Our children need us to lead, but leadership has its challenges. This is when the planning and management meetings you have as a couple are important. How can we lead when we have no clue where the trail is headed? What often comes into play is our worry that our leadership and taking a stand will irreparably hurt our relationship with our child. However, quite the opposite is true. It is in these management meetings that we need to discuss Joey’s tantrums when we say no, Susie whining at every meal, Daniel bullying his brother, Mary’s attachment to her phone. What rule do we need to enforce? What are the consequences? It may take several tries before change happens, so don’t give up after a few days and say it didn’t work. You have to work it, and you may have to work it for a long time before you know if it is effective. If it isn’t effective, then you may need to pivot with a new consequence for that rule. Discipline needs leadership, and our families need parents willing to lead.
TRAVEL TIPS
What are some practical suggestions for leadership?
Lead with your life. The best leadership is modeling and being an example. It is important as a parent to never stop learning and growing. This is a great model for your children as they learn it is never too late to change behaviors. Some of you may need to say to your children, “I know that I am yelling at you a lot, but I am working on that. Will you help me remember?” For your teens, you can say, “Pray for me. I really want to have a different tone when I speak to you. I am asking for your forgiveness for the way I spoke to you. The way I said it to you was wrong, but what I said was correct.” Apologize for your part, and then go back to their part. Be humble to ask your children for forgiveness when you do it wrong. As a leader, you are also modeling humility, forgiveness, and grace.
Lead with your love. As a parent, I am irrationally crazy in love with my kids. I want to lay a relationship foundation of nurture and responsiveness. As I create connection and trust, I also express expectation – especially in adolescence. Love is not indulgence. Indulgence is when we are afraid they won’t like us so we do more, buy more. When we lead with love, we love them through their mistake making.
Lead with your lessons. As your children grow, keep opening files in their minds and teaching the how-to’s of social interactions. This applies to simple commands (When mommy says come, you come) and manners (please, thank you, sorry, greeting others, table manners, chivalry), and other interpersonal relationships they will need to navigate with peers and persons in authority.
Lead with life lessons. Whenever possible, let natural consequences be a teacher. When we are teaching our children, we are the ones enforcing the consequences to crisis them to grow. When we refer to life lessons, the consequence comes naturally. You have told Joey to stop banging his toy because it might break. When it breaks, the natural consequence of a broken toy is the lesson (as long as you don’t go and buy a replacement the same day so that Joey doesn’t cry). Life lessons are natural and logical. We need to give our children the freedom to fall and fail, so that they become responsible when they grow up. They need to learn life lessons, but when we always bail them out, we sabotage their growth. If you don’t let the natural consequences play out, they won’t get their assignments in on time, they won’t get a job, they won’t keep a job . . . because they grow up thinking someone else always rescues me. As you give increasing responsibilities, trust that they will follow through by speaking to who you believe they can become. When the consequences play out naturally, your job is to show empathy and encourage for the future. “Next time, I think you will make a better choice! You will get this!”
Lead as a team with a plan. You and your spouse are more effective when you have the same goal and are headed in the same direction. You can have different approaches, but be united in the application and ultimate goal. A great analogy of this is a nutcracker. When we want to access the edible walnut in the shell, we have to lift the handle up, then press down. As parents, to access your child’s heart, you need to “lift up” their spirit, but also “press down” on discipline. If we solely took a hammer to the walnut seed, we would crush the entire thing – shell and nutmeat. Lifting up and pressing down requires teamwork. Make time to talk together about it. We need to take a united stand in building character into our children.
Release control as your child takes on responsibilities. You are the leader, and a good leader entrusts to those they are leading. Our end goal is to have the kids become responsible adults. We need to let our children grow and go so give them opportunity and space to develop their decision-making. Sometimes this means backing off and letting them not make their bed. But then, they couldn’t go to the party until their room was straightened up. You can control the environment, but back off a bit to allow your kids to make the decisions.
Inconsistency places kids in the leadership role. Habits matter not because of the results you produce. Habits matter because of the identity you are reinforcing. You cannot think about habits you want to form unless you think about who you want to become.
Parents, this is our word of encouragement to you: Embrace who you are and where you are. Parent from your strengths, and be the leader in your home!