{If you missed part 1? Check it out right here}
If every human being has a driving need for security, significance and strength – including the little ones hanging onto our ankles – then we as parents have to be intentional about seeking out opportunities to instill and cultivate these qualities in their young lives.
Here’s a list of 10 ways we try to do just that…
1. DISCONNECT THE REMOTE:
Kids love to get a rise out of us. It makes them feel powerful. It’s as if they’re saying, “watch this, dude…I can make mommy scowl…I can even make her yell…oh, and get this…I can make her chase me. Now run!”.
It’s as if they have a remote control plugged into our belly buttons, as Danny Silk describes it, and they know their behavior gets a reaction out of us. In essence, we give them control of us.
We’re learning to disconnect that remote and get control of ourselves in the midst of their bad behavior. If we want them to manage themselves well, and control themselves in the midst of frustrating circumstances… we have to model it. When we fly off the handle because of something they’ve done or said, we’re saying…”this is how you behave when you don’t like what someone else is doing”.
It’s all about self control. We have to focus on controlling ourselves, before we can expect them to control themselves.
2. EMPOWER THEM:
So often in parenting, daily life becomes a battle of the wills. We wrestle for power in the simple attempt to get something done, melt-downs ensue, and we end up squelching their desire for autonomy in the process. The notion that one of us has all the power, and the other has none, is a sure recipe for disaster.
Every human being was created with the need to feel powerful. If we’re not given power…we will do whatever it takes to get some.
Our children are powerful! We just need to teach them how to use their power wisely.
With little ones, giving them choices is a huge part of empowering them. We almost never battle over the silly stuff because we’ve learned the magic of choices. Rather than, “put your shoes on”, we say, “which shoes are you going to wear…the red ones or the brown ones?”. “Are you going to put your shoes on, or would you like me to help”. Rather than, “come and put away these dishes!” (for the 3rd time), we say, “are you going to put these dishes away before or after you have your snack”.
And we hold to it. Consistency is tremendously important here. If something hasn’t been done that’s been committed to, other things don’t happen until it’s completed. We simply let them know that, “we’d be happy to read you a book/get out the play-dough/take you to Beth’s house as soon as you’ve done such-and-such”.
Things we used to fight over have literally become effortless. I kid you not.
All because we’ve learned the pure delight of offering them 1 of 2 choices…both of which we’re happy with. It’s quite hilarious to watch, really. They feel so powerful because they get to decide…and we’re happy because they’re doing what we’d like them to do.
Leaving a store/play-date is rarely an issue anymore as we simply say, “would you like to leave now…or in 10 minutes”. They choose…we go. This works especially well if you’ve remembered to ask them 10 minutes before you actually want to leave.
Simple, effective brilliance, I say!
3. TEACH THE ART OF BEING CONSIDERATE:
Our kids need to realize how their attitudes effect those around them. I think sometimes in this parenting gig we forget that we’re grooming them to succeed in the real world, and in the real world, stinky attitudes and whining won’t fly.
Whining, meanness and outbursts aren’t tolerated around here.
We use the terminology “fun or room?” to offer them the choice to be fun, and stay around us, or go to their rooms and have some alone time, where they can be as miserable as they choose to be. We also learned this little trick from Danny Silk’s parenting curriculum and love how easily our kids have caught on. Initially we had to spell it out…”in order for you to stay around the rest of the family, you need to change your attitude. But that’s your choice. So are you going to be fun to be with…or do you need some room time to work through your attitude?”. Now they get the simple phrase, “fun? Or room?”.
They almost always choose “fun”.
This teaches them to carry their side of our relationship, and how to be considerate of others. They need to understand that they make up half of this relationship dynamic and they need to be responsible for their part of it. This will have positive ripple effects well into their work lives and marriages.
4. WALK THE WALK:
Our kids don’t listen nearly as well as they watch. I have found myself scolding my kids for things they’ve learned simply by observing me.
They are little mirrors. They reflect back to us all our worst behaviors and habits.
If I am intolerant, ungracious and snarky to them, they will be intolerant, ungracious and snarky to others. I can tell them to be kind and patient with each other, but if I do not model that with them – and in the way I interact with others – they will learn more from what they observe me doing, than how I tell them to behave.
Along the same vein, I can urge them to “speak life” to each other until I’m blue in the face, but if they hear me bad-mouthing their daddy, I set the standard for how we speak to, and about, other people in this family.
5. GIVE THEM ROOM TO FAIL:
Our children need to have a safe place to screw up when they are still young, while the stakes are low, while they still run instinctively to us for help.
If we show them that we cannot handle their mistakes now, when they’re little, they will learn to hide their failures – which, when they’re older, can lead to secret addictions & disaster.
