Most of us agree that children and teens these days are more obnoxious, bratty, spoiled, and entitled than ever before. Take one look at social media and you will see hundreds of comments about how disrespectful our children have become. If you Google the words “kids disrespectful”, thousands of articles and images come up confirming this long held belief that this generation of children is like no other.

But what if we’re all wrong? What if we are all making a big deal out of nothing? Are kids these days really that much worse than we were? Didn’t our grandparents think the same of our parents? What about the generations before that? Here’s an interesting quote I found while perusing the Internet. “The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.” Guess what? This was Socrates who lived 470 BCE to 399 BCE.

How can it be that parents felt the same way about kids thousands of years ago as we do today? Maybe, just maybe, it is normal. Call me crazy, but I actually take comfort in knowing that parents have faced the same struggles and dilemmas for thousands of years. Maybe we’re not such failures as parents after all. Maybe it’s really just part of being a kid to be disrespectful. Maybe all kids feel entitled and have bad manners. Is this part of their development? Something they need to go through to figure out who they are and how to be a successful adult? Perhaps we’ve just become too nit-picky as parents that we just care more about everything little thing our kids do? Perhaps we’ve gone too far and just have really unrealistic expectations of how kids should behave. Of course, no one really knows the answers to all of these questions, but it’s certainly worth pondering.

Here is what we do know. Nobody wants an obnoxious kid. Luckily, there are things you can do to ensure that yours isn’t.

1. Don’t be afraid to say “no”. From the earliest age, children need to know that they cannot just do whatever they want. And they need you to set the guidelines and the boundaries. It’s not always easy, but it’s your job. Did you think parenting was supposed to be easy? It’s not, but you signed up for it, so do it well.
2. Be a parent, not a friend. Your kids need friends, but it’s not supposed to be you. You need to be the authority figure, and don’t worry so much about upsetting your child or making sure they like you. Sometimes they won’t. Deal with it.
3. Don’t over indulge your child. Don’t but them a Mercedes when they turn 16. Sometimes, make them save their own money to buy something they want. I’m all in favor of giving them nice things and going to nice places, but not all the time and not just because they want it. Make those moments the exception, not the rule, and make them special. A nice gift and/or meal for a birthday or holiday can be appropriate. But if it’s Mercedes, new iPhones and filet mignon all the time, your kids will be in for a rude awakening when they leave home and actually can’t have all of that whenever they want.
4. Do not allow your child to be disrespectful to you or others. That means you call them out on it every single time, and have consequences for them doing so. Do not ignore this behavior or you are telling your child that it is acceptable, which it is not. Lying, talking back, rolling eyes, and breaking rules are all forms of disrespect.
5. Make sure your child understands the difference between needs/rights and privileges. There are very few actual needs. Don’t be afraid to take away privileges when they haven’t been earned.
6. Be consistent. Remind yourself that all of this will pass, and your job is to teach and guide your child into adulthood.

Most importantly, don’t dwell on the bad behavior. Do what you need to do, and then move on. Remind yourself that this is what children do, and it’s what they’ve done for thousands of years. It probably won’t change any time soon, so just hang in there. If you do this right, one day, your child will be all grown up and a light bulb will go off. He will remember everything you taught him, and be a respectful, productive and respectful adult.

