Calm Parenting Podcast - How A Dad Stopped a Power Struggle Over School

Episode Date: May 6, 2021

How A Dad Stopped a Power Struggle Over SchoolSo I almost sobbed throughout this podcast. How do you turn a power struggle over school work into a bonding experience? How can Moms be free from the burden, guilt, and anxiety over trying to make everyone happy?  Our Mother's Day Sale Ends This Weekend! You get the Calm Couples Marriage Mentoring Program FREE with your purchase of the Calm Parenting Package or the Get Everything Package. Make this your Mother’s Day gift to yourself or tell your husband THIS is what you want. Get Personal Mentoring with Kirk Over the Phone.Kirk will work with you individually or with you and your spouse to get you on the same page and help with your toughest parenting challenges you haven’t been able to solve.  Questions? Need help deciding on the best tools for your family? Email [e-mail] and Casey will help you personally!  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. Ever been locked in a really bad power struggle? Ever have kids who just have interests that are different than yours? It's tough. That's what we're going to talk about in today's Calm Parenting Podcast. This is Kirk Martin, founder of Celebrate Calm. Glad you're here with us. I had planned this morning. I was psyched. I was going to do a whole message for moms for Mother's Day. And I started getting all these emails this

weekend. And one of them just hit me really hard. And so I thought, you know what, let me roll with what is kind of moving me and is top of mind. And I promise I'll get to a good Mother's Day podcast because as you know, if you followed us, I'm not a big fan of Mother's Day being one day out of the year, right? Because moms do everything for everybody else, like 365 days out of the year. And then we just like throw one day at them and just have heartedly. And I want every day to be Mother's Day, every day to be Father's Day. I want everybody taking care of themselves and making themselves a priority. Watch, this is kind of cool,

and I'm gonna get back to what I was gonna do on the podcast, but let me roll with this. This is not selfish, because a lot of people are like, oh, it's so selfish, self-care. No, it's not. My goal in life is to benefit and help other people. I don't have a good way of saying it. My daily, I've got these little daily affirmations, and it's been this for a long time. Today, I will be a blessing to three

different people today. And I try to consciously give out, especially to the people closest to me, because it's really easy to be nice to people and be good to people that you don't have to live with and wrestle through life with, right? Like it's easy being nice to that person that you see, right? Like once in your lifetime, like you give them a big hug and you give, that's easy. It's the people that are around you that are the hardest. And so I try to be conscious of that. And I try to be, and that's my goal is to give out. Part of being calm, being calm. Look, a big part of why I want to be calm isn't so I can enjoy life and I like being calm. It's because my business is named that. It's because when I calm my inner anxiety, when I calm down my control issues and perfectionism, see, the anxiety inside,

moms, look, I'm going to do something for you anyway because I just feel like it today. So roll with me. It's going to be good. When I go off track like this, it's usually really good insight. So moms, moms often have, I did a phone consultation with this mom this past weekend and she's like, ever since my kids were born, I've had this constant soundtrack in my head. It's always running because there's always stuff to be concerned about. The kids' schedule. Am I going to get them on time? They're on time. What do I need to plan? And I've got camps I've got to plan for, and school things I've got to plan for, and I've got to sign them up for different volunteer opportunities. And does my son have the right, he's going over to a friend's house and did he pack his favorite sweatshirt?

Because I want him to be comfortable. And what about food? I want to make sure that my kids eat healthy food and I plan my meals. And I've got to make sure they get their schoolwork done and they go to the right school and they get the right teacher and they do the right. And it's constant.

And his mom was like, it never, ever ends. And so her kids are getting a little bit older now, right? Middle school and high school. And what I've been trying to teach her is, I want you to go from being mommy to being mom, right? See if this makes sense. There's a big difference there. When your kids are little, you have to be their mommy, right?

