Episode 125: College or Not series: Helping Your Child Identify the Future that is Right for Them w/ Oie Dobier
/I hope that the first episode of our College or Not Series helped you find resources in supporting your child in determining their passion in life. For this week, we will have the second installment of the series which will tackle figuring out if college is the right path for your child and supporting your child in finding careers that are fulfilling for them (and not what we think is right for them). So much of respectful parenting is about setting aside our preconceived notions of how children "should" be and learning to accept and parent the child in front of you, and educational choices should be no different!
To help me in this conversation, I brought in Oie Dobier. She is the founder of Project Who Am I where she, along with her daughter, helps students who are struggling with their career choices discover their natural talents, passions and values so they can pursue a fulfilling career.
Here's an overview of our discussion:
How to eliminate the “I Don’t Know” Answer to “What Do You Want to Do After High School?”
How to Increase Your Teen’s Exposure to Cultivate More Self-Discovery
How to help our teens find their career that is purposeful
You can find Oie on projectwhoami.com and they have a special free guide for those who have teens (yay!).
TRANSCRIPT
Parenting is often lived in the extremes. It's either great joy or chaotic, overwhelmed. In one moment, you're nailing it and the next you're losing your cool. I want to help you find your way to the messy middle, to a place of balance. You see balance is a verb, not a state of being. It is a thing you do. Not a thing you are. It is an action, a process, a series of micro corrections that you make each and every day to keep yourself feeling centered. We are never truly balanced. We are engaged in the process of balancing.
Hello, I'm Dr. Laura Froyen and this is The Balanced Parent Podcast where overwhelmed, stressed out and disconnected parents go to find tools, mindset shifts and practices to help them stop yelling at the people they love and start connecting on a deeper level. All delivered with heaping doses of grace and compassion. Join me in conversations that will help you get clear on your goals and values and start showing up in your parenting, your relationships, your life with openhearted authenticity and balance. Let's go!
Laura: Hello, everybody! This is Dr. Laura Froyen and on this episode of The Balanced Parent Podcast, we're going to be talking about how to figure out if college is the right path for your child and how we can support our child in finding careers that are purposeful and fulfilling for them as opposed to just what we think is right for them. And to help me with this conversation, I'm bringing in an expert and the founder of Project Who Am I where she helps students who are struggling with their career choices to discover their natural talents, passions and values so they can pursue a fulfilling career. So my guests name is Oie Dobier, I'm so excited to have you here with me, thank you so much. Why don't you tell us a little bit more about who you are and what you do?
Oie: Great! Thank you, Laura so much for having me, my name is Oie Dobier and I am a mom of two teens and what brought me here today as part of a co owner of project, who am I am co owner with my daughter and my husband, so we are a family business and what brought me here is really through a series of a couple of different activities, one is just my own career path.
And in my early forties I came across a situation where I had to pick up my head and really think about what am I doing here and what do I want for the future for myself at the same time, shortly after who was our daughter, who's 19, she was 15 at the time and she had to go to some college tours due to her competitive soccer schedule and we had to go to colleges and she asked me mom what should I be when I grow up? And so those two coincided and really thought about you know how society is today in shaping our thoughts around career paths and we really said, you know, what should it be, not what it is and what should it be? And since we helped to go through her process and we've helped many teens go through this process and thus the project, my project came about.
Laura: Oh, that's beautiful. So something that we're really passionate about here at the Balanced Parent is trusting our children and following our children, understanding that we are not here to shape and mold our children into who we want them to be, but we are here to help them discover who they already are and who they're going to be. So I think that this is a great fit and I think that I feel like it's so much easier to know how to do that when they're little, when it's like, do I like blue shirts or red shirts?
But when it comes to like, am I going to college or am I going to trade school? It's bigger. It feels much bigger. And so I'm just kind of curious about how can we go about supporting our kids and figuring out who they are, what matters to them, what their values are without that kind of our stuff sneaking into it. Do you have any advice?
Oie: Yeah, I have some advice around that, you know, first thing is to sit down with yourself and your spouse and just talk about your own expectations and and have a family. Maybe a couple of conversations first about what is my expectations for my kids? What are your expectations for your kids? Talking to your spouse and having a spouse conversation about it and then just kind of peeling the onion a little bit about why is that the case? Right?