1. Be more, teach less. Don’t try to teach your children lessons all the time. That only leads to franticness and worry. Children learn best from modeling and in those precious moments when they feel connected to parents during “just being” time.
2. Accept the child you have. “If only…”, “Why me?”, and “He never…” can fill your days and keep you disconnected from your children—and your lives. Pay attention to who your child is and what she is attempting to say instead of wishing she were different.
3. Practice mindfulness. You don’t have to sit and meditate to be in the moment. Simply focus on the dish you are washing, the floor you are vacuuming, each article of clothing you are folding, the words and emotions your child is expressing—right now—without jumping to conclusions.
4. Pay attention even when what you hear is unpleasant. Your child is always attempting to tell you something but doesn’t have the maturity to say it in a way you can easily understand. His words and actions often need interpreting. Don’t take them literally.
5. Practice “the pause”. Don’t react to teach your child a lesson. Stop, breathe, wait, and think. Your automatic reaction will be ineffective at best, damaging at worst. Breathe to give yourself a chance to drop back into your body. Then come back to it when you’re both calm.
6. Establish unplugged zones and times of the day. Make sure the rules are established together and are agreed on by all. For instance, cellphone-free zones in the car, mealtime, family playtime, and at bedtime.
7. Once you have tech devices in your home, don’t spend time fighting to get your children off them. Set time structures together and allow self-regulation. Encourage family time. Proficiency in the tech world is your children’s future.
8. Under-schedule your children. Put value on hanging out and being bored. Creativity doesn’t arise when a child is scheduled and adult-directed.
9. Less toys, more creativity. Stay away from talking toys and get ones that allow invention. When your child wants to buy something, ask what it is she wants to do and how she can make that happen.
10. Accept yourself. Negative beliefs about yourself, “I’m not good enough,” “I can’t do this”, etc. come from messages you learned from your parents when their buttons got pushed. They are not true. You only thought they were.
11. Accept your emotions as well as your child’s. Despite what you may have learned, emotions are ALWAYS okay. Don’t be tempted with feel-good-now solutions. Even when depressed and despondent, stay with it. Emotions teach and can be a call to action. Never blame them on your child.
12. Positive self-talk. Get in the habit of staying present with something like, “I can deal with this”, “This too shall pass”, “It’s not the end of the world” or “I’m having a hard time right now.” The one constant of parenting is that everything changes.
13. Stop yourself from catastrophizing. It’s easy to soar into the future in a nano-second when your children provoke fear and anger. Check yourself when you have thoughts like, “He’s going to be in jail by the time he’s fifteen.” “She’ll never have any friends.” “He’s never going to finish anything.” We convince ourselves of the worst.
14. Learn to say no. Many mothers were brought up to believe that doing for others equals being a good person. Parenting is the toughest job there is. Especially for working parents, prioritize the needs of your family and yourself to stay focused and present.
15. Care for yourself. You cannot be present when you wish you were elsewhere. You can’t fuel your child until you fuel yourself first. Find ways and times to do for you so you feel better when you are being a parent. Don’t buy into the old “selfish” bit.

Is it hard to get your preschooler to clean up his or her room? You know kids should help around the house, and his own room is a good place to start… but why is it so hard to get it done?  The truth is, for a young child, cleaning up a bedroom or playroom is actually a pretty complicated task.  Consider:

• There are many different areas that need attention (bed, shelves, closet, wall hooks, bins, floor)
• Many different locations the misplaced items need to be returned to (This goes in the closet, this in the bathroom, this in the clothes hamper…)
• Different physical motions required.  (Hang up, set down, straighten a stack, pick up, carry this, tucks this in…)
• The work is open-ended (or at least it seems that way to a young child.)

This challenge is made even harder by the fact that young children have a hard time completing a series of tasks, and certainly a series of undesirable tasks will be even harder still.  Also, have you ever sat down at your computer to look up something particular, and before you realize it, you’ve spent 10 minutes checking email or Facebook?  That’s what we’re asking kids to do… pick up every toy you’ve enjoyed lately but DON”T PLAY WITH THEM, even for a second!  Pretty challenging!

So what to do?  First off, change your goal.  Yes, a clean room is still ONE of the goals.  But consider that “teaching and reinforcing the lesson of HOW to clean a room” is an equally important goal.

Secondly, young children do better when expectations are clearly and concretely spelled out, and when they can receive instructions in bite-sized pieces.  They also do better when they have you nearby.  (Sure, we want our kids to be able to do the ‘right thing’ independently, but the preschool years are a bit early in this situation.)  So clean the room WITH them.  Your physical presence helps them stay focused, your bite-sized directions help them know what to do next, and your positive attitude makes the whole experience better.

Thirdly, consider playing music while you work, or singing, or dancing!  It helps with having that positive attitude (for both of you!) Turn the experience into together-time, and try to make it fun, or at least cooperative.  You’ll find that this can make a world of difference… and a clean room!