Because you can't tell like the four-year-old, like, hey, fend for yourself. Get your own food. Do your schoolwork, shouldn't have schoolwork at that age, take care of yourself. As your kids get older, absolutely you should do that, right? Because you want them to be independent, but it's really hard for mommies who were really into their kids and did everything for them to transition to being mom. But you have to, otherwise you will suffocate your kids as they get older. You will suffocate them and they won't want to have anything to do with you because it's normal for them to have their independence. And I've found it's easier for

moms if I say, yeah, I don't want you not to be there. You're always going to be their mom. When you're 85 and they're 65, you're still going to be their mom. And just like my 85 year old mother still reminds me, honey, it's cold out, wear your jacket. And of course I dismiss her because I'm like your kids and I don't like wearing a jacket because I have sensory issues and I don't like feeling confined. So, but she will always be my mom, no matter how old old we get so you're never going to stop being her mom but I want you to turn off this constant chatter because moms do way too much right is that not true moms you do way too much it's it's not that you do too little you do too much and like you never feel like you do enough or you feel like it's never good enough. And it's not just that you have unrealistic expectations of your kids. You have unrealistic expectations of yourself.

And you envision, see, because you envision this happy little family that runs smoothly because everybody does what's expected. And you've micromanaged it and you've planned it. And that's an awesome thing to a degree. But you've tried to create this perfect family but if you read enough history you'll find out that has never been the norm and people always say well you know Kirk I grew up in this dysfunctional family and my spouse is like so did everybody like everybody grew up in a dysfunctional family because we're all broken, insecure people. But the purpose of relationships, the purpose of family life is not bliss. It is not happiness.

It is transformation. And this will change you more than anything else. It is transformation. Moms, it is not your job to do everything for the kids it is not your job to make sure everybody's happy you can't do that it is not your job to manage everyone's emotions you can't do it it will make you miserable and resentful because after all you do for them and they can't even see that your issue, you're doing too much. And nobody is ever, look, your kids are never going to wake up

and say, mom, listen, we've decided you do way too much for us. They're not. You're going to have to decide that yourself. And this mom that I talked to this weekend in our phone consultation, what she said, because I asked her some questions and she said, what I'm realizing is this. I did all of those things. Everything I did. And the truth is, no one really cared about it all. It was just me. The kids weren't asking for it.

Nobody was just me. The kids weren't asking for it. Nobody was demanding it. I was demanding it of myself because I had a mother who did the same thing. And that soundtrack played through my brain. And one of the things you will hear on the Straight Talk for Moms CD, and actually all of them, is creating a new soundtrack. I am 54. I am having to recreate the soundtrack in the brain that came from my father, that you're never good enough. You're never going to amount to anything, right? All of those things that play through a kid's head and heart when he's four and seven and 14

continues until you change the soundtrack, until you take control of that and you create a new soundtrack and you stop doing everything for everybody else, right? And so what I want you to see in this is moms, I don't want more burdens for you. You're already burdened down too much. And right now, my guess is you burden yourself these are coming from within those voices that constant chatter that constant pressure is coming from within and the really awesome liberating freeing news is you can't change your kids and you can't change your spouse but you can change yourself and you can change that soundtrack inside of you. And so I want you to start to see your kids and see your spouse as a tool of your own transformation of a person. You become a new person.

Watch. As the people closest to you, your kids, your spouse, your own own parents that brother and sister right there's people around you as they test your patience and as they push buttons you never knew you had and when you start watch this is so liberating because everybody has told us our whole lives right or a whole time as parents are like well you've got to get on your child, you better discipline, you got to motivate them, you got to figure this out, and it's all about changing another human being, and that has never worked in the history of the world,

and if you look back and read any ancient history, you will see that is true, you will see it happen with Cain and Abel and Adam and Eve and whoever else you want to read about. Romulus and Remus, the two brothers that started Rome, one killed another, right? Like it's all there. It has not changed. It never works. But what always changes is when I can let go of that and I focus on changing myself,