Because it's more about the why behind the expectation versus the expectation and the reason why it's super important to do that is the next step is to sit down with your team and have that conversation with them because you know again you wanna lead with you know your values and the why behind what drives your thoughts and actions versus the solution right?
Because the solution is gonna look different for them as a teen, as a young adult, as people that are growing up and one thing that they'll do is kind of say yeah I agree with mom and dad's value or I don't and so that's the first tip I would say is to sit down and really self reflect on what are your expectations and then share that with your team and have that very fruitful conversation about, you know, do they agree or not agree and that's you know a grown up thing to do is sit there and have a family conversation about values and what they agree or don't agree on.
Laura: Absolutely, I think an important piece of you know getting really clear on our values and that why like you were talking about is then to start questioning to around like, okay, so here's the value, here's the Value and here's the Why, is it something that I actually choose? Like is it something that I have been conditioned to think is important and valuable? Is it in direct conflict with what I actually believe to be true of my child and my role in their life and really getting curious and like brave, I think with that questioning that line of self inquiry, it's hard to question deeply ingrained beliefs that are very cultural and handed to us through multiple generations, like I, you know, so we're talking about college, right?
So my both of my parents were first generation college folks and when my sister and I were growing up, it was only college college was the only option for us, you know, there was still this like really deeply held belief and not just any college, like a good college, the college, you know, high top tier college and I'm in a place with my kids where I'm starting to feel a little bit more open to the idea that this narrative of college is the way to progress socially or you know, to engage most effectively in the capitalistic society that we have, I'm starting to push back against that a little bit more, especially as I see folks around me have really fulfilling careers in the trades and beautiful skilled trades or who go the college route and then don't do anything with their degree and are saddled with debt And end up doing finding their passion, you know, like you did 20 years down the road and start doing something completely different. I did that too.
I had this awakening of what am I doing, what is this really the life that I want, did I choose this life? I left academia, it was a professor and I left and so I would really love to save my kid from having to have that like awakening moment. I'd like them to move into their career and their education choices with awareness. I think that's what you help parents do. Right.
Oie: Right. Absolutely. And my first thought about college or maybe not college after 20-25 years of a career, I thought about, okay, what am I good at, what do people pay me well for? And guess what? I never learned that stuff in college, it was stuff that I was good at ever since I can remember. It was just innate things that make me me and obviously I learned a bunch of things in college, but could you learn those things in a different way beyond college?
Absolutely, there's plenty of people who don't go to college and they learn life lessons just as well and you know, maybe even better like to your example that you're saying, You know, some people who go to college and they're not really doing anything, so you know, it's very situational. So I think, you know, we just have to think about as every parent has this discussion within themselves and with their teen, you know, really thinking about what did you learn in college? And are there other ways to learn that in today's world? Because today's world is very different than it was 20 years ago?
Laura: Absolutely is it's so different and you know, so I guess I'm curious then how do you, so you've got this kid who is you know, a teenager and maybe it feels a little adrift a little directionless, lots of teens that I've worked with in the past don't really necessarily know what they're doing, what they what they want to do. How do we help them figure that stuff out, not impose our stuff onto them but help them figure it out.
Oie: Right. So I would suggest that first thing is really dig in to do a couple of things. You know, one is their natural ability, right? And these are things that they have been good at ever since Their little I have two kids, for example, her natural ability is she's a creative she has always been that way ever since she was little and I have Gobs and Gobs of example where she's just a very creative person.
Dominic our son, he's completely different kids as we all know if you are parents of more than one kid and he is Mr. Doer and so, you know, thinking about college plans for him, school is kind of not his cup of tv, he would rather be out in the world doing things because that's what he enjoys, you know, whether it's playing soccer or we went to a glassblowing lesson the other day and he just absolutely loved that. And he keeps asking me, when are we gonna go again, mom?
Because he loves doing things with his hands or his body or you know, he was into motor crossing for a while because it was just a matter of doing things. and so I think, you know, just getting them to sit down and focus on what am I naturally good at. And the second thing is what am I interested in, because as you know, there's so much in the world that you can apply your natural talent and you can impact any industry that you want, the world is your place to make a difference. And so, you know, whether if you love kids, you could take your talent and somehow help kids, if you love animals, you could do it that way. If you're really into nature and plants and environment, you could do it in that way.
