S2E34 – Young Adults, ADHD & the Pandemic of Disconnection + guest Dr Jack Hinman

Season 2

Julie Legg is joined by Dr. Jack Hinman — clinical psychologist and Executive Director of Engage Young Adult Transitions. Drawing from over two decades of experience working with young adults in hospitals, residential treatment, and community mental health, Jack shares what he sees at the root of today’s growing anxiety epidemic: a crisis of focus, a crisis of connection, and a culture of avoidance.

Jack explores how ADHD often shows up subtly or is missed altogether in young adults, especially in women, and why emotional regulation, identity development, and executive function all suffer when connection is lost.

This conversation dives into the deeper systemic and developmental factors shaping today’s “anxious generation,” and why safety, structure, and relationship-based support are key to long-term growth.

KEY POINTS FROM THE EPISODE:

  • Why ADHD is under-diagnosed in young adults, particularly women
  • The real drivers behind anxiety, shutdown, and burnout
  • How emotional dysregulation and avoidance are often misread
  • The impact of missed early coping development and attachment
  • What’s fueling the “attention crisis” and “connection crisis” in this generation
  • The harmful effects of pathologising normal anxiety
  • The role of phones, online connection, and the loss of real-world social skills
  • Why therapy should be immersive, relational, and present in everyday life
  • The importance of structured autonomy and consistent support
  • How nature-based, experiential learning (like skiing or biking) boosts self-trust
  • What young adults, and parents, need to thrive through transition

LINKS:

TRANSCRIPT

JACK: A big crisis happening in our culture, it’s the attention crisis and I talk about the connection crisis too. And so what happens is that our brains are being developed to not focus and to not attend. And so the tip of the spear with what’s going on in our culture is focus. And that focus drives lack of connection. That lack of focus drives like problems with identity formation, so I mean all those things.

JULIE: Welcome to Season 2 of ADHDifference. I’m your host Julie Legg, ADHD advocate, author of The Missing Piece, A Woman’s Guide to Understanding, Diagnosing, and Living with ADHD, and an unapologetic doer of many things. This season, we’re turning up the volume with a global lineup of brilliant guests. bringing their lived experiences, insights, research, strategies, and resources. And of course, along with a healthy dose of humour and humility. Whether you’re neurodivergent yourself or just curious, there’s something here for every curious brain. Let’s dive in. So many young adults today aren’t failing, they’re disconnected, anxious, and unsure how to take their next step. And for some, ADHD is part of that story, even when it hasn’t been clearly named. Today, I’m joined by Dr. Jack Hinman, a clinical psychologist with over two decades of experience supporting young adults across hospitals, wilderness therapy, residential treatment, and community mental health. He’s the founder and executive director of Engage Young Adult Transitions, where his work focuses on helping young people build healthy independence through connection, not pressure. In this conversation, we’re talking about what’s really driving anxiety in today’s young adults, the growing pandemic of disconnection and why relationships, not just skills or strategies, are often the missing piece. We also explore where ADHD fits into all of this, especially when it shows up quietly, misunderstood, or later than expected. Jack, thank you so much for joining me today. 

JACK: It’s great. I’m totally excited. I love talking about young adults. I love talking about the role of mental health, how it impacts their ability to move into adulthood. And I’m sure we’ll get into conversations about ADHD and all those things. And so, yeah, I’m totally stoked to be here. 

JULIE: Excellent. Well, of course, you’ve worked across hospitals and wilderness therapy programs, very interesting, residential treatment centers and community health. So now you lead engage young adult transitions. So I’d just like to ask you before we dive into our barrage of questions that I have for you, what drew you specifically to supporting young adults at that stage of life? 

JACK: Man, what I really love about the like that critical period of emerging young adults is that their intellect, their insight and their awareness is starting to come more online. And so you have a higher degree of like awareness and like, and insight into kind of their life and who they are, while at the same time it’s still a very dynamic part of life. It’s still a huge part of life where identity is being formed and you’re starting to really figure out like what you want to do in life and who you want to be with, who you want to hang out with. And so you have the ability to really make a huge influence. I think it’s one of the most crucial periods of development. And I really like the idea of working with young adults where they’re stepping away, learning to step away from their parents. They’re starting to really… they have to take ownership of their life and their decisions. So, and so I love that exciting period of time in their development. And so, that’s why I’m leaning into it as a clinician. That’s why I run a young adult program and so, yeah, that’s why I’m in this space. 

