Building Resilience To Bullying with Izzy Kalman

In this episode, Izzy Kalman discussed bullying, what does not work to stop bullying, and how to help your child respond to bullying more effectively.

Israel “Izzy” Kalman, MS, has been a school psychologist and psychotherapist since 1978. He has developed a quick, fun and powerful system for teaching people how to solve interpersonal problems, including bullying, without anyone’s help and without getting anyone in trouble. He is director of Bullies to Buddies, Inc., creator of the Bullies to Buddies Golden Rule System, and author of a book for youth called Bullies to Buddies: How to Turn Your Enemies into Friends, as well as a number of other publications and video programs for kids and adults. He is the lead author of the Be Strong Resilience Program. Izzy writes a Psychology Today blog called Resilience to Bullying, and has been the world’s foremost critic of the anti-bullying movement, warning since the Columbine massacre that the “war against bullying” will backfire. History has been confirming his predictions.

More than 50,000 mental health professionals and educators have attended Izzy’s full day seminars on bullying and anger control. His articles have appeared in newspapers, magazines and journals, and he has presented at many professional conferences. Izzy is a sought-after expert on bullying for radio and TV shows. His work has been featured in The New York Times, Good Morning America and TEDx 

https://www.izzykalman.com/

My store page:

https://www.izzykalman.com/shop

My Psychology Today blog, Resilience to Bullying:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/resilience-bullying

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/15/magazine/bullying-teenagers-gilbert-goons-gang.html

Cover art by Charlotte Feldman

Please note that while I am a pediatrician, I am not your child's pediatrician. This podcast is for informational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. For any medical concerns or decisions, please reach out to your child’s health care professional.

Transcript

0:06

Welcome to Kids Matter. I'm Dr. Elisa Minkin. As a pediatrician, mom and grandma, I understand how challenging it can be to help our kids grow into their best selves. We are so much more powerful together. Here I will be sharing the knowledge and wisdom of a wide range of people who understand and care deeply about children. I'm hoping for your input as well because kids really do matter. They are our future.

Alisa Minkin 0:35

Israel, Izzy Common. MS has been a school psychologist and psychotherapist since 1978. He has developed a quick, fun, and powerful system for teaching people how to solve interpersonal problems, including bullying. Without anyone's help and without getting anyone in trouble, he is Director of Bullies to Buddies Incorporated, creator of the Bullies to Buddies Golden Rule System, and author of a book for youth called Bullies to Buddies, how to Turn Your Enemies Into Friends, as well as a number of other publications and video programs for kids and adults. He is the lead author of the Be Strong Resilience Program. Izzy writes a Psychology Today blog called Resilience to Bullying with a whole bunch of posts I might add. I'm still catching up. They're amazing and has been the world's foremost critic of the anti-bullying movement warning since the Columbine Massacre, 1999, that the war against bullying will backfire. History has been confirming his predictions. More than 50,000 mental health professionals and educators have attended Izzy's full day seminars on bullying and anger control. His articles have appeared in newspapers, magazines, and journals, and he has presented at many professional conferences. Izzy is a sought after expert on bullying for radio and TV shows. His work has been featured in the New York Times. Good Morning America and TEDx. I did watch your TED Talk. It was awesome. So thank you so, so much for joining me today. Izzy, welcome to the show.

Izzy 2:13

Thank you so much for inviting me.

Alisa Minkin 2:18

I've been waiting for this. I'm really excited. I've been reading about this ever since, but we have to start from scratch. Let's start with just please a definition of bullying basics.

Izzy 2:27

There is a scientific definition of bullying that's used by all the researchers. It's used by all anti-bullying laws and programs, and it happens to be a, a very unuseful definition that causes more problems than it solves. I won't go into the problems behind it, bullying is. When somebody is intentionally hurting somebody or, you know, causing them pain. It has to be intentional. That's the first part. The second part is there has to be an imbalance of power. And, you know, of course the bully is a stronger one. And the third element is that it has to be repetitive. a what? A one time act of aggression is not bullying. But if it's twice or more, then it becomes bullying.

Alisa Minkin 3:21

That's a great succinct definition and I also want to know where it happens and is. Especially how this has changed over time.'cause you've been in the field for a long time.

Izzy 3:29

But before I get into that, I want to give, I consider the only youthful definition of bullying,

Alisa Minkin 3:39

Okay.

Izzy 3:40

It's when you're being picked on over and over again by the same person or people you don't like you, you're getting upset, but they keep on doing it to you. That's the situation of every victim of bullying. They're being picked on every single day by one or more people, and it makes you absolutely mis miserable. So,

Alisa Minkin 4:02

Right. That would've decided call the real life definition. Right.

Izzy 4:05

And, and that's what really schools use. The first one, one, let's say we're kids in school and I, now you called me a bad name. So I tell the teacher on you, and the teacher sends you to the principal or whoever is responsible for dealing with bullying. Do you think they're going to check to see if you fit those three categories? They have to check that you're doing this intentionally. say, it's not intentional, then am I the, you know, or is, is the principal going to say, okay, it's not bullying because it's not intentional? No, there's still a problem. will they check to see that it's, there's an, an balance of power that you're stronger than, than the victim. How do they assess whether you're stronger than the victim? Is it physical? Is it mental? And if it's, it's, it's a one time event? Is the principal going to say, oh, it only happened once. You know, leave, you know, go away. I, I can't help you. But did I present it as though the victim goes to the principal or no, the bully goes to the principal. Yeah. So the principal will ask, you will say, oh, it only happened once. You know, I, you know, it's no problem. You can leave. The principal has to do something about it. if I tell you once, give me your lunch money, or I'm gonna beat you up after school, that's not bullying. if I insult you twice, that is bullying because it's repetitive. You know, the, the whole definition is, is worthless. Nobody uses it, but they really check is the kid picked on over and over again. And if so,

Alisa Minkin 5:44

Right

Izzy 5:44

the alleged bully gets labeled a bully. Okay. Now the, the

Alisa Minkin 5:48

right.

Izzy 5:49

was, how it has changed is that.

Alisa Minkin 5:52

Well, where does it take place and how that has changed over time.

Izzy 5:58

Well before there was the internet and cell phones, it took place pretty much in school or on the way home from school. Sometimes in the neighborhood, you know, it couldn't happen in the neighborhood. but typically it's in school and since you have cell phones and internet, it can happen 24 7 anywhere. So that's made things, you know, bullying more common. And there's a debate whether, which is worse being bullied in cyberspace or being bullied in person. I think in general, being bullied in person is worse.

Alisa Minkin 6:35

I think the threshold, you know, for kids to bully on, on the internet may be lower though, because you are anonymous potentially,

Izzy 6:43

You mean the person.