We need to intentionally foster an atmosphere that declares, “when you fail…run to me!”, rather than away from me. We want our kids to know that, while there will be consequences for their actions, they can depend on us as a safe haven to retreat to when they’ve screwed up. This demands that we be careful in the way we respond to their failure.
We can choose grace – and foster relationship – or stand harshly on rules – and foster rebellion.
This is also a tremendous fleshing-out of the relationship God desires to have with His kids…when we mess up, we should run toward Him – but if our image of God is distorted, if we believe He is an Almighty Jehovah Zappa! ready to smack us upside the head, we will turn and run away from Him.
The way we handle our kid’s failure sets the stage for how our children approach God in their times of personal weakness and disappointment.
We long for them to know, despite the fact that the water may be dirty and the temperature a guaranteed shock to their systems, that it’ll always be worth it to jump in our direction. We’ll catch them, no matter what.
6. ALLOW THEM TO EXPERIENCE CONSEQUENCES:
It’s so easy for us to sweep in and save our children from the consequences of their foolish decisions by cleaning up their messes for them, swooping in to fix relational issues, and making excuses for their behavior. All the while muttering under our breath how this is the last time we’re gonna do it. Darn it!
But when we let them experience the discomfort and pain of consequences, they learn and they grow through their errors.
Our children are brilliant…we just have to give them room to think through how to solve their own problems, which involves us stepping back and asking, “what are you going to do? How are you going to solve this problem, love?”.
Remember too that there is a big difference between punishment and consequences. The way in which we handle our kid’s screw-ups sets them up to understand God’s grace…where there isn’t punishment for our sin {because of the price paid on Calvary}, but where there are always consequences for our actions – good or bad. God is the ultimate Father, and in His wisdom, He allows us to experience the consequences of our choices…and we get to choose whether we learn from them.
This is a very important concept for them – and us – to grasp.
“As much as I adore my children, as crazy as I feel about them, I betray them if I put their happiness and comfort over God’s overall purpose in their lives and in our world.”
– Gary Thomas, Sacred Parenting
7. GET TO THE ROOT:
I am finding that when my kids are the most unlovable, is when they need my love the most.
Creating boundaries, and consistently sticking to them, not only makes sense, but also creates a sense of safety & stability for our children. Our kids need to know where we stand on certain issues – and attitudes – and see us follow through on dealing with them.
We have found, in dealing with behavioral issues with our kids, that while it’s easy to just discipline the action and move on, it has little lasting effect in the long run. A passing smack across the noggin’ and a barking reprimand does little to instruct. We simply end up dealing with the very same attitude/action the next day. It may be an easy way of dealing with our kids, but it’s not an effective one.
This method of discipline makes as much sense as putting a Band-Aid on a cancer.
We need to get to the heart of the matter – what was going on inside their head and heart when they did this? By taking time to sit, face-to-face, and ask questions, we deal with the root issue. There are endless opportunities for our kids to learn and grow and mature, if only we’re willing to take the time to look for them and seize them.
While it can be instinctual for me to yell and scold, when I extend grace to my kids – when they’re expecting anger – I literally see their faces soften and can sense their hearts softening. They are so much more teachable this way!
By focusing more on motives than actions, we uproot a behavior, and are able to plant truth and love in its place.
8. LEARN THEIR LANGUAGE:
In the same way we have different love languages (the way in which we extend, receive and interpret love), our children speak specific love ‘languages’.
If we are to build courage and confidence in them, we need to celebrate their differences, their quirks, their unique makeup. And a big part of celebrating, is valuing and validating.
If we don’t know what someone’s native tongue is, it’s very hard to communicate something effectively to them. For instance, if my daughter’s primary love language is quality time (which it is), but I keep buying her gifts as a way to express my love (because maybe giving and receiving gifts is a love language for me), I will not effectively be expressing my love for her. She craves time with me, not more toys.
Gary Chapman points out the 5 primary love languages as: quality time, words of affirmation, gifts, acts of service, or physical touch.
It would be wise for us to become students of our children, and to make a point of speaking their native tongue.
**As a side note: in this world of extremes, where touch can be sexually corrupted or sterile and non-existent, our children desperately need affection (whether their primary love language is physical touch or not). We were created for affection. In fact, studies show that touch – more than any other sense – is universal across all cultures and species, and that even animals know that touch is critical to life.
We crave affection and physical attention, whether we realize it or not. And daddies, you should know, when you’re not loving on your daughters and meeting their need for affection, they will try and get those needs met elsewhere. Their need for this is woven into the fabric of who they are!
Here’s a great article on the effects of lack of affection on childhood development.
9. TEACH THEM TO MANAGE THEIR FREEDOM:
This has been one of the most revelatory concepts for me.