JULIE: And the young adult age group, if we can just clarify what that is, Jack, is it 18 to young 20 year olds or is it younger? 

JACK: That’s an awesome question because we could spend a whole hour answer just talking about that question right now. Because yeah, what we’re seeing right now in research and a lot of new research is coming out about brain development. And we’re starting to see there’s like five critical periods of brain development and we’re starting to understand that adolescence is really starting around like 10, 11, 12 years old and goes to 30. Adolescence goes to 30 and that’s the term ’emerging adulthood’ and that term has been utilized for decades but we’re now starting to see the research to prove it where… And so that’s where we’re moving that adolescent. We’re pushing the standards of on Ericson’s like stages of development, those things. But man it’s 30 and maybe even early 30s. And so like I’m on the board of a it’s called Young Adult Transition Association and we’re going through this whole discussion right now. What is it? What is young adult? What is that period of development? And we’re having to extend that. You’re seeing young adults in programs like ours, like the programs I’m at that are older now like and so we’re seeing people 27, 28, 29, like 30 are in that are struggling in idea development, struggle moving into independence that you might see more in the early 20s. And also too like economics, man. Like the world is so much more challenged from an economic standpoint to be independent. So that’s changing things. We’re starting to rethink culturally. Like we’re starting to think that like, because I’m 51, back in the day where it was like you turned 18, you moved out. That’s kind of what you did. And now we’re starting to like rethink that concept. We’re starting to really be open to other cultures, how other countries, how other cultures do development where that runway is longer. So, it’s a really complex, dynamic concept of young adult. 

JULIE: Absolutely. I did read actually recently about brain studies and that development was still happening even at that early stage. So, that was an eye opener for me. I want to throw ADHD into the mix, Jack. So ADHD often comes up in conversations about young adults struggling with anxiety, motivation, and independence as well, but it doesn’t always present in obvious ways. And I was wondering in your work, where do you see ADHD fitting into some of the challenges that young adults are facing today? 

JACK: Yeah. Yeah, ADHD is a lot more, a lot more complex presentation or diagnosis or struggle than it really meets the eye. And unfortunately, like the DSM which is the actually the manual that is what people utilize in psychiatry and psychology and research for making diagnostic kind of criteria for people is very behavioural-based. It’s very observable behavioural. And a lot of times people like you see people get like maybe children get identified with ADHD early in life based on their hyperactivity because you see that. You can see somebody being hyperactive. You can see them bouncing in and out of the chair and usually boys have more of the hyperactive type. You see girls have more of the inattentive type and boys have the combined type in a sense. And so people, you’re kind of like the loudest instrument in the orchestra gets heard is kind of like around that concept. And so you, so unfortunately a lot of people go under-diagnosed with ADHD because they don’t present the exterior hyperactivity piece. And you see that more and more as one gets older. And so you’re moving into adulthood is that a lot of people get under-diagnosed with ADHD because what happens is that a lot of their impulsivity presents as anxiety. It looks, it doesn’t look so much impulsive. It’s… it kind of comes across as anxiety. And then also too you see avoidance. You see shutting down versus distraction. So that shows up more avoidance the pathological demand avoidance piece. And also too you see a lot of people who get misdiagnosed or do not get diagnosed because they have a high verbal ability but they have really low execution, like low execution of their verbal ability and so these things you don’t see. And also too a lot of folks who have ADHD have a lot of emotional dysregulation so they get misdiagnosed with that. So there’s a lot of symptoms that are kind of going on underneath that people are not picking up on and you see that more prevalent with women than men. And there’s a lot of women are going around or missed are not diagnosed with ADHD. But there’s also a big crisis happening in our culture. It’s the attention crisis and I talk about the connection crisis too. And so what happens is that our brains are being developed to not focus and to not attend. And so the tip of the spear with what’s going on in our culture is focus and that focus drives lack of connection. That lack of focus drives like problems with identity formation. So I mean all those things. And so I was just thinking about like this concept of focus around that concept because I think what happens is we kind of like make ADHD sound like a like a soft a soft issue or a soft diagnosis. It’s not a big issue, but it really is. 