Let’s admit it: It’s not easy to raise confident girls. There are so many negative influences in our culture which chip away at a girl’s sense of confidence: mean girls on the playground who exclude each other; older girls who spread rumors or exclude others to gain a sense of social power; and media influences which suggest that girls or women who show off their body and sexuality are the most interesting and desirable. As a parent of a young daughter, most reality shows which showcase female cattiness, obsession with shopping, and a proneness for showing as much of their bodies as possible churns my stomach. More than anything, we should want these two things for our daughters: that they be kind, and that they feel good about how who they are.

As parents, there are simple things you can do to help encourage your daughters to be confident and to like who they are. I will highlight some important activities you can encourage and statements you can make to give your daughter the best chance of liking herself through the various stages of school. It’s no easy feat to raise a confident daughter, but it certainly is possible!

Praise your daughter a few times each day – especially when she is a toddler or in elementary school – for good qualities you see in her.

If you want your daughter to like herself throughout her life, the best thing you can do is to remind her on a daily basis why you like and admire her. Praising girls is especially important when they’re under the age of ten because this is when the self-esteem foundation is set. I will share examples of behaviors you may see your daughter engage in that warrant a praising comment from you: playing by herself; playing nicely with someone else; reading; sharing something with someone; not giving up even when she gets frustrated; organizing something or putting something back where it belongs; remembering something which shows that she had been paying attention; and so forth. When you see her doing any of these things, regularly say, “I see the way you are [insert behavior] and I think that is so great that you are doing that.” Another example: “Wow, I am so impressed that you [insert behavior].” When you positively reinforce this type of behavior, she will keep engaging in that type of behavior in the future.

Never, ever criticize your daughter’s physical appearance or body.

The names of girls and women I’ve treated over the years who feel bad about their body or appearance could feel an entire notebook. Many females I know share that either their own mothers or mean girls at school made harsh comments about their appearance, planting the seeds for a lifelong battle with bad body image. Make it a priority to never, ever say anything negative or critical about your daughter’s body because she will not only never forget it, but she will also be more likely to make the same kinds of hurtful comments to her own daughter when that time comes. Tell your daughter at least once each week how pretty she is, and comment on specific things that make her feel good about her appearance: “I think you have the sweetest smile;” “I love your eyes because they are so pretty and gentle.” Quick note: If you do slip up and say something critical, do the honorable thing and apologize later. No parent is perfect but good parents try to repair any previous ruptures in the parent-child bond.

Have your daughter play team sports throughout the year.

The age of four or five years is a great time to start your child on organized sports teams. Some parents wait to put their kids on sport teams until they’re a little older, often because the child says, “I don’t want to,” or because the parent feels the child is too shy or timid. Yet it’s precisely shy or timid kids who need organized sports the most! Give your child a choice of many sports to choose from, and then tell your child that you’ll attend every practice and cheer them on from the sideline. If you have to sweeten the pot to get them to agree, tell them that they will earn a reward at the end of each sports season they finish, and let them brainstorm with you about what the reward should be. The bottom line is that sports allow girls to access their natural aggressive and competitive impulses within a positive, team-oriented environment.

Final analysis

Creating confidence in your daughters is an ongoing endeavor that requires many years of parental encouragement, praise and vigilance. Practice each of the interventions above and you will be providing your daughter with tools she’ll need to take care of and like herself throughout life.

Blaming something or someone else when we are angry, criticized, or thwarted in any way is as common among humans as laughing or crying. We naturally and automatically defend ourselves when we feel attacked, but each one’s perception of what amounts to an attack is up to individual interpretation. Unfortunately many parents feel under attack from even their smallest child. So we blame.

Blaming another for what is my problem, my responsibility, is clearly learned. To take responsibility for ourselves—our own behavior and emotions—is hard. We want others to suffer when we suffer. It’s called retaliation. We learn to retaliate when we are blamed—often at very young ages.

