Ep 213: Why Self-Awareness is the Most Underrated Skill for Kids

This week Lindsay is back with a solo episode, and it's a good one. She's making the case for self-awareness as the single most foundational skill we can give our kids — and unpacking why so many families accidentally skip it entirely.

Spoiler: it's not because they don't care. It's because we've been taught to associate self-awareness with selfishness. And that association, Lindsay argues, is completely backwards.

What We Cover

• Why self-awareness is the foundation of emotional intelligence, emotional regulation, AND empathy (not selfishness)
• What self-awareness actually is — and what it isn't
• Why kids who don't have it yet aren't dramatic or difficult — they just need the language
• The five reasons self-awareness matters for your child right now
• Why kids struggle to develop it (and how to give them grace while they do)
• Five practical, low-pressure ways to start teaching it at home today
• The story of a client who went from crippling anxiety and almost no self-awareness — to knowing exactly what she needed and accepting herself with full compassion

The 5 Reasons It Matters

1. It's the foundation of emotional intelligence (Daniel Goleman's research)
2. It improves emotional regulation — naming a feeling literally calms the brain
3. Self-aware kids understand their strengths AND their challenges (hello, growth mindset)
4. It strengthens executive function and decision-making
5. It improves relationships — with peers, family, and eventually themselves

5 Ways to Teach It at Home

1. Narrate instead of interrogate ("I'm noticing your body looks tight — are you feeling frustrated?")
2. Use body-based awareness ("Where do you feel that? Does it feel fast or slow, tight or heavy?")
3. Model it yourself ("I'm feeling really overwhelmed — I'm going to take a breath")
4. Pause and give them space (stop demanding answers; value the exploration)
5. Normalize ALL feelings — emotions aren't good or bad, they're information

Want to Know Where Your Child Is Starting From?

Lindsay uses an intake survey with every family she works with — it helps pinpoint exactly where your child is and what kind of support would serve them best.

Complete the survey here: Take the Intake Survey

No obligation — Lindsay is happy to follow up with book recommendations, podcast episodes, blogs, or just a conversation about where to start.

Connect + Resources

• Complete the intake survey: form.jotform.com/91358944039163
• More tools and support: thestressnanny.com

Loved This Episode?

Share it with a parent who's been told their kid is "too sensitive" or "too emotional." This one is for them.

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Lindsay Miller is a distinguished kids mindfulness coach, mindfulness educator and  host of The Stress Nanny Podcast. She is known for her suitcase tricks  and playful laugh. When she's not cheering on her daughter or rollerblading on local trails with her husband, you can find her using  her 20+ years of child development study and mindfulness certification to dream up new ways to get kids excited about deep breathing. Having been featured on numerous podcasts, platforms and publications, Lindsay’s words of wisdom are high impact and leave a lasting impression wherever she goes. 

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To review the podcast click here.