JULIE: You said something very interesting and that was about, it almost sounded like verbal masking where you can talk the talk but as far as the follow-up execution side of things go, not so much the case, particularly in women. I completely relate to that. We mask and we learn the banter. We know what we’re meant to say to try and ‘be normal’ in the eyes of our peers, in our workplace. Are there any other patterns that you notice in young adults whether diagnosed or missed or misunderstood? You’ve mentioned anxiety. Does burnout come along with that at a young age? 

JACK: Yeah, it’s interesting like around the concept around burnout where you see a lot of folks who are neurodivergent and ADHD. ADHD is on that neurodivergent space and so it’s really on a continuum. And what drives that continuum is the dopamine kind of like access around that is the degree of dopamine dysregulation or that’s impacting that continuum of ADD like dyslexia, ADHD, ASD1, AD2 and three and so you typically… The word burnout comes up in the space of like folks who are, who have neurodivergent or autistic, are trying to mask and that kind of like trying to present a certain way is burnout. But yeah, I think a lot of like, I think a lot of folks that have ADHD didn’t really acquire the systems and habits of managing attention deficit difficulties. And they don’t have the skill set to manage their day which causes burnout. So they’re working overtime to manage their day, but they’re getting the same results. So that’s a definition of burnout. When you think about it, you’re putting in more effort with the same result. That equals burnout. Then another part about the burnout is that a lot of folks, a lot of young people, this generation is also not developing the resiliency of stress, the resiliency of anxiety. And so whenever they feel overwhelmed, our culture, parenting dynamics, is like basically telling you, “Okay, when you’re anxious, that’s bad.” So you shut down, you avoid. So you never have a chance to work through that, develop the skill set to work through those things, which leads to burnout. So burnout’s a very also complex concept, too. 

JULIE: And so we’re talking really about the anxious generation and from your clinical perspective, what’s driving those levels of anxiety you’re seeing in young people today? 

JACK: Yeah, there’s kind of a like a couple parts driving that where there’s this, there’s this concept creep that’s occurring in our culture where anything that anything related to anxiety is pathological, where we over-identify everything as anxious. We’re defining everything as trauma. We’re identifying everything as addiction. And so this concept creep is concept, these concepts are creeping into this space. So when I feel anxiety it’s something wrong. So I need to avoid it. And so normal anxiety is being seen as pathological. Normal anxiety is being seen as clinical. And so what’s happening is that like kids in this generation is being taught is that anxiety is bad. And that’s… and then so in the reality is when you’re learning anything, when you’re actually building more myelin in your neuron or you’re actually building a neuro connection, you’re going to experience anxiety. So your, for your brain to grow, for your muscles to grow, you’re going to experience discomfort. So we’re in this kind of discomfort crisis too where and so we’re taught that we can’t experience anxiety. So there’s not a normal developmental process to learn how to cope. Like so for example, like from zero to two you cannot spoil a baby, like an infant. It’s impossible to spoil an infant from zero to. You want to be there with everything. Then what happens in it starting at two, a toddler, then you could start pulling back and not responding to every little second of their need. It’s important to think about coping on a developmental trajectory where you like zero to two you want to, your goal as a parent, to teach that child that I’m safe, creating a secure attachment base. Then you develop that security. You develop a base. Then you start slowly developing coping in that child at two and on and it… And coping develops on a developmental continuum and so what happens is that kids are not developing coping around anxiety. And then once they head into adolescence or into adulthood where unfortunately the world or schools or their parents can’t protect them from that, they don’t, they’re not equipped with the world. And so that’s the anxious generation. And then you have this sucker right here [mobile phone] that’s also complicating the anxious generation where this is my self soothing device. It should look like, I put a pacifier. I should get like a little case for it. It should be a pacifier. This is a pacifier. When I feel any form of discomfort, I’m using my phone. And so that’s creating poor coping. And also too, when you feel anxiety, we should lean into relationships. And this is disrupting connection. Also anxiety, sitting in your anxiety, working through your anxiety teaches me what I like and don’t like. So it’s impacting identity development as well, too. You have this, the development of the smartphone. You have this concept creep. And so that’s kind of what’s building this anxious generation. 

