In this series of mistakes that fail your family, I am highlighting common strategies that undermine your children's success and happiness. We have covered several behavioral strategies recently, but today's discussion focuses on a critical mental mistake: Taking things personally. The Wide, Wide World of Infinite Opinions To find happiness and offer our children the seeds of happiness, we must discover how to learn and grow in life without taking others' opinions personally. What does this mean? The world will opine, judge, snarl, and roll its eyes. It's a given. However, when this 'feedback' or 'input' flows in our direction, we tend to get hurt, feel bad, and react; we take things personally. We make their story of life emotionally crucial in our story of life. When someone says you did a lousy job, you take it personally. When your kids tell you you're a bad mom, you take it personally. When your teenager calls you stupid, you take it pe...