Alisa Minkin 6:44

and you're not in, you're not in person. So you can say, or maybe you're not anonymous, but you can, it's, I think it's easier to say things when you're not facing the person.

Izzy 6:52

it's

Alisa Minkin 6:52

I think we find that in general that the internet is a very hostile place for that reason,

Izzy 6:56

things being said tend to be worse than the things people will say to each each other in person. the problem I think is more, not always, I mean, sometimes the cyber bullying can, you know, make somebody absolutely miserable. most of the kids that I meet with, they're telling me they're being picked on in school, you know, one-to-one. It's not, sometimes it's over cell phones or internet, but almost everybody complains that they're being picked on in real life, you know, face-to-face. It's

Alisa Minkin 7:29

and it's not either or.

Izzy 7:30

either or. But you asked me where it happened, so I

Alisa Minkin 7:34

Right.

Izzy 7:35

you know, where it happens. But it can happen any place, you know, any place that people can interact, is a situation in which bullying can develop

Alisa Minkin 7:46

What are the typical targets of bullies?

Izzy 7:48

a typical, a typical target is somebody who's obviously low in self confidence, awkward something obviously different about them, so they get, you know, picked on. But it's not necessarily, so sometimes it's the, the best looking, most talented, smartest kid in the class that gets a bullied. What it, what it really boils down to is whether the, the child gets upset when they're being picked on. If you get upset,

Alisa Minkin 8:21

It is. We're not gonna do profiling here. It's really all about the reaction, and it could be anyone.

Izzy 8:24

it can happen to anyone. It's more likely to happen to somebody who is more sensitive and likely to get upset easily. First of all, they're they're an easier target. They look like somebody who's probably going to get upset, it doesn't take long to find out. If they get upset, they get upset. Oh, you know, you have fun. You keep on doing it. So it really can happen. It can happen to anybody. And, and the truth is another thing I wanna say the bigger the group is, the lower the percentage of people being bullied will be like, let's say if we're a class of 30 students. So, so there might be one or two or maybe three victims of bullying, you know, kids who are being picked on every day. Maybe more likely one or two, so that's maybe 10% of kids or or lower, are being bullied. If it's a class of 10 children, you'll still have the same one or two kids being picked on. But then instead of it being 10% or less, it's now 20 or 30% because they're a smaller amount of kids. the place where you have the highest percentage of victims of bullying is in the family. family is a small group, and most families parents have one child that's become an expert at driving them crazy. They disobey them, they're disrespectful. They, they drive them crazy and the parents feel bullied by the child. That child, from his point of view as being bullied by the parents, the parents are yelling at them or getting angry at them, punishing them all the time. So each one feels like they're a victim of the other one. And siblings will usually pick on each other regularly. So if there are two kids in, in the family, there's a very good chance that those kids will be picking on each other or one picks on the other. So it's close to a hundred percent of people in the family that are being bullied.

Alisa Minkin 10:26

We're, we're not calling all picking on each other being bullied. Right. That's just sibling rivalry. That's not the same thing as being bullied. No.

Izzy 10:33

experts calls sibling rivalry. Bullying also, if it,

Alisa Minkin 10:37

Really.

Izzy 10:38

it's happening, yeah.

Alisa Minkin 10:41

Because that makes me wonder about what's normal kid stuff and what's a problem.

Izzy 10:46

Picking on each other is normal. But, but you know, the thing is, we are focusing on kids and we think the problem is kids. And we, you know, I often hear it said that adults wouldn't be allowed to get away with doing what kids do to each other. Know kids should also not be mean to each other. don't know what they're talking about.

Alisa Minkin 11:11

I'm laughing.

Izzy 11:11

Look, look at social media, adults look at

Alisa Minkin 11:15

Right,

Izzy 11:15

Everybody's picking on each other. Everybody's putting, everybody's putting Trump down. Everybody's putting their, the other opponent down. There are so much hostility among adults. You know, it, it's incredible regarding the Israel and and Palestine issue. Everybody's at,

Alisa Minkin 11:32

right.

Izzy 11:32

other's throats. Look how mean people are to each other.

Alisa Minkin 11:37

How do we expect the school to solve? This is my question, but we're gonna get there later. We're gonna get to what the school should thinks they should do and what the, you know, standard advice is. But I first wanna go one more line of questioning,

Izzy 11:49

Before we get to that,

Alisa Minkin 11:50

which is, yeah.

Izzy 11:52

to that, there's one more thing I want to say about the definition of bullying. What's being called bullying today is not what was called bullying until about 30 years ago, or 25 years ago. It used to be bullying is, give me your lunch money, or I'm gonna beat you up after school. Or a big kid you know, beating up a, a smaller kid just for the fun of it. Now that's bullying. It. But that's extortion. These are criminal behaviors. It's extortion, it's assault and battery today. Anything that can upset anybody is called bullying. Name, calling rumors, social exclusion. Like, you know, I don't wanna be a friend that's bullying you. Gestures like eye eyerolling. There are actually state laws that specifically mention eyerolling as a form of bullying, as long as it upsets you, and it's happening again and again. It's bullying. And the school has to make all of this stuff. They have to guarantee that no student is upset by another kid.

Alisa Minkin 13:00

No tolerance zone.

Izzy 13:01

Yeah, no, no tolerance for bullying. And,

Alisa Minkin 13:05

we, we have to get to that in a minute. I, yeah.

Izzy 13:07

go ahead.

Alisa Minkin 13:09

Yeah. I just wanna know more about the bullies themselves. What do we know about the bullies?

Izzy 13:14

They're human.

Alisa Minkin 13:15

What are they like? Okay.

Izzy 13:16

have two legs from, in most cases, two arms, eyes, a nose, you know, a face like us. You know, the thing is, everybody thinks the bully is the other person. It's not the other person. It's us. And, and I demonstrate this all the time, you want, I, I hope we'll have time for me to do a role play with you, and we'll see who the,

Alisa Minkin 13:39

Oh yeah, we have to do that.