JULIE: Yes. And it is indeed a bit of a pandemic for young adults with ADHD, or not. How does this disconnection amplify things like emotional dysregulation and avoidance or feeling behind their peers, the levels that they’re achieving? 

JACK: The disconnection starts at like at day one. Like as we arrive on this earth and the co-regulation between a mom and a baby is crucial to development and it’s crucial to attachment development. It’s crucial to… even like learning how to regulate yourself. It’s also crucial to self-validation. And unfortunately where this thing again [mobile phone], whatever this thing is, like is getting in the way of co-regulation. It’s getting in the way of like healthy attachment where like a mom or a dad, whoever, caregiver, is taking care of that child, their eyes are gazing over the phone even while they’re holding their child. And so it’s even like impacting kind of like the connection process. So a way, the way a child or a baby learns about its own emotional experience is by reflecting looking at its mom’s face. So when a baby cries what do, like what does our face normally do? We go we make a little cry face. It’s teaching that baby what they’re feeling. When a baby laughs we go we laugh too. We’re mirroring that reflection. Also when a baby is like crying and getting dysregulated the mom will self sooth. There’s a neural connection. There’s oxytocin that’s going back and forth. The attachment piece, you’re already setting the stage for disconnection at that point. So, what happens is that a lot of young adults are seeking out connection online. Like I talked to a lot of young adults and it’s unfortunately the majority of their connection is all is shifting towards online. You’re losing out on learning how to like be present. You’re losing out on the non-verbal cues, all the nuances that go on around relationships. And also too like the barrier of entry into an online relationship is really low. It takes no… it doesn’t take skill development. So back in the day, if kids wanted to get together and ride their bikes to their neighbourhood, you had a go buy a bike or had to get had to figure out how to get a bike. You had to actually learn how to ride a bike. And so it takes skill to be part of a little biker crew. It takes skill to be part of like a baseball crew or a Pokemon crew. So it like, so there’s no skills into the barrier of entry to online relationships. And also too like you can get booted out of an online relationship really quickly. If you if you do something that’s toxic like or like it’s going to upset those ghost you. It’s so and so what happens, young adults are forming the concept of relationships through this online experience where they’re not developing the skills to know how to really keep an in-person relationship. A lot of them are getting ousted or ghosted because they might say something awkward or quirky or inappropriate. And so then they’re feeling shame and guilt from that. And so then when they try to seek out relationships in real life, they don’t have the skills. They don’t have the confidence about it. And so it just keeps them more disconnected. And the research has proven that your, our longevity is based on the quality of our relationships and real life relationships. And so yeah, it’s a crisis connection which leads into identity like crisis and identity development. Because who you hang out with and what people like and your identity is formed on who you’re around. 

JULIE: Yeah. There’s a huge jump between the nurturing delightful, one would hope, childhood years when you’re being nurtured and in those 0 to 2, fast forward into young adulthood. There is quite the transition. And I was wondering if we could talk about that. Particularly in young adulthood there’s this sudden expectation of independence and I’d like to know why this transition can be especially overwhelming for young people with ADHD or anxiety? 

JACK: Because it’s not, we’re not setting the stage for it at day one, at the beginning. And we’re like these kids are… we’re becoming more of a culture of non-experience. Like they’re not going out and playing like in the neighbourhood. They’re not going to the parks. They’re not experiencing life. The way our brain works is experiential. Like you cannot read a book. You cannot learn how to ride a bike by reading a book. Like you really can’t learn how to be a therapist by reading a book. You got to be putting your hands on the cockpit and flying that plane to learn how to fly a plane. And that’s how that’s how life is. You got to be experiencing life. You got to be experiencing relationships. And so what happens is that like another part too about the anxious generation of Tyson is that we’re so… we’re over-protective of the external world and we’re under-protective to the online world. And so kids are not having normal experiences where they’re learning how to figure out the rules of a playground and rules of being a friend. You’d be surprised how many kids cannot ride a bike. That’s, those are developmental stages of independence. Like that’s, those are early stages. It has to start early. And so what happens is parents are not doing the work like when they’re younger and then when their kid gets like 18, 19, 20, 21, they’re frustrated at their young adult like “Why aren’t you adult?” I’m like, mom and dad, you didn’t give me the skill set when I was earlier and now you want to kick me out of the house with no skills, no resiliency around being that. So you have that part playing out and also to the economics. We have to be really like honest about the economics like about what it takes to be financially independent and it that looks very little a lot more nuance. Because like parents are going to need to help, provide some financial support to get them launched earlier. Like the cost of getting your own apartment is astronomical than it was back in the day. And so, so yeah, you got to start that early and you got to be intentional. It doesn’t happen in a vacuum. If you want it to happen, you’ve got to do it early. 