I mean, there's so many different ways you can take the things that you're good at and apply it in a meaningful way. So that interest part is really key. And I was talking to a parent and I said, well what are your kids interest, I don't know, you know, their interest is Tiktok and he's like, well, yes, but dig into that. What are they specifically looking at in Tiktok? Right. So if you were to look at my son's, Tiktok, he's really into cars. I mean all things cars and he's also into fish. So he's really into aquariums and what kind of fish and what kind of environment. So those are very specific things. And once you kind of understand, what are they interested in, help them explore that world and the various aspects of fish or cars.
And ideally, you know, you also want to look at, it doesn't necessarily have to be one or the other. You know, okay, if you like fish, you should do something from a biology for perspective or if you like cars, you should be something, you know, car tech related. You know, the world is, you should be able to purposely mold your life to what you could be. And so I'm dreaming, but you know, it would be really cool if Dominic could do something with a combination of fish and cars. I mean, I haven't figured it out yet. And we haven't, I mean, but there are so many options.
Laura: Yeah, things like designing a healthier fish tank, you know, a self cleaning fish tank or you know, some like more effective motors in the filters and fish tanks, you know, like there's so much overlap. Yeah, sure.
Oie: Yeah. You got your on the same wavelength.
Laura: Yeah. And this, so this brings me to something that I think you like to talk about. So I hope that we can talk about it for a minute, exposing our kids to a big range of possibilities. I think plays into this too. I know that when my mom was going to college In the early the late 60s, early 70's when she went to talk to her guidance counselor about what her options were, there was beauty school, secretarial school or becoming a teacher, maybe a nurse.
You know, those were the four options that she knew about and she didn't have, she was in a small farming community. Her parents were farmers, she didn't have visually access to seeing women in other roles. Now obviously some women were in other rules at that point in time, it wasn't in her worldview. And so I'm curious about how we can expand the bubble that our kids are in and make them aware of the possibilities that are open to them.
Oie: Yes, expanding their bubble is key because there is a question that gets often asked, you know of teens, what do you want to be when you grow up or what do you want to do after high school? And a lot of teens, their answers, I don't know and you know, I would say the main reason why they don't know is because they're circle of people and of knowledge is really narrow, it's really small. And so I think the easiest thing to do about that is expose them to more people, different people because if you get them to hang out with different people, those different people do different things and they'll start to see all sorts of different activities, different points of view, different perspectives.
And so that's the easiest way to kind of expand their world is get them exposed to different people and encourage them to hang out with people that they don't normally hang out with because if you hang out with the same five people, you know, you only know the things those five people know, But if you start to say you know what I want to meet someone new, I wanna you know hang out with 10 people, I want to hang out with 20 people and not all at once because I I know I'm I'm that way I like to have one on one interaction. I don't like to hang out in a big crowd, but you know one month you can hang out with someone that you met at the coffee shop or a friend of a friend, that's the easiest way to start to expose them to different things.
Laura: I love that. I'm one thing that I do with my girls, my girls are younger, they're nine and six. And so one thing that I do with them is when I see folks out in the world who are doing jobs that my girls don't normally see in our everyday lives. I point those jobs out to them. Like the other day we were on a walk and there was a group of folks who were introducing native plants into the pond setting that we were in and so we stopped and we talked to them about what their jobs were.
Some of them were in college, they were on a summer internship and we talked about like, what a wonderful job you're outside all day, you're helping mother nature. You know, like we talked a lot about those things, but we also talk about things like when we are driving through a construction zone, we wonder wonder, you know what their lives are like. It looks like they're enjoying their, you know, these guys are all laughing with each other, it looks like they're enjoying their work, They get to be outside.
One of my husband's buddies works in construction and just loves it and gets paid great, like gets paid a really great, has a great income and has a specialized job that he's worked up through and been trained on the job and is very satisfied. And so I think that it's important that we notice the work that's happening around us too. And something else that we do is we talk about the role that those jobs, the very vital role that many jobs play in the whole system, our whole system that we are embedded in, you know, having smooth roads means that we can get to work that groceries can be delivered, you know, all of those things, right?
