Calm Parenting Podcast - Dads: Want Kids to Listen? Here's A Game Plan

Episode Date: April 1, 2021

Dads: Want Kids to Listen? Here's A Game Plan It seems like your kids are constantly in trouble, misbehaving, and getting consequences that don't work. So how do you get your kids to actually listen to and respect you? Kirk gives you a specific game plan to implement this week. GET THE CONFIDENCE YOU NEED TO LEAD YOUR KIDS. Email [e-mail]. Tell us your family situation and we’ll put together a custom package to meet your specific needs within your budget or take advantage of our Big Spring Sale this week!  Big Spring Sale: Get the Calm Parenting Package for only $179 (Reg. $475)Digital downloads are included with all orders: Listen directly on your iPhone, Android, or Tablet. Get 100+ tools to replace your child's shame with confidence.Click here to learn more about our Big Spring Sale. Email [e-mail] for the most helpful service on the planet or to customize your bundle!  NOW SCHEDULING LIVE EVENTS & ZOOM CONFERENCES. We can provide high-energy, customized presentations for your PTA, Adoption/Foster Care Conference, church parenting conference, and Teacher Professional Development training both via Zoom and in person!  BONUS: When you schedule a TEACHER TRAINING, we will provide a Parenting Event for FREE. Take one action step today:  Email [e-mail] with the name of your school, city, and state. We will show you how easy it is to train your parents and teachers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey moms and dads, you know that our goal is to raise curious kids who love to learn, and iXL makes that so much easier. iXL is an online learning program that enriches your homeschool curriculum from K-12. iXL encourages students to be curious and empowers them to choose how to learn. No matter your child's learning style or knowledge level, IXL has video tutorials and learning games to guide your child in the way your kids learn best while meeting them at their level. On IXL, kids can explore any topic in any grade level. They're not forced into a single learning path. Kids love IXL's positive feedback and parents love knowing specific skills that need work.

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no multiple step protocols, just simple scientifically validated solutions. The secret is One Skin's proprietary OS1 peptide. It's the first ingredient proven to switch off the aging cells that cause lines, wrinkles, and thinning skin. OneSkin is the world's first skin longevity company. By focusing on the cellular aspects of aging, OneSkin keeps your skin looking and acting younger for longer. Get started today with 15% off using code Kirk at OneSkin.co. That's 15% off at OneSkin.co with code K-I-R-K. After you purchase, they'll ask where you heard about them. So please support our podcast and tell them we sent you. Do you have kids who are always seemingly in trouble? Does it seem like you're always just saying, no, no, stop, stop. Well, you know why it feels like that? Because you probably

are, right? And no matter what you do, it's like you just constantly give consequences for these kids and it doesn't really change anything. And ultimately what you want is for them to listen to you and respect you, right? That's why you're listening to the Calm Parenting Podcast. So I'm going to teach you how to do that today. I'm going to give you very specific instructions, a mission for you for the next week. For those who don't know, my name is Kirk Martin. I'm founder of Celebrate Calm.

You can find us at CelebrateCalm.com. For the men who may be listening who haven't heard before, I'll give you less than a one minute summary of me and my life, how we came to this. My dad was career military. He was known in our home as the colonel. So my dad did not have a full range of parenting tools at his disposal. He knew how to have a very loud voice, very gruff. He knew fear and intimidation, and he knew the my way or highway approach. My dad, like me, struggled when things weren't in order, right? So when he'd come home from work and there were Legos all over the floor and there was disorder in the home or we didn't listen, he had freaked him out. And I was very much the same way. I

believe partly that's why he was attracted to the military because of the order and structure there. It was very safe for him. He knew how to operate within that structure. But once you took that structure away and he stepped through the door of the home, now how do you handle it when you've got four boys and you've got a wife? That's hard. And many of us can identify with that because at the office, we're cool and calm. We can identify with that because at the office we're cool and calm we can handle anything that goes wrong we step through the door of our home and there are some legos on the floor and we start freaking out already well that's what I kind of inherited from my dad and so for those who don't know I have a son named we have a son named Casey and I got on that kid from

the day that he was born because I thought my job as a parent is to correct that little kid and grow so he grows up to be a highly disciplined, motivated young man who says yes ma'am and yes sir. And I tried all of that. And what I found was I was on him all the time, all the time, and our relationship was really suffering and it wasn't helping at all.

So I changed. And when I changed, our relationship changed and his behavior changed and our whole family changed. So I wanna give you some tools today because I've noticed a pattern when I'm doing phone consultations or just meeting people. It's usually there is this dynamic oftentimes of a mom who's kind of around the kids more. So she ends up being a little bit more lenient because, you know, you can't, you can't be tough like 24 hours a day, right, moms?