Whenever we feel blamed, we get defensive. So do our children. “Why did you do that?” “What did you do now?” “You always .…/never….” “I can’t leave you alone for a second!” “How dare you?” “How many times do I have to tell you…?” Just a tone of voice can send blame showering over a child filling him with tension and resistance—“Jason!” He has no option but to defend himself. “I didn’t do it!”

We live with the myth that a child who is blamed and yelled at is going to learn to take responsibility for her actions, own up to everything, and never do it again for fear of displeasing us. That’s not how it works. When children feel blamed, their focus turns inward with self-protection, and they defend themselves against the blame to keep from “getting in trouble”. More spirited children resist with aggressive behavior, act out and learn how to get sneaky and shirk responsibility.

Children with a more compliant, adaptable temperament take blame personally, plummet into guilt and self-doubt, learn that “everything” is their fault and that they are a disappointment, and lose self-esteem. These children look like the good girls and boys because they are able to shift their behavior to keep out of trouble—but at the cost of self-worth and confidence. These children are the reason we keep using blame and punishment because it looks like it works. But once self-esteem drops, trouble begins.

When children who are used to being blamed become parents, they continue to blame. It’s hard not to. It comes trippingly off the tongue. Teaching children to be well disciplined, respectful, and responsible can be done far better with no blame. Once you understand the principle of blame and how it plays out, you will never want to blame again.

Blame provokes defensive behavior. Running away, laughing, hitting, pushing, lying, yelling, “you’re not the boss of me”, “you can’t make me”, “you’re so mean”—are all defensive actions to “get back” for getting blamed. Some children become overly concerned about how you feel. “Are you happy, Mommy?” means the child has learned to take responsibility for your feelings and likely feels guilty if you are upset. Your happiness means he can relax.

A mother of two young daughters has been trying to convince her girls that they are not responsible for her feelings. The six year old said to her, “But when you scream at me for not turning off the television, I know you wouldn’t scream if I turned it off, so that means I’m responsible for your feelings.” Pretty astute for a six year old!

When we blame in anger, we indeed teach our children that they are responsible for our feelings and our behavior. “You make me so mad. Why do I have to yell 10 times before you listen? Or “It makes mommy happy when you do that.”

 We don’t pay attention to the messages we send our children with blame. “You’re the bad one, I don’t approve of you, My love is conditional on your behavior, You don’t have a right to your own feelings and desires, You have to make other people happy with your behavior.”

 When we refrain from blame, even when one child has hurt another badly, we can put our attention on the hurt and allow the hurter to take in the situation he has caused. When he is blamed, he cannot because all he can focus on is getting out of trouble or blaming the other for starting it. When he is not blamed he actually experiences the consequences of his behavior. You can then offer him ways to make amends. “Do you want to get the icepack to hold on your brother’s arm?” Later you can talk about his anger and how to express it differently.

Problem solving and conflict resolution promotes true accountability. Blame and punishment prevents it. When children know they are not going to get in trouble, the fear of trouble no longer drives them to defensive behaviors.

The nature of tragedy is that it is out of our control. Ultimately so is just about everything. The nature of parenting is the desire to maintain control. The irony is that in order to best handle times of tragedy and to best maintain influence over our children, we first need to let go of that desire to control.

Instead we tell them what to think and feel, what to say and do. Everything around us tells us that if we do this, take that, wear this and buy that, we will be happy. Rewards and punishments are the way we control and tell them how to be. This method raises our children to focus externally (what will happen to me if…? Or what will I get if…?). They often don’t know how to handle themselves without those external controls. Most of us have lost sight of what we already know — if we could trust ourselves to just listen.

In order to stay calm, do our best work, and have the greatest influence on those around us, we must stop trying to control others. Nobody likes a dictator. Children are no exception. In working with parents all over the world, I find that nothing is harder for parents to do than let go of control.

When tragedy strikes, we try to protect our children from worry and fear. When my daughter was four she was afraid of fire. One Sunday the house next door burned to the ground. My first instinct was to close the door of the room she was in to insure she did not see the fire. Immediately, I realized the futility, and so I carried her to the window to watch. She wanted to get as close as I would allow. She was mesmerized and asked lots of questions over days and months that I answered honestly. The experience helped her through and over her fear, to know it was not the end of the world. It helped her to feel less afraid.