Transcript

Welcome And Why It Matters

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Hey there. I am so glad you're here today. This is a solo episode. I have had a lot of things to say lately. So you may be seeing a few more solo episodes these days. But today I want to talk about why self-awareness is one of the most underrated skills we can teach our children. And I actually feel like it's one of the most misunderstood skills for modern families. And that's because we associate self-awareness with selfishness, and we do so unnecessarily. And in my experience, most kids who have self-awareness are actually very unselfish. And so I think that there's not only a misconception about it, but an actual correlation that is directly opposite to what most people believe. So we're going to get into this. But really, I want you to think what if the most important skill your child could learn isn't reading earlier or performing better or behaving perfectly? But what if it's understanding themselves? Because when a child knows what they're feeling, why they're reacting, and what they need, everything becomes easier. Their friendships are easier, school is easier, their confidence grows, they're more resilient, their relationship with you is able to be more connected because they can give and receive feedback in a way that respects and honors their own experience. And the best part is that it's not an like either you have it or you don't, kind of a skill. It's something we can teach. And we can teach it in a playful way, a gentle way. We can teach it over time. So take a deep breath. We're not adding more pressure by giving them this skill. And we're not adding to the pressure you feel by giving you one more thing to teach. But we're giving you a clearer path to the relationships that you actually want with your kids. One of the interesting things that I find about this is that when I coach kids, I do a little intake survey. So I ask parents different questions like what are some of your child's strengths? What are some of the things they struggle with? What are some of the ways this is impacting their social life, their school performance, their relationships with family members? And then we talk about goals like what are some of the ways you're going to know we're making progress on this particular developmental hurdle for your kiddo. And it's so interesting because a lot of parents have a lot of clarity about what their kid is experiencing, and they'll share amazing and beautiful details with me about what they're seeing and why it's concerning. But when we talk to kiddos, there is a difference between a parent being able to observe something and a child being able to connect with that pattern in their own life. And so I think that there's a lot of value in helping kids have the same awareness about themselves as we have about them. And again, we need to do this in a gentle way. And we need to do it in a way that promotes confidence. But there's a way to teach it and imbue kids with the knowledge of what they need and want in a way that, again, doesn't make them more selfish, but just makes them self-aware. And when they're self-aware, they can confidently walk out into the world, say what they need, find the situations that you know are a good fit for them, look for opportunities that speak to the things they care about, et cetera, instead of feeling pulled in every single direction because they don't know what they want specifically. So let's start out with talking about what self-awareness is and what it is not. So really, it's just the ability to notice what's happening inside your body, what's happening with your thoughts, and what's happening with your emotions without immediately reacting. Now, if this is feeling a little familiar, it may be because the definition of mindfulness that I like to use is knowing what's going on inside of you, including your physical, mental, and emotional responses, what's going on outside of you, which is like what context you're in, who you're with, what pressures you might be facing, and then making a choice on purpose. So self-awareness is integral to having a mindful response to anything because we have to know how we feel body, mind, spirit, you know, and we have to be able to connect with those things in a pretty quick way. And again, there's a part of the brain that's in charge of this, but if that part of the brain doesn't have a lot of practice, self-awareness feels like a slog. And what's a really beautiful thing to watch is child build self-awareness. When I start working with kids, a lot of the kids that I work with don't have a ton of self-awareness. And it actually is causing a lot of the stress that they're facing because they're in situations or having thoughts that aren't serving them, but they're not attributing their struggle to those things because they're not even aware of it. So once we can put them in contact with the feelings they have in their body, the thoughts that are going through their heads and how that's impacting their experience, all of a sudden it's like unlocking door. And now they have all this information that they can work with. And then over time, what we see is we see like repetitive thoughts along the same lines. And that's when we help them start to notice their patterns so that we can confidently say by the end of coaching, like when they're ready to graduate from coaching, usually we have a list of like, okay, we know these are your tendencies. We know these are the thoughts that are consistently a struggle for you. And then we have a whole array of tools we use for those tendencies and to work with those thoughts. But again, if you don't know any of the things starting out, it's really hard to find the tools to work with them because you're just kind of trying a bunch of random stuff and you're not targeting your approach to the specific needs of the person. And self-awareness is how we do that. So for a child, self-awareness is being able to say, I feel frustrated. My body feels tight right now, I need a break. And we're not talking about overthinking and we're not labeling kids as sensitive or dramatic if they know this stuff about themselves, because it's actually a very, very cool skill that they have. We also don't want to force it. So if there's a child who doesn't know very much about