Calm Parenting Podcast - Child Messing Up Your Agenda?

Episode Date: January 7, 2020

Child Messing Up Your Agenda? You are a conscientious parent with an agenda—to raise your child to be a responsible, respectful adult. You’ve read all the books and done the right thing. You may have other kids who are easy. But this strong-willed child is upending your home and destroying your agenda. So what do you do now? Listen and discover how you can enjoy and motivate this child. Want to take advantage of our New Year's Sale? Click here and make 2020 different than 2019.  20 SECONDS CAN SAVE 200 FAMILIES and 20%.What we teach changes homes and classrooms. Parents and teachers rave at our live events because they are fast-paced, practical, funny, and life-changing. So as 2020 begins, take 20 seconds to save families and get 20% OFF our training. Email [e-mail] with the name of your city, state, and school, church, or PTA.  We'll send you a one-page proposal you can forward to your PTA, principal, school counselor, or church leader.      Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Calm Parenting Podcast listeners get an exclusive 20% off an IXL membership when you sign up today at ixl.com slash kirk. Visit ixl.com slash kirk to get the most effective learning program out there at the best price. Welcome to the Calm Parenting Podcast. This is Kirk Martin, founder of Celebrate Calm. You can find us at CelebrateCalm.com. Pretty easy. We've got a Facebook page. We've got a free newsletter. All kinds of good stuff. So join our community. It's pretty cool and you'll feel supported. I wanted to talk about today about that strong-willed child who has ruined your agenda as a parent because I guarantee if you're a parent, when you're planning on having

kids, what happened? You had a vision for how life was going to work and it's not turning out that way, is it? And if you had an easygoing child first, that child was awesome. You're like, we're such good parents. Let's have more. And then you had the strong willed child and you determined that everything that you did for the one child backfires on the strong-willed child. So we're going to go through three different ways to handle that. It's going to be a big theme this month. We're traveling a lot. One quick note, we're going to Kansas City in the end of January, and it's cool because we're going to do some parent training, some training for teachers. We're also training an entire county of mental health workers.

Really cool. We're also doing corporate training, of mental health workers. Really cool. We're also doing corporate training, which is awesome. Come right into your company. But along the way, see, we go to Kansas City, and after that, we go to a conference in Western Michigan. And so in between stops, we have a couple open nights in places like Nashville, St. Louis, Chicago, Iowa. We'd love to come to Iowa. So instead of hearing politicians spout off, you could bring the calm guys in,

and we'll actually change your life for the better rather than making you more upset. If you're in Indianapolis, Michigan, contact us. Here's why. On the way to these places, we have a couple options. We stay at a hotel in a place like Nashville or St. Louis. Kind of cool places. But rather than sit in a hotel room where Casey and I will just irritate each other,

we'd rather be out working and helping families. So contact my son Casey. Casey, C-A-S-E-Y, at CelebrateCalm.com. Tell him what city you're in. Just email him or call him, 888-506-1871. Just email or call and say, hey, come to our school. Come to our church. Come to our synagogue.

Come to our company. Whatever it is, your organization. Let's make this work. And so when you contact them, say, hey, listen, I'm going to spare you from being with your dad all night in a hotel room. Come instead speak at our place. And we'll set you up. And the great thing is, if you do this in those cities on this trip, kind of get discounted rates because we'd rather be speaking to you. Look, we'll come anywhere. We're overseas this winter. We go everywhere. So no

matter where you are, contact my son. We'd love to come. And we kind of bring a lot of live energy to this. And one thing that we hear all the time is, this is really effective, especially for men. A lot of dads are like, blah, blah, blah, parenting stuff. They come out to a live event and they're like, oh, that guy's kind of me. He described me. He's a real guy. He struggled. He changed. If he can do it, I can do it. So do this. It's cool. Here's what we're going to talk about today. That child who ruins your agenda.