Often our experience of tragedy comes from how those around us deal with it. My father died suddenly in the middle of the night when I was eleven. With all best intentions, my uncle hushed my crying with, “Now, now, Bonnie, none of that.” My mother remained stoic without a tear. She later had a nervous breakdown, and I learned the consequences of stuffing my feelings around tragedy. This is not the way I chose to bring up my children.

Letting go means trusting that our children are strong, capable and resilient. Resilience comes from experiencing all that we have inside us and getting to the other side of big intense feelings — not by denial, belittling, toughening up, or keeping secrets. Our children are capable of understanding truth. They don’t need details they cannot yet understand to feel assured by a parent’s willingness to tell the truth.

For children, tragedy is personal — losing a parent, friend, pet. A terrorist attack or mass deaths will not hit home unless they fear it will happen to them. Imagined tragedy can be as strong — a parent’s death, thunderstorms, a monster attack, a bad guy getting in the house. Whatever it is, children do better when they come face to face with the fear, have a parent’s calm support and understanding, and get through it — sometimes years later. The more calm and centered we are, the more we understand that we have no control of our children’s futures, fears and experiences. The more we understand our role as their guides along their own journeys, the more we can allow them experiences rich with feeling, often unpleasant, to be better prepared for the hard world.

Trust
Trusting a child’s capabilities is hard for a parent who was not trusted as a child—a child who was told to listen to someone else, who was ruled by the carrot or the stick, or who was sheltered from the knocks of life. We lack trust in our children to the degree we worry and fear for their safety and healthy development and to the degree we fear lack of control over them.

Your trust is like a constant flow of antioxidants into your children’s veins—trust that your child knows right from wrong; trust that expression of his feelings will never hurt anyone (but bottled up emotions can), trust that he can make good decisions and wants to succeed; trust that sometimes he knows better than you what is right for him, and trust that he will make mistakes, sometimes big ones, which he will learn from when he has your trust that it was indeed a mistake.

Model honesty
Be honest with your children. Don’t try to hide or deny what you know they have been touched by. Keep TV news off in front of young children but do not dismiss or belittle anything they ask or express. Fears will only expand when you dismiss a worried child with, “There’s nothing to worry about.” When your child asks questions or exhibits concerning behavior at a time of stress in the world or in your family, talking about it with facts and assurances will help.

Grow and develop along with your children
If you have used reward and punishment methods to control your young child, your influence and limits will be ignored in the teen years. Influence and limits will remain strong when you give your children more and more responsibilities and freedom to make their own choices and direct their own lives. This requires connection and trust.

Letting go of control and parenting with acceptance, understanding, support, and guidance keeps your influence primary. Control turns them away to find authority among their peers. Your influence and values will always be their rock when life throws the unexpected their way.

Are you aware that you probably live under a spell? I’m not talking about voodoo or magic; I’m talking about the story you have created about yourself and developed over the years based on your perception of what your parents thought of you. This is how powerful parenting is. We all live under spells, some positive, some negative; some we have realized and got out fro under, some we live under that direct all we do.

Spells are unconsciously cast by well-meaning parents who do not understand the power of their words and expectations on the developing brains of their children. Parents are so powerful in children’s eyes that they buy into these spells hook-line-and-sinker.

And it goes on—we cast spells on our children.

First think about the spells you lived under during your childhood. These are what you believed about your role in your family. For instance:

• I was the favorite.
• I was the responsible one, expected to take care of my siblings. I was always counted on.
• I was the pain in the neck member of the family, the troublemaker. I made my parents’ lives miserable.
• I was never good enough. No matter what I did, I could never be who my father expected. I was a huge disappointment.
• I was the clown, the brunt of family jokes.
• I was invisible. No one really cared. I didn’t matter.
• I was the academic achiever—always expected to be the best and smartest.

Some of these were based on what you heard; some on what you extrapolated from experiences.

