Life Skills Archives - Kathleen Hassan

Healing Teen Anxiety: 5 Ways to Break Free

There's an anxiety epidemic in our culture today and it's affecting millions of teens, especially girls. Nearly 32 percent of adolescents in the United States have an anxiety disorder, according to survey data reported by the National Institute of Mental Health. Society's solution is often prescribed medication to alleviate the symptoms, but like a bandaid on cancer, it only masks and rarely eradicates the problem. In order to heal it, we have to fully understand it and become aware of the insidiousness of this disease. Make no mistake about it—this is indeed a disease, as in, not being "at ease," and it's literally killing our kids. According the CDC (Center for Disease Control), suicide rates are up 30% since 2000. 23% of high school girls seriously considered attempting suicide in the past year (YRBS - Youth Risk Behavior Survey). Just last year alone, four of my teen girl coaching clients [...]

By Kathleen| 2021-06-07T13:35:42-05:00 April 3rd, 2019|

What Are You Waiting For?

What are you waiting for? Are you waiting for your big break? A book deal? A financial breakthrough? A promotion? Your house to sell? The love of your life to come and sweep you off your feet? Your daughter to respect you? For her to love and accept herself? To lose twenty pounds? For your roots to grow out? To get all your ducks in a row? The legendary Tom Petty sang, “And the waiting is the hardest part.” No one likes to wait. We live in a world of instant gratification and quick fixes. In today’s society, entitlement has replaced empowerment and as a result, our kids are suffering with depression and anxiety. We need to teach them persistence and resiliency skills, how to stop looking to everyone else for their sense of self-worth and how to stop being so damn afraid to fail. There’s a worship song we sing at [...]

By Kathleen| 2018-05-01T01:30:25-05:00 May 1st, 2018|

Need help? Hire a Girl!

My business naturally yields itself to working with girls. Let’s face it, my business is girls! But even if you’re not specifically in the female empowering biz, hiring a girl might be the best thing you could do for your company, and will probably be the best thing that could happen to a girl too. This past summer, I hired an intern for some special projects, one of which was getting organized and clearing out all old files from my desk and computer. While transferring files onto a external memory drive, I came across a series of audio files that I had created years ago while mentoring a group of girls at GirlTalk Radio, a station run by girls in Boston. All the girls had cool DJ names and they dubbed me “DJ Kat.” I created twenty short audio clips/confidence tips that they could play regularly on air as girl empowerment [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-12-24T14:47:04-05:00 December 24th, 2017|

Stand Beside Her

I'm so honored to be a national partner in the Stand Beside Her movement, which encourages girls to support one another and help each other succeed. We were asked to create a video of our own #StandBesideHer story and here's mine. <https://youtu.be/rEnxYcaIdNA> Last week I spoke at an 8th Grade Girls Summit and their brochure had a picture of a mountain and I used that theme throughout my talk to demonstrate the journey from where you are to where you want to be and most importantly, it's not the goal but what it will make of you to achieve it. In other words - it's the climb. During my talk I referenced a Hindu Proverb that says, Help thy brother's across and LO! thine own has reached the shore. I told the girls that we need to change that up and say this instead: Help thy sister up [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-11-03T15:21:39-05:00 November 3rd, 2017|

You Are Here! But Where Do You Want to Be?

You are here! You know that map at the mall? The one you look at when you're trying to find Forever 21? In order to get there you have to know where you're coming from. It's the same thing in life. You can't get where you're going until you know the starting point. Last week was the final session of my brand new pilot program called Buried Treasure: A Girl's Guide to Discovering Inner Strength and Confidence. It's a social emotional curriculum that helps girls deal with their feelings and relationships more effectively so they can navigate the onslaught of pop culture that constantly sets them up for feeling like they're not good enough. This particular program was a six-week after school program, but will be adapted for a weekend retreat experience as well. The Buried Treasure™ curriculum was developed to help girls explore their place in the world, to [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-06-05T15:50:09-05:00 June 5th, 2017|

