They caught up with kids on benches, in front of statues, in the median of Flatbush Avenue. Mr. Shapiro-Barnum wielded his interviewer’s microphone like a magic wand, using it to distract, redirect, conjure and bestow. A consummate director, he double-checked his lighting, or shifted Ms. Ty Goldberg’s position.
Mr. Shapiro-Barnum scrolled through approaches like one would a TikTok feed: off-kilter questioning, imitation, silly voices. At one point, he pretended to be a tiger, wondering if he could befriend a child he also wanted to eat. The child demurred, not exactly not-scared. Occasionally, he’d suggest a retake, asking a child to answer a question again, or face forward when delivering lines he could clearly see as pull quotes for an episode.
In order to preserve his shambolic portrait of childhood (mis)apprehension, he occasionally had to fend off intervention. “Sometimes parents can’t help but give direction. ‘Sit up straight.’ ‘Smile.’ ‘Wipe ice cream from your face,’” Mr. Shapiro-Barnum said. “We like it to be a little more informal.” As a pair of young women walked by, one leaned into the other and said, “That’s the guy from Instagram who makes the kid videos we were laughing at.”
When I asked parents why they allowed a stranger to have access to their children, on camera, for free they had different responses. “I’m a huge fan of the show,” one said. “He just seemed so nice,” another said. “We need this kind of open community connection now,” a third said. The father of a girl who’d appeared on a previous episode referred to the recognition his daughter had received. “The entire school came up to us after it aired,” he said. “She was like a celebrity.” (After filming, the girl requested a treat. “When you hit 100,000 likes, you can have a doughnut,” her father joked.)
Mr. Shapiro-Barnum spun threads of internet gold with his young subjects. He got down on their level — the ground. He echoed their thoughts, encouraging elaboration. He scaffolded their energy with silly riffs. “It just takes an entry point,” he said. “We’re just looking for a bit.”
Some of this ease comes from years of working with young kids. Mr. Shapiro-Barnum taught young children improv at the MacGuffin, a theater and film company in Philadelphia. And he was a creative force in corralling the energies of younger cousins with whom he spent a lot of time in his adolescence. “I like making kids feel comfortable, and making them look good, and making them feel like they’re having fun,” he said.
Mining kids’ original thoughts as a source of entertainment has a long and adorable history, from Johnny Carson’s reading of school-age kids’ letters on the Tonight Show in the 1970s and Rosie O’Donnell highlighting children’s jokes on her 1990s talk show, to Jimmy Kimmel featuring little ones in video bits and, of course, the ongoing series Kids Say the Darndest Things and Kids React.
But with Recess Therapy — the runaway-hit Instagram series that asks kids on the street to weigh in on topics from superheroes to climate change —creator, host and producer Julian Shapiro-Barnum is looking to shift from that groundwork.
“I use it kind of as a counter text [to the] vetted kids who have gone through probably a couple rounds of interviews,” he tells Yahoo Life. “I’ve always found what makes Recess Therapy special is that it can be any kid — no studio … [or] casting call or anything. It’s really just the kids walking around Brooklyn.” And unlike some of the historic ways of approaching kids and their humor, he adds, “I try to meet them exactly where they’re at and, like, feel like a peer with them a little bit.”
The Brooklyn-based Shapiro-Barnum, 22, kicked off the beloved series right in the middle of the pandemic — June 2020 — and just recently eclipsed 1 million followers, along with being named a Fave Follow by the Today show at the start of the new year. He says the fact that Recess Therapy is resonating with so many people — of all ages, by the way — is both a sign of the times and a result of what the series offers.
“I think the social media sphere is a very weird place — and I think there isn’t a lot of, like, purely positive content out there,” says Shapiro-Barnum who, as a member of Gen Z, has never known a world without social media. “I think Recess Therapy is positive, but not dishonest. Like, we don’t hide that there is ugliness in the world and that kids are grappling with these issues, but I think there’s something that’s uplifting [and] kind of hopeful in seeing kids talk about these things.”
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A quick perusal of the supportive comments — both on the Instagram series and the YouTube version, which features longer interview segments — shows that people are definitely feeling buoyed by what they see. And then there are the direct messages Shapiro-Barnum receives, “just saying how much the content has impacted them.” For example, he says, “someone will be like, ‘I’m going through a really bad divorce and I get home and I watch these videos and it makes me feel like a person again,’ or ‘I work at a children’s hospital and we’ve been using these videos to teach bedside manner to the new doctors.’” Which of course inspires him to keep going.