Now see if you can replace, “I was ….” with “I am….” Are you still conducting your life under that spell? How does the spell play out in your parenting today? What spells are you are casting on your children?

If you knew what you needed to do to get your parents’ approval and could do it, you probably made out pretty well. You got what you wanted (approval), but was there a cost? Did you learn that that approval was conditional on your behavior? What did you have to give up in order to get that approval?

Now, what if you expect the same behavior from your child, but she doesn’t have the adaptable personality to adjust herself for your approval. How do you react? What spell does your reaction cast on her? Are you demanding and critical so she learns that she can’t ever be who you want and thus believes she is not good enough? Or do you adjust your expectations appropriately so she develops under the spell of support, understanding, and acceptance—“I’m okay just the way I am.”

You may have a child who criticizes you, blames you for everything that goes wrong, hits you and says, “You’re not the boss of me” or “You’re stupid” or “Get out of my life!” Do you take it personally and react with anger, blame, or retaliation? Or do you try your utmost to tip toe around your child and do what he wants to make him happy. In other words what do you do if you need your child’s approval—the approval you never got from your parents? Can you withstand the hurricane or do you get sucked into it and blown around until you are worn to a frazzle?

This approval example can work as a template for any spell you are under. We all experience them. Becoming conscious of them allows you to make choices and get out from under an active spell so that you don’t pass them on to your children.

Imagine if your children were to live under these spells:

• I am good at trusting and listening to myself for guidance.
• No matter what, there is a support system I can count on.
• I am an important member of the family and my opinions always count.
• I can make mistakes and learn from them. Mistakes are not failings.
• I am accepted for who I am and do what I want in life.
• I am capable of getting my needs met.

Whenever I talk to parents about ending the use of rewards and punishments, I hear, “But doesn’t my child have to experience a consequence for her behavior?” Sounds logical; sounds appropriate. The problem is most parents don’t allow the kinds of consequences that actually teach lessons—natural ones.

Natural consequences of behavior often bring with them sadness, anger, disappointment, even failure for our children, which sometimes reflects negatively on us. We will do anything to avoid that—even by punishing. Taking away a privilege often shuts down a child’s unpleasant feelings or coerces corrected behavior—so we get what we want and think it’s working. Leaving our children to the natural consequences of their behavior may feel like abandoning them to the wolves.

Handing over the job of homework to your child may mean it doesn’t get done or presented on time. Can you allow that? When children are hitting each other day in and day out, are you willing to learn how to facilitate conflict resolution so they learn to work out their own problems or do you insist on taking something away, blaming one of them, or enforcing separation? Far easier.

If your child screams, “I hate you” and you isolate her or tell her she doesn’t get to watch TV, she feels unheard, misunderstood and very angry. She is trying to tell you something that she does not have the ability to say more maturely (hmm, do you ever react with an immature emotional outburst?) You will be more responsible when you genuinely listen, get to her level and say something like, “You sound so mad at me. You wish I had said something different and you don’t want to get ready to go.” Now she will at least feel heard and thus be more likely to cooperate.

Do you ever feel inspired to cooperate with someone who holds power over you by threatening what will happen if you don’t do what is asked? No. You may do it—but out of fear of the repercussions. That is not cooperation. That is not coming from a desire to help and support.

What about simply saying, “I don’t like that. That’s not okay with me. You clearly want X and I want Y. How can we make this work for both of us?” That requires time and negotiation to resolve a problem. It also means you have to be willing to say “No, that doesn’t work for me. What else can we think of?” It also means establishing a trusting relationship so that your child stays in the problem solving discussion because he knows you will work it out fairly and logically. It’s much easier to just send him to his room.

Children thrive on fairness and logic. Fairness does not mean, liking it. But when it makes sense they are more likely to buy into it. Taking away an iPhone because your son didn’t empty the dishwasher when you asked makes no sense and therefore provokes resistance and anger.

Saying, “As soon as the dishwasher has been emptied, I will be happy to take you to your practice. Let me know when you’re ready” does not make your son jump for joy, but it is the logical outcome if emptying the dishwasher is an agreed on chore.