Look, I can tell. You're listening to a parenting podcast. You know what that means? You're a conscientious parent who wants your child to grow up and be a responsible, respectful adult and to do the right things, right, and to be maybe like you were as a kid or maybe not to make the mistakes you were as a kid. So you're conscientious, and you have an agenda. And I can tell at the live workshops, I'm like, all these moms come out and I can tell like, you've got an agenda because moms, you read all

the parenting books even before you have kids. You make sure that your kids eat the right thing. You fix their own, right? You have your own little organic garden. You do all the right stuff. You make all the right decisions. And yet, this child is difficult, wants to do things on his own terms. Every time you ask him to do something, they say, why? Right? You can't get him to do anything. And I hear words like they're bullheaded, they're difficult, they're challenging. And I get that.

And what happens is this child will ruin your agenda as a parent. And you know what the downside and the end point of that is? You stop enjoying your child. Because now watch what happens. You're so invested in this idea of my job is to create a successful child and grown adult. And what happens is this child will resist that pressure. You've seen that, right? The more you try to push them, the more they resist. I'm going to come back to that in a minute. And so what happens is you begin to feel like a bad mom or dad and you lecture and press your child more. And what happens is this child is no longer your son or your daughter. This child becomes kind of a pawn that you manage to fulfill your mission.

And you've got to watch that because if you study revolutions, study it going back to the French Revolution, Bolshevik Revolution, any revolution. You can watch it in politics now. You can watch it on either side of the aisle. The mission becomes more important than people. Watch that. The mission becomes so important. And what happens in your home is you become resentful toward this child. Why?

Because they're difficult. Because if they just do what you'd ask them to do, everything wouldn't be so hard and they could be successful. Right? You recognize that, right? And so you become resentful because maybe when you were a kid, you didn't cause all these problems. Or maybe you did cause those problems and now you're trying so hard to save your child from pain and heartache and yet they're not listening to you. And so you get resentful and you stop enjoying them. And instead, you try to figure out all the different ways that you can change or manipulate them so that you can complete your mission. And you don't want to be there, right? Because

it ends up spiraling, constant power struggles, you end up feeling guilty, right? And it doesn't work. So a couple things I want you to do and encourage you to do, probably maybe go through two or three of these. I want you to relax a little bit and know that this child is going to be okay. They're just not going to follow your path and that's okay, right? They're going to find their own path. But you know what? It's going to be a rough path. And they're going to stumble a little bit.

They're going to fall down. They're going to skin their knees. And they have to because they're stove touchers. And they learn by doing and failing. They learn by touching that hot stove. And you have to step back so that they can step up. You have to allow them to do this. You know what's really happening in your home? You get this anxiety about your child's future because they're not living up to their

potential. They're capable of so much more. So you get on them and on them and on them. They resist. And the whole cycle keeps getting worse and worse. And this really isn't about your child. It's about your anxiety over your child. It's about your anxiety over your child, right? It's about your anxiety about your child's future. And you're going to have to control that anxiety and let go of that and relax a little bit, right? Because otherwise, see, you're spending all of your time trying to motivate your child to care about what you care about, and they won't, and they don't. And you're going to have to instead figure out what they are motivated by. And we can show you how to do that, okay? But I want you to do that. I want you to accept your child on a deep, deep level.

And some of you have a hard time with this because you're too busy changing them. In our No BS program, one of the action steps, I mean, there's a lot of them. There's 25 of them. They're really good. And if you find yourself in this situation, you're like, you know what? We don't have a good relationship, especially as your kids get to be 10 and 12 and 13 and 16 and 17. You've got to turn that around. And it's not going to be some bolt. Your kids are not going to have some moment, right? Like Saul on the way to Damascus get hit by a bolt of lightning to do this. You're going to have to initiate it and change it. The great part about that is you have complete power to do that.

So if you're in that situation, definitely go through that program. Let me read you, not read you something, tell you a little story. And this is related to a previous podcast around the holidays. Remember that family that was in the car and they had downloaded the CD programs, right, from the Christmas special and they were all listening on their own iPhones, which is cool. And then they went around the car and said, hey, what did you learn? And dad said, I learned that I allow you to push my buttons and I apologize. And mom owned up to her thing and a brother owned up to her thing, his thing. And they looked at the daughter and like, well, what did you learn?

