take care of and so on. But they mostly have to just deal with you. So it's kind of like they're more focused on getting around you and so on. So I kind of think I would differentiate between trusting because you can't really trust that they're not going to get hurt. They might. But it's, I think, more to give them the feeling like, although I don't trust you exactly, I do respect you and I think I have confidence that you will be able to learn from your mistakes. And I'm here to help you with your mistakes. And my daughter didn't get in trouble with a drug, but she got in some other trouble. And when I went to pick her up from the trouble she got into, I didn't add to her trouble when I picked her up. I was quiet and kind to her.

[14:49]

And I think that helps situations sink in. How are you feeling, Michael? I'll live. I'm fine. Great. No worries. I just have to take it easy. Okay, welcome back. Thank you. I would like to ask permission to put my foot up and rest it while I'm in the sundown. You may do so. Thank you. You can do so here, too, if you want to. All right. I'm fine. So I think you can't control them. The little one you think you can control, and that's not intimate either. Controlling is not intimate. So don't try to control them. And try to respect them and let them know you're there to help them. And ask them to... And I guess my basic thing about anybody...

[15:55]

but particularly teenagers, is express yourself to them fully, so fully, that there's not the tiniest bit of manipulation in your expression. So for example, you can say, I want you to tell me X. I want you to come home at such and such a time. I want you to tell me if you're going to be late. I want you to tell me where you are. Tell them what you want. But don't tell them that to get them to do what you're telling them you want. I don't want you to do X. But don't tell them that to get them to not do X. Tell them to let them know what you want. So that they know when they go out, they know what you want. So they're out there doing whatever they're doing in this incredibly intense field that they're in. I mean, nothing's more intense. Except their relationship with you. They're out there doing this intense thing of basically getting ready to get pregnant.

[17:00]

You know? But you know what they're doing. They're experimenting. They know that they're dealing with a life and death situation. I mean, they know what they're saying. If you respect them, then they can own up to how dangerous it is. You don't have to tell them. If you respect them, you don't really tell them. When they're teenagers, if you respect them, you don't say to them, you're going out to do a dangerous thing. You're going on a date. You're going to a rave. You're going with his drugs, and that's dangerous. You don't talk to them like that. Because, of course, by the time they're teenagers, they know Dad. They know. They're smart. They know that stuff when they're 10. By the time they're teenagers, they know a lot. So you don't have to tell them anything anymore. If they haven't learned by then... But what they need to know, excuse me, they need to know that at this moment, not to mention in the past, at this moment, you respect them and you want something from them.

[18:01]

You want them to do their best. And you tell them that so they know, my dad wants this. My dad does not want this. So when they go out there and they're in that space, they remember what their dad wants, somewhat. And they get drunk or stoned and forget. But they do register what you told them you wanted. And they want to know what their parents want. And they want their parents to tell them. But you can do that in a bilateral way. In other words, you're telling them what you want, but not to control them, but as a gift. And then you can check to see, did they hear you? And that's the front end of the bilaterality. I tell you what I want, and you can respond however you want. Yeah, and you can ask me if you tell me what I want, what you want, or what you don't want. You can ask me how I feel about it, but teenagers don't answer. So, at teenagers, sometimes I'm like the dog. They do not want to do the bilateral thing with their parents.

[19:04]

And part of the reason why they don't want to do it is because they want to find their own thing. And they don't want their parents to be too influential. Maybe you could say they don't want their parents to know that their parents are influential. They don't want that also, right? But I would contend you say often enough. For instance, I say to my children, you may do drugs after you're 21. Your brain is still developing. My preference would be for you to wait until then. If you're going to do them before then, talk to me. And that lets them right off the hook. Because they don't have this moral obligation to never do drugs hanging off of them. But they do hear this voice that says, I'm not 21 yet and I don't have to do this if I don't want to. But just pretend like they don't hear you, but say it every six weeks anyway.

[20:08]

They hear everything. But they don't want you to know they hear it. And you can ask for them to respond, but they may not. Because it's kind of, to some extent, again, they're trying to develop their own way of doing things. And they don't want to do things your way. I mean, they sort of do. That's the influence part. They want to do it your way. But they also know that they have to do it their way. Otherwise, they won't know. And they don't really know who they are. So it's a tough situation. It's really tough. Read King Lear. It's about this. You know? Huh? It doesn't end so good. No. Well, the daughters who are no good are the ones who pretend like they're doing what daddy wants. The daughter who stands up to you, she's the one who loves you. So that's the one you can really respect. The daughters who pretend like they're doing what you want, watch out for them.