And so sometimes you're a little bit more lenient. Maybe that's your personality style. And then there's dad sometimes is like me, who's kind of calm at home, and immediately he's like all over the kids, and he's kind of gruff with things and takes it a little bit too far. And so moms put in this position of, wait, do I protect my child from my husband's words? But if I do, am I undermining my husband's authority? And then this divide in the home starts to grow. And so I was doing a consultation the other day and I shared this analogy with, I've shared it with a few dads and they found it very

helpful. Now, if you want to do a phone consultation with us, I'll be happy to mediate between you as a couple or just even on your own. I'll do that. I think it'd be a lot cheaper if you just went through the Calm Parenting Package that we have on our website. And I know people don't like like, why do you have to mention your stuff? Because it helps lots of people, right? And it's 30 hours. It's my life's wisdom with these kids distilled into 30 hours of very very practical strategies and insights that I don't believe you're going to get at the therapist's office and it's it's 30 hours probably for less than a cost to go see a therapist in one session we've got a big spring sale or if you're really ambitious and you want to change just go and get the

everything package it's it's It's so compared to what you're going to pay. It's such a good process to go through. So anyway, or you can just do one call with me. So imagine this. I'm going to tailor this to men a little bit. Imagine that you get a new job and you go into your new job and your boss only tells you what not to do. Don't do this. Do not do that. And by all means, never do this. And he constantly corrects you, but he never really tells you what to do or shows you how to succeed. It's like the boss doesn't give you any training. He's like, just like, don't do this, don't do that, and you better succeed. And he's like, just be a good employee.

But he doesn't give you specifics, right? Because we always say that to our kids. You need to behave. You need to be a good child. What does that even mean, right? And then when you inevitably fail, because you will with that kind of job and that kind of boss, your boss will threaten to fire you. And then he may even pile on.

I don't know how you even got a job here. Certainly don't have much of a future in this company. Well, you wouldn't put up with that. You'd feel frustrated. You'd feel like a loser and you'd resist or you'd shut down. But consider how we often parent our kids. We say, no, no, no, no, don't do that. Stop, stop, stop all day long. We constantly correct our kids and point out every single mistake that they make. See, our parents didn't really do that as much to us because we were outside a lot and they weren't as engaged with us. And so there's a little, we had a little bit more freedom. But you're around your kids all

the time and you feel like you have to point out every single thing that they do. And we don't really give our kids tools or show them how to succeed. We say, you need to behave, be a good kid, but we don't show them how. And then when they inevitably fail, because they will, we threaten them with consequences. You know what, if you don't stop that, I'm going to take away your video games. You know, go to your room right now. It doesn't work. You've noticed that dads, moms, you've noticed that consequences don't work with the strong willed child, right? And then we often pile on and we doom our kids with our words. And I did this to Casey when he was young,

and it was brutal. You know, what were you thinking? How are you ever going to be successful in life? You know what? Can't even do a simple task. And I was dooming his future, and it was just brutal because I was making it personal. And just like you at this new job,

your child's not going to put up with that either because they're going to feel frustrated, like a loser, like you don't like them, and they will resist or they will shut down. So what are we going to do differently? So you just think at work, a good leader will define how you can be successful. Look, if you accomplish these three big goals, you'll get a raise, you'll get a promotion. Good leader will give you adequate training to show you how to be successful. When you do well, that leader, good leader is going to affirm that and point that out and say, hey, nice job with that project. When you fail to meet expectations, a good leader will address it. But how's he going to address it? He's going to be like, you know what? I can't believe, can't believe that you turned in that proposal like that. What were you thinking?

Right? It's obvious that you don't respect me. No, he's not going to say that. He's probably going to say, hey, last two projects, nice job. The latest recommendation fell a little flat for me. Here's how I think you can make it better. I think you need to add a little bit more context, consider some of those competitive changes that we may not be anticipating. And then I think you can make it better. I think you need to add a little bit more context, consider some of those competitive changes that we may not be anticipating. And then I want you to come back to me with that proposal. And I look forward to seeing what you come up with, right? So he's addressed that what you did didn't meet standards, but then he showed you how to improve, right? It's different. So with our kids, let's do the following for the next week. I can give you a hundred different things to do, but I want to keep this specific for this analogy

for the next week. When you say no to your kids, and you should, this has nothing to do with like permissive parenting, let your kids get away with things. No, we need to say no. But when I say no, even matter of fact manner, there's nothing personal. There's no anger. There's no malice. Look, that's just not happening in my home, right? When we say no to inappropriate behavior, say yes to something that is appropriate, an activity, a project, a challenge, a mission, something that's appropriate. So it can sound like, hey, jumping on the sofa, not happening in my home. Hey, picking on your sister, nope, that's not working here. But I could really use your help doing X. Hey, doing what you're doing right now, that's not going to work in my home. No. Can you hear that? There's no, I'm not saying like,