I can free myself and I'll free you from your pride of thinking that, oh, my kids are great because I was such a good mother. But it will also liberate you from the thought that like, oh, well, my kids aren't that good. It must be that I failed. Or maybe I'm a bad mother. And that's not true. That's a lie. Because your kids have choices to make. And I want to free you from the false

expectations. And I want you to question, say, why are you doing too much? What is driving and compelling you? It's nobody else. It's coming from within. And the awesome, freeing, liberating, non-burdensome message is you can change that. You can change that. And part of the reason we talk about self-care is this, because look, the greatest gift I give my family is not what I do for them. It is what I do for myself. Because when I take care of myself, when I make myself a priority, when I go for a walk in the morning, when I listen to music that's uplifting, when I take care of myself, when I make myself a priority, when I go for a walk in the morning, when I listen to music that's uplifting, when I listen to podcasts that feed me positive things,

when I turn off the TV and I turn off that Facebook and Twitter feed and I feed my soul and my brain and my heart with positive things, and when I take that time, whatever it is for you to pray or to read scripture or to meditate or to do yoga or to do your exercise, when I take time to do those things, now I just got rid of all that clutter in my brain. Now I have managed my own anxiety. I have cleared it all out so that now

I can see what's happening inside of you and I can be there for you and I can help you instead of you managing myself because watch what happens moms dads when we don't take care of ourselves we put other people in the position of having to manage our emotions for us that's where after all I do for you comes from it's a manipulative tool saying after all I did for you, you owe me. No, they don't, right? Dads, like I did, fear and intimidation, my way or the highway. You know what that is? It's an immature reaction because now I'm using fear and intimidation. And what I'm really saying is I need you to behave, son or daughter, because if you don't behave, I'm not sure I can behave. You do

not want to see me angry. See, does that make sense? When I do those things, I'm basically saying I haven't taken the time to control myself and work on my own anxiety and perfectionism and control issues. So child, four, seven, look, it starts as early as age two, right? We get it all the time. Well, my three-year-old is just so strong willed and she's, I'm like, okay, come on. She's three. I know she's difficult. She came out of the womb being difficult, but you're, you're not going to tell me that the 35 year old isn't, doesn't have a little bit of control here. Right. Uh, right. Does that make sense? It's like, well, my three-year-old's controlling me. Okay, then you've got an awesome kid, and you need to work

on yourself, right? And there's no burden and no guilt in this. I want to make it clear. I want to make it clear. I don't do guilt, manipulation, blame, none of that, none of that, none of that. But in being free, I take care of myself. It's an awesome thing. So I didn't plan to do that. Here's what I really wanted to tell you. And it fits in with this. And it's a beautiful story. So there's this dad.

So last weekend, I did, last weekend, I did that podcast for dads. And I was like, hey, get the Mother's Day sale for your wife. She'll appreciate it. And she'll actually get what she wants. And your home will be different. Well, what happened is all these dads ordered it, got the downloads and started setting it up on the family computer and on the phones. Well, I got a bunch of dads this weekend. They were curious, like, what is this? Right. And so there's one called Straight Talk for Dads, which is awesome because it's short and sweet bullet points and it's on sale which men like so the dads are listening so I'm getting all these

emails this weekend of like hey um I ordered this for my wife but I'm kind of listening and you're describing me as a dad I just want to let you know that it's resonating and I was like that's awesome so here's the story Dad is locked in a power struggle with his daughter over doing schoolwork, which doesn't even count now because most schools aren't even counting the schoolwork. So good luck motivating your child. We can help you do that, but you got to find out what motivates them. And that's what we're going to do in this story. So look, this can go one of two ways. And I want you to picture this. Daughter, dad. It could be daughter, mom, son, doesn't matter.

One way it happens is the usual way. Dad gets upset, starts talking like, I don't know why you can't do simple work. When I was a kid, we did our work. I was up early. You know what? I don't know why you can't do it. And he starts digging in. If you don't do your homework, I'm going to take away all your electronics, and you're

not going to talk to any of your friends because that's the only way you can keep in touch. Well, what's going to happen? Daughter digs in and they start trading negative jabs at each other. Because your kids are not wallflowers, right? They're not like, okay, mom. They're going to come right back at you and they're going to escalate because that's what they do. Because we incite it usually. And then dad explodes, takes everything away.