And she said, I'm not telling. You know why? Because that's what our kids do. And they don't want the pressure. So I just got an email from them. And they're like, so here's what happened. All through the holidays, we're like, Connie, you're going to share? You're going to share?

No. And I told them, I said, stop asking her. You're pushing her. And it's too much pressure. I guarantee if you step back and relax, when she's ready, your daughter will share. So guess what happens? New Year's Eve, they have a little shindig, little thing. It's cool, whatever. They wake up New Year's morning and there's a note on the kitchen table for this girl's family. And here, and I'm going to paraphrase it because it's very personal, and I want to paraphrase it. Here's what she said to her family.

Mom, Dad, Brother, I want to apologize. I have been difficult, but I want you to know the journey I've been on. Because I thought all along that there was something wrong with me and that I was just the bad child. I didn't even know why I was pushing everyone's buttons. But here's what I learned from Casey. It's from Casey, my son's CDs, and listening to the Strong Willed Child one, which is a must. You have to listen to that program, the Strong Willed Child.

It's foundational. And so here's what she said I learned. I finally learned why I'm this way, that I have a path to choose, and that strong will is going to help me. But the reason I was pushing buttons is because my brain needs stimulation. And I didn't realize that I was doing some risky things that I haven't even told you about. But I didn't know why I was doing it. I just thought there was something wrong with me, like I was broken, like I didn't fit in because I'm not like the rest of you. And I don't fit in at school. But what I learned is there's nothing wrong with me. It's just the way that I made.

And instead of spending all of my energy trying to make things difficult and pushing people's buttons, I've learned a different way. I've learned that I have gifts and passions. And I've always, I've never really acknowledged them because everybody always just asked me about school. But I'm really good in all these different areas and I'm awesome with little kids. Little kids love me. So my New Year's resolution is I'm going to use my gifts and passions and I'm going to help little kids. And I'm going to put my time into this because I know when I do that, it makes me feel good about myself and I'm helpful and it makes me feel alive. So instead of bugging you guys for the next year, I'm going to throw my energy in actually helping other people because I finally realized

there's nothing wrong with me. So forgive me for my attitude and forgive me for that, but I finally am learning to accept myself as I am. If your child wrote that, what would you say? What would happen? You'd bawl, right? You'd be like, I never understood. And that's the third thing I want you to do in addition to accepting your kids on a deep level is you have to understand them. I promise you, look, I get emails every day and they're always like, look, even three-year-olds. And I want you to know if you've got toddlers and little kids, I know I get the emails, do some stuff for little kids. And I will, I will. We have whole programs on that. I will. But you know, what's even more important than the strategies? It's understanding your child

on a deep level, right? Because I hear these things like, I've got a three-year-old, he's bullheaded. And as soon as I hear that, I hear a pejorative, I hear a negative connotation. And what I usually hear is a frustrated parent who can't get their child to do things. And I understand the frustration because that was our son. And we worked with 1,500 of those kids in our home. But I can promise you with almost 100% certainty that if you just double down on hardcore discipline, right, expect quick, happy, thorough obedience from the child, you will have more power struggles. You will grow apart from your child and he will never ever trust you because that's the pattern. And I guarantee

when I hear that from people like, he's just bullheaded, you know what's on the other side of that? Probably kind of a bullheaded parent. Now, you may be a rule-following compliant parent, but you want your way because you've already been raised like this is the way it's supposed to be. And if we're honest with ourselves as parents, it's just easier that way. Look, I used to tell Casey when he was little, it's not that hard. Why do you have to make everything so difficult? Just do what I asked you to do. It's not hard. I did that for my dad. Just do it. Everything will be fine, right? And what happened was, though, this dynamic that was happening with this girl in this story that's

happening in your home. And I can tell you if you learn to understand them on a deep level and you learn to really listen to them and stop fighting everything, right, you will reach down into their hearts and find that these kids actually have really big hearts and they're very bright. And when you switch that around, like this girl, like this teenage daughter, she can flip it around. Think about this. Just like that, they can flip it. How many of you have kids who aren't doing well in school, but they're bright enough to do it? But some of them have different learning issues. They learn in different ways. But if you could reach in and flip that switch, and they flip that switch tomorrow, they turn it around. Some of your kids are like way behind. They could make it up