[21:12]

Don't fall for that. The sons or the sons, whatever. So I'm actually thinking of this in a therapeutic setting, dealing with the parents who are making the interventions with these kids. And what I'm hearing here is that my role would be, from an intimate point of view, would be to say to you, the client, I want you to do this with your kid and then get your response. I want you to have this kind of conversation that you just described with your kid. You can tell your clients that. Right. And that can be between you and your clients. Right. You're not trying to control your clients. You're just saying that's what you want them to do. You can say that to your clients. So that answers. Or you can say, or you can not, you don't have to tell your clients you want them to do this, but you can suggest to your clients that they tell their children what they want. But they just tell their children what they want. They don't say to try to control the children, because if you say that to the children, they feel disrespected. If you say to a kid something with the intention of, they feel you're saying that to try to control them, they feel like, you think you're going to control me by saying that?

[22:22]

Then I have to do it to prove to you that you can't control me. Don't you know what you've got here? You've got a nice, healthy kid. So you don't want to back them into the corner of having to prove that they've got some guts. by talking to them as though you could control them. You can't control a healthy kid. But if you treat them respectfully, you don't control them either. It's just that then they're a kid who not only has energy, but who has parents who respect them. So he says, you know, they kind of want to live up to that respect. They may not. But they kind of want to. They kind of want to do something that you'd be proud of. And they want to because they think you're proud of them. And you are. I've got a great kid here who's about to go do something very dangerous. And I would like him to do well. But I'm not going to say that because they might interpret that I'm telling you to do that.

[23:23]

But I can say I want you to do well. I want them to be brought there and they're going to do well tonight. Yes or no? You tell them you want them to be home by 11 o'clock and you don't really want them to be home by 11. No, no, you do want them to be home by 11. You tell them that, not because you think that you tell them that they'll be home at 11. Because you don't know when they're going to be home. They're not under control. They're not reliable. Children and adults... I'm not reliable. People aren't reliable. Don't expect that of people. People are impermanent, unworthy of confidence. But you can still talk to them. You can still talk to compounded things. Like, hello, compounded thing. I have no confidence in what you're going to do next. But I still have something to say to you. And what I say to you is, I would like you to come home at 11. But I do not expect that you're going to come home at 11.

[24:25]

And if you don't come home at 11, I don't like that. I don't like it. But I'm not saying that to you to get you to come home at 11. I'm saying that so you know you've got information now about your father. You know what your father wants. So you go out with your little brain, which has all this information in it. And part of the information is, my father wants me to come home at 11. And my father didn't say that to me to get me to come home at 11, because he knows he can't make me come home at 11 by telling me he wants me to come home at 11. He just told me that so I'd know what time he wants me home. And I know. And he respects me. And I kind of like that he does, actually. And I'm not going to come home at 11. I'm coming home at 3. Because I like that he respects me, but I don't like it enough to come home when he wants me to. That's what you've done. And then they might think that. Meantime, at around 11, they might think, hmm, it's 11.

[25:28]

That's when this person who respects me wants me to come home. And I'm not going to. And then it gets to be 12, and I think, hmm. My dad told me he wanted me to come home at 11. And now it's 12. And he respected me. And he wasn't trying to vindicate me or do anything. But I want to stay up later. But I'm not staying up later because he's trying to control me, and I'm going to show him he can't. I'm staying up later because I want to. And then they come home at 3, and then they see the consequences of that. And then they say, man, I was too late. Now I feel really lost. They learn. They learn like we do. People learn from their experience. But if you're surrounded by people who don't respect you, it makes it harder to learn. Because you're doing all kinds of weird stuff in reaction to not being respected. So if they don't respect me, maybe I shouldn't respect myself. So I should learn from my mistakes because I'm a wreck.

[26:29]

I'm a worthless person who all these people are trying to control because they don't think I've got any intelligence. No, they think I'm intelligent. And I think I'm intelligent. And I can see what happens. And I stayed out past time. And there were consequences. And I learned from that. So you want to optimize learning. That's the point in Buddhism, is to help people learn when they have mistakes. People have to make mistakes. They don't want to make mistakes. You can't stop them. But you can give them respect so that when they go out in the field of mistakes, they feel like, somebody loves me, and somebody wants me to do well, and they think I can learn. And I'm going to try this mistake, and I'm going to do this dangerous thing, and I'll end it. You're not trying to control. And I think that's really intimate and scary. Because you're not, you're realizing you're not in control. It's not that you give up control, it's that you give up trying to control. You don't really control, ever, if you delude yourself into thinking that.