I can't believe that you would do that. When will you start listening to me? I'm not frustrated. I'm just letting them know. Now I'm frustrated inside. Let me clarify. You should feel frustrated. You can feel disappointed, feel at your wits end, feel all of the things, all you want inside, but you can't let it come out of you because as soon as you start with this kind of frustrated tone, it escalates things. It's for a different podcast and we have lots of them. So listen, but my no becomes, hey, that not happening in my home. Nope. There's no energy to my no, but after I say no, then I give energy. Hey, that's not happening, but here's what I could use some help with. You need to channel your kids' energy. They have a lot of energy, physical and emotional and mental

intellectual energy. And you've got to focus that on something purposeful that challenges them, that engages their brain, that motivates them, right? And you make it very specific. So you're showing your child how to succeed. We actually create successes, right? And I've done that many podcasts of you create the success because otherwise all you're going to say all day long is, no, stop, you didn't do that well. And the child isn't going to shut down. And then I want you to affirm, just like you want your boss to notice when you do a good job, your kids want you to notice. And I promise you, many of you, if you stick with the negativity, you're going to destroy that relationship. And in their teenage years, here's what your child's going to say. You know what it feels like? It feels like my whole life, all you've ever noticed is the things that I don't do right, and you never notice the things

that I do do well. And I don't want to do that. Your kids are looking for intensity. What happens in our home? We tend to give most of our intensity to our kids when they're misbehaving, when they're doing something wrong, or when we're frustrated. You know, hey, stop it. How many times do I have to? That's when we give the intensity.

What happens to their brains is the human brain seeks intensity. Your kids want your intense emotional involvement. And what they learn very quickly is, oh, if I want my dad to put down his phone and give me his intense emotional involvement, I just need to do something wrong because then he'll yell at me. And they get desperate for it. So they'll just do something wrong. And it physically changes their brains. And that's a scary thing. But you can counteract that by doing the opposite. By giving intensity to when the kids do things well. Purposefully. Intentionally. Noticing that. Hey, nice job. Look, this is short and sweet stuff. A little fist bump. Hey, nice job. Well done. Hey, honey. really proud of you. Shows me

you're growing up. Like how you handled that. It's not that hard, but we have to be intentional about it and really put some time into that this week. I promise you, if you will do that, it will change how your child responds to you. It will. It will change their behavior. It will also change your marriage because when your spouse feels like she doesn't have to walk on eggshells and be the referee between hubby and the kids, that changes things immensely. And I promise you, men, I know as a man, I want one thing more than other things emotionally is this. I want respect. I want people to respect me. Professionally, I want my kids to respect me as their father, and I want my wife to respect me as well. And I'll just be brutally honest

because I'm a guy. Some of your wives don't respect you because you're a grown man who goes to the office and handles everything well there. And you do. And you're to be applauded for that. And it's a wonderful gift and sacrifice that you give your family. And you do that for the wives who do that too. Whether you're working outside the home, in the home, or both, right? You're to be applauded for that. But then when you come home and you can't handle things for that child that your wife loves more than anything on this planet, including you, right?

Because she loves her kids more than you, right? That's just the way that it works. And you can't handle that child and you cause more tension and you escalate situations. She doesn't respect you. She doesn't. And nor should she in that way. Now that's not meant to be harsh, but we have to. It's not just about, look, I went through this myself. And in the early days, here's what I said. Fine, fine. You know what? Fine. I can't do anything.

I can't do anything right. Now, there's more to this because there's also the part that your wife needs to affirm you and needs not to pick out everything that you do wrong with parenting as well, right? Both of us are in this together. And at first, I felt like, fine, you know what? I try to help out and I do everything wrong. You know what? I'll just go to work.

I'll earn a living. You handle everything with the kids, right? That's a very common thing that we end up doing and saying. I want your wife to respect you. And when she can relax and know that no matter what's going on in the home, you can handle it. When the kids aren't behaving or when they're upset, that will change a lot of things in your home. So let's do this for a week. I guarantee you 100% your child wants to please you. He or she just doesn't always know how

to do it. Just like you wouldn't know how to please that boss if that's that environment we described. That's what you had to work in. So let's change it because remember relationships change behavior. Rules and consequences don't. Connection breeds compliance. Do this for one week. When you mess up, which you will, apologize. Reset yourself and then let me know how it goes. If we can help you in any way, email Casey, C-A-S-E-Y, at CelebrateCalm.com. Tell us about your family, how we can help. We'll give you ideas and strategies. We'll recommend resources for you within your budget. We do have a big sale going on, so look that up at CelebrateCalm.com, and we'll be glad to help you. Love you all. Let us know how we can help.