Izzy 13:41

Nobody thinks they're a bully. And very often, you know, the, the bully the victims is, or the people who feel like bullies and victims, they're angry at each other. Whenever two people are angry with each other, each one feels like they're the victim, and the other one is the bully. One way have this definition of, of bullying and, and bullying, but there's no definition of a victim. There's no scientific definition of a victim. You know, a victim, of course, is the one who's being picked on, but there's no definition of what his characters like and what his intentions are. It's not like a three part definition, like the scientific definition of, of bully. no definition of victim. We talk about bullies and victims. We should know who a victim is. are three simple signs by which you can be certain that a person feels like a victim. One of them is anger. The other one is hatred. And the third is revenge. When do we, when does a person get angry? only get angry when they're victimized. We don't get angry at people when they make us feel good or do things our way. We only get at angry at people when they do things against us. an angry person, by definition, feels like a victim. Hatred. do we hate somebody? When we feel victimized by them. don't hate people who make us feel good and do things our way. We only hate people who do things against us. We hate our boss because he's making us miserable. We, we only get angry at when we feel victimized. And revenge. Who commits revenge? A victim, So then you carry out revenge. So revenge by definition is what a victim does, but the bullying experts call anger hatred, and revenge bullying. They take the behaviors and feelings of victims, and they attribute it to bullies. It's invalid.

Alisa Minkin 15:44

Wow.

Izzy 15:45

But the reason we do this is because the, even though bullying is considered a field of psychology the very approach to bullying is a law enforcement approach, a legal one. In the law enforcement approach, there's a crime you know, a criminal and a victim. The criminal is guilty and the victim is innocent. So in bullying, there's a bully who's the guilty one, and there's a victim who's the innocent one who supposedly has nothing to do with what, what's happening to them. But that's not psychology. In psychology when two people are upset with each other, each one feels like they're the victim, and the other one is the bully. It's not a, a legal approach, a scientific approach, reali. It has to look at how each one thinks and feels, and, and in, in most bullying relationships the victim is getting angry at the, the so-called bully. So the bully feels victimized by the victim because the victim is angry at them. You know, they're hostile to them. And the number one, the worst way that kids will victimize their bullies is buying a form and gun them to the school. Now they're in trouble. That's the worst thing you could do to somebody, is to try to get them in trouble with the authorities. kids know this, that's why they don't wanna tell, they don't wanna be known as, as a as a, what's the word?

Alisa Minkin 17:14

Snitch. A snitch.

Izzy 17:15

A snitch. Yes,

Alisa Minkin 17:16

A snitch, yeah.

Izzy 17:18

get stitches and end up in ditches. but the adults don't know this. had sent me this article from the Times a we,

Alisa Minkin 17:26

Yes. Wait, I, I do wanna go there, but before I go there, I wanted to take a little step back. All right. I wanna take a little step back and I wanna go to Columbine 1999, because I mentioned that in the intro, and you talk about that all the time, how that changed the landscape of how schools are expected to deal with bullying. So I want you to just go back there and give us that little history, please.

Izzy 17:47

You know, the war against the bullying, especially in schools, has been going gone for so long that a lot of people think it's been going on forever. No, it hasn't been gone, go, gone forever. The truth is that bullying has always been considered a problem. I even saw a book from I think it was 1901, no more than a hundred years ago, talking about bullying, you know, being a problem in school. So it's always been there. The event that made the United States and the rest of the world go on a campaign to make schools free of bullying was the Columbine shooting of April 20th, 1999.'Cause what happened was these two students in Columbine High School in Colorado decided that they're going to destroy their school. They planted bombs, which fortunately didn't go off, but they came with guns. They killed 12 students, a teacher. They injured 24 people. were dead by the end. And they had in advance prepared videos explaining why they're going to do this. they presented themselves as victims of bullying. Now your kids are shooting us like garbage. This is why we're going to do this. But even before Columbine, there had been a series of school shootings in the United States and researchers found that just about all of these school shooters are victims of bullying. And it's not hard to understand why. If you are being picked on every day by your fellow students, you want revenge. You're full of anger and hate you, you want revenge. And it was known for even longer that many kids who take their own lives do it because they can't stand being bullied anymore. So it's been recognized as a problem for a long time. But the Columbine shooting was so horrific that the world said, my God, look what kids are doing victims of bullying us, shooting up their schools, we have to make it stop. And so that's really what launched a massive campaign to get rid of bullying from schools and from a society in general.

Alisa Minkin 19:58

So what are they doing? Because it doesn't look like we're getting any progress, right? I mean, it doesn't look like the rate of school shootings or, or suicides or any of these things are going down.

Izzy 20:08

if anything, they're going up because

Alisa Minkin 20:12

correct.

Izzy 20:12

the scientific way that they're defining the bullying problem is misguided. It's a law enforcement approach. They're treating bullying like a crime that's not to be tolerated. The bully is the guilty one. We have to apprehend the bully and punish or rebuild, take the bully. And the victim is innocent, has nothing to do with what's happening to them to understand how society and schools should deal with acts of aggression because they're not all the same. have, have made two categories of aggression. didn't invent this. You know, this I think, is known in the legal world. there's, there are acts of aggression that caused objective harm. And there are acts of aggression that caused subjective harm. An act of aggression that caused a subjective harm means if you did it to me and I got hurt, you are the one who hurt me. If you hit me with sticks and stones and I get hurt, hurt me? hurt me. If you didn't throw me the sticks and stones, I wouldn't get hurt. Acts that cause objective harm, things like assault and battery rape murder, vandalism, theft. These are things that are treated like crimes legitimately because are hurting me. So you have to be punished. You have to make restitution to me. Acts that cause subjective harm means if you do it to me and I get hurt, I really hurt myself. Meaning my feelings were hurt. And the example is an insult. Elisa, if you call me an idiot and I get upset, what percentage it depend on me If I get upset by your calling me an idiot?

Alisa Minkin 22:08

Your reaction is gonna drive what I do from there on,

Izzy 22:10

percent? No, but what, what percentage, does my pain have? Okay. Let, let me think. If you call me an idiot and I get upset, what percentage does it depend on me? If I'm going to get upset by the insult,

Alisa Minkin 22:30

A hundred percent.

Izzy 22:30

percent, it means that it's up to me if I get hurt. It's not up to you. If I get hurt, if you insult me and I get hurt, I hurt myself. I didn't have to get hurt. I could have ignored it. I could have made a joke about it, but if I get hurt, I did it to myself. My feelings are hurt. You can't treat them the same. If, if you treat acts that cause collective harm, the same as acts that cause objective harm, meaning you treat it like a crime, end up having more subjective harm and even more objective harm. let's say insulted me, I get you sent, get sent to the principal's office. Are you going to like me for having gotten you sent to the principal's office? You're going to be angry at me. You'll be angry at me. Are you gonna wanna be nice to me afterwards?

Alisa Minkin 23:20

Now.

