Loving Discipline

Please excuse me for saying so, but we Americans are a relatively narcissistic, disrespectful, and irresponsible bunch. And we have become the most tuned-out, numbed-out, medicated, and obese population in recorded history. The causes of these are likely to be multi-factorial, but at its heart we have a relationship problem.

“Discipline is the obligation of relationship.” — Frank Marrero

What Is Loving Discipline?

Loving discipline is an approach to parenting grounded in neuroscience and the most current research on human development. The primary principle is this: love and limits are necessary for the brain to wire up in the most complex way possible and for the development of responsible behavior, mutually satisfying relationships, and the reaching of our full potential. The goals of Loving Discipline are:

1. To help your child live a happy, authentic, and meaningful life.
2. To support them toward becoming self-motivated, self-directed, respectful, and responsible adults.
   
3. To create a more harmonious, less frustrating household.
4. To deepen connection, intimacy, and sweetness in your home.
   

What Is Discipline?

Most people think of discipline as “getting your child to do what you want now.” But ironically, this view leads us to do things that make our children less independent and responsible down the road, and it ruins the relationship along the way. At Essential Parenting, we view discipline as having two facets:

• short-term compliance
• long-term maturity

We believe that every intervention must be considered in light of its long-term effects. The reason we keep on eye on the long-term is because ultimately, maturity is the resolution to all behavioral problems. When we focus on getting our children to “do as they are told,” at any cost, this may result in short-term compliance, but does not work in the long run. Over time, this approach can cause our kids to:

• Become hardened
• Turn away from us as a source of guidance
• Become less adaptable and resilient
• Remain relatively immature

If our methods focus on short-term compliance only, then we may win the battle, but lose the war. Discipline methods based on making love conditional increase insecurity, defensiveness, and behavioral problems over time. Today’s highly touted separation-based techniques use this approach. These children might seem cooperative, but at what cost?

“We have a cultural notion that if children were not engineered, if we did not manipulate them, they would grow up as beasts in the field. This is the wildest fallacy in the world.”  — Joseph Chilton Pearce

What Are Separation-Based Techniques?

Any punishment that is designed to alarm a child by withdrawing your connection with them to get him or her to behave is a separation-based technique. Time-out’s, if used in this way, are one example. “1-2-3-Magic!” is often used in this way as well. Trying to make a child feel ashamed is another separation-based technique. Each of these results in the child’s “attachment alarm” going off and the fear generated often causes them to “get in line.” These techniques are effective, but only in the short-run. Using our love—our connection—with a child as a prize to be won only creates more anxiety and insecurity over time. In the end, this can lead to all kinds of symptoms such as inattention, restlessness, impulsivity, tuning the parents out, chronic boredom, numbness, alcohol and drug addiction, aggression, and bullying to name a few. The short term gains are rarely worth these long-term problems.

How Does Loving Discipline Work?

The primary focus with Loving Discipline is bringing the child’s nervous system to rest by meeting their needs. The primary need for all human beings (beyond food and water) is connection with their loved ones. When we have a loved one who protects us, cares for us, and lovingly guides us, our nervous systems relax and function well. And this state—the state of rest—is how we also grow up and mature most easefully. Kids in chronically stressful situations—particularly when their parents are a major source of their insecurity—become hardened over time and typically do not reach their full potential. With Loving Discipline, we strive to be a source of security for our children, which in turn puts us in a better position to help guide them toward appropriate behavior and living up to their full potential.

“How did the rose ever open it’s heart
and give to this world all of it’s beauty?
It felt the encouragement of light
against it’s being,
otherwise we all remain too frightened.”
— Hafiz

How Do I Get Started?

Below you will find the insights, key skills, and practices you will need in order to guide your children toward their full potential while simultaneously creating a household that runs smoothly, with less frustration and yelling. Read these over and begin applying them when appropriate. Many of you will be happy to discover that you have intuitively found your way to these principles on your own. It is the birthright of every human heart to know how to be loving and respectful with others. When we put relationship at the center of discipline it not only works better, but it becomes a discipline that everyone can feel proud of.

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Insights

1. Conditional love provokes “bad behavior.” When we hold the connection with our child up in the air as a prize to be won, rather than a gift that is freely given, we provoke our child’s nervous system into states of anxiety and fear. This leads to all sorts of problem behaviors, slows development of the child’s pre-frontal cortex, and doubles our work load.
2. Judgment and harshness leads to counterwill and collapse.* When children are confronted in a judgmental and harsh way, their instinctual brain goes in one of two directions. When the counterwill gear is engaged, the child pushes back against your direction, either overtly or covertly. When the collapse gear kicks in, the child becomes overly submissive. Both of these reactions arise from feelings of shame and lead to a mentality of “victim-hood,” inhibiting the development of feelings of responsibility for ones actions.
3. Mutual enjoyment and play evoke a desire to be good. When children are enjoyed, appreciated, and played with regularly they become deeply connected and “in love” with their parents. When a person is in love, there is a strong desire to “do right” that person and a tendency towards harmoniousness in the household.
4. Rushed and pressured adults contribute to more meltdowns and resistance in their kids. When the people around us are running around in a stressed out state, barking at us to “do this” and “do that,” we tend to kick into either counterwill or collapse. We see this manifest as our kids dragging their feet, specifically not doing what we tell them, or throwing a fit on the kitchen floor precisely when we are late and most needing to get out the door.
5. Saying no to a behavior does not require shaming or disconnection. Kids make hundreds of “mis-takes” every day and it is our responsibility to help them towards safe and appropriate behavior. The most effective—and the most enjoyable—way to do this is by remaining respectful and connected to your child even as you help them learn “the way we do things around here.”
6. Coercion and control decrease compliance over time. The more your child feels controlled by you, the more they have to “fight” for their autonomy. A system that uses primarily punishments and rewards leads to children becoming more tuned out and less open to our guidance over time. This causes parents to have to constantly “up the ante,” and the vicious circle of control becomes the main dynamic of the relationship.
7. Truly moral behaviors spring naturally from compassion. Laying down dogmatic rules teaches children far less then pointing out the impact of their actions. Truly moral behaviors arise organically from each persons wise and loving heart when we are taught with kindness and compassion.
8. Tears are part of the package. A well-lubed emotional system is necessary for full maturation, and crying is like getting an oil change. Stifling tears—either with harshness or with always giving the child their way—gums up the emotional system and reduces resilience and adaptability.
9. Kids thrive with the right amount of structure. When kids know what to expect—when you have lovingly built the banks of the river for their benefit—they can relax easefully into the flow. This contributes to a more restful, intimate, and smoothly-running household.
10. More then any method, it is your state of consciousness that matters most. When our awareness is relaxed and spacious, when our heart is open and attuned, we are an embodiment of discipline. From this place of loving confidence, behavioral problems are less prevalent, less problematic, and are seen for what they are—an opportunity for everyone to learn and grow.

