Understanding the connection between childhood and early adolescent experiences and later adult outcomes is the cornerstone to prevention and intervention science [1,2]. We know that what happens in childhood and adolescence has an important effect on the kinds of adults that people will become. This is incredibly important as the cumulative effects of negative outcomes as the result of early experiences are still being explored. Early substance use in adolescence, for example, can have longterm educational [3], economic [4,5], criminal [6], and health [5] outcomes. To date, the primary focus of these connections has traditionally been around how to prevent adverse early childhood experiences to mitigate adult outcomes [1,2], but in their recent article in Journal of Adolescent Health, Rougeaux et al. [7] flip the script and point us toward the importance of promoting positive late childhood and early adolescent aptitudes, in this case, mental health competence (MHC), to reduce adolescent health risk behaviors.