You don’t really need to be taught anymore that killing, stealing, raping, and pillaging is wrong. Your conscience tells you these are not right. No one really needs to convince you. In a similar way, it is unlikely that you would allow a political leader to start a war, dominate a country, and steal all of its precious cultural and art objects. Yet today we have museums around the world that are filled with stolen objects or the “spoils of war.” This kind of psychopathic egocentric behavior was acceptable just fifty years ago.
As the collective consciousness of society changes, conscience evolves, as well as intelligence. When people are not capable of knowing what is right or wrong, they need lots of rules which then must be enforced with punishment. If one is capable of developing a conscience, then the need for punishment is outdated. Rather than focus on teaching children what is right and wrong, positive parenting is more focused on awakening and developing children’s innate ability to know within themselves what is right and what is wrong.
Rather than teach what is right or wrong,
teach how to know within yourself what is
right or wrong.
Having a conscience is the ability to know within ourselves what is right or wrong. It is like having an inner compass that always points us in the right direction. We don’t always have all the answers, but our inner compass will always point ourselves in the right direction. In the past, some people have described conscience as listening to a quiet inner voice. That was the only way they could describe something that most everyone now experiences. We now just say, “I had a feeling.”
Feelings are the doorway through which our inner soul or spirit communicates to us. When people are “stuck in their heads,” all they can do is follow the rules and punish those who don’t. People with open hearts are able just to know what is right for them. This same inner knowing, when applied to interpreting the world, is called intuition. When applied to problem solving, it is called creativity. When applied to relationships, it is the capacity to love (or recognize a person’s goodness) without conditions and forgive. Developing the mind is certainly important, but developing a conscience is the most precious gift parents can give to their children.
All parents want their children to know what is right and then on that basis, to act wisely. Until this global shift in consciousness occurred, that was not possible. Parents employed punishment and other fear and guilt-based strategies to deter children from being bad and motivate them to be good. Today children are born with a new potential to develop this inner knowing. Their sensitivity gives them this ability, but it can cause them to self-destruct when outdated fear-based strategies are employed. Whatever treatment goes in either comes right back out or becomes self-directed.
Children today tend to self-destruct in
response to fear-based parenting.
Every child born today has the innate ability to know what is right and wrong. They have the potential to develop a conscience, but that ability must be nurtured if it is to come out.
Positive-parenting practices awaken that inner potential in our children. The result of being connected to an inner conscience is that our children are well behaved but not mindlessly obedient. They respect others, not out of fear, but because it feels good. They are willing to and capable of negotiating. They can think for themselves. They are willing to challenge authority figures. They are creative, cooperative, competent, compassionate, confident, and loving. By learning and applying positive-parenting skills, not only does parenting get easier and easier for us, but the rewards for our children are so much greater. There is no greater reward in life than seeing your children succeed in making their dreams come true and feeling good about themselves.
3
New Skills to Create Cooperation
The sooner you experience the power of positive parenting, the easier it is to give up fear-based parenting skills. Just give yourself one week to practice the ideas in this chapter, and you will never want to go back. Remember that for positive parenting to work you can’t revert back to punishing or threatening your children. You will find that your children will magically begin to respond. This is true for children of all ages. Even your teenagers will respond. The earlier you start, the more quickly your children will respond. When children or teenagers are used to being controlled by fear, it can take a little longer, but it still works. It is never too late to apply these positive-parenting skills. In many cases, they are skills that will help you communicate better with your spouse as well.
ASK, BUT DON’T ORDER OR DEMAND
To create cooperation is to instill in children a willingness to listen and to respond to your requests. The first step is to learn how to direct your children most effectively. Consistent ordering does not work. Think about your own experience at work.
Would you like someone always telling you what to do? A child’s day is filled with hundreds of orders. It is no wonder that mothers complain their children don’t listen. Wouldn’t you just tune out if someone nagged you all the time?
A child’s life is filled with orders, for example: Put this away, don’t leave that there, don’t talk to your brother that way, stop hitting your sister, tie your shoes, button your shirt, go brush your teeth, turn off the TV, come to dinner, tuck in your shirt, eat your vegetables, use your fork, don’t play with your food, stop talking, clean up your room, clean up this mess, sshh, get ready for bed, go to bed now, get your sister, walk — don’t run, don’t throw things in the house, watch out, don’t drop that, stop yelling — and on and on, again and again. Just as parents become frustrated nagging a child over and over, the child just tunes the parents out. Repetitive orders weaken the lines of communication.
The positive-parenting alternative skill to ordering, demanding, and nagging is asking or requesting. Wouldn’t you rather be asked by your boss (or spouse) rather than be told? Not only do you respond better, but your children will as well. It is a very simple shift but it takes lots of practice.
For example, instead of saying, “Go brush your teeth,” say, “Would you go brush your teeth?” Instead of saying, “Don’t hit your brother,” say, “Would you please stop hitting him now?”
USE “WOULD YOU” AND NOT “COULD YOU”
Make sure that, when phrasing your request you use the words “will” or “would” instead of “can” or “could.” “Will you” works wonders, while “could you” or “can you” creates resistance and confusion. When you say, “Would you clean up this mess?” you are making a request. When you say, “Could you clean up this mess?” you are posing a question about competence. You are asking, “Do you have the ability to clean up this mess?” To motivate cooperation, you have to be very direct and very clear about what you want. You must first present your request in a way that evokes cooperation.
It is fine to say, “Could you clean up this mess?” if you are really asking about their competence. If you are asking a child to do something, be direct. Most of the time parents will say “could you” as a way of ordering their children with a little guilt tossed in. Most often parents do so because that is how their parents behaved and it is automatic.
Although it may seem like a little thing, how you ask makes a huge difference in children’s willingness to cooperate.