Izzy 23:21

insult me again and, and tell everybody I'm a snitch and they shouldn't talk to me. So

Alisa Minkin 23:28

I'm, I'm gonna push, wait, I'm gonna push back here. So, sorry. I wanna push back at this moment in time because we can say, this is where they say it's victim blaming, victim shaming, like, not everybody's able to control. I mean, by every definition, victims are often the most vulnerable to the own reactions, not having control over them. It's easy to say it's on you to control your reaction, but can you,

Izzy 23:51

Okay, because people think like that. They think the solution must be to punish or rehabilitate the bully. So look, look what happens. You insulted me, which caused me subjective harm. Now you get sent to the principal's office, it makes, it makes you more angry at me. You're gonna wanna get back at me, so you'll insult me again. Just listen. Hear me out. I So after you send to the principal's office, you wanna hurt my feelings even more. You're going to insult me worse and turn other kids against me. So there's an increase in subjective harm. You're doing it more to me, but now you might wanna beat me up. Now you're gonna beat me after, after

Alisa Minkin 24:32

Right.

Izzy 24:33

So if we treat it like a crime, you are calling me an idiot like a crime. It makes everything worse. If you look at if.

Alisa Minkin 24:41

But I'm saying that there really is a problem. There really is a problem. The question is what is the solution? What, I agree with you that the proposed solutions, and we should go through them a little bit, and maybe just the founder of the. Main program that, you know, a lot of people follow and the evidence behind it, I think I would wanna go there, but I, I do have concerns that it's, it's easier to say, don't react or, you know, than it is to actually do it. And more so for some kids than others.

Izzy 25:07

I don't tell kids not to react. I teach them how to solve the problem, and I would be happy to demonstrate here how I do it.

Alisa Minkin 25:16

Okay. So let's do it now. Let's go for it. I'm ready.

Izzy 25:19

when I work with a child or an adult, I do the very same procedure with adults because people come to me because of relationship problems. Somebody's treating them badly. That's the main reason. That's why people come to me. Of course, there are other kinds of problems that aren't relationship problems, but that, yeah, today I, for years, I've only been working with relationship problems. Everybody who comes to me is that, is because they don't like the way somebody is treating them, and they don't understand why the person keeps on being mean to them. So I do this procedure with everybody. let's say you come to me for help. You're being picked on by kids in school. So I'll spend, you know, several minutes asking you about the problem. Who does it to you? How often, how do they pick on you? When did the problem start? After I know the problem. I ask you, do you want the kids to stop doing this to you? Of course. I tell you, I'm gonna play a game with you that's going to teach you why the kids keep on picking on you and how to make them stop. Now, what I'm doing here is a shortened version of what I do. I also in general, explain to the children how the golden rule works before I do this. But I'll, I'll skip that for now. And you, your job in this game, Melissa, is to insult me. job is to stop you, don't let me stop you because if I stop you, I win and you lose. Do not worry about hurting my feelings. It's make believe. I want you to do a good job. If you don't insult me well, I'm going to be disappointed Also. Don't work hard, don't talk without, don't

Alisa Minkin 26:58

Pressure.

Izzy 26:58

without stopping. You'll get worn out. Make it like a conversation, giving me a chance to answer you. Go ahead Elisa.

Alisa Minkin 27:07

Okay. That's really hard. I need help.

Izzy 27:10

he,

Alisa Minkin 27:10

I'm not good at this. Okay. Izzy, you're an idiot.

Izzy 27:14

No, I'm not.

Alisa Minkin 27:17

Yes you are.

Izzy 27:18

I'm smart.

Alisa Minkin 27:20

You don't anything.

Izzy 27:21

That's not true. I'm, I'm very smart.

Alisa Minkin 27:25

You are the lowest of the low. You are not smart at all. What were you thinking?

Izzy 27:29

all. Now you, you apologize to me.

Alisa Minkin 27:33

No way.

Izzy 27:33

What do you mean? No way? You have no right to talk to me like

Alisa Minkin 27:36

Because you're stupid.

Izzy 27:37

I am not stupid. I'm smart.

Alisa Minkin 27:40

I told you, you are the bottom of the class right now.

Izzy 27:43

not.

Alisa Minkin 27:45

You just think you're smart. You're really dumb.

Izzy 27:47

knows me well, knows that I'm smart.

Alisa Minkin 27:51

Nope. Super dumb.

Izzy 27:52

I am not

Alisa Minkin 27:53

I'm not buying that.

Izzy 27:54

Listen, I'm, I'm worried. You better stop or you're gonna be sorry.

Alisa Minkin 27:59

I'm not gonna be sorry at all. I'm having fun.

Izzy 28:00

gonna have fun much longer.

Alisa Minkin 28:03

Why?

Izzy 28:04

Wait a

Alisa Minkin 28:04

Who cares?

Izzy 28:05

I know karate,

Alisa Minkin 28:07

Yeah. I believe that. Sure. You're probably the bottom of your karate class too.

Izzy 28:12

true. You call me idiot again. You, you are gonna see what happens to you.

Alisa Minkin 28:16

Idiot, idiot, idiot, idiot.

Izzy 28:18

it right now. Stop laughing. It's not funny.

Alisa Minkin 28:21

No way. Yes, it's

Izzy 28:22

not.

Alisa Minkin 28:23

it's hilarious.

Izzy 28:25

idiot. That's funny. It's not funny.

Alisa Minkin 28:28

Cry baby. Cry baby.

Izzy 28:29

not a cry baby. You're gonna be crying soon when this goes through your nose.

Alisa Minkin 28:34

No, you're the one crying.

Izzy 28:36

your mouth. Stop it already.

Alisa Minkin 28:39

No way.

Izzy 28:40

sorry. This is your last Yes. You stop.

Alisa Minkin 28:41

Dumb. Dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb.

Izzy 28:42

it already. Okay. Good job. That was wonderful.

Alisa Minkin 28:46

That was fun.

Izzy 28:47

I give up.

Alisa Minkin 28:48

I was never a bully. I had to practice

Izzy 28:50

Was it hard to insult me or

Alisa Minkin 28:52

now.

Izzy 28:53

So if you want to insult me, can I force you to stop?

Alisa Minkin 28:57

Nope.

Izzy 28:57

only words, it's your mouth and brain.

Alisa Minkin 28:59

Right.

Izzy 29:00

you want to insult me, you're going to insult me. You did a super job.

Alisa Minkin 29:03

It is more fun when you, when you act like that.

Izzy 29:05

super job. I wish you all of my you know, people I role play with did such, will do such a wonderful job. We're gonna play the

Alisa Minkin 29:13

I try to be a good student.

Izzy 29:14

same game again.

Alisa Minkin 29:15

You

Izzy 29:15

You have to insult me and don't let me stop you.

Alisa Minkin 29:21

are so dumb.

Izzy 29:22

that what you think?

Alisa Minkin 29:25

Yeah, you're really dumb.