The natural consequence for not unloading the dishwasher as promised is a parent who doesn’t feel like fulfilling the next request of the child. “I see the dishwasher still needs emptying. I will get you a snack after I see that has been done. Until then, I don’t feel like helping you, when you don’t help me.”

“I want the dishwasher emptied so I don’t have to do all the clean-up. Is that something I can count on you for or is there another part of cleanup that you would agree on?” Offer choices so your child doesn’t feel ordered. Nobody likes that.

When we threaten, take away privileges, or isolate them from us, we are breaking connection and harming our relationship. If your spouse began ignoring you or calling you names, I doubt you would tell him he can’t use the computer for the weekend. You would know there is a problem with the relationship. Why should it be any different with your child.

Notice that there is not one threat or statement of blame in anything I have suggested. Firmness in setting limits, in expecting help, in getting cooperation never needs blame, threat or consequences.

When my daughter Molly was five, I was exhausted. I couldn’t see a way out of our daily power struggles. She was pushing all my buttons, and I was reacting with hostility. But it was the mental notes playing in my head that got me the most. I was worried we would fight always. Fortunately I was wrong.

One morning, the same whiny, angry face approached—but something was different. Every other morning when I saw this face, I thought to myself, “She’s out to get me.” This particular morning I thought, “Wait a minute, she’s not out to get me. She’s miserable.” Suddenly I saw her differently. Instead of a resistant, defiant—okay I’ll say it—brat, I saw a very upset little girl who didn’t want to separate from me. I was battling her and she was anticipating the battle. It was all she could do to get me to understand her, and I wasn’t cooperating.

My shift in perception—she wasn’t being a problem, she was having a problem—changed our relationship. My emotions switched from anger to compassion. Once I got there, I didn’t have to fight her anymore. We never had another power struggle because I didn’t engage.

A power struggle is a fight to the finish when you and your child are both out to win. Most parents believe they are right because, after all, they’re the parent. But consider this, if you win, your child must lose. Your fear fuels your need to win. Your child shows defiance and you think you’re a terrible parent and your child will be a terrible person. However, in the moment of the defiance, you do have a choice even if you feel trapped. You can fight back or not.

There is no power struggle if you choose not to engage. Here are some tips to keep in mind:

Let’s start with the Don’ts:

• Don’t try to reason with an upset child. Rational thought is impossible when the system is stressed.
• Don’t resist resistance.
• Don’t punish, threaten or coerce.
• Don’t give in or try to fix it. If you feel responsible for your child’s feelings, you will try to make him happy (which is not within your power), you will inevitably lose, and then you’ll feel like a failure.
• Don’t take it personally. It’s not about you. Your child is expressing upset in the only way he knows how right now.
• Don’t ask questions.
• Don’t worry, jump to conclusions or catastrophize into the future.

Here’s what you can Do instead:

• Detach. This is your child’s problem, not yours.
• Observe and listen. Allow child’s feelings to come out until they dissipate.
• Maintain a “holding” attitude. See the hurt she is feeling and empathize.
• Hold her as soon as she will let you.
• Acknowledge feelings and intention. “You really don’t want to go to school today. I bet you wish you could stay home and play with me.”
• Give in fantasy what can’t happen in reality. “Wouldn’t it be fun if you had a magic wand. What would be the first thing you would change?”
• Honor desires. “How do you think you could make that happen?”
• Offer a choice. “Do you want to put your clothes on or would you like me to today?” “You don’t have a choice about going to school but you do have a choice about how you will feel about it. You can be grumpy or you can be open to what happens. It’s your choice.”
• Be an intentional parent. Plan, anticipate, give warnings, set predictable expectations and be firm and clear with limits.

When your child feels accepted for his desires, he is more likely to cooperate even when he can’t have what he wants. His resistance is telling you that he doesn’t like being pushed around. Don’t try to change him but do let him know that you understand even when he has to do it your way. Attempting to stop the child’s behavior with a power struggle shows disrespect for the child’s intention and asks the child to be the grown-up first.