in no time because they're bright enough. It's not that they're lazy, and it's not that they're not trying hard enough. It's they're not motivated to do it, and they don't have the tools to do it. Does that make sense? Because that's what I want for you. So I do encourage you. I encourage you. Go to CelebrateCalm.com. On there, you're going to find we have a New Year's special, which is everything we've ever created,

and we're giving away free stuff like a marriage program. We're giving away in that the No BS program. We're giving away, I think it's 13 different programs on screens, on defiance, on siblings, on discipline. The CD program for kids to listen to, for moms, for dads, strong-willed child, ADHD, everything. And while you're on the website, look, we still have the Christmas sale up there. You know why? Because it's working for people and it's my company

I know Christmas is gone I can do whatever I want that's why I love doing this and so we have it up there and you may say we're not ready for the New Year's sale to do it all but we'll do the Christmas special if you don't want to do the No BS program

I don't care but start listening to this let your kids listen to this on their own, even. Put it on the background. If you've got toddlers, look, the thing that's going to change, and I may not have wrapped that up, is it's not so much the strategies of discipline. It's how you see that child. Because if you just see your child, whether he's three or three, he's just disrespectful and rebellious. Well, then everything's just going to be negative. That's all that's going to happen.

But if you see them in a different way and say, huh, I see a curious child who doesn't like to do things the way I want, who likes to do things on his own terms. I'm not going to, look, this is not soft parenting. I don't like that. Well, you just need to tiptoe and make sure everything... Not at all. I want you to be tough with your kids. I just want you to be tough in the right ways and to understand from a deep level what's really going on. I want you to be able to say no. I want you to look at them and say, no freaking way. I'm not getting that for you. No, you don't get the fruit snacks right now. You don't get the fruit snacks. Okay. Have a tantrum if you want. I'm okay with your

tantrum. Your behavior does not change my behavior. Your mood does not determine my mood. Be in a mad mood. I don't need you to like me right now. I don't. I just want when you're older for you to respect me to know that I've got. I just want when you're older for you to respect me to know that I've got enough self-respect to know what's best for you. So look, this is not permissive parenting like, well, just tiptoe around and let them do things. Not at all. But I just don't want you to overreact or react at all to your kids and assume that they're being lazy and rebellious because it just heads into power struggles. Because once you have this trust built and you can reach into their heart, see what I want is, I want for the parents to go to that daughter proactively and say, we need to apologize

to you because for the first 5, 10, 14, 13, whatever years of your life, we've misunderstood you. And I bet you feel very misunderstood, like we don't get you. And that probably makes you feel very different, like there's something wrong with you, but there's not. The truth is we're the ones who need to change and we're going to be the leaders and start to change. That'll change your home forever. That will reach into a child's heart from a young age and say, I've got grownups in the home who are taking ownership of their issues. I can trust that kind of parent because they're not going to lose it. They're not going to

overreact. It's a really cool process. So I'm going to stop it there. If we need help with anything, email us. We're good people. We're not always good people. Casey and I kind of jerks at times, but we're really good to other people, right? We're really, we will help you. Our mission is to change generations of families. If you email us, we had a lady on Facebook, she's like, I love your stuff, love your stuff, but we don't have enough money to buy the thing, blah, blah, blah. Like email us, email us, tell us what you need. Tell us about your home. We will find a way to help you within your budget. It's not that hard. You just have to do it. So Casey is my son. C-A-S-E-Y at CelebrateCalm.com. Email him. Email him for help. Email him to book a live event, especially in one of those cities, because we don't want to be stuck in a hotel

together. Do that. 888-506-1871. Join us on Facebook. If you want our free newsletter, sign up at the website so you get all of this stuff kind of written down. Love you all. Happy New Year. Let's make 2020 different. No more excuses. Let's change stuff because this is cool. You're going to have a home like that family where the daughter completely is changing herself. That's an awesome thing. Anyway, love you all. Talk to you soon. Bye-bye.