JULIE: I was going to ask you about connected therapeutic support as a core part of your model. And I was wondering if you could explain what that means and how that differs from traditional approaches to therapy or treatment? 

JACK: Yeah. So, we’re technically a residential setting, however, our young adults live in engaged houses. Like, right now, I’m… my office is in one of the engaged houses. Like, like, upstairs is three young adults. They have their own room, their own bathroom. I hear them getting up in the morning. I hear them getting ready in the kitchen. I see them throughout the day. We have next door another engage house where we have a therapist offices are in their house. So we are showing up. We are present in their process which means that where you have to have trust, you have to have security and consistency for therapy to work. And a lot of our young adults have been in like lots of therapy, individual therapy over the years. It maybe moved the needle in certain areas of their life. And so the therapeutic process of is very dynamic. I mean of course we have traditional individual therapy, family therapy but a lot of times therapy happens on the ski lift like a conversation with your therapist. And the concept too is that yeah, we have therapists here. We have a psychiatric nurse practitioner. We have case managers. But everybody here has the power of being therapeutic. So like training that and providing that and so we really make therapy about the here and now. We make it about what’s relevant to them, what’s important to them. It might not necessarily be like be pulling up their history. It could be we do somatic forms of therapy here like EMDR and brain spotting and those things which really are effective for trauma. But it’s really our thing is we’re next to a college. We’re right smack in the community. Like it looks like we’re just student housing. And so our clients are living their lives in this therapeutic environment. So we’re providing structured autonomy. We’re providing compassionate persistence in that process. And so we have life… we have like our staff which are life coaches here. And so the power of therapy is kind of like in the gosh, the atmosphere of what we’re doing there. 

JULIE: I love the fact that they’re going about their day as they would but with all this support and connectedness and I think you’ve mentioned connecting and how important that is. So I was going to ask as well about the role of being in this safe consistent relationship or environment and how that helps young adults especially those with ADHD for example to build regulation and confidence and self-trust. 

JACK: Our role here is to provide a secure base. This goes back to attachment and where and the way you build a secure base is building trust and the way you build trust is being consistent. Consistent in how you show up, consistently being here available. And so like, so our role is like being consistent in like our schedule. Like this is what group is it’s going to happen, and our staff or life coaches are here at 11:30, and they’re here and we have people available to you and so that so feeling you cannot, you cannot grow, you can. And you cannot get vulnerable unless you feel safe. And so like having people here available during that time is creating that secure base. And so you think about it, remember the stranger test where the little baby would run off and come back and run off and come back. Like that’s what we are. We’re like we’re that base where our young adults can explore. They can go get jobs and go to school because they got that security to go back to. They have a therapist. They have a case manager to go back to when things are not going well for them. And so yeah, like we’re what when it comes to ADHD is when you don’t have a sense of security, you’re dysregulated. And when you’re not… when you’re dysregulated, it affects your ability to stay focused and to show up from an attention standpoint. Where a lot of people get confused around like is this ADHD or is this anxiety? And it’s hard to pull us apart because anxiety impacts your attention concentration and then if you’re, and your ADHD impacts your ability to connect with people and your inability to connect with people makes you anxious. And so I think when we try to like make it separate and put them things in separate boxes, we make it things way too simple. 

JULIE: So when we’re looking at healing and growth, which is what the young adults are doing within your environment in your therapy, what actually helps them move forward? You know, particularly if they felt misunderstood or chronically stuck where they are, what skills do you think are required for them to go forward? 