Izzy 29:26

Because I happen to think you're smart.

Alisa Minkin 29:29

Yeah. I'm smart and you're dumb.

Izzy 29:31

You think I'm dumb?

Alisa Minkin 29:33

Yes, I do. I think you're really dumb.

Izzy 29:35

wanna think that I can't stop you,

Alisa Minkin 29:38

I, I am a hundred percent convinced of that. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Izzy 29:41

can think that if you want, you can say it if you want.

Alisa Minkin 29:46

Yep. I am dumb, dumb, dumb. This isn't as much fun. You're right.

Izzy 29:49

you're giving up.

Alisa Minkin 29:52

I give up.

Izzy 29:52

played the game two times,

Alisa Minkin 29:54

It's not as much fun,

Izzy 29:56

but,

Alisa Minkin 29:56

but, but can I say something though,

Izzy 29:58

I, I will, I first want to show you how I teach kids why they're being picked

Alisa Minkin 30:04

right,

Izzy 30:04

take more questions.'cause that questions now people are going to miss much of the point of what I'm doing here.

Alisa Minkin 30:12

right.

Izzy 30:12

played the game two times. Which time was more fun?

Alisa Minkin 30:16

The first one,

Izzy 30:17

of fun. Was the second time was frustrating you? We stopped almost immediately. Who won the game the first time?

Alisa Minkin 30:25

me,

Izzy 30:26

second time?

Alisa Minkin 30:27

you.

Izzy 30:28

Which one of us looked like the bigger idiot the first time? Did I look like a little idiot or a big one? A

Alisa Minkin 30:37

Pretty big.

Izzy 30:38

idiot. Which one of

Alisa Minkin 30:39

Yeah.

Izzy 30:39

like the

Alisa Minkin 30:40

Sorry

Izzy 30:40

idiot the second time? Yeah. Didn't you feel like an idiot the second time?

Alisa Minkin 30:46

It didn't feel so good. No,

Izzy 30:49

which time did I work? Harder?

Alisa Minkin 30:53

the first time

Izzy 30:54

and screaming. My blood pressure's going up. The second time I was completely relaxed. I let you say whatever you want. I'm always nice back to you. Easiest thing in the world. The first time was I treated you like a friend or an enemy

Alisa Minkin 31:08

an enemy,

Izzy 31:09

time, like a friend or an enemy.

Alisa Minkin 31:14

I wasn't paying attention. It was quite hard.

Izzy 31:15

happen to thi

Alisa Minkin 31:16

I guess a friend, I don't know.

Izzy 31:18

you are smart. Now, if you wanna call me an idiot, I can't stop you. If you wanna say it's okay, I was completely

Alisa Minkin 31:25

It's like poking a hole in a balloon. Yeah, it's like, it's very deflating.

Izzy 31:29

that's what I was doing. But I was treating you like a friend. That is the real difference. The first time I treated you like you're my enemy for insulting me the second time like you're my friend, and which way you're more likely to being my friend.

Alisa Minkin 31:44

Second.

Izzy 31:45

way, there's no way you're gonna wanna be my friend because I look

Alisa Minkin 31:47

Right,

Izzy 31:48

idiot and I'm hostile towards you Now, when you were insulting me the first time and I was getting angry, who was making me angry?

Alisa Minkin 31:56

You were,

Izzy 31:58

Very good. But what did it look like?

Alisa Minkin 32:01

it looked like I was,

Izzy 32:02

looked like you were making

Alisa Minkin 32:03

but it was your reaction.

Izzy 32:04

Yeah. But it looked like you were making me angry. And almost everybody I do this with tells me that they made me angry. And I'm sure the, the watchers were sure that you were making me angry. But you're right. I was doing it to myself. I had you insult me two times. The first time I got angry, the second time I didn't. do you have a remote control to my brain and you're pressing the anger button. No, if I don't wanna get angry, I'm not gonna get angry. But it always feels to us like the other person gets us angry. Elisa, let's say you are the kid being picked on in school. Doesn't it feel to you like the other kids are making you angry? It always feels that way,

Alisa Minkin 32:46

Yes.

Izzy 32:46

they really have a remote control to your brain? Are they pressing the anger button?

Alisa Minkin 32:52

No, but I'm, I, I really wanna say, I really wanna be fair to all the kids out there that just don't have the resilience skills to do this. You can role play up the wazoo, but you need to have a certain level of resilience to start with. I think.

Izzy 33:06

No.

Alisa Minkin 33:07

I think building resilience is incredibly important. I do.

Izzy 33:10

I teach resilience. This is the procedure of which I make children more resilient. Now we think that resilience takes a very long time, is a very difficult thing to acquire. It's not true. resilience takes a long time. Do you by any chance play guitar? People, people play guitar, it hurts their fingers in the beginning that they're pressing on strings. And if it steel strings, it really hurts. But eventually it stops hurting because they develop callouses. Little by little they develop callouses. It hurt. It doesn't hurt anymore, but that takes time. If you're a boxer, you wanna become a boxer. know what it feels like to be punched all the time. But they develop resilience over time. They're able to take it without it hurting, but that takes a long time. Emotional resilience can be acquired like that. You just, you, didn't finish the procedure, but it can be acquired like that. And I do it through this procedure, which I didn't finish doing with you yet. By the time I'm fin

Alisa Minkin 34:18

You wanna do more, you have more to do.

Izzy 34:20

finished the procedure. So I I, I want you to see how it works because I'm, I'm teaching the kid why they're being picked on and how to make it stop. But

Alisa Minkin 34:29

Mm-hmm.

Izzy 34:30

it feels to you like the other kids are making you angry, right? But do they really have remote control to your brain? We do it ourselves,

Alisa Minkin 34:39

No.

Izzy 34:40

feel that way. This is so important for people to understand. They don't realize that they are making themselves angry because it doesn't feel that way. it doesn't feel that way is because we have animal bodies. Our bodies are not computers or robots that are made in a factory and programmed to do whatever the programs want us to do. We are animals. We have bones and muscles and blood like the other animals. Do animals live in civilization or nature? And and nature. Life is very dangerous. Can each eat each other for dinner? They can kill each other. Nobody arrests them in nature. Getting angry is the first step to winning a conflict. Leslie, Elisa, you and I are creatures that live in nature and you attack me. Can I tell you, Hey, get your hands off of me. It's against the law. I'm gonna call the police on you. Doesn't mean anything. What's police, what's law? You are allowed to kill me and nobody arrests me. So in nature, if you attack me, I better get angry at you to scare you off. if you're scared off and you leave me alone, I'm very happy I won. If you're not scared off and you're still looking to kill me, and I can't escape, I have to have the drive to tear you to pieces before you tear me to pieces nature. The more quickly and intensely that I get angry, the better my chances are of winning. So our brains are programmed to get angry like that in a split second whenever somebody attacks us or threatens us. since it happens with no conscious thought process, it feels like the others make us angry, but it's our own brain. Do we get to us now? We play the game two times, Elisa, each time there was an optical illusion the first time, did you see me trying to stop you from insulting me? You didn't see me trying to stop you Shut

Alisa Minkin 36:38

mean, not effectively.