themselves, I'm like, okay, cool. So then we just gently ask questions and we start to build that awareness. So a lot of times we can be frustrated if as a parent we have a high level of self-awareness and our kiddos, or it's something that doesn't come naturally to them. And we just want them to say what they think or feel. And sometimes kids are external versus internal processors, and we'll talk about that on another episode. But the idea is that for some kids, this self-awareness piece is a ton of work. For other kids, it's it's not, and it's relatively easy. But for some kids, it takes a lot of practice. So kind of demanding or forcing it out of them, it's not always the best way to go about it. So we want them to just start to observe their experience. We don't want them to be overwhelmed by it, and we don't want to overwhelm them with questions about it, but we do just want to give them the space to start to like let these things flutter into their consciousness and then to work with them in a productive way. So let's talk for a minute about why this matters. And there's a ton of research to support this. Daniel Golman identifies self-awareness as the first and most essential component of emotional intelligence. And again, that's because if we don't know what we're feeling, we can't regulate, right? And we can't have empathy because we're like not in tune with our own lens. But if we're very clear about the lens we're seeing a situation with, then we can learn to work with it, right? And we can either switch the lens or we can remove the lens in order to see a bit more clearly. And then we can also recognize that our lens is not someone else's lens, and we can allow empathy to develop because we can notice what's different, like what is us and what is someone else. And until we have that, we can't really manage it. We don't recognize what's going on. And so kids can't manage what they don't recognize. Another reason it matters is that it improves emotional regulation. So for kids who know a lot about what they're feeling, it's a great place to start with emotional regulation. But then we need to go take it further and talk about how labeling emotions reduces the amygdala response, right? Amygdala is the fight, flight, freeze, faint, or fawn part of the brain. And it is something that is super, super reactive. And if we have kind of a sense of when our amygdala is getting triggered, we can use our tools to support ourselves through that moment. And literally, if we could just name the feeling, it calms down the brain. So when we name the feeling, it's the first step to feeling calm. And it's also this integral part of self-awareness. So if your kid comes to you with a ton of feelings, maybe for you, the articulation of feeling feels really heavy. But for this kid, being able to say what they think and feel in any given moment is a massive benefit. And so using that and kind of channeling it is key so that the kids can work with this self-awareness and like use it in ways that are productive. The third reason it matters is because self-aware kids, they understand their strengths and they understand their challenges. So this goes back to the work of Carol Dweck and growth mindset, right? If we understand that a particular situation is just something we need to grow through, we have a different orientation to it than if we feel like it's something that's a roadblock or that we cannot do. So kids with self-awareness, they know what strengths they're bringing to any given situation. So this is one of my favorite things on calls, too, is that I'll have kiddos who are super creative and they're also very hardworking. So when they hit a roadblock or they're navigating something that feels really challenging, we're like, okay, great, what are the assets we have in this moment that can help out? What are the things you're bringing to the situation? Like, even just apart from the tools I can give you, what are the things you're bringing to this moment that are gonna serve you? And if we can say creativity and hard work, I mean, what struggle can we not overcome with those two skills, right? But if kids are like, I don't really know what my strengths are, then we're like, okay, let's figure that out because that's gonna be key to you overcoming challenges. And for some kids, this type of self-awareness, the self-awareness around strengths, can be really challenging because it feels like bragging to them or it feels just like a lack of humility. And we've been taught, you know, we're not necessarily flaunting our strengths in these moments, but knowing what you've got, like what resources are available to you as an individual person in this world, it's crucial, right? For so many things. And kids get that feedback from adults all the time. You know, they might get it on report cards, they might get it in parent teacher conferences, you might get it from people at church, you might get it from friends, parents. But the thing that's gonna serve them is for them to know it, right? And so sometimes we can take that feedback and we can be like, yeah, this is great. And I'm so glad they have this skill, but we don't always help them see how it applies in different moments. So again, some of the things I'll do when I'm working with families on this is like once a child identifies a strength, I'll encourage the parent that week to say, Hey, like if you see this strength show up, if you see this kiddo being especially creative, or if you see them problem solving and their creativity comes into play, point it out. Help them make the connection and develop the self-awareness around this particular skill because it's gonna be massive in terms of them seeing what it means to be creative or what it means to be hardworking, right? Or what it means to be able to problem solve. And so, as a parent, if we can point out those strengths and point out how the strengths can combine to help kids overcome challenges, we see kids who are more persistent in trying to access the growth that comes from a challenge because they know they have resources to get through it. We see less shame because it normalizes the fact that everybody has challenges and everybody has different strengths and weaknesses. And whatever your particular tendencies are in this moment, like maybe you have some that are getting in