When Approval Becomes an Addiction

Why "good jobs" and gold stars are not the encouragement we think they are.

It started with a gold star.

A single, shimmering sticker on a construction-paper chart in my kindergarten classroom. I don’t remember the assignment. I don’t remember what I drew or said or built.

I just remember the star.

And how it glowed.

There’s a photograph of me from that week. Five years old, Dragon Ball Z backpack, missing front tooth (I knocked it…