Izzy 36:40

you're not gonna be laughing much longer. That's gonna

Alisa Minkin 36:42

Oh, okay. It was just, it was not very

Izzy 36:45

No, it wasn't. It didn't work. But did you see me

Alisa Minkin 36:48

Right.

Izzy 36:49

you?

Alisa Minkin 36:50

Yeah. You were trying

Izzy 36:51

it didn't work. But that was an illusion. It looked like I was trying to stop you. You know what? I was really doing the first time, Elisa?

Alisa Minkin 36:58

egg egging me on.

Izzy 37:00

I didn't want you to stop. If you stopped, it would've ruined my demonstration. I knew that if I get angry, you're gonna have so much fun. You're gonna win. I'm gonna look like a big idiot. Why should you stop? You're having a great time and this is what's happening with you and the kids in school. They pick on you and you get angry, and it doesn't matter if you express it outwardly or you keep it bottled up inside. They know that you don't like it and it makes you angry, but you are angry because you want them to stop doing it. That doesn't make them stop. It's why they're doing it. They're not calling you four eyes because you have glasses or dumb because you are in special ed or fatso because you are overweight. They're doing it because you get upset when they call you four eyes or, or, or dumb or, or or fatso. The second time you played the game, there was also an optical illusion. The second time did you see, you see me allowing you to insult me.

Alisa Minkin 37:54

You did, you didn't fight back.

Izzy 37:55

if you wanna call me idiot, that's okay. You know,

Alisa Minkin 37:58

Right. You just didn't react.

Izzy 38:00

I did react. Well, I responded to you, but, but

Alisa Minkin 38:04

You didn't react emotionally.

Izzy 38:05

I responded positively emotionally to you. Not negatively. I responded emotionally. I was emotional. Oh, you really think I'm an idiot? I think you're smart. It's emotional. But I was treating you like a friend instead of like an enemy. But it looked like I was letter. You insult me. You know what? I was really doing the, the second time stopping you. The game was for me to stop you and you were sure I would not be able to stop you the second time I stopped you like that. And it was effortless and it was hard to see what I was really doing. Now, if you're a kid being picked on, I explained to you that this is what I want you to do for one week, only takes a week to see if it works. You're gonna tell yourself if the kids wanna pick on you, it's perfectly okay. Nothing wrong with it. If they make fun of you and you're perfectly calm and happy and respectable, who is going to feel stupid? You or they will you be upset if they feel stupid when they make fun of you. You'll be happy if they feel stupid. So for the next week, you're going to be happy when they pick on you because you are going to win. They're going to feel foolish and after a while, they're gonna stop doing it to you. So I even want you to look forward to them doing it for, for the next week. Now, there are two warnings I have to give you, otherwise it's not gonna work. The first warning is the problem is probably not going to get better right away. It's probably gonna get worse because they've been picking on you for a long time. They like to see you getting upset. They're gonna see you not getting upset. They're gonna try hard. They wanna win. And they know this is supposed to bother you. So at the beginning, they're gonna try harder to upset you. think it doesn't work. It works except it gets worse before it gets better. And the second warning is you have to do it all of the time. If you do it, most of the time it's not gonna work.'cause if you pick on me 10 times, nine times, I don't get upset. But the 10th time I do get upset, you are going to discover. It really does bother me. You just have to keep on going. Eventually I got, I'm gonna get upset. It's only when I never get upset, you're gonna stop trying to upset me. Now I wanna ask you a question. Are you a good person, Lisa? Yeah. You're a, I'm sure you're a good person. A little while ago you were calling me an idiot. I was getting upset and you were loving it. You couldn't stop smiling and laughing. It was so much fun when I was calm and nice to you. You didn't like it. You wanted to stop. It was so uncomfortable. You had such a good time when I was getting upset. What kind of a good person are you? You know,

Alisa Minkin 40:41

I just being a good student.

Izzy 40:43

think the bullies are them. No, it's us. I brought, I

Alisa Minkin 40:46

Right, right, right.

Izzy 40:48

by my act.

Alisa Minkin 40:49

I didn't even know it was there. That's kind of scary.

Izzy 40:51

don't know. They don't realize how much fun it is to upset some somebody else under the right circumstances. You're not gonna do this to anybody. But since you, you knew I wasn't really getting hurt, you didn't feel guilty. And then you can, you know, you saw how much fun it is. you wouldn't do this to a, a real person, you know, if they're getting

Alisa Minkin 41:12

Right, right, right, right,

Izzy 41:13

in the game

Alisa Minkin 41:14

right.

Izzy 41:14

it's so much fun. The bullies are not them, they're us. This can happen to anybody. If somebody acts like a victim with you, you're probably gonna end up acting like a bully and enjoying it.

Alisa Minkin 41:27

Right.

Izzy 41:28

The, the, But now I teach kids to be resilient. Resilient. The next thing I do with a client is I tell them, I'm going to insult you terribly, and I want you not to get upset no matter what I say. you get upset, you lose the game. So now you're practicing, I'm gonna insult you terribly and you're gonna see, boy, it's effortless not to get upset. It's so easy and you and I look like a, a jerk, and, and you'll come out being the winner. So after this whole process, you see, wow, the solution is so easy. I just have to let them do it be nice to them, and I come out being the winner and they stop. And, and I, I do,

Alisa Minkin 42:05

If you can make it through the, the

Izzy 42:06

in one.

Alisa Minkin 42:07

extinction burst,

Izzy 42:08

yeah. But, but I prepare them. I

Alisa Minkin 42:11

right.

Izzy 42:11

in advance. This, it's going to get worse before it gets better, by the way, the extinction birth, very few people know that term. Very good. I'm impressed.

Alisa Minkin 42:20

Ex extinction burst, meaning that, like you said it before, you used without the terminology, you said that they're gonna be worse before they get better because they wanna get their reaction. And then the problem with this, if you give in one time, that's called intermittent reinforcement. It is the most powerful reinforcement. It's a slot machine.

Izzy 42:35

read this in my writings, did you?