your way, but you have these other ones that are really going to help you out. And it also, you know, along with this growth mindset idea, gives them a greater willingness to try again and stick with something, as opposed to feeling like, well, I just don't have what it takes in this moment. So I may as well just give up. Instead, we're saying, Well, you're super creative. So if you haven't found the solution yet, it just means like you haven't had the idea yet that's gonna work. But you've probably had a lot of different ideas about this, right? And they'll say, Yeah. So we're like, okay, well, let's just keep trying, right? We're gonna find one because we know you're creative, like, we're gonna find one that works. And that small sense of confidence around a challenge can make the biggest difference, especially for middle school kiddos. But really, kids of any age, if they see themselves as like a prime actor in the situation with strengths that they're bringing, they are much more invested in what's going on. And then another reason that self-awareness matters is because it supports decision making. So it strengthens executive function, which is what happens in our prefrontal cortex when we're talking about planning and organizing and making higher level decisions that aren't reactive, the prefrontal cortex does that. And so when we can have self-awareness, again, the prefrontal cortex knows what it's working with. So if I'm working with a kiddo who has a hard time staying organized, and we're like, okay, so we know one of your tendencies is to put off or procrastinate, organizing or like setting out on paper what you need to do, you know, making a list, whatever it is, or like figuring out the steps of a project so that you can get them done. If that's one of your tendencies, then we can use that awareness to then set up a strategy or a support system that helps move through that challenge, right? So whether that means like coming home and doing a voice memo as you're listing off what you need to do for the project and then you can transcribe it. Or whether it means like sitting down with a parent and talking through your plan for the rest of the weekend in order to get your homework and projects done, in addition to your soccer and friend activities, right? It's like whatever you can do to help kids plug in to the part of the brain that understands what they're feeling, what they need to do, and how it relates to the world around them, then we practice executive function and we build that self-awareness. It also helps kids buy in, right? Because then they're the ones pausing, reflecting, they're choosing. And even if there's still some impulsivity there and they don't always choose the thing they planned out, like we can expect that because they are normal humans and also adolescents whose brains are actually unplugging from that prefrontal cortex. And so as they're growing, there are just moments when that happens. But when we can help them prioritize and make decisions in a measured way that includes like an awareness of their own tendencies and what support they might need, we set them up for long-term success because they're going to need to do that over and over and over again in school, in work, in a variety of situations. And so giving them the opportunity to know themselves well enough to get the support they need is key. And then the last one is it also improves their relationships. So kids who understand their emotions, they're better at reading others. One of the kids I was coaching the other day, she was talking about how her strengths help her. And she was talking about being able to read the room. So she said, like, she's working on articulating emotion a little bit more and telling people how she feels and being able to own her perspective. So self-awareness has been a lot of the work that we're doing. One of the things she said was like, I can see that my ability to connect with other people and my empathy, it is gonna allow me to read the room and understand when sharing what I'm feeling is gonna be helpful and when maybe waiting till later would feel better to me. So I love that because in that moment she was tethering several different skills, right? She was having awareness around her tendency that, like, she doesn't articulate emotion a ton. She was owning her strength of reading others and having a ton of empathy. And then she was speaking to the skill that we've been working on, which is articulating and communicating her needs and her perspective in moments that will serve. So her being able to triangulate all of those things is so cool because those are the types of kids who can connect, right? So I think being able to use those skills in connection, in conflict, like those are all really helpful things to know. One of the other things I have noticed is that kids who understand self-awareness, they can read the conflict of others in a different way. So if other people are having conflict and those kids have self-awareness, they're recognizing what is someone else and what is themselves. And again, that's a super powerful skill for kids to have because when you have that separation, A, you're not taking on the emotions of others and kind of attributing them to yourself, but B, you're able to approach the situation with more neutrality and then help people often help people move toward resolution when you can just say what you're thinking and observing. So again, you're kind of like removing your own discomfort from it and saying, Yeah, this is really uncomfortable that I'm around these two people who are navigating conflict. And then you're saying, Here's what I'm noticing, guys. Like, is this what's going on with you? Or here's what I'm seeing. Are there any potential ways we could combine what you both want to make it happen? Right. There's just an element of neutrality that comes when we're able to filter our own responses and our own emotions in a situation. So here are a few reasons why kids struggle with this and why it can be tricky to develop. We want to normalize a lack of self-awareness to the extent possible. Again, some kids seem to like come with it in droves, and other kids it takes some time to cultivate. Everyone has to practice it, and everyone has to practice how to channel that self-awareness into a productive use. But for some