[27:31]

Because although you might be able to push something across the floor, there's lots of things going on that you can't control. Right that moment. I just want to reinforce my daughter's 25, but my husband and I are both artists, so we brought her up in galleries with musicians and actors and the whole scene, and she was very much into that, and she's a virtuoso and rock guitar. She also graduated from Duquesne University, Catholic University, which she went to when she was about 18, because she was tired of all the things she saw from the art, artistic people. But you give them love, and what I always wanted her to do is always trust her and always tell her the truth. There were many times I said to her when she was 18, 19, I don't hear anymore. So it's like, I really don't hear anymore. But I listened, and I kept working. Just never let her go. Just go away with her friends or do anything really crazy. And they stay connected because out of trust and love in the most unbelievable circumstances. So I think it's really the truth.

[28:32]

Because they're going to do what they're going to do anyway. Her friends were more of the country club kids. They just hid from their parents what they were actually doing. And she was working in Western Psych for many summers while she was in college. And she saw many of her friends from high school and college going through Western Psych in terms of having drug overdoses. She was exposed to people, not my people, but people in our community were doing drugs. And she saw what they were doing, but it didn't do her a lot. So I don't think you can protect people with the MTV culture from what actually was happening, particularly urban kids. But I think you can be there for them and trust them. And with the help of Buddha, she turned out wonderful. She's working at a very, very fine job in Houston, Texas right now. As a health coordinator for over a million people, she's 25. She's, like I said, a very creative, artistic kid. I think it was good for her, if anything.

[29:35]

When a teenager or an adult, in a more extreme case, are not healthy and are in a cycle of... self-destruction. And one of these techniques in the world of treatment is a formal intervention where family, friends and family get together and confront that individual. So I guess I'd like to ask, is there a time for that? And how would you do that intimately? Why don't you tell me specifically an example in some detail about how that would go, because it's different types of interventions.

[30:39]

Yeah, I've been a part of a number of them, and most of them have not gone well. I was just recently asked to be a part of one, and I'm very reluctant to participate because there's an ambience, there's an atmosphere, there's a hot seat. And there's a strong arm mentality of this is what we see, this is how we feel when we see this and we behave like this. And here are your options and what are you going to do? And most often that option is a bed and a treatment center. And that way are the highlights, so to speak. That way are the highlights. I think that could be done biologically and intimately.

[32:07]

Again, using my daughter, it's not such an extreme case. But using my daughter, I kind of said, that way or the highway to her at one point. It was a case of where she was. She was 19. And she had come home from NYU. And she wanted to go to work. She wanted to go to work. She wanted to get a job. And she came back in May or June. And she moved in with her parents again. But she didn't get a job. And she didn't get a job. And she didn't get a job. But she did. She was breathing all day long all those days. And she somehow managed to stay up quite late at night every night. And she got up around noon most days. And then she would go out to get work in the afternoon.

[33:12]

I think it's not a bad time to ask for a job. I think it's better to ask in the morning, actually, because they like to see if a teenager's going to get up in the morning. But also, I can imagine my daughter going in for a job interview. This is my confidence in my daughter. This is my confidence. She's a beautiful person. She's very smart. She's beautiful. And I can imagine my daughter going into some job interview, and I can imagine her giving the impression that she didn't want the job, and I can imagine her not getting the job. by saying, I don't want this job. You don't want to hire me, do you? And the person's saying, no, darling. See you later. She said, thanks. I can imagine that, more or less. But I also know if my daughter went into someplace and wanted the job, almost nobody would hire her on almost anything.

[34:12]

She has to be a physician or something. But any job that didn't require a college graduate a billion or more advanced degree, she would probably get it. If she wanted it. That's my feeling about her. I have a lot of confidence in her. She's amazing when she wants to do something. And when she was in college, I said to her over and over, I said, you know, I feel that if there's anything you want to do, when you find out what it is, you're going to be great at it, and you're going to be happy to do it. But right now, you don't know what you want to do, so it's kind of a hard time for you. I said, I was lucky. When I was 23, I kind of saw what I wanted to do. But you may not find it so early. But she got pregnant. She found something she wanted to do, and she's a great mom. But before that, she was kind of floundering. But anyway, she comes home. She goes out into the whole summer without getting a job. And I'm going to leave home for the fall and go to the monastery.