And watch what happens. Daughter is now up in her room crying and dad is fuming and they're separated physically and emotionally. And watch what else just didn't get done. The schoolwork didn't get done. But you know what did get done? A relationship just got frayed a little bit more. See how that works? When we escalate and follow our kid's lead and we push the strong-willed child, it's awful. You not only don't get what you want, homework didn't get done, chores didn't get done, not a good attitude, but you ruined the relationship. And so here's what this, and I call this, he's a regular old Joe. He's a normal dad, right? Just normal dad who works,

and he's got a pickup truck, and he just does his regular life. This isn't some like amazing self-aware guy who practices mindfulness, okay? By the way, I've made jokes about that before because you know what the mindfulness book I'm going to read? Not by the guy who lives by himself in the south of France. It's pretty easy to be mindful when you're not married and don't have kids. I'll buy the mindfulness book by the plumber, the electrician, the regular guy who has to work a job who's got three kids and a wife. When that guy changes himself, oh, I'll read his book. But enough of all these millionaire guys. Oh, I just practice mindfulness. I don't have a care in the world. Course is easy, right? And that's why I, and I think that's why this has resonated over the years, Celebrate Calm.

Most of the parenting stuff is usually a lot of is done by moms, which is awesome. But this is a dad because it's harder for dads, I think, to change sometimes. And it was a regular guy, me, who changed. And I'm not that bright of a guy, but I changed. And so here's what this regular old Joe kind of dad did this weekend. And we're going to break it down. And every time I do, in my mind, it makes me cry. Here's what he wrote to me.

It's a small victory, but your advice was spot on. I invited my daughter to come sit with me in my truck while she did some homework. And I used her favorite passion, really interesting moms and dads, stop trying to make your kids care about what you care about and be interested in what they're interested in, even if you hate it. I used her favorite passion, which is anime, and told her we should pick out a new costume piece as soon as we get the Zoom call complete. And it worked. She went from flat out refusing to comply. I then told her each week we'll order something online if the assignments are complete. And she came back to me with her four-week plan! He wrote. I didn't even know she thought like this. And watch what just happened. That dad decided to lead his daughter.

He invited her to his truck instead of yelling and pushing. He decided to draw his daughter. And I promise, I really want, if you have a strong-willed child, listen to the Strong-Willed Child CD program. You can download it right to your phone. Let your kids listen. And I guarantee you, they will tell you, that guy and his son are describing me. It is critical that you understand these kids. They are different.

You have to do it in different ways and you have to lead them. You have to draw them or you will push them away. This dad connected with her and you get tired of me saying it, but it's connection breeds compliance, right? It's relationships that change behavior. He was creative. He did it a different way, and he got a different result. And I know you're going to be irritated by this, because look, everybody else, all your friends will be like, well,

just be the authority figure. Tell this little snowflake of a daughter to do her work. And if she doesn't, bring the hammer down. Give her severe consequences. That'll shape her up. Look, I get that. I like the tough approach and I use the tough approach sometimes. But most of you have done that a thousand times and it's never worked. Ever.

And people don't get you. People judge you because they don't have a strong-willed child and they don't get the fact, and some of the husbands don't get the fact, and wives don't get the fact, that if you push these kids, they will just choose to dig in and they will choose a harder consequence and they will make life difficult on themselves.