Oie: I love that, that you do that and you know you're doing something that I think is very fundamental as parents is lead by example, right? So you're curious about the world and you're talking out loud to your kids about, oh look at over there, you're observing the world yourself and then kind of leading by example for them, because you're sharing your thoughts out loud with them so that they can be curious too. So great job.
Laura: Oh, thank you. So, one thing that I think though that we struggle with that I know I struggle with is having been in the kind of the high achieving academic pressure world for so long, There are times where I catch myself with old thinking, especially like, so right now my oldest daughter's future career, what she says she wants to do is she wants to work at a doggie daycare, that's what she wants to do and there's a part of me that in my head is like that's a job she could have in the summer as a high school student, but that's not like an end career and that's pushing and striving for her and I it's really hard to like hold myself back and be kind of open and accepting and enthusiastic for her for whatever she's saying that her interest is in.
Do you have any tips for parents who are kind of in that place where they know like I am, I know I'm supposed to like not feel those that way, but I do anyway and let's just be honest, we're human and that's all there any advice for us?
Oie: I'm still proud of you for being self aware of that. First of all I do have a couple of tips, one when your daughter gets old enough, I think it's important to share your story that you just told us with her because you know, kind of, I don't wanna say exposing her to your failures, that's a terrible phrase, I just said, you know what I mean?
You know, be vulnerable to your children and show them that this is what it means to be human, you know, everybody has biases and expectations and they pop in our head and they're there for all these reasons that we grew up with, but yet what we value is different and just show her how that is a constant, you know, journey as human beings to kind of lead by your values versus kind of where your head goes on that. So that's the first tip and then yes, I have two more tips.
One thing is once your daughter gets older enough we have like strength finders assessment, that Gallup that we use from the Gallup company. And they have one for teens, they can take it well. They have two of them. They have one for 10 to 14 year olds and then older and then adults. And it identifies your top five strengths. It sounds like one of your top strengths is an achiever. My one, number one strength is achiever, so I know what that means is, you know, always wanting to achieve something new and great and achieve a goal, I love that, that just makes me so happy as your daughter gets older, maybe she has the same strength and so to have her be in line with you as far as strength might be something really cool or she might not have that strength at all and it's important to pay attention to why she wants to be it was that doggy daycare, what's appealing to her about that, right?
And then give her options of how based on her strength, what role she could play in that industry in that world, because as a kid, she only knows, you know this much as far as jobs are concerned, but just expose her to that and understand as a strength, you know, whether she could be a thinker or a helper or organizer or do her creative, you know, doggy day care, you can you can take that concept and really help her understand how can she can apply her natural talents to that world.
Laura: Oh 100%, I think that we will move in that direction over time, with her. I think right now she just wants to play with puppies all day, that's what she thinks she's gonna do. But I mean, she's already like, we have a written contract that when she turns 13, I will help her start a dog walking business. So she definitely has goals in mind for those things. But I think, like, I think the big struggle though is being really vulnerable with ourselves and very aware of what biases we might be carrying, what old stories and narratives we might have, especially as our kids move closer to that college or not decision or that which college decision, it's really, I think important for us to hold ourselves kindly and gently, but shift to our side and let the kids be front and center because it's their life, you know?
Oie: Right. Right. So going back to that college thing, I mean, applying what we just talked about to college again, you know, think about if college is important to you, why is it important? And peel that onion and then have a discussion with your team. You know, I have this expectation or have this desire however you wanna word it, this desire for you to go to college and here are the reasons why, and here's why I think that, you know, when I grew up this was part of my life and because of that, it made me hold onto this value and like I said, they might agree with you or they might think about that differently.
And so that's where I think the college or not college discussion needs to go. And also remember, You know, 20 years ago or even when our parents were going to school, education looks very different now than it did back then. There are so many more options. I was just talking deny about this the other day because it was about okay, depending on where you wanted to go in your life and what you want to do and how you want to make an impact and what do you want to build your expertise on?
You're going to have to get some continued education. And so depending on the expertise you want, it could be college, it could be trade school, it could be, you know, getting a coaching certification or anything like that. I mean there's so many options or it could be simply, you know, reading a bunch of books, I mean books are amazing these days, you can learn anything and everything really.