JACK: Yeah, like here we first going back to secure base concept is that we want to find out what is going to be the anchor for this young adult, something that they can hold on to. And it might be going skiing or hiking or mountain biking every week that we do. Or it might be neuro feedback like something that’s like that they can hold on to, that’s going to be an anchor for them in the program. And having that anchor is going to help them buy into the kind of the other parts of the program as well. And so that’s just the first part of that that healing part is finding something that can ground them, ground them here. It could be the relationship with their therapist. It could be a friend here that can be the grounding element. It could be going to the technical college and learning how to be an auto mechanic could be the grounding moment for them. And then everything kind of comes into play about like other parts of the program around that. And so the thing is it’s like where they can like yeah that grounding piece is the start of that process. 

JULIE: You mentioned before about your hiking and your skiing and that being a part of what you do on a regular weekly basis. Can you explain how that being immersed in nature, how that also helps with the therapy? 

JACK: First off, you’re getting vitamin D. And there’s such a deficiency in probably what 80% of people who are not getting adequate vitamin D. And then vitamin D is so crucial for like brain functioning. So I love being out west. We’re in Utah, man. It’s like it’s winter time and it’s sunny. I’m like I love where my office is because then the sun can hit my eyeballs and my retina and so I’m loading up on vitamin D, and so you’re getting vitamin D. You’re also like you’re raising your heart rate so you’re helping with like cardiovascular functioning and a lot of young adults don’t know, they don’t know how to connect. They feel very awkward in trying to make trying to connect. And so having a structured activity of skiing and falling on your butt together and having this like moment where you’re freezing cold and you’re like you’re miserable, but you’re having a miserable experience together. And you’re having that bond. And so you’re having a structured activity that’s setting up for that. Because young adults, this a lot of people, just don’t know how to interact. Like I don’t know what to say. I feel, they feel super anxious and awkward and so you’re also you’re also learning to be more proficient about your body. You’re developing some more mastery on your body and also too, you’d be… it takes a lot of executive functioning skills to get to the ski hill. Like you got to make sure you got your gloves, you got your pass, you got your pants, and there’s a lot of things you got. There’s some there’s executive functioning skills you got to learn just to get to the ski the ski hill. And you’re also connecting with nature. You’re seeing the beauty of nature and you’re having that bonding moment with like with somebody else as well too. So that powerful healing of the outdoors and that’s what got me out west. Like my crucial development was in my young adulthood where I struggled as an adolescent. I barely graduated high school. If there was a little thing most less likely to succeed, that was me. I was in that little like I was in the little yearbook of that piece. And but I just somehow had a friend who went out west and got a mountain bike and he’s like, “Jack, you’re going to get a mountain bike.” I’m like, “Okay, I’ll get a mountain bike.” And the power of mountain biking built that connection when I was 17 years old that’s driving me today. And I’m like, I got a buddy from Idaho that’s coming down. I got bikes set up for tomorrow. And so it’s just so that like having those outdoor skills is been the thriving connection for me. Yeah. The more time you’re on a bike, the less time you’re on a on a phone. 

JULIE: At what point do young adults come to see you and how long do they stay in this wonderful environment of yours? 

JACK: They come from all over the like from the US, but they can come from like from across the pond. It sounds like you’re like they could come from the UK or they we’ve had a young adult come from Panama and actually none of our young adults are local from Utah. They come from like Manhattan, New York to the Bay Area, like San Francisco. They’re with us for about nine months and the goal they’re working towards is being successful in one of our apartments. That’s what they’re shooting for. And that’s the goal. And so they start off in a house with a high level of support. We’re here like I can hear them laughing. I can hear them crying. I can hear them like burning the eggs on the stove over there. And then so they’re working towards a level of independence which includes our mental health to be in the apartments. And so they’re with us about for nine months. And we have young adults that love the area that stay here and they’re still part of our community. We have young adults that go back to their previous college or go back to their previous area. And so here like you’re not when they come here, it’s a safe place to land. It’s a safe place to figure things out and have fun and have a sense of connection while you’re doing it. 

JULIE: I wonder for parents listening who are a bit worried about their young adult child, a bit concerned for them, what’s one thing you wish they understood about support versus pressure?