kids, it's really, really challenging. And so they don't always have the language for the internal experiences. One of the kiddos that I'm working with right now, we're talking a lot about interoception and like the signals we're getting from our body and how to communicate those to the people around us in ways that help us get what we need. And it just takes time for kids to understand the language around it and to be able to communicate it. And so recognizing that language is a huge part of self-awareness. We want to create as many opportunities as possible to give kids the words. So, like in this situation, we used a pain chart that helped give some phrasing or descriptive words so that this kiddo had a vocabulary to work with. And he knew a lot of the words, but there were some words he didn't know. And so we printed the chart, and now he has that that he can access when he's trying to describe how he's feeling. And when we do that, again, we empower kids with the language and just give them the chance to start articulating. So it's just the very baby beginning of the process, but so important for continued growth when it comes to self-awareness. Another reason it's tricky is because, like a lot of times, big emotions move faster than our brains. So my little nephew, he's two and a half, and I love playing with him, watching him. He's the sweetest. And there will be times when he is feeling a big thing or thinking something, and his brain is like not quite catching up with what's going on in his body, right? And so he'll either is like trying to get a thought out that he's super excited about or he's feeling something really big and just isn't finding the words to say it so it comes out in action. And so when we recognize that we don't always have the words as fast as we have the emotion, we can give kids a little bit more grace when it comes to acting out and behaviorally expressing those things. And that's again when we want to identify and observe and give them the language in those moments. And I love watching my sister with this because she'll just name what he's feeling. Like, oh, you are feeling so sad because you just hit your elbow on the table, or you're feeling very, very upset because your friend took your toy, right? And when we give them language for it, again, just accepting, normalizing, yeah, it's normal. When someone takes something from you, you feel bad and you're mad. Then we give them the tools to get started articulating on their own. Another reason why kids might struggle with it is that we maybe sometimes, maybe a lot of times, prioritize behavior over understanding. So we want something to look a certain way instead of identifying the factors that are contributing to the experience. And that's a pretty deep concept. But if we have been hyper focused on our child's behavior without connecting with kind of the root causes of that behavior or the needs that they're trying to get met through that behavior, then what we're really noticing is that like they just don't have this self awareness in that moment and they're learning it as they go, right? And so again, as these moments come and we take them as learning opportunities, we can identify, okay, do you have the language for this? Is this something like, is this big emotion just moving quicker than your brain can work with? And you you're not able to speak about it yet. You're still working with just the felt sense of it. Or is this a moment when I'm asking you to behave a certain way without connecting with what you're actually trying to communicate through the behavior? And again, we really cut kids off from self-awareness when we patch over what they're trying to say or the need that they're sh revealing to us by just trying to make their behavior a certain way. And to be fair, obviously there are moments when we need them to kind of like move through and then we can work through the behavior piece later. But to the extent possible if we can prioritize understanding then the behavior is going to make much more sense and it'll be something that gives us clues instead of gives us grief. So here's a few practical ways to teach self-awareness. We want to narrate instead of interrogating. So we don't want to say why are you acting like this we're saying I'm noticing your body looks really tight. Are you feeling frustrated right now? So we build the language without pressuring them to have the language already. And then we use body-based awareness. So we say things like where do you feel that in your body? Does it feel fast, slow, tight, heavy? When we're talking about thoughts, I'll ask kids like do your thoughts feel really slow right now or do they feel like they're coming very fast? So do you have thoughts that are like racing or walking right and again we don't even have to know the content of the thought. We can just know what is going on in your mind right now. Is it a quick kind of experience or is it a slow experience? Is it a confused experience? What is happening? Give me as many words as you can and then we can take it from there. Again, they're going to access the body awareness likely before they have the emotional vocabulary. So giving them a chance to notice what's going on in their body again builds a self-awareness and then also leads to conversations where emotional vocabulary can be built. Another way we can teach it is by modeling it. So just phrases like I am feeling really overwhelmed right now. I'm going to take a deep breath or I got really frustrated when we were working on that. I'm going to go take a minute and reset and be back. And then you give them permission and then you also give them the framework, the language, all of it right or like the other day I said something about like my heart is beating really fast. So I'm just going to sit down for a minute and take a couple deep breaths. I'm noticing I'm getting a little frustrated. We don't have to be super prescriptive if we don't feel like that's resonant for us or we don't even know what we need. We can just give them what we've got right so don't feel pressure to have that look a certain way except for be accepting of yourself. Because if you judge yourself for feeling the thing, they're going to judge themselves too. Okay. Another way we do this is just pausing. So we just say let's take a second and notice what's