[35:18]

And I do not want to leave this big, powerful, intelligent, beautiful girl with her mother unemployed. for her mother to deal with this unemployed girl, this unemployed giant person. Unemployed. And I talked to her mother and said, I'd like to tell her that if she doesn't get a job in the next week, like leaving in two weeks, I'd like to tell her I want her to leave out. If you get a job, you're going to die. That's what I'm going to tell her. Her mother said, okay. So I met with her. She and her mother met with her. She and her mother met with me. Me and her mother met with her. She was 19. Just got back from New York City. She did very nicely. She liked New York. Didn't want to study, but she liked New York. She got all around New York.

[36:19]

There's a lot of stuff. I don't know what, but... Anyway, there she is after all summer not getting a job. And she wants to get a job, but didn't get a job. So I sit her down. And basically, I say, start out by saying, I want to tell you. Your mother and I want to tell you. And your mother says, I changed my mind. And I said, okay, your mother doesn't need me anymore. It's just your father talking to you. Your father, me, I want you to either get a job in the next week or move out. If you don't get a job, I want you to move out. And she said, she listened, she said, well, if I move out, what am I going to do? And I said, you'll have to figure that out. But I actually have quite a bit of confidence that you will do fine. You know?

[37:21]

The key thing is that when I was talking to her, I looked her in the eye. I'm looking in the eye of my little girl. And I'm saying, if you don't get a job in the next week, I want your father to want you to move out. And I didn't look away. And I don't like to look in my daughter's eyes when I'm telling her something that's not very nice for her to hear. But I kept my eyes on her. And I watched her face. And if she had made certain faces, I might have changed my mind. But she did OK. But the main thing is, I did OK, because I was delivering this obnoxious message, or frightening message. But I looked at her when I said it. I respected her, and I loved her while I said it. And it was not easy to say it. But I felt good that I was able to look at her while I said this kind of shocking thing. And when she said, what am I going to say? I kept looking at her when I said what I said. And that was pretty much it. And she got up and walked over to her room.

[38:27]

And she didn't slam the door, which she usually would do after any kind of a conversation that didn't please her. She did not slam the door. She closed it kind of like normally. And if the week had gone out and she hadn't moved out, I still would have said, I want you to move out. But that doesn't mean I would have thrown her off the street. I wouldn't have done that. I just probably would have said again, I still want you to move out. And your mother doesn't, so I guess she can stay. But I want you and your father, I want you to move out. And she might have stayed if she hadn't got the job. We don't know what would happen. The next morning, this amazing thing happened. She got up before noon. As a matter of fact, she got up kind of like birthday. When I came back from meditation, like at 7.30, she was up. I don't know how that happened, but she was up. And she said to me, Are you going to say I'm just going to bed?

[39:31]

And I said, yeah. She said, could I have a ride? I'm on it for a job. This is mine. I'm happy to give you a ride. And then she did this thing which she hasn't almost ever done even when she was a little girl. She came out and she said, which sweater should I wear? Sometimes she would ask her mom, but she never asked me. And I said, I think that one. And then she's probably like, which shoes should I wear? Which shoes do you think are best? And I said, those are shoes. She wore the pair of shoes I suggested. It's like magic. That never happened since. So we rode to San Francisco. And I went where I was going. I went swimming at this club on the bay that I was swimming in. And then she went off. And I said, I'll see you later. And when I came back out of it, and after taking my shower and stuff, she was waiting for me in the waiting room of the club, like this, you know, sitting in a chair like this.

[40:33]

How girls go like this. And she said, yes, what dad? And I said, I don't know, but she said, I got two jobs. Two. in about an hour and a half. I wasn't surprised. I know she could do that. And then she said, do you think I got the job because of what you said last night? And I said, I don't know. I think she liked that answer. It was true. I didn't make a job. I didn't control her. I don't know how that worked. But I think for me, two key things. One is I told her what I wanted, and the other is I looked her in the eye. And sometimes in the past, when I told her what I wanted, I looked away. And when you look away, you lose information.

[41:35]

So I think if you do an intervention, and you really love the person, and you keep your eye on them, not just love them, but face them, and watch, then if you say whatever you're going to say, a difficult message, you see the consequences, and you respond to that. And if you feel like you're being mean and cruel, and you see that they feel that way, then maybe say, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it that way, or whatever. And my daughter had, you know, there's hard line and tough love. I don't know what they mean, but she had her interpretation of which one was which and which one she liked. And the one I do, I was either doing hard line or tough love. I don't know which one I was doing. But according to her definition, she liked the one I did. I don't know whether I was hard line or tough love. She liked it. It worked out. And it was one of the most intimate moments in my life with my daughter. The saying to her, and this thing about being involved in her boardroom selection, and going to town with her, and having her be there to tell me she got the job.

