Why We Spend Too Much Time Fixing Kids Instead of Growing Them

I’ve believed for a long time that schools and even well‑meaning parents spend too much of a child’s early years trying to repair weaknesses instead of developing strengths. And I don’t say that as an educator or a researcher. I say it as someone who lived on the wrong side of that system.

When I was a kid in grammar school and junior high, I struggled with reading, spelling, and comprehension. I was dyslexic in ways nobody had language for back then. Every adult conversation about me revolved around what I couldn’t do. My entire identity was reduced to the weakest part of me.

But here’s what nobody seemed to notice: I had strengths that were already fully alive.

I was good with my hands. I was curious about science, nature, and how things worked. I could talk to anyone. I could persuade people. I could lead without trying. And I had a natural connection to music — rhythm, tone, patterns — the kind of thing that shows up early in kids who later thrive with instruments. If someone had put a piano in front of me at three or four, I would’ve taken to it instantly. That’s how early strengths reveal themselves.

I didn’t know the word “entrepreneur,” but I was already living it. I wasn’t just selling lemonade — I was making money at it. I understood customers, margins, and presentation before I could spell half the words on my report card. While teachers were circling my spelling mistakes in red ink, I was out in the world learning how to buy, sell, negotiate, and influence.

Those weren’t hobbies. Those were early signs of who I actually was.

But the system didn’t care about any of that. The focus was always on the deficit. The weakness. The thing that needed “fixing.”

Now, I’m not saying kids shouldn’t learn to read and write. Of course they should. But the idea that a child should spend the majority of their early learning years grinding away at the things they’re naturally weakest at — while their strengths sit untouched — is backwards. It drains confidence, wastes time, and delays the development of the abilities that actually shape a child’s future.

My strengths showed up early, and they showed up loud. By 21, I was already a manager — while most people my age were still figuring out how to show up to work on time. Not because I was the best speller in the room. Not because I aced grammar tests. But because I had instincts that school never measured: leadership, persuasion, problem‑solving, people skills, and the ability to make things happen.

Those strengths carried me through my entire career. They’re the reason I became a district manager at 36. They’re the reason I became a VP. They’re the reason I retired from corporate America at 48 — decades before most people even start thinking about it.

And here’s the part that still makes me shake my head: everyone around me — my father, my uncles, my older siblings — told me I’d never go anywhere without a college degree. That was the message of my childhood. It wasn’t said to hurt me; it was said because that’s what their generation believed. They thought success only came through one narrow door, and if you didn’t walk through that door, you were finished before you started.

They were looking at my weaknesses. My life was built on my strengths.

Imagine if someone had seen those strengths when I was 6, or 8, or 10. Imagine if a teacher had said, “This kid is a natural leader,” or “He’s entrepreneurial,” or “He’s mechanically gifted,” or even, “He has musical intelligence — let’s develop that,” instead of “He needs to improve his reading.” My early school years would have felt completely different.

And that’s the point. When adults focus only on weaknesses, they miss the child entirely. They miss the spark. They miss the thing that makes that kid unique.

But when they focus on strengths, they’re not just teaching — they’re accelerating a child’s destiny.

I believe parents and teachers can start recognizing strengths as early as age two or three. You can see it in how a child plays, what they gravitate toward, what lights them up. And once you see it, you can build on it. Not instead of teaching the basics, but alongside them — and with far more impact.

Kids don’t become great by fixing what they’re bad at. They become great by growing what they’re good at.

And if we started doing that earlier, we’d raise more confident kids, more capable adults, and far fewer people who spend half their lives recovering from the labels they were given in school.