Why? Because they're not going to be pushed because they want to own it themselves. And it's a great quality and we miss it. Look, that almost makes me cry when I say that because you have this kid. Look, you adopted or you chose to have kids and this child was born and we had this idea of how we want them to be

and we love the compliant kids because they're wonderful and sweet. They do what we say, but you had the strong-willed child and I promise you, you are misreading this child. They don't wake up. They don't wake up every morning and think, oh, I just want to be difficult so that everybody, I almost said the F word there, so everybody freaking hates me. But that's what it feels like when everybody around you doesn't understand you. And you're not, look, I am that person. I don't wake up and think, oh, I just want to be an oppositional

a-hole today. That's not how I think. It's not my intention. But I see the world in different ways. And I know that I'm swimming upstream, but I'm 54 so I can deal with it and I get it. I know how to work things. But when you're a kid and nobody in your life has ever told you there's nothing wrong with you, you're just different and you do push our buttons. But you know what? That's our issue because we have so many buttons. And instead of looking at that child as some difficult, challenging child who makes my life difficult, which is what I used to tell my son, instead you look at that child and say, thank you. Because I needed someone to come along and show me all my control issues. And then'm riddled with anxiety and this sweet, sweet

mom that I talked to this weekend. It's the same thing. You have to be free of this stuff. This sweet mom for the last 15 years has had constant chatter in her head. It's never good enough. Do more. Be a good mom. Try harder. You're not doing well enough. Your kids aren't responding. No, we have to be free from this stuff. And maybe, just maybe, the strong-willed child is a gift to you because they're going to bring up all the ick inside of you and free you from it. Stop fighting it. My son was given to me because of the way my dad was. I was my dad. Fear and intimidation, yell and scream, not my issue. Rigid inside, can't deal with anything. And yet I'm thankful because though I nearly destroyed my son and my relationship,

nine and a half, 10 years in, it finally got into me. Maybe I'm the one who needs to change. And Casey drew out of me so much ick that I never would have seen if not for him. If I would have had an easy child, it would have been lovely. And I would have had an easy child it would have been lovely and I would have been an immature person who never learned how to deal with hard things in life and he freed me from anxiety inside and trying to control other people and trying to make other people happy and having to fight people and trying to convince people that I'm right and he freed me from all of my political fights with people that only prove that I'm a jerk, right? Even though I think I'm right in my opinion, it just proves that I'm a jerk and he freed me from all of that so that I could enjoy relationships with people. See, and I

want you to see that in your child. They're just, they're not trying to be difficult. They want someone who looks at them and says, you're different from me, or you're just alike. And I want to understand you. And I want to stop fighting you. And thank you for bringing all this stuff out in me so that I can deal with it now. It's awesome. And so look what happened with this dad, right? Look, I kind of lost my place there, and I didn't mean to But look I get it other people are gonna be like, oh you just need to be tough you've done it before it just Creates distance and broken relationships. This dad is a hero to me Watch he had every right as a dad to yell at his daughter and his dog and whoever it was and dig in.

But he humbled himself. He humbled himself. And when I talk to men and talk to moms too, humility is a powerful tool with a strong-willed child. If you're intent on digging in, I promise you your child will dig in even further. They don't care about the consequence and they'll take it. They will. Humility. Humility will break the walls down. It will change the child. And you didn't change the child. You changed yourself first. And his big old dad, right? I like picturing it. Simple, big old dad with his pickup truck,

right? Whose father probably whooped him, probably did the fear intimidation thing like I did, right? Instead, humbles himself and invites his daughter out to his truck. And now watch what he did. He takes an interest, and I'm just going to be honest. I had a lot of kids that came to our house. We had 1,500 kids in our house over the course of a decade. And a lot of those kids loved anime. And they loved all kinds of electronic and technology and all kinds of weird crap that I thought was stupid. And this big old dad invites his daughter and likes anime. And he's going to order little costumes. You think that's what this big old dad wants to be doing?

Probably not. And yet he takes an interest in something his daughter cares about. And watch how cool this is, right? Watch how cool this is. Sorry about that. I didn't plan on this. But I'm picturing this big old dad and his daughter next week when that little anime costume piece comes in the mail.