happening right now. Let's take a minute. And so we give them again permission to stop and notice and we don't demand answers or information immediately. We just value the exploration and accept that it might take time which is a huge huge part of developing self-awareness. And then we've referred to this one but the fifth way would be to normalize all feelings. So we don't call emotions good or bad. We just say they're information. And this gives them the opportunity to share any emotion because if we judge certain emotions, we kind of ask our kids to not bring those into awareness and a lot of times that does us more of a disservice than it helps. So we want all emotions to be okay and they provide us information. What we do are actions based on those emotions like there are definitely some things that are more skillful than others in that department but we don't want to negate or ignore certain emotions because often they build up and then come back in another way. So by normalizing all feelings we reduce shame increase honesty and provide for the full self-awareness as opposed to a compromised one. And then the final way is just to use play and reflection. So we can use phrases at bedtime, at the dinner table, you know, what was something that felt tricky today? What's your rosebudthorn? We can use stories or drawing for little kids we can role play to help them understand what a certain emotion might mean. The other day I was playing with puppets with my little two-year-old nephew and we were like talking about feeling nervous and then giving a few examples of a why you might feel nervous about something. And again for him he's just developing the vocab, right? So giving him a name and a word that he can eventually connect into his framework is the goal in that situation. But for older kids you can role play you can have different conversations about like experiences that you're having and then ask them to weigh in as if they were and again we're not giving them super heavy experiences but if you just have an interaction that you're you're in the thick of and you're noticing something in yourself coming up that is making you either hesitant or procrastinate or something you can let them in and see if they have any ideas about it. And that gives them again permission to be normal and human and have struggles but then also gives them a glimpse into like how you can productively work with an emotion. So just circling it back to why a self-awareness practice is key for kids, think about it this way if you have a teenager who understands peer pressure and understands what that feels like within the body and can clue into their own experience in order to say yes or no to a situation as opposed to feeling intense pressure externally to comply with whatever's being requested that's because you've taught self-awareness, right? And it's not to say that if you have a teenager who does succumb to peer pressure that you haven't taught it. Like sometimes there's things just happen. But a self-aware child becomes a teenager who understands peer pressure. A self-aware child becomes an adult who can manage stress and a self-aware child becomes a human who can navigate relationships with clarity. Like what do you want in this situation? Is this person a good fit for me for a friendship for like a romantic relationship? Is it and so launching our kids into the world with this information seems like such a service right because we're building skills they'll use for the rest of their life and we're helping them identify the things that are going to be resonant for them in this world. And that's a beautiful thing. So again self-awareness it's the foundation of emotional regulation emotional intelligence. Kids don't develop it automatically it's something we model and teach although some kids are going to come with a bit more awareness than others. And these small everyday moments of noticing that's what builds the skill so it's not a one and done situation and it's not something we need to wait till a certain time to teach. It's something we just teach as we go and then at one point we turn around and we say oh my gosh this kid knows himself so well. I mentioned at the beginning of the podcast a client that I had a couple of years ago and again she started out with so little awareness of what she needed or wanted and a ton of anxiety. And you can see the correlation between that right like if you don't know what you need and want and you're just feeling tons of external pressure you're in a position where you're just like not sure what to do in any moment because like you getting pulled in every direction. And it was so beautiful to watch her through the course of our time together be able to clearly articulate what she was feeling know exactly what she needed in that moment and honestly accept herself with full compassion in those moments when like self-awareness was telling her hey maybe this isn't for you or hey like you're struggling right now. I know the people around you aren't but you're feeling kind of anxious so let's take a minute to do what we need to do. She made so much progress and again the confidence that comes with self-awareness is beautiful because a child who knows themselves, knows what they need and knows how to access the support that will serve them is an incredible child, right? And again, it's a life skill. So let's remember your child doesn't need to be fixed. They just need a little support in understanding themselves and self-awareness doesn't always make life easier. I will say that like sometimes it's challenging to have the awareness but it does make them stronger and it does make them more resilient. So that's the practice. If you're listening to this and thinking you want this for your child but you're not sure where to start feel free to complete that intake survey that I mentioned earlier. You don't have to figure this out alone if you want to answer those questions I'm happy to send you resources. I can send you books, podcasts, blogs like I can send you whatever you need. I'm obviously available for coaching but I'm happy to brainstorm with you ways to help your kid develop this awareness of themselves in order to support their growth over the long term so thank you for being here until next time so that's it for today. Thanks so much for being here