“That aspect of it makes me feel really good about doing it,” says the Boston University theater major (and film and TV minor) grad. “I think people love to see the show for the catharsis level of it that’s very sweet. I think there’s the comedy element that people just enjoy. And then I think there’s the, like, ‘Wow, these are the young folks and they’re thinking and giving us hope for the future,’ maybe.”
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It’s Shapiro-Barnum’s clear-eyed perspective — and uncanny ability to speak to kids on their level, without condescension, whether they’re 2 or 10 — that also makes the series so lovable, and something the host credits to his unique and empowered upbringing.
“I have five gay parents — three moms and two dads,” he says, explaining that his two moms asked their friend who had a boyfriend to be their sperm donor and that, when he was 2, his moms broke up and one partnered with a new woman.
Julian Shapiro-Barnum is creator and host of Recess Therapy. (Photo: Yahoo Life)
“They all co-parented us,” he says of himself and two siblings. “In that, I had all these amazing, cool adults very much encouraging me to pursue all of these passions. And the one thing that I can point to that I think directly connects to Recess Therapy is that I, as a kid, was very much treated kind of older by them. Like, we would have these conversations about race, sexuality, gender, the earth. And I felt like my parents really didn’t treat me like a kid in a lot of ways … They, like, really respected me in a way that I try to do with the kids that I talk to.”
It makes sense that he’d approach his subject this way, considering how deep they tend to go, he points out.
“It’s mostly fun and games,” Shapiro-Barnum says, “but what does stick out to me in a heavier way is how many kids bring up how afraid they are of climate change and how many kids bring up how much they hate racism.” Interviewees as young as 4 or 5, he says, “voluntarily bring that stuff up whenever I ask them what they want to change and what they want to see differently in the world. And I think that just really speaks to how much those things affect everyone — and how important it is to facilitate those conversations with kids, starting at a young age.”
—Video produced by Olivia Schneider
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Stressed Out? Try This Loving Kindness Meditation
One of the things I struggle with most is kindness, both to myself and to others.
I think this may partially come from my training as a classical musician. Since I was a kid, I’ve gotten very practiced at scanning myself and every situation I’m in for flaws. My brain is very good at finding what’s wrong with a situation and overlooking what’s right. And while I’ve read that the human brain in all of us is hardwired to seek out the negative, I think that this habit of hypercriticism has made me maybe just a little bit more rigid, a little bit more perfectionistic.
This is why I often find myself struggling with trusting that things will work out.
Often, I feel unsafe, which makes it hard to feel calm and connect to other people.
Here’s one skill that I’ve found helpful:
You may have heard of Loving Kindness Meditation, which is a way to practice feeling kindness for yourself and others. This meditation can lead to increased feelings of safety and connection.
This version is from Radically Open Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (RODBT).
Loving Kindness Meditation is a way to shift our mood so that we may activate our brain’s social safety system, or our ability to feel safe and open with others. The RODBT Loving Kindness Meditation (LKM) is meant to be used before social encounters and its effects have been reported to last from 20 minutes to 4 hours.
I’ve used this meditation to help me before a range of stressful situations: as part of my pre-performance routine, before interviews and professional meetings, and even before social situations like dates and parties.
A lot of us folks who may be over controlled (which can include people who are perfectionist and striving) can find directing feelings of love and kindness towards ourselves distressing, which is why RODBT LKM focuses on creating a sense of warm feelings and then directing them towards people we know and also people we don’t know.
The main difference of Loving Kindness Meditation in the RODBT practice is that the goal is not to increase our feelings of love or kindness towards ourselves so much as it is to increase those feelings towards others, which can lead us to feeling calmer and more open to social connection.
A friendly reminder that while I’m not a professional therapist, I’m sharing tools and skills that I’m learning to help me feel a little bit better, in the hopes that they might help you feel a little bit better, too.
So, how do I practice RODBT LKM?
While a daily practice of this short exercise is recommended, I’ve found that even just having this in my toolbox, to use when I need it, can be helpful. Practicing this Loving Kindness Meditation can increase our sense of safety which can help us feel more calm, content, and at ease in social situations.
A Script for Loving Kindness Meditation
You can use the following script to make your own audio recording. Or, I’ve made a recording for you here, if you want to try it out first.
This is designed to be read aloud and it’s recommended that you not change the wording. Practice using the script as it is currently written first.
Committing to a daily practice is a recommended but, again, you might want to just try this out and see how it feels. If it helps a little bit, even once, it still counts 🙂
Here’s the script:
Find a comfortable seated position in a chair, on the floor, on the sofa. The most important thing is that you find a position in which you feel alert and the chances of you drifting off to sleep are minimal. For the practice of loving kindness you can keep your eyes open or closed—the choice is yours—with the understanding that our goal is to remain awake, as best we can.