Alisa Minkin 42:38

No,

Izzy 42:38

impressed. Very impressed. extinction burst

Alisa Minkin 42:42

So that's what, that's what makes it so hard for kids who are vulnerable. You can role play, but in the real world, when they're pushing those buttons, they may or may not be able to do it. And if they do it intermittently, they've just made it worse.

Izzy 42:55

Yeah. But the, the great majority of kids that I work with are happy to do this because they're miserable, they're suffering for so

Alisa Minkin 43:03

Right.

Izzy 43:04

don't know why. And

Alisa Minkin 43:05

Right.

Izzy 43:05

understand why it's happening to them. So they're eager to try this. And since I warned them, what's gonna happen, it'll get worse before it gets better. And you have to do it all of the

Alisa Minkin 43:14

Right.

Izzy 43:15

ready. And most kids do a good job. And before long, the problem is over

Alisa Minkin 43:22

But again, it depends on the kid. I'm gonna bring up neurodivergent kids, kids on the spectrum. Every kid is different. And I also wanna do, bring up another point, which is the role of the parents. Right? I, I read a book once and they said, don't interview for pain. Your kid comes home from school. What did this kid do? What did they say? Oh no, that's terrible. So I think the role of the parents is really important here. It's not just the kid that you're talking to

Izzy 43:45

the parents are very important. Now. You also teach parents how

Alisa Minkin 43:49

right?

Izzy 43:49

their kids. Also, you know, parents are so concerned about their kids being bullied in school. Meanwhile, their own kids at home are tormenting each other every day worse than kids do in school. And the parents are going crazy trying to stop it and nothing is working. when I find out that parents have kids that fight a lot at home, I teach the parents what to do to make them fight less.

Alisa Minkin 44:15

And then the role of the school. So we really have to go into what has come out of that Columbine, that supposed evidence-based programming. The, the, the, the programming. Like Ola, is that his name?

Izzy 44:27

old ve all old

Alisa Minkin 44:30

Okay. The W. That's a V. Okay.

Izzy 44:33

it's old

Alisa Minkin 44:33

Hmm.

Izzy 44:34

And he's the guru of bullying. And everything that he says is considered absolute truth. Even though they found that the program doesn't work very well, it often makes the problem worse. but it's still called the gold standard now. I think the main reason his approach considers continues to be called the Gold Standard is because, the approach to bullying has become mandated by law. The VE approach is mandated by law. they don't have to use the VES program per se, but it's the ves philosophy and instructions. You are not, you're gonna treat bullying like a crime. It's not to be tolerated. We're going to teach everybody in the school community to have no tolerance for bullying. They have to inform the school authorities when they're bullied or witness bullying, and the school has to conduct investigations and fi find out who the bully is, and to punish or rehabilitate the bully. We have to get the parents involved. We have to get everybody involved to tell kids, stop being bullied and, and then supposedly bullying is going to disappear, but it doesn't work. Treating bullying like a crime. Bullying acts that our criminal should be treated like criminals. If I break your computer, that's a crime. I should pay you back for your computer. It's a crime. But when you start making insults and gestures and social exclusion of crimes, you end up dealing with it endlessly. Everybody gets, you know, more upset the parents. You know you are. I complain that you believe me. Now the school has to inform your parents. They have to inform my parents. parents probably love me and want the school on my side. Your parents probably love you and want the school on your side. So now it's not only two of us against each other. It's our families against each other, and the school has to play judge in the middle. Judges don't make two sides happy. At most, the judge makes one side, one side happy. The other side is still miserable. The two sides still hate each other, and the loser of the judgment hates the judge also. And now we've turned the

Alisa Minkin 46:51

Absolutely.

Izzy 46:52

enforcement agencies that have to do investigations and courts of law, and we don't know why things aren't getting better.

Alisa Minkin 47:01

You know, I, I understand the idea behind, let's start at the, you know, the very beginning of the problem. Let's be super sensitive and not have anything be tolerated. But I also see how it can make it worse when it's not intrinsically dangerous, but there's gotta be a point where it's not benign for the kid, even though he's not being physically hurt. We know that verbal bullying still hurts, kids exclusion, ostracism, all those things hurts them. So what are they supposed to do if they're not capable of shutting them down with your approach?

Izzy 47:34

the kids now, if you are capable of learning how to solve your problem by yourself, I have not helped you by protecting. I'm, I'm you continue be being vulnerable and not knowing what to do. So if you're able to learn, if you're smart enough and you're psychologically together enough to learn how to solve the problem by yourself, you deserve to be taught. kids who we do have to protect are the ones who truly are not capable of learning by themselves. There are kids who can't do this. It's, it's still object. It's subjective harm, but they can't control it. They're not smart enough to do this, or they don't have the emotional control to do this. Those

Alisa Minkin 48:17

Right.

Izzy 48:18

that deserve help. Now, if I work in a school. And you are picking on some poor kid who can't possibly deal with it by himself. I'll talk to you, but I'll talk to you nicely. I'm not gonna say, you know, you do it again. You're going to be sent home. You're gonna be suspended for two days. If I'm angry at you for the way you're treating the kid, you are going to wanna defend yourself. What are you talking about? I'm the, I'm just fooling around with him, or he is making it up. So you're gonna be angry at the kid. You're gonna feel victimized by him for telling on you. You're gonna feel victimized by me, the school personnel that's angry at you and threatening you. instead, I'll say, you know, you know what this kid is like, he's, he's complaining that he's being picked on. He really doesn't know how to handle it. You know, I wish he knew how to handle it, but he, but he can't. And I know you're not really looking to hurt him, but he's, he's upset and he's complaining. You know, maybe instead of, you know, picking on him, maybe you can make him feel good. Make him, you know, we want everybody in school to be happy. Maybe you can figure out how to make him happy in school. If I talk to you nicely, there's a good chance you'll listen to me. But if I, you know, I'm angry and threatening, you're gonna wanna defend yourself and you're gonna be angry at everybody for treating you this way. Now, now you feel victimized instead of a belief. I,

Alisa Minkin 49:40

Yeah, I, I, I, I think that unfortunately we have a victim culture and that plays into this, and that could be a whole other podcast. We're not gonna go there because we're, we're running low on time. But I wanna go back to the New York Times article because I think it really illustrates points. We want kids to be safe, kids have to be safe, safer than they are, but what we're doing is making it worse. And I think that that story was an illustration of that. I'd love to hear your thoughts and have, I'm gonna link it so people can read it, Hopefully.