“The most precious gift we can offer others is our presence. When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers.” — Thich Nhat Hanh

Key Skills

1. Read their needs and take the lead in fulfilling them.* When we bring our children to a state of rest by fulfilling their needs, acting out behaviors diminish drastically. No longer having to work “to get the food and get the love,” their “higher brain” can come on line leading to better impulse control, greater empathy and cooperation, and the development of responsibility.
2. Know your child from the inside out. Make getting to know your child a priority. When you know who they are—their temperament, their likes and dislikes, and their current developmental stage —you will be in the best position to lovingly guide them toward appropriate actions and maturity.
3. Become more playful. The next time you feel frustration building up, try channeling that energy into playfulness rather than being judgmental, harsh, or punitive. Negative energy can consciously be transformed with intentionality and practice.
4. Make life more spacious and less hurried. More is not always better. Mindfully reduce the amount of activities you shuffle your kids around to each day and build in “down-time.” Life becomes enriched when we slow down and take in the preciousness of the present moment.
5. Be able to say “yes” while simultaneously saying “no.” Unless we are clear, children will feel that there is something wrong with them when they get reprimanded for “inappropriate behavior.” The ability to communicate a “yes” to them—to their being and to the relationship—while also communicating the “no” to a particular behavior is key to avoiding shame and the development of a negative self-image, while still teaching them about right action.
6. Reduce coercion and control wherever possible. Try to find ways to give your child autonomy in place of micro-managing and manipulating. Although this may require more patience and messy clean-ups on the front end, the dividends of an independent, autonomous, and responsible young adult that you can trust to steer her own ship are more than worth the investment.
7. Support empathy more than moral prescriptions. Help your child feel the impact of their actions in place of memorizing a list of moral standards. The ability to take an other’s perspective, to sense the impact our actions have had, and to feel responsible for that impact is the most effective path to consistently treating others respectfully and fairly.
8. Don’t be afraid of tears. Set limits on things that do not work, and use softness and sweetness to help your child sink into their vulnerable feelings when the tears begin to come. Your ability to see tears as natural and healthy is key to helping your child develop resilience and retain their emotional vitality.
9. Use structures wisely. Create enough structure so that your kids can relax into a natural flow of living, but not so much that they feel constricted and subdued. Loving structures can turn a chaotic, free-for-all house into a smoothly integrated home that is nourishing for all.
10. Model maturity for your kids. Set the intention to be the “adult in the room” as much as possible. Being an embodiment of self-discipline will teach your children a hundred times more than all your verbal reprimands.

“Do you have the patience to wait till your mud settles and the water is clear? Can you remain unmoving till the right action arises by itself?”  — Lao Tzu, Tao te Ching

Practices

In addition to the important practices of Essential Time, Connect Before You Direct, and Mindfulness found in the Nuts and Bolts section, here are a few more practices to try on. Pick one a week, commit to fully engaging with the practice, and see how it affects your child, your relationship with them, and impacts your entire household. A more detailed description of each of these practices can be found in the practices section.

1. Practice “yes” while saying “no.” The next time you feel a “no” brewing up in you, try to make sure that you also communicate to your child, “you and I are fine.” Most effective through non-verbal communication—soft eye contact, getting down low, a gentle hand on their back, sweetness in your voice—this “yes” keeps their nervous system regulated enough to take in the lesson, builds trust, and over time will deepen the bond between you.
2. Let your kids “fail” more. Let things get messier than is typically comfortable for you. Give your child more room to take the lead, make mistakes, and figure out how to pick up the pieces themselves. You will grow your prefrontal cortex by periodically practicing this mindful allowing, and help your child develop this same brain-muscle simultaneously.
3. Support the flow of tears. When you are clear that something is not good for your child and a boundary needs to be set, communicate the limit clearly and lovingly. When the tears come, become a grounded embodiment of love and give them all the room and support they need to go through a full cycle of experiencing their disappointment. Surviving the vulnerable territory of the human heart is a primary way that resilience is developed.
4. Find the one thing that sets you off and work with it. After becoming reactive—getting angry and yelling, becoming anxious and discombobulated, or shutting down, withdrawing, or going numb—take some time to reflect on what it is that provokes your nervous system in this way. Begin to understand your “buttons” and interrupt the inter-generational transmission of these historical patterns of mis-attunement.

Read more about these practices.

* Concepts learned from Dr. Gordon Neufeld.

Next Steps

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