Once you find that position, begin by simply taking a breath—with awareness. Not trying to change the breath or fix it in some way, just being fully present with the full duration of the inbreath and the full duration of the outbreath. You may notice it most strongly in the nose and the throat. Some people notice the breath in the chest or the belly. Wherever the breath is most alive for you, just allow yourself to rest your awareness there. If your mind wanders away from the breath, which it is prone to do, then, without judgment, just simply bring yourself back to the next natural inhalation or exhalation.
And now, very gently, allow your awareness to move from your breath to your heart center. Into that place, right there, in the middle of the chest. Not as much the physical heart but that place where we tend to feel warm emotions. If you would like to do so, sometimes people find it helpful to gently place their open hand over the location of their physical heart as this can help facilitate the practice.
As best you can, try and find a memory or feeling sense of a time when you experienced a strong sense of loving kindness, either from someone or toward someone. It might have been the first day you met your life partner; the day a child or grandchild was born; it might have even been a particular afternoon with your favorite pet, or a time when you felt warm appreciation after helping or being helped by someone. The idea is not to find the perfect experience or image, nor should you be concerned if you find yourself thinking of many different events or experiences. The idea is—as best you can—to re-create the warm, tender, or positive feelings associated with prior experiences of loving kindness, and to allow these feelings to grow in your heart center. For just a moment, allow these feelings to grow.
And now, in your mind’s eye, gently bring into focus an image of someone you care about, a person you already have existing warm feelings for, may feel love toward, or may feel a sense of positive connection with. It doesn’t have to be a perfect relationship or one without conflict—the idea is to find an image or feeling sense of someone you know whom you already have warm feelings for. As best you can, hold this image or a feeling sense of this person in your heart center. And now, from the feelings of loving kindness in the center of your chest, extend warm wishes to this person you care about.
Using these phrases, silently repeat to yourself…
May this person be at ease.
May they be content with their life. May they be joyful.
May they feel safe and secure.
Again, extending warm wishes of loving kindness to this person you care about… May they be at ease.
May they be content with their life.
May they be joyful.
May they feel safe and secure.
And again, from the source of loving kindness in your own heart, extending well wishes to this person you already care for…
May this person be at ease.
May they be content with their life. May they experience joy.
And may they feel safe and secure.
And now, gradually allow the image or feeling sense of this person you care for to gently dissolve from your mind’s eye, resting your attention back in your heart center, back into those feelings of warm loving kindness—as best you can.
Bring to mind an image of someone who you don’t really know, who you’ve at least seen once but don’t feel any connection with one way or another. It could be your postman, or a supermarket clerk you’ve seen, or someone else of that sort.
And again, as best you can, from your own heart, extending warm wishes of loving kindness toward this person you hardly know about, saying silently…
May this person be at ease.
May they be content with their life. May they be joyful.
May they feel safe and secure.
Again, extending warm wishes of loving kindness to this person you hardly know at all… May they be at ease.
May they be content with their life.
May they be joyful.
May they feel safe and secure.
And again, from the source of loving kindness in your own heart, extending well wishes to this person you barely know…
May this person be at ease.
That they be content with their life. That they be joyful.
That they feel safe and secure.
And now, with warm loving care, gently turn your attention back to the sensations of your breath and your heart center, allowing the image or feeling sense of this person you hardly know to be released—allowing yourself to rest here, in this moment, with your feelings of warmth and kindness. Remembering that you can carry with you throughout your day these warm feelings of love and kindness that you were able to generate, knowing that you can always find your heart center when needed and making a kindhearted commitment to integrate this practice of loving kindness into your life, as best you can. And when you are ready, you can open your eyes and bring your attention back into the room.
Some reminders and suggestions for further practice:
Remember, the goal of LKM practice is to activate a positive mood state associated with social safety. We want to try to spiral up out of feeling threatened or unsafe, into a better mindset and mood that can help us feel just a little bit more open, calm, and better able to connect with others.
If you find this practice helpful, you might consider making it a daily practice. Try practicing each day prior to leaving your house or first thing when you wake up.
And, if you like, you can also try writing down your experience in a daily practice log. Yuu might consider asking yourself these questions:
What did I notice during the practice?
How long did the social safety experience last?
How did it impact my day?
Notice if your day to day experience of the world and others starts to shift. And even if you don’t find this helpful as a daily practice, that’s okay, because you might still consider adding this Loving Kindness Meditation to your toolkit of skills and strategies to support you in your mental health journey.
(Adapted from Radically Open Behavioral Therapy by Dr. Thomas Lynch)