Izzy 50:05

the New York Times writes an article, it's very well done. I see stories about kids being bullied in school all the time, but usually in, in local papers, local media. But when something hits the times, it's like all over the country or even all over the world. It's the more serious cases. I, I think they, the writer treated this like a very serious case because a child had died in this process. Remember somebody died. When somebody died. It's much more serious. But they're trying to figure out, know, they went to the school, the school didn't help, they went to the police. The police didn't help. I think they went to the pa. I know they, they went to a few different bodies for help and nothing helped. And what everybody is missing is what really caused the problem to be bad. And that's because the father went to the school authorities. If that didn't ha the kid didn't want him to go, but parents do this, they think it's the right thing to do, to tell, and then well snitches get stitches and it gets worse and it's escalates and escalates. And when you get the police involved, it's even worse. Many years ago when I was you know, shortly after Columbine, when I was really, you know, first getting involved in teaching this to, you know, making this my cause I worked with a 14-year-old freshman in high school from Canada and he was being insulted terribly. Now he was a big kid, very mature looking, but you know, he was getting upset. So I taught him what to do about it. And after the first meeting thing, things were getting better. He wasn't getting upset, but because, had made threats against each other, the school involved the police. It, it, the, the problem is over, but the police got involved. Once the police got involved, everything blew up. My, my client got a gun and the police caught him, and, and my client wouldn't talk to me anymore. It was it after that it was over for me. Working with him.

Alisa Minkin 52:10

I mean, once you talk about true, you know, the violent end, it, it, it's, it's very different. And I think the point to take from this though is that once you look at it from a legalistic way, from the lowest level, right, from verbal. As opposed to actual criminal acts, right? That unfortunately they're, they're making it, they're more likely to make it worse than make it better.

Izzy 52:33

Yeah.

Alisa Minkin 52:34

And that's something to, to really keep in mind,

Izzy 52:36

things that hurt our feelings are the normal parts of life. There is no such thing as living a life with people and your feelings never get hurt. It's going to happen. just like kids go to school, not to be protected from math and science and social studies, et cetera, but to be taught how to master it. has social challenges. Children deserve to be taught how to handle the social challenges of life and will help them for a lifetime. by the way, teaching kids how to deal with hostility, with bullying is much quicker and easier than teaching them how to read and do math. things take years. This takes a couple of sessions. Why not teach this to

Alisa Minkin 53:19

you know, but I think it.

Izzy 53:20

kids?

Alisa Minkin 53:21

I think we, we, we have to be reasonable. First of all, we have to understand that school-based bullying programs have very limited efficacy and could potentially make it worse. Right. We didn't really go into that, but I think I'll link some articles in, in the show notes.

Izzy 53:35

by the

Alisa Minkin 53:36

I think it's like 15 to 20%. Right?

Izzy 53:39

and when they started talking about anti-bullying laws, also when the Veis program became popular, I began right away warning that this is not going to work. Everything I predicted has come true. not because I'm a genius, it's because it's basic psychology. If you understand human nature and you look what what's being proposed to do, you can understand how it's going to make things worse. I was amazed that,

Alisa Minkin 54:05

I think it's really, yeah. I'm sorry.

Izzy 54:08

psychological professionals could see that this is going to make things worse.

Alisa Minkin 54:15

It's emotionally resonant that, and we didn't even talk about the bystander effect. I like how they said it. You should be an upstander. You shouldn't stand by. You should stand up and there's no evidence. Even if you can try to make it work, let alone if you can't make it work for it's.

Izzy 54:32

is that it hardly works. That is the evidence. I, I think I sent you an article, one of mine that I wrote that referred to the Burger King bullying study, or that they, they, and it's based on the idea that the bystander is key to solving the bullying problem. And in that article that I wrote, it was a link to a, a research study insisting that the, the bystander is the solution to the problem. But then if you read the research, there's no basis for that assumption because the research shows that the program did not help many kids. It showed that it really doesn't work. But still,

Alisa Minkin 55:17

Right. And in some ways it can make it worse.

Izzy 55:19

conclusion was that the bystanders is, is the key to the solving the problem.

Alisa Minkin 55:24

because it sounds so nice. I believed it, you know, and I have been looking into the research, you know, and what you say is, is, is correct. It's disappointing. But it's correct, but it, it's sad for me to see that we're really getting something that's really more by consensus than by evidence.

Izzy 55:40

Yeah, the bullying psychology, even though it's supposed to be scientific, it's really like a religion and a religion.

Alisa Minkin 55:49

Right? That's what I mean by consensus Dogma. And I wanna talk a little bit before, before we leave, I wanna talk a little bit more about building resilience, because I think the key here, and I do believe this very strongly, not just for bullying, but in general, is I think unfortunately we've been living in a victim culture and we have to learn how to make our kids resilient. We have to fight back. Against, against this, this victim victimhood culture, and it can only come from the family. You can't expect the school to do that.

56:19

So it's funny, while I was talking about resilience, you were no longer there and that was because you're recording. We had a glitch, we've had a number of glitches, but we are going to model resilience here and we're gonna pick off as best we can where we left off, which is really just at the very tail end. So I wanna thank you so, so much for doing this with me, and I'd like you also to be able to tell us where we can find you. First of all, there's. Izzy kaman.com. Izzy Kaman is one word, no periods. I have tons of information there and links to other things. Uh, you can find, uh, a great deal of my writings on my Psychology Today column. It's called Resilience to Bullying. If you look up Psychology today, Izzy Kaman, uh, I will show up. I have about 170 articles there. Uh. I have a YouTube channel. You can look me up there. So also, I, I don't mind if people look for my books on amazon.com. You can put in my name, you'll find my stuff. I also have a store on my, on my website. Right. And you do this counseling through a tele, like a tele platform, like remotely. Correct. Everybody I work with today is by Zoom. So how could somebody reach you to work with you? My website. You can contact me. There are contact buttons and you'll Okay. Be able to e email me. Okay. I-Z-Z-K-A-L-M-A n.com. Like Perfect. Thank you again so much of doing this with me. I learned a lot fun with you, Lisa. Yeah, I'm, I'm so glad. I really appreciate it. You're well. Thank you for listening to Kids Matter. Raising Healthy, happy Children Takes a village, and I'm grateful you are part of ours. If today's conversation resonated with you, please share this episode with another parent, grandparent, teacher, or anyone who cares about kids. Together we can build a supportive community our children deserve. I'd love to hear from you. Share your thoughts, questions, or suggestions for future topics at Kids Matter podcast@gmail.com. With no explanation for your voice truly matters. Until next time, keep advocating for the children in your life because kids really do matter. They are our future. I'm Dr. Elisa Minkin and this has been Kids Matter. Please note that while I am a pediatrician, I am not your child's ped. This podcast is for informational purposes only and does not constitute medical. For any medical concerns or decisions. Reach out to your child's healthcare professional.