Readers — As many of you know, when I’m not busy posting, I am often off to give a keynote. It’s how I make my living. (Not fkrrsknfhs
by blogging? No. Not by blogging.) I’ve spoken everywhere from Microsoft, to the Sydney Opera House, to the Yale Child Study Center (twice!). In the next two months I’m off to conferences in Edmonton,Charlotte, Chicago, and Toronto. And in June? Bulgaria! (I do hope to see you there.)
Audiences love the lectures and they laugh a ton. (See below below.) But they also seem to leave changed — less afraid, more hopeful, more skeptical about society’s favorite message: Your kids are in constant danger! So here’s a 3-minute reel introducing me and the Free-Range message, along with my speaking engagements page. If your corporation, conference, college, school district or organization is interested in having me give a lecture or hands-on seminar (or both!), let’s talk. You can drop me at line at lenorespeaks@gmail.com . Hope we get to meet! – L.
And here are the audience responses to a speech I gave in March to a consortium of 14 private schools in Princeton, N.J. (I didn’t even edit them down!):
“Best lecture I have ever been to!”
“Such a great presenter – loved her humor and message!”
“Ability to add research to real life scenarios”
“Getting us to look at ourselves through humorous stories”
“Little bit eccentric but very engaging – excellent!”
“Common sense seems to be making a comeback”
“Her humor punctures the bubble of anxiety felt by modern parents”
“A hilarious dose of old-fashioned ‘how-to’; a salve for overstressed, perfection-driven parents”
“Funny and down to earth. Takes you back to a time when our life and thinking were less complicated”
“It was wonderful!”
“So funny — Extremely humorous”
“Thought provoking – no real weakness”
“Funny and not prescriptive”
“Funny and inspiring”
“Very approachable and helped me feel better about my parenting”
“Please get more speakers like this one!”
“Hilarious”
“Awesome”
“Entetaining and creates awareness”
“Great comedic delivery, thought provoking”
“All good”
“Great ad libber, very funny, connected with audience” “did not hold back”
“Kept me engrossed, great anecdotes”
“Excellent stand-up comedian”
“Superb”
“Bravo!“
12 Comments
I was quite excited to hear you were coming to Edmonton, but I had to Google to find out when and where. Don’t tease us! Put a list of your upcoming engagement details on your speaker page!
My favorite quote from the video: “Just like Tina Fey.” There’s no higher compliment, in my opinion.
This reminds me, Lenore. Is there any chance of those of us who were unfortunate enough to be in the US and unable to see Bubble Wrap Kids having a chance to see it? Hulu or Netflix or something? Anything? 🙂
Yes, when and where will you be in Bulgaria? I can’t find the details on your blog/site.
@Roberta: She must have a hidden agenda then 😉
Since I somehow managed to miss episode 6&7 TWICE, I too would love to be able to see Bubble Wrap Kids, or World’s Worst Mom as it was called on TLC, somewhere online.
Funny how you guys know Lenore from anything but her TV show, while for me it’s exactly the other way around since here only one (1) newspaper (not mine; circulation 200,000) devoted fourteen (14) sentences to Lenore when her book came out (in the US…).
I so much agree with Jet. I want to watch Bubble-Wrap Kids! No joy so far though, other than a few teasers on youtube.
Proud Canadian here who watched every one of the 13 episodes online (Slice network)… and got teary every time, I was so moved to see these parents who were stressed to the point of illness getting a new lease on life! Never mind the wonderful strides for the kids!!
Anyway, YES, bring Lenore in to speak, I saw her slay them in Vancouver, she rocks the house.
Lenore
You’re making a difference. It’s a HUGE difference! The world is starting to understand the dangers of the fear hysteria. Worst first thinking is cancerous. I have studied anxiety for years. I know how dangerous it is and how it’s self perpetuating. I recognize the symptoms in an individual but also in a nation. Whatever you fear consumes you. You can develop tunnel vision so that you can’t see anything else! You can convince yourself 100% that pedophiles are on every street corner and every 1 in 500 people that you see is a kidnapper!
When you convince yourself that it’s a potential life or death situation, the reptilian brain becomes the boss of all other parts of the brain. You think very simply. Everything is either black or white. There are no shades of gray. You develop an us vs them mentality.
Tunnel vision can get so intense that you can completely disregard anything else. I’ll highlight one of the other dangers.
Bullies target the children that are full of fear. However, bullies are not exclusive to grade school. Their ages range from 4 to 100 years old. Workplace bullying or domestic violence is rampant. A person is 50,000 times more likely to encounter a bully than a kidnapper. This is common sense. However, people in the grips of anxiety have a hard time with common sense.
A parent that has tunnel vision and can only see kidnappers can inject their own fear/insecurity into their children. This will attract bullies to them in the same way as spilled sugar will attract ants! THEY ARE SETTING THEIR CHILDREN UP TO BE VICTIMS! However they are unable to see this because the part of the brain that compares risk and probability has shut down. The reptilian brain has become the supreme dictator and cannot be questioned.
You’re changing the world. You cannot fathom how much we will benefit from this.
You are dedicating your life to making the world better. I admire you and your cause so much. I can’t think of any way that I can help arrange a speaking engagement for you, but if one happens near me, I’ll be a paying customer in a heartbeat.
OK. I found the engagement in Edmonton. Any possibility that you’re speaking in Calgary?
it’s nice that they ask you to speak, but they fervently asked John Holt to speak in the 1960s, and look where the schools are now… Sometimes, when control freaks are screwing up, it’s just a shuddering thrill for them to hear a reasonable point of view expounded, even though they know it’s “absolutely impossible” to implement.
I was forced to look at your blog for work, and I am absolutely disgusted. I was raised by one of you so-called “free range” parents, and am now a 32 year old with crippling chronic illness that was never treated when I was a child.
I was allowed to wander free–as you so self-righteously encourage parents to allow their children–not only as a 5-8 year old in “safe” Colorado, but also as a 9-10 year old in the city of Jakarta, Indonesia, and as a 10-13 year old in Boston. I nearly drowned when I was 4 because my mother let me go “free range” and I fell through a frozen pond. It’s absolutely a miracle that nothing else happened to me. I moved out when I was 16 after dropping out of school because I finally realized that she was an insane narcissist who had convinced herself that not parenting her children was in their best interest somehow.
Safety is not just about strangers with candy, but assuring positive emotional development. Children need protection and security, and letting them roam free from a young age is not the way to build that. The result of my mother’s insane neglect is three children with extreme anxiety issues, one alcoholic/drug addict, and one chronically ill. I’m not saying to put 12 year olds on leashes, but you’re giving an already self-indulgent and self-obsessed generation of people another excuse to not put their all into parenting. As the product of one of those people, it horrifies and disgusts me.