[42:46]

This was like a real, this is what fathers are made for, is to help daughters do that kind of stuff. And it was like, But it was tough. So that was my intervention with her. And it was intimate. And it was intimate. And I wasn't pushing her or controlling her. And she didn't feel pushed or controlled. And even at the end, she said, do you think that what you did made me do that? I didn't really know. I didn't know how it worked. But it was a wonderful thing. And I think if you can do an intervention like that, When you really look at the person, you don't just walk in the dark and say, we're going to say this, and no matter what they do, we're going to do this. That's not very respectful. Now, a little bit more difficult situations, but it might be possible to say this way or the highway, but in a loving way that might be good.

[43:47]

But you've got to watch and see, because maybe it won't be. Then you change your mind and say, well, how about now? There was another time when I said something like that to her. She had done something really irresponsible. And then we were supposed to meet her someplace. And she didn't show up. And really late. to show you, we went home. And she finally showed up. She called us and said, would you come and give me a ride? We went all the way home, a long ways from this place she was supposed to meet us. And she wanted us to come all the way back and pick her up and take her home until she didn't show up. And for not a very good reason. It wasn't that she had to buy a car or something. She wasn't lying about it. She didn't make up some good excuse for being late. It was just in the framework of her schedule. This was like a year or so before. And I said, what?

[44:49]

I'm not going to come pick you up. You figure it out. And she did. But it was scary. It was scary, but I did that. But the problem in that case was, although I didn't want to say it that time either, like, well, I'm not going to pick you up. I didn't want to say that. The problem was, even on the telephone, I didn't really face her. I kind of flinched when I said, I don't want to pick her up. And even on the telephone, if you stay there, you can hear the voice. But it is harder when you can't see the person. In that case, it worked out. She got a ride from her friend. She stayed overnight. Actually, she didn't know what she did was. She went over to a friend's house, got a ride over to a green house, and a friend stayed at our house. Something like that. Anyway, somebody stayed over someplace and worked it out. She worked it out. But it was scary to have her. She wasn't going to tell me everything. And then her mother told us something really scary about something that happened to somebody else's kid that they didn't get to do.

[45:59]

But still, you know, it was anyway. And it wasn't too long later when she called the phone. She said, can I talk to dad? Mother gives me the phone. She said, blah, blah, blah. I didn't wait too long to find out what she was working on. It didn't take her very long. But I didn't know how long it would take. So I was pretty scared. That was another case where I was kind of like, I kind of intervened by not going along with her. doing that kind of stuff. And so she gradually is learning to be more responsive in person. But it's still scary moments. But I wasn't trying to control her. I was just, I wasn't going to go along with her routine. Intimacy is not easy. possible in those situations.

[47:04]

Just for this small discussion, when we had setting limits with the younger kids too, at what point do you grab them and tell them they can't go out into the street because there's a car coming? And at what point do you move? limits with your daughter, saying you have to get out of the house and do this and do that. Yeah. And what mean it means, I mean that that's what I want. I'm not saying I mean that I'm going to throw her off the street. I said I do mean, I actually did mean, but I wasn't going to try to control her if I said that. So one kind of setting limits is setting limits And the other is setting limits to try to control. And that's the key thing I'm saying is that when you set them not to try to control, I think it can be intimate. It's a gift to set limits. They want them. They need them. Can I say one more thing before you go on? Sure.

[48:05]

My daughter, when she was around that age or younger, actually younger than that, sometimes she would spend a lot of time with her friends and wouldn't see much of her for a few days. She would stay over at her friend's house stay up late, but basically not spend much time with us. And when she was with us, she would get more and more disrespectful, more and more rude, more and more scattered. And then we would ground her. You see, you can't go out. This is maybe, let's say, make singlets in the summer, put Jen to her school. So she's in the house all day long. I bring her home to her room all day long. And she can't get out of the bathroom. And she hated it. But every day, she got more and more happy. After two or three days of being around it, she was happy, respectful, just a happy girl.

[49:05]

And then she'd go out there with her friends again. This is like when she's 14. They need limits. We all need limits. We need forms to reconnect with our own body, kids, teenagers. And little kids, too, if they don't have that connection, the form of touching the parameter, they get crazy. And so if we weren't controlling her, we just, you know, we just said, you're grounded. They need it. We need it. We all need it. Then students need it. We need forms. Otherwise, we lose our mental and physical tone.

[49:47]

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