Copyright Forbes
In today’s era of hyper-competitive college admissions, parents aren’t just cheering from the sidelines. They’re in the game, headset on, calling the plays. The spreadsheets. The supplemental essays. The strategic testing timelines. For many high-achieving families, managing the process has become its own full-time job. I see this dynamic every day in my work with parents who love their kids deeply and want to get it right. What begins as devotion can quietly morph into over-functioning. Parents become project managers, personal coaches, even crisis communicators. The cost isn’t only measured in time or tuition, it’s in connection, calm, and joy. Entrepreneur and author Amanda Goetz, in her new book Toxic Grit: How to Have It All and (Actually) Love What You Have, names this cultural moment for what it is: an addiction to perseverance without pause. “When rest feels like failure,” Goetz writes, “grit becomes poison.” That dynamic is on full display each fall as the college race begins. Families equate relentless effort with good parenting and stamina with success. Yet the research is clear: when parents chronically over-invest in achievement, children mirror that anxiety and pay the price. The Rise of “Toxic Grit” at Home Goetz argues that the same mindset that drives founders and executives to burnout is quietly reshaping parenting. The obsession with optimization, tracking every metric, filling every hour, has infiltrated family life. MORE FOR YOU “My kids aren’t even close to college admissions,” Goetz shared over email. “Yet my seventh grader already worries she’s not ‘doing enough’ to get into a good school. Whenever she starts to spiral, I remind her of the power of open space. Problems are solved by thinking, not by optimizing every moment for output. Rest is the key to problem solving—and that’s what college is meant to teach.” Recent studies back her up. A 2022 study published in Frontiers in Psychology found that parental “education anxiety” directly predicts student burnout, mediated by the parents’ own emotional exhaustion. Another longitudinal study in Social Psychology of Education concluded that perfectionistic academic demands and “helicopter” parenting increase school burnout. Translation: grit helps until it doesn’t. Past a certain threshold, effort without reflection becomes counterproductive. Teens pick up on that imbalance quickly. When parents treat exhaustion as a virtue, young people learn that achievement equals depletion. They stay up later, push harder, and define worth by productivity. Ironically, this also works against what admissions officers actually look for in applicants—genuine intellectual curiosity, self-driven initiative, and creativity. When a student’s life is micromanaged to optimize outcomes, those very qualities are the first to disappear. The household becomes a microcosm of what Goetz calls toxic grit: a place where rest is rationed, not valued, and “enough” never feels like enough. Modeling Burnout, Generationally The problem isn’t limited to teenagers. Goetz believes it’s generational. “I have three kids in junior high and grade school,” she says. “The amount of homework is hard to digest. I tell my kids to get off technology and be present with real people, but schools keep them staring at screens all day. We’re teaching kids to always be on. My hope is that we learn to focus and finish the most important work early in the day—and then open ourselves up for thinking, reading, and play.” That kind of unstructured time isn’t wasted. Thinking, reading, and play build the executive functioning, empathy, and self-awareness that colleges say they want to see. They nurture the curiosity and creativity that make for not only stronger applications, but more resilient, adaptable students who arrive on campus with the life skills to thrive and the self-knowledge to make meaningful use of a college’s resources. But children rarely model what they don’t see. When adults move through their own days in a constant state of overextension, kids learn that busyness is a badge of honor. A 2024 study from the Ohio State University College of Nursing reported that 57% of parents identify as “burned out” from a “culture of achievement" and pressure to be perfect. The link between overextended adults and over-pressured kids is direct: anxious parents raise anxious children. From Control to Command High-performing leaders know the difference between control and command. “My parenting style is about leading by example,” Goetz explains. “If I want my kids to live an active lifestyle, I move with them. If I want them to think creatively, I show them my process. We’re breaking the cycle of ‘do as I say, not as I do.’ And when it comes to control—every time I’ve tried to control something, it became elusive. I tell my kids success takes hard work, direction, and timing. You need all three.” In other words, parents can guide without gripping quite so tightly. Command involves clarity and trust, not constant correction. The most effective families balance structure with space. They plan, but they also pause and model recovery as a skill, not a weakness. Why “Grace Over Grit” Is a Leadership Skill Grace, Goetz insists, isn’t softness. “Parents need to show their kids what it looks like to build seasonality into ambition,” she says. “Set a goal, go after it, then downshift, rest, and reassess. Toxic grit is hustle without intention. Our job is to teach healthy bumper pads around ambition.” That rhythm—effort + recovery—is not only sustainable but strategic. Neuroscience research from the University of California, Berkeley, shows that rest consolidates learning and strengthens creative problem-solving. Harvard’s Center on the Developing Child similarly finds that emotional regulation and executive functioning are two of the strongest predictors of long-term success. For families immersed in the admissions grind, “grace over grit” is more than philosophy; it’s performance science. As Goetz puts it, “We’ve got to stop allowing trends to dictate our season of ambition. It’s necessary to go into the soil to grow stronger roots before you blossom. We should celebrate each other’s seasons of blossoming and replanting, no matter where we are in our own cycle.” Redefining the Win In a culture obsessed with optimization, stepping back can feel like failure. But some families are redefining what winning looks like. Among the clients I advise, I see this shift gaining traction. The parents who lead most effectively don’t just track metrics; they model mindset. Their teens are the ones who thrive not only in admissions but beyond it, because they’ve been raised to value recovery as much as effort. These parents still “quarterback” the process, but they do so with curiosity instead of control. They view success as helping their teen develop agency, authenticity, and inner steadiness, not just a resume. “On the other side of boredom is creativity,” Goetz reminds. “Don’t be afraid to let your kids find that magical space beyond boredom.” That creative boredom is exactly what selective universities value but can’t teach: genuine self-knowledge and curiosity. Students who can articulate what moves them, not just what they’ve mastered, and then take action are the ones who stand out in competitive application pools saturated with empty, passive achievement. Practical Plays for Parents 1. Schedule rest as a strategy, not a reward. If rest feels like failure, calendar it like practice. Elite athletes recover by design, not default. Families can, too. 2. Let your teen lead the narrative. Instead of editing essays into perfection, ask: What story do you want this application to tell about you? Reflection builds agency. And if it’s hard to step out of the driver’s seat, consider bringing in a neutral mentor or counselor to guide the process while you keep the parent-child relationship intact. 3. Model the downshift. Show—don’t tell—what balance looks like. Turn off email after dinner. Skip a weekend of over-scheduling. Your presence teaches more than your reminders. 4. Replace perfectionism with perspective. Perfectionistic parenting predicts burnout; moderated grit plus resilience prevents it. 5. Track energy, not activity. Ask: How’s the emotional climate of our home? Parental burnout directly influences children’s anxiety. Awareness is data, too. The Conscious Quarterback The best quarterbacks know the game isn’t just about executing plays; it’s about reading the field, empowering teammates, and knowing when to step back. The same applies to parenting. Conscious leadership in business, and at home, means replacing relentless perseverance with reflective composure. It’s the courage to pause when everyone else is pushing. “Grace,” Goetz writes, “is the antidote to grit gone wrong.” In the end, the goal isn’t to win the admissions game at all costs. It’s to ensure your child still loves the game when it’s over.