Perfectly Imperfect: Adele Models the Art of the Do Over

Thank you Adele! Last night during the Grammys, in front of millions of viewers, Adele modeled the art of the do over to perfection. She was singing a tribute to George Michael and a few bars into her rendition of Fast Love, she stopped and said, "I'm sorry, I can't mess this up for him. Can we start over?" A collective gasp shot round the world. Then, as if realizing what she'd just done, she dropped an undeniable f-bomb. You might wonder, what's so perfect about that? Often times our greatest failures become our greatest life lessons, but try telling that to a teenage girl who is obsessed with perfection and will do just about anything to achieve that. There's an anxiety epidemic in our world today as our girls are bombarded with air-brushed images and unrealistic standards of beauty and perfection. To witness a pop culture icon publicly screwing [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-03-07T10:59:57-05:00 February 14th, 2017|

One More Trip to the Mall is Not Going to Solve Your Daughter’s Self-Esteem Problem

“The only time my daughter wants to hang out with me is when it involves spending money and most often that means another trip to the mall.” Sound familiar? I've heard this over and over again from so many moms who keep caving in and resorting to the only strategy that seems to work. But does it really? There’s even a book, dedicated to beleaguered parents of teens called, “Get Out of My Life, but First Could You Drive Me & Cheryl to the Mall.!” It may sound amusingly tongue in cheek, but the reality is that this is an all too familiar scenario for most mothers of teen girls. One mother, who’s daughter suffers from body anxiety and who was having full blown panic attacks each morning as she was getting dressed for school, readily admitted, “My current solution of ‘let’s go shopping’ has become an exhausting, monotonous, vicious [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-03-07T11:34:37-05:00 October 3rd, 2016|

Let’s Hear It for the Girls! Favorite Moments from the #StateofWomen Summit

Last week I was honored to attend the United State of Women Summit in Washington, DC. Five thousand women gathered in our nation’s capital to celebrate the progress made throughout the Obama administration to improve the lives of women and girls here and around the world, and showcase innovative solutions to the obstacles women and girls still face. The invitation-only guest list was a who’s who of activists, academics, journalists, public officials and business leaders who are all change-makers dedicated to building a better world. I cannot tell you how grateful and humbled I was to be among them. I was invited to attend the Summit by Jess Weiner, CEO of Talk to Jess, a consulting and strategy firm that acts as a thought partner for companies who seek to change their messaging toward women and girls. Jess moderated a panel on Revolutionizing Gender Norms with Amy Poehler and Juliana Chugg, EVP [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-03-07T11:39:41-05:00 June 22nd, 2016|

Want Peace? Think on such things.

My son got married last weekend and gave me the greatest honor by asking me to do the blessing and say grace over the meal at the reception. The moment he asked, I started to think about what I wanted to say and immediately thought about my favorite bible verse; Philippians 4.8. I wanted these words to reflect all that was in my heart and be a blessing to everyone there as well. But as with most things that begin with “I want”, it’s so easy to get caught up in self-will and lose sight of God’s will. And so, I paused and prayed. I wrote in my journal and asked that I might be a channel for God’s love and that he give me the right words to say. I turned the page and there on the very next page, was Philippians 4.8! Whatever is true, whatever is noble, [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-03-07T11:51:56-05:00 November 17th, 2015|

Perfectly Imperfect: Five Ways to Kick Perfectionism to the Curb

Have you ever felt like you just weren’t good enough? Most of us have felt that way at one time or another. But for many teen girls, this feeling is a chronic ache and is being perpetuated by a culture that celebrates the illusion of perfection. Beyoncé sings, "perfection is a disease of a nation" and tells us pretty hurts, yet how many girls are killing themselves to be just like her? Red carpet glamor and excessive photoshopping makes girls, and women alike, strive to be perfect and contributes to the ingrained belief that we are not good enough - just the way we are. This past spring I spoke at the Marin County Teen Girl Conference. Thirty teen girl ambassadors were planning the conference, selecting the speakers and choosing the topics. They polled girls in their schools and the #1 requested topic was how to deal with the stress of [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-03-07T12:17:22-05:00 October 13th, 2014|