The internet has so many online courses. I mean there's just so many options and that's what's important is what are they actually good at where and how do they want to make an impact? And then how do they build those skills and what options are available? And college is just one of them? And if college adds value beyond the education like learning life skills, having building that base friends kind of group, I've heard that too, talk out loud with your spouse and your team as a family and talk about if college isn't something really that they're keen on, how could they get that otherwise.
Laura: Because I get the same experience.
Oie: Right, there are many, many different options or you know, come to the realization that while having a strong friend group from college might be important for you, it might not be important for your kid.
Laura: Yeah, but it's hard for parents, I think to release that what's important for us might not be important to our kids, but we have to because it's their lives that they're gonna have to go off and live, you know.
Oie: Right, I have a great example of this nine Irish is talking about earlier this summer, you know, having summer jobs between freshman year and sophomore year because she's just finished her freshman year last year. And one of the things is, you know, my husband when he came home for the summer, he worked like crazy during the summer like 12-hour days. And his goal was to earn enough money to pay for school so that he wouldn't have to necessarily work that much during the school year. So, he would just like work crazy 12 hour shifts. Crazy, crazy, crazy, worked at the American can making type of package, so he's like, you know, Mr. Hardcore Worker and so he was kind of on nine to get you know, a summer job or a couple of summer jobs. And she was very like, I don't know if I want that and then she comes close to us, which I'm glad she did is you know mom and dad, I really value summer to kind of regenerate school, the school year is hard. And so I have to do a lot of thinking and so it's really my time for my mental health to rejuvenate and that's what's important to me. I value kind of getting back to center as far as mental health and refreshing myself and you know as a parent, I value hard work. But I also value, you know, getting rejuvenation in your soul because that's important you need that when you have to go to school and value both. So I'm glad you shared that with us.
Laura: And how beautiful to be 19 and already know that that's a vital part of having a fulfilling and passionate life as the rest. And rejuvenation is absolutely essential part of that, that you can't just work yourself into the ground. What's interesting too is that probably your husband had that same value. He liked to be able to go be in school and be able to focus on his studies and have time to relax while he was in college while he was in classes and so there's it's the value is the same but how it looks and how it's enacted is different, you know, it's interesting. Yeah. You know, when I was in college, my dad really wanted me to work at the library because that's where my sister had worked and she could study and you know, all the time while she was working, you know, and that was like the ideal job and I did not want to do that.
I didn't have to study a lot anyway and I worked at a travel agency and I had the time of my life working at that travel agency, it was so much fun. I got to go on so many free trips and it was awesome and I just had different goals for my time working in college and I think it's so important to get curious with your kids about what their goals are. And I think that, you know, the listeners of this podcast will have been, you know, lots of my listeners have kids who are much younger and they will have been practicing this getting curious what's important to you, what matters to you, what's working for you.
If we, I think if we're practicing this from a very young age with their kids, it's not quite a shock as much of a shock when we, it's time for them to go to college. And they're like, no, I'm not going to college, I'm going to trade school, I want to be a plumber. There's no point for me to go to college right now, you know. Thank you, this was so much fun to talk about this with you. Is there anything else you want to share? I'm, I want to make sure people know where to find you and your amazing daughter who are doing this cool work.
Oie: Yes, you can find us at projectwhoami.com and we have a special free guide for those who maybe have a little bit older kids. So you can go to projectwhoami.com/career and they can find those free guides. And those are customized free guides based on people's natural talents, you know, so there's six categories of that. Doer, helper, thinker, creative organizer and what was the other one? Did I say helper?
There's six of them. Anyway, you can go check that out. We're also on Facebook and Instagram and as I mentioned, we're a family business. Nya is part of the business and she's definitely got the Instagram thing going. So if you are curious about, you know, teenagers perspectives, she shares it all with an Instagram. So there's lots of different stories and reels that you can check out there.
Laura: That's awesome. Well thank you so much for sharing your story and your expertise with us.
Oie: Thank you Laura for having me.
Okay, so thanks for listening today. Remember to subscribe to the podcast and if it was helpful, leave me a review that really helps others find the podcast and join us in this really important work of creating a parenthood that we don't have to escape from and creating a childhood for our kids that they don't have to recover from.
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All right. That's it for me today. I hope that you keep taking really good care of your kids and your family and each other and most importantly of yourself. And just to remember, balance is a verb and you're already doing it. You've got this!