(Or the Johari Window for Moms and Teens)

Recently published in Brain, Child Magazine‘s awesome special Teen issue, this cartoon explores how information is shared (and likewise withheld) between parents and teens.

I was introduced to the Johari window 20 years ago at a UCLA Leadership workshop in Ojai, CA by none other than Joe Luft who created the concept with a guy named Harry Ingham (get it?) in the 50s. Despite being a terrific cartoon device, this matrix was a challenge for me. I had to virtually make up everything in the lower two quadrants. (Why make sh*t up when so much going on around you falls into the category of “you can’t make this sh*t up?”)  As a parent of two teens, I have all sorts of things I could have used in the lower left quadrant, but I’m nowhere near ready to share that information, just yet.