How I Discovered the Power of Doing Meaningful Work?
I couldn't wait to jump out of bed this morning. It's a fantastic feeling when your head is spinning and your body is buzzing with excitement because you can't wait to get working on things. It's not that I don't love what I do with The Finish Line Group, because I do love it, but my audience isn't as engaged as I am about it. How Are You Feeling resonates with almost everyone. So many parents have experienced these emotional challenges with their children firsthand. Many have friends who are going through this with their kids. Others have kids approaching these challenging years and wonder how they can better prepare themselves and their kids. Do they roll the dice and play the odds? Do you leave it alone, hoping that nothing upsets the hornets' nest? Undoubtedly, there needs to be a preventative solution. My purpose has never been more evident. This is what happens when you discover the power of doing meaningful work.
When I met with Bob Calvert in the fall of 2021, trying to figure out how to bring How Are You Feeling to the marketplace, it felt like a huge uphill battle. As I delved into what Bob and Janice Berger had created over the past five years, I realized we had something exceptional. Experience had told me from my hundreds of conversations with parents and their struggling kids that this was about saving lives, families and futures. I knew that the demand was massive, the resources available to support these kids were sparse, and the government funding was inadequate. Kids were suffering, and their parents were struggling as well. It was a perfect storm for a disaster in the making.
Unfortunately, most parents don't realize their challenges until they are embroiled in this emotional roller coaster ride. Quite frankly, it's too late when you're going through it. Most of the financial resources are focused on fixing the problem instead of preventing it from happening.
Many charitable organizations have been created to help fund and bring awareness to this growing mental health epidemic. Even The Maddie Project, which is the foundation that Maddie's mom, Nicole German, started to help bring access and awareness to families who have youth that is struggling with mental health concerns, is about helping families who are already in crisis. It's an incredible initiative that has enormous community support. Nicole and The Maddie Project community have raised millions of dollars and directed the funds to augment mental health services in such dire need.
When the relative cost to fix the problem is exponentially greater than preventing it from happening, shouldn't we earmark funds in the area of prevention? Investing our efforts in our kids' emotional development and emotional literacy will further stretch our funds allocated to mental healthcare and decrease our healthcare system's financial strain.
What hit home for me was when we set up a focus group of volunteers to participate in the program. As the group progressed through the program, I realized we had a group of ardent fans who were more than advocates for the program; they were becoming activists! Our group is comprised of teachers, therapists, coaches, professionals, social workers, and human resources professionals. About 90% of the focus group were parents. Their feedback was enthusiastic and decisive. This program had to be taught in our schools.
We are getting closer to our first goal. We are close to setting up our first pilot program in a school. When the kids, teachers and parents start seeing the power of what the program teaches, the dominos will fall.
About the Author
To say Chris is passionate about youth mental health is an understatement. Ever since he lost his 14-year-old daughter, Maddie, to suicide, he's been trying to coach parents with similar struggles with their kids. He's talked to hundreds of parents with struggling kids. In many cases, these parents are barely holding it together too. He knows because he was one of those parents. He is relentless in ensuring another family doesn't experience the loss that his family has endured.
He is Co-Executive Director of How Are You Feeling, a not-for-profit online, scientifically-based teaching program that makes kids understand their emotions and how to deal with them before they become "big feelings."
Chris has been an entrepreneur for most of his career. He also runs a financial services company called The Finish Line Group, where he helps support the entrepreneur's financial, philanthropic, and emotional journey.
Chris has written extensively about his experiences with his daughter and has been featured in numerous print and online publications and radio and television media. He has been a keynote speaker at several entrepreneur and mental health conferences.
His personal "Why Statement" is "To openly communicate the lessons learned from his past so that others will thrive in their lives, minimize their setbacks and leave a positive and lasting legacy."
