Richard Eyre - Avoiding the Entitlement Trap of Raising Children in Affluence [The Business of Family]

Richard and Linda Eyre may be the most prominent and popular writers and speakers in the world on the topics of family and parenting. Among their incredible 50 books is Teaching your Children Values, the first parenting book in 50 years to hit #1 on the New York Times Bestseller list.

The Eyres’ work is based on the real-life experience of raising 9 children, founding and running 3 businesses, and trying to keep up with high-level involvement in politics, church, music, and sports.

Key Takeaways

• The importance of raising children who are happy and motivated
• Understand the benefits of implementing a family economy
• How a Family Traditions Calendar can have lasting and permanent affect
• Why documenting and sharing family history can empower your child
• Giving your children ownership to empower and avoid entitlement
• Why some failures can lead to major success
• The ways that giving children more can actually give them less

Episode Timeline

• [1:34] How Richard Eyre dedicated his life’s work to healthy families and parenting
• [5:16] Parenting to raise motivated and happy children amid wealth
• [7:57] Formal documentation and structure in the family environment
• [11:29] Teaching families how to have a family economy
• [14:44] Richard and Linda’s family traditions calendar
• [20:37] Empowering children through ancestor storybooks
• [23:12] Rescuing your child from the entitlement track
• [26:55] Giving kids ownership to empower and motivate
• [29:29] #1 New York Bestseller, Teaching Your Children Values
• [33:37] Books and publishing with insights on new book, Happiness Paradox
• [37:32] Richard’s public failure leads to bestselling success
• [40:52] Creating free online access to the Eyre books
• [44:45] Richard Eyre’s landing page
• [48:08] Richard’s belief that if we give our children more, we give them less

Standout Quotes

• “We just found that there was a tremendous resonance with the idea of raising healthy kids and looking at it as a management opportunity, a management challenge.” – Richard Eyre [04:37]
  
• "Our goal is to help parents raise responsible, motivated kids. That is a tricky thing to do in a household of affluence." – Richard Eyre [07:11]
  
• "It's the idea that you as a parent have one single focus each month you're going to do well. If you're trying to teach multiple values or multi-task on that you're never going to do it. Just focus one whole month on honesty, suddenly everything that happens is an object lesson.” – Richard Eyre [31:20]
• “It was on the heels of that defeat that we wrote this book, Teaching Your Children Values. One year after losing the governatorial race, the book went to number 1. The first family book in 50 years to get to number 1 on the New York Times Bestseller. One door closed but another one opened.” – Richard Eyre [39:38]
• "To those of us who have spent our lives in or around business, I think management by objective always resonates. People who are clear on what their goals are and where they're trying to get are the ones who succeed. It's quite remarkable that that very basic sort of practical thinking has rarely penetrated areas of relationships and families and it should." – Richard Eyre [46:40]
• "If you are clear on what the goals are that you have for your family and your children, for your family institution it doesn't guarantee success, but it certainly allows you to measure your success and how well you are doing." – Richard Eyre [47:13]
• "We need to find ways to pass on what we have without it being a gift that's not value. We have to find a way to share responsibility and to teach the concept of earned ownership rather than running the huge risk of entitlement, spoiling children, putting them on a path of low motivation by giving them too much." -- Richard Eyre [49:07]

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• Book: Teaching Your Children Values - Eyre, Richard, Eyre, Linda — One of the greatest gifts you can give your children is a strong sense of personal values. Helping your children develop values such as honesty, self-reliance, and dependability is as important a part of their education as teaching them to read or how to cross the street safely.
• Book: The Entitlement Trap: How to Rescue Your Child with a New Family System of Choosing, Earning, and Ownership — Dump the allowance-and use a new "Family Economy" to raise responsible children in an age of instant gratification.
• TheEyres.com - Values Parenting — For nearly twenty years, Richard and Linda Eyre have been among the most prominent and popular speakers in the world on topics of parenting, life-balance, and family-strengthening.