When our kids know that we simply deal with bad behavior swiftly, without taking time to hear their hearts and uproot the real issue, we start to instill an external management system. It’s all about the rules.
Them behaving well, and making good choices, depends on the presence of someone to deliver punishment when they step out of line. They know not to mess up around mom or dad. Or a teacher.
But what happens when you remove that external management system? Things get messy.
So we’re learning to cultivate an internal management system in our kids, based on a heart-to-heart relationship with us. They have an internal compass, a sensitive spirit and a moral awareness, that – in our absence – guides their choices. They don’t want to make that stupid decision because they care about our connection and they want to protect our relationship. They’re guarding our hearts.
This is exactly the difference between religion and relationship. Religion says, “it’s all about the rules…you better behave in church”. Relationship says, “it’s all about the intimacy of our connection…and I don’t want to grieve your heart because our relationship matters too much to me”.
We have been given so much freedom, and I am so ridiculously thankful for this. I don’t want my children to feel shackled or held captive by our fear of their freedom. But in order to trust them and equip them to face the many choices they will in life, they need to know how to manage their freedom.
I don’t know about you, but this is the kind of connection (internal management system) we want to have functioning in our children when they head out into the real world every day.
“Those who think that the wisest way to groom a child for spiritual maturity is to isolate him from the evil, corrupted world system or airbrush his childhood environment so much that it exposes only him to the good and never teaches him how to process the bad (or the counterfeit) will set a child up for a life of mediocrity at best and spiritual annihilation at worst.
Unfortunately, when it comes to meeting our children’s driving need for inner strength, it’s easy to want to build a safe hope in them rather than a strong hope.”
~ Tim Kimmel, Grace Based Parenting
10. MODEL A HEALTHY MARRIAGE
It is so true that one of the greatest gifts we can give our children is a strong, healthy marriage.
My mother fleshed this out beautifully. She just talked my daddy up, praised him, respected him (in his presence and his absence), and she loved him extravagantly right in front of us. They kissed, they flirted, they laughed. And they had intense fellowship. They modeled for us 4 girls just what a healthy marriage looks like, and we are deeply grateful.
The atmosphere we create in our homes is hugely impacted by the health of our marriages. When we are at odds with each other for an extended period of time, or are simply being nasty to one another, the security and safety our children so desperately need from us is compromised.
My hubby and I are a unified front. Our kids don’t play us against each other because they know they won’t get away with it. We refuse to speak negatively about the other in front of the kids (because our spouse’s name is ‘safe in our mouths’}, and we try to model how to have a disagreement like civilized human beings.
I love the way my husband handles our kids if they are disrespectful or rude to me in front of him…”you will not speak to my wife that way again, do you understand?”. Apart from silently declaring, “I got your back, babe!”, it clearly lays out where our priorities lie: God first, marriage second, family third.
It’s simple stuff, really, but stuff we can easily forget about when we don’t keep the big picture in mind amidst the whirlwind of daily life.
Our marriage is laying the groundwork for how our children will approach their relationships, and eventually their marriage. We want our kids to make great choices, to know their worth, to know how to speak lovingly and respectfully to others, to know how to fight right, to know how to be loyal and committed even when things get uncomfortable, to be resilient, and to get comfortable with saying, “please forgive me” when they mess up.
They learn the fundamentals of these things – the good, the bad and the downright ugly – on a daily basis by simply watching us ‘do life together’. We need to ask ourselves frequently…”what is my lifestyle and attitude setting into motion in their lives?”.
I’ve read many parenting books over the past several years..some have inspired belly laughter & sweet sighs of agreement, others have deeply encouraged my heart and bubbled-over with wisdom and ‘ah-ha!’ moments, while others have simply evoked a hearty face-palm encounter and a prompt ‘Goodwilling’ of the book.
Here are my favorites. Book that have challenged me, encouraged me, stretched me, and in many ways completely transformed the way I approach parenting….
* Loving Our Kids On Purpose by Danny Silk*
* Grace Based Parenting by Tim Kimmel
* Going Public by David & Kelli Pritchard**
* Sacred Parenting by Gary Thomas
* Momology by Shelly Radic
* Parenting with Love & Logic by Foster Cline & Jim Fay
* Shepherding a Child’s Heart by Tedd Tripp
*My hubby and I have done Danny Silk’s parenting course a few times now and simply love it to high heaven. It has totally changed the way we parent (a lot of what I shared above was learned from Danny). If I could recommend one tool to secure in your parenting tool-belt, it would be this one!
**If you happen to be a Jesus-loving momma who is wrestling with the ‘Good Christian Mommas Home-School Their Kids…but the mere thought makes me want to dry-heave’ dilemma, this is the book for you! It will encourage, inspire and equip you to send your little light-shedders out into the world and make a difference!