Guess what? She's going to be excited. She's going to open it up. Guess what she's going to do? She's going to run, show it to her dad. Now, if this were me back when I was, before I was, had changed, you know what? I've been like, fine, stupid animal. I'm a dumb. I don't know. I don't get this. Why are you doing that? And we do this at our peril. We dismiss things that our kids are

interested in at our peril. I will tell you, if you enter into it, it's one thing that you will learn on the No BS program. You can get either the Mother's Day special or the No BS program on our website, Celebrate Calm. They're 66% off. Everything's on sale because we want to help you. If you want to get everything, get everything. It's on there. Get everything together. Lowest price we've ever done. Anyway, get it. One of the key points in the No BS program is one of the keys with these kids is you have to enter into their world and be interested in something they're interested in. And I guarantee it's going to be something that you don't like.

But it's going to create a bond there that's very, very powerful. And this little girl is going to adore her father. Because that same father the previous week probably yelled at her and said, you'll never amount to anything. He probably didn't say that. That's what I used to say to my son. All right, you're going to be successful. You can't do this. Go do your homework.

And now they're sharing this. And now you picture this. Picture this. This little girl now grows up and she's a teenager. And now she's having to navigate the teen world. Because the teen world's tough. She's got all this peer pressure. You're a teen girl.

You know what's harder than managing boyfriends? Your girlfriends. Because they're tough. They choose sides. She's got to manage that. Guess what happens? The first time, maybe a boyfriend breaks up with her and breaks her heart. You know what this girl's going to do?

She's not going to go and start vaping or drinking or seeking something destructive. She's going to go hop in hering or drinking or seeking something destructive. She's going to go hop in her father's truck and sit there and wait for him. And he's going to go get in that truck, picture it, and they're going to drive around. And they may not even say anything. That dad may not have to say a word. But he's going to be with his daughter. She's going to be there and they're there together. And that little girl, when she was eight or nine or 10, learned from this one instance when they crawled into that truck and she did her little Zoom session from the truck and did it well and ordered a

little anime piece and she came up with her own plan when she's a teenager they're gonna go for rides in that pickup truck and this little girl knows my dad's a safe place this is a cool thing I can trust him. I can go to him with anything. And that is beautiful. See, it's not just about changing your child's behavior. It's about connecting and building trusting relationships. That will change the behavior. That's what we're called to do. And to this dad, I say, beautiful. You just saved so many power struggles. You just created a new tradition. My tradition with Casey was chips and salsa. This one is this.

It's going for a ride with your daughter and sitting in that truck and having deep talks in that truck. And then you give your daughter that truck and make her pay for it from you, buy it from you. But that becomes her truck. And that becomes your code word. Hey, dad, want to go for a car ride? Want to go out in the truck and I'll meet you out there? That's a beautiful thing.

Because now when you're driving, you don't have to look at each other. You can just play some music that you hate, but your daughter loves, right? And if you're lucky, like I was with my son, we actually grew to like the same kind of music and we bonded over it. This is what we're called to do, moms and dads. I don't want you doing more. Moms, no more.

I don't want to add things to your plate I want to take stuff off of your plate enjoy your kids connect with them understand them have a relationship with them and it changes who you are and it's a beautiful thing I apologize for this going so long, but I hope, look, my day's different because this, this dad just changed my day. I'm going to call my son after this and I'm going to connect with him even deeper. And I'm going to connect with people in my life. And I want to connect deeper, right? Because that changes people and it changes who I am. I encourage you, if you need some help, contact us, Casey, C-A-S-E-Y at CelebrateCalm.com. He will help you. He will help you with whatever you need help with. And that's what we're here for. I would encourage you, we've got a Mother's Day sale and we've got the No BS program. We've

got phone consultations with different price points. We can help you different ways. If you need help within your budget, contact Casey, he'll help you. It happens every single day. We get lots of moms and dads emailing, and that's what we do. This is what we're here for. But anyway, I'm going to shut up now because I'm going on and on like you do with your kids. So anyway, love you all. I'll talk to you soon, and thanks for being patient with me. Bye.