teen girls Archives - Kathleen Hassan

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|

One Mother’s Advice is the Answer to ALL Your Problems

The Monday morning after Mother's Day I crawled into yoga with an emotional hangover. It had been a long trying day and I was ready to put it behind me. “Hey Kat… How was your Mother’s Day?” asked Laurie, my yoga instructor. “Ugh,” was about all I could muster. After my less than enthusiastic response, Laurie moved on to the two women on the mats next to me — a mother and daughter who were taking the class together. “So how was your Mother’s Day?” she inquired. In unison, they both raved about what a wonderful day it was. Four generations had gathered together to celebrate and the grandmother was 92 and still going strong. I turned to both of them, bowed and jokingly said, “Namaste Bitches!” My own mother died when I was sixteen so Mother’s Day has always been a little tough. But this year, my sons were [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-03-07T11:45:46-05:00 May 18th, 2016|

I Got My Daughter Back!

“I got my daughter back!” Those are the very words I heard this week from a client who hired me to coach her daughter that had lost her way and was in crisis. Nothing brings me more joy than to see a girl begin to really understand her own worth and power while helping both the mother and daughter learn how to communicate more effectively while creating a relationship based on trust and mutual respect. I can’t think of a more perfect Mother’s Day gift than this. Today I am honoring and celebrating this most sacred relationship and over the next few months will be sharing some of the strategies I used to coach this amazing turnaround. Just two months ago, I received an email from a distraught mother, begging for help. Her fifteen year old daughter had been sneaking out of the house and getting into all kinds of [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-03-07T11:48:29-05:00 May 8th, 2016|

Go Ahead. Make My Day! The Power of Compliments

Yesterday I was running into Whole Foods to get a Green Dream (sounds so much better than kale smoothie) and noticed a young woman in the parking lot wearing this awesome purple dress and really cool purple shoes. Without a moment's hesitation I said to her, "Girl... you are totally rocking that purple outfit today!" The guy she was with said, "I'm so glad you said that!" I was thinking that probably he had already told her the same thing and she didn't believe him, so I asked, "Why are you so glad I said that?" He went on to explain that she had, just moments earlier, commented to him how much she liked another woman's cardigan sweater and the boyfriend had said to her, "Well, why don't you tell her that?" But she told him she'd feel silly and that the other woman would probably think she was weird [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-03-07T12:19:43-05:00 October 8th, 2014|

Raising Teen Girls in a Social Media World

Social media is everywhere and a huge part of how teens communicate. By the time you finish reading this article, how likely are you to have received a text from your teen? A 2012 Common Sense Media study found that 75 percent of teens have a profile on a social networking site like Facebook; 68 percent text every day and 23 percent use at least two types of social media every day. Those are some pretty significant statistics. But just because it’s common, doesn’t mean it’s good. The same study found that: 57 percent of girls sometimes feel left out after seeing photos of others online 45 percent of girls are concerned about other people posting photos of them 28 percent of girls have edited photos of themselves before posting them Like Dickens’ famous line from A Tale of Two Cities, technology has created both both the best of times [...]

By Kathleen| 2014-05-07T20:11:55-05:00 May 7th, 2014|

Bullied: A Tale of Two Girls

There has never been a better time to be a girl... opportunities abound. Yet, there has also never been a worse time to be a girl as so many young women suffer from the pressure to be perfect and are forever attacking themselves and each other in their pursuit of such unrealistic standards. In this video, I share a story about two girls, both being bullied. Two very different choices and two vastly opposite outcomes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zF9W4I57QfE How to Take Back Your Power Make a decision... that no one has the power to make you feel like you're not good enough. Practice The Ruby Rule: Others will treat you the way you treat yourself. Start a self-love revolution and focus on everything positive about yourself that makes you YOU! Like attracts like, therefore self-love will bring you more and more love. Tell someone... if you're being bullied, threatened [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-03-07T12:28:26-05:00 April 8th, 2014|

Mothers and Daughters: What Happened to My Little Girl?

In my 15 plus years of working with girls and coaching mothers and daughters, I have observed, and have seen it played out over and over again, this deep desire to be acknowledged and to be heard. This morning, while listening to Deepak Chopra's 21 day Meditation Challenge, Oprah, in her introduction to the meditation, gave her #! lesson that she has learned in life. I hit the pause button, grabbed my pen and jotted down her quote (below) because when I heard it, I knew it in my core to be the truth. I started thinking about all the mothers and daughters that I've coached over the years, and felt a nudge from the Universe to write about this deep need to be noticed and appreciated. “If there is one lesson I have to say I’ve learned during my time on this planet it is this: the number one [...]

By Kathleen| 2017-03-07T12:43:00-05:00 August 18th, 2013|

Ask Kat: Can Anybody Hear Me?

I feel like I'm standing in a crowded room, screaming at the top of my lungs, and no one even looks up..but that's only because nobody cares unless you have extraordinary beauty or you're famous:/ Thx for listening I hear you. I have felt this way many times. I think we all have. Even the so-called extraordinary beauties and celebrities pay publicists a ton of money to keep their name and face out there. It's a noisy world filled with so many people posting and tweeting and desperately trying to be "somebody" and be the next big thing. Our culture and society places so much value on celebrity and fame. However, we can focus on that and feel miserable - OR - we can turn our attention inward and get our sense of self from the Source of all love and power. That is the truth and when you take [...]

By Kathleen| 2013-08-07T08:41:55-05:00 August 7th, 2013|