JACK: Yeah. The thing about the runway is longer into adulthood. Even if you have like five kids, they’re all different. They’re all on a… it’s okay. They’re on a different path and they’re on a different time frame. And so that’s important to understand, too. That ramp up to adulthood is longer than it was when we were kids. And we’re understanding it more for even from a neurological standpoint. So yeah, the key is that you’re moving from micromanager to a consultant like ultimately present being and being available. And also too, you cannot control your child and understand the power of influence. So you have to earn your trust. You have to earn your respect as a parent. You have to earn your sense of influence and you have to work at it to have that influence on them. And so, so yeah, you have to show up. And so the key is you’re moving from like a… from a from a parent to a consultant. You’re there as a consultant and you’re there to provide feedback, but ultimately they make that decision and it’s their life, and it’s their decision ultimately. If you’re always told what to do and where to go, at some point there’s a little bit of a backlash, isn’t there, saying, “No, I’m going to… I’m going to make my own choices,” if there’s too much one-way pushing from the parent to the child, I believe. What Jack would be a practical shift for young adults themselves or the people supporting them that can help rebuild connection and momentum? You cannot grow unless you feel discomfort and which means like reaching out to somebody or introducing yourself, making connections is going to feel uncomfortable. You have to get outside your comfort zone to build connection. You have to get outside your comfort zone to grow. And we really have to stop pathologicalizing typical anxiety. Anxiety is bad. No, anxiety is good. Like it is okay. That’s where you’re going to grow. And so I think we need to start like supporting our culture around that. Because what happens is like kids are showing up to school thinking that once they, when they experience this discomfort learning how to do math, they shut down because I feel anxious. So that’s I think that’s the biggest takeaway I think we really need to do right now as parents, as teachers and as the therapists, and is the concept of anxiety is okay. 

JULIE: What’s the first step that you take when you decide that’s it, it’s going to hurt, it’s going to be painful, but I’m going to grow. What’s the very first step? 

JACK: Yeah, I’m like I come from a very developmental standpoint. Like I mentioned earlier, it’s got to start at a very, very early age. And also too, I think we really need to have like… where there’s a reason why people can’t smoke when until they’re 20. Like they can’t anyway, nobody should be smoking anyway. And we know any form of alcohol is really poisonous. But anyway, but we still allow people like in the US here, you can’t smoke or drink until you’re 21. This should be the same way with social media like where like you should not be introducing any form of social media until your child passes through puberty. Like it’s just it’s really, it’s really impactful like on their brain. And so the thing is like is building… it’s like going to the gym, building muscle strength over a period of time on a developmental standpoint. But if you’re kind of like now we’re past that, I can’t go back in the past, like now I’m like I have a young adult now. And I think the thing is that you have to like, you just can’t expect it like expect your 19-year-old all of a sudden overnight be independent which like a lot of parents do sometimes. And the thing is that you really start have to like start pulling back and allowing them to feel discomfort in incremental ways where it yeah… It could be putting boundaries around the internet. Like you can actually turn off your Wi-Fi at a certain time at night and your young adult might flip out, but they’re going to be okay with that. And so just start setting boundaries around that where and it’s got to be progressive over time. And that’s what we do here. We have a lot of young adults that have like have delayed development, independence, and all these other things. And we don’t expect them day one to be jumping out of the gate. So, we slowly ramped up over a period of time. When you pull away that opportunity for them to work through the anxiety, you’re telling them they can’t do it. You’re teaching them they don’t have the confidence. When you do things for them, you’re teaching them that they can’t do that. And so I think the thing is it’s like yeah, like stepping back, letting them struggle and struggle at a stage level over time. Ramp that up over a period of time. 

JULIE: When the results equal independence and a joyful, happy young adult, it’s worth those growing pains to get through to push through to the next stage. For a young adult who might be listening to this podcast who’s feeling disconnected and anxious and unsure how to take that next step, what would you most want them to hear? 

JACK: It gets better. Like if you look at research, this period of time of young adulthood is the period of time of least happiness because of this the dynamic nature of figuring things out. And in life right now, we’re in a very uncertain world and it’s getting more uncertain. And when you’re in your 20s, even like when you when you and I were in our 20s, it was very uncertain, but it’s even double more uncertain now. And the thing is, I would tell them like uncertainty is okay. Like it’s okay to have uncertainty about your future and to kind of really validate the uncertainty, the anxiety around the uncertainty, teaching coping around uncertainty. It’s part of that. And also too, it gets better as you as you move through that, you figure out more who you are. You have more personality around your coping. Life will get better. It gets happier as you get older. 

JULIE: Thank you very much for joining us today. Okay. Thanks.

 

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