Calm Parenting Podcast - Secret Discipline Tool: Men, Moms & Marriage

Episode Date: October 16, 2017

Secret Discipline Tool: Men, Moms & Marriage: Using this secret weapon will change your child’s behavior more quickly than you can imagine. And it has absolutely nothing to do with your kids. Learn 10 very practical (and funny) tips that every man (and woman) can use TODAY to strengthen even a struggling marriage—and calm their kids. Email [e-mail] or call 888-506-1871 to book Kirk or get help with our resources. 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. Hey everyone, this is Kirk Martin, founder of Celebrate Calm. And today I wanted to take kind of a different look at discipline because often when we talk about discipline, we need both parents on the same page. And so at conferences, we'll often address marital issues because it's really important for the two parents to be on the same page. And even if you're single, I think you'll find this really helpful because at some point you're going to be back in a relationship. And I want to give you 10 tips for

couples. And to start off kind of broadly, you know, the purpose of marriage and relationships is not happiness and bliss. It's transformation. It changes us because it's really hard being stuck with someone your entire life. And I don't mean it like that, but you are. You are in this home and in this life sharing it hour after hour, day after day, week after week for years and decades. And you're two independent people and you're going to get on each other's nerves. You are going to help each other. You're going to cause each other to grow. And I think in marriage and relationships is when we come face to face with our insecurities. And it's probably the hardest thing we will ever do. And so you can either,

you know, you can go one of two paths. You can either grow up or you will grow apart. And if not for yourselves, I'd encourage you to do this for the sake of your child and your kids to learn how to get on the same page and demonstrate for them, model for them how to handle conflict and how to have a long-term relationship. So I know we were just speaking, we're just speaking from a live audience

and I look out in the audience and I know, you know, a certain number of the women had married their husbands because they thought they could fix them, and they were kind of fixer-uppers. And then you get married and find out you can't fix that man, and that's not your job. I know some of the women out there married an engineer. And if you're expecting a deep emotional connection with an engineer, probably not going to happen. And that's your choice because you married an engineer. But the good thing is he tends to be pretty stable, earns a good income, and it's pretty good dad. He just may not be the most emotional guy that you've ever met. And that's okay. But I do know when I look out in the audience, I know that at

least 35% of the women sitting out there are literally counting down the days until the kids go off to college and then they're out of there. And that's a very sad thing as I look out at people because that's just a reality. And look, it's not all the guy's fault. It's not all the woman's part. We both play a part in every relationship. There are two people. I know based on my background and how I was raised, this is what I kind of brought to relationships and marriage, is this, I would steamroll my wife. So she'd say something and I'd kind of overcome her objections

and I'd steamroll over her with kind of the force of my personality until she stopped speaking up. Sometimes that's what happens. Our wives are afraid to speak up. I would dismiss things. She'd to speak up. I would dismiss things. She'd bring something up and I'd dismiss, oh, it's no big deal. You don't need to worry about that. There's no need to be upset. And I didn't realize at the time how much I was really wounding and hurting her. At times I would be gruff. Why? A subtle form of manipulation and

intimidation in a way so she'd stop bringing things up. At times I was controlling because that's in my nature to be a little bit controlling over things. And then when that didn't work, I would withdraw. And I'd just go to the basement. I'd say, you know what? I'll earn the living. You take care of everything else. And so my wife and my family often had to walk on eggshells around me. They didn't know how I was going to react to things. And it was, for me as a man, it was very humbling because I can handle anything in the work world. I can work late. I can fix problems. I can solve anything. And by the sheer force of my will, I can be successful at the office. But when I walked through the front door of my house, it was like, I was clueless. I don't know how to be a parent. I don't know how to handle relationships. So this is hard stuff. It's not that easy. And I know my wife's part in this is

that she was never assertive. She wasn't confident. And so you have both, you have this whole interplay, right? Where my wife kind of shrinks, isn't very strong. And so in the absence of that, I'm already kind of an intense guy by nature, but now I step up even more to step in that gap that she provided by not being fully assertive. And it just snowballed in it. And it's not a good, it's not a good place to be. So let's jump in. I'm going to try to make this kind of quick. Um, cause, uh, especially for the husbands who are listening, cause I know we like quick stuff and I'll try to kind of get because especially for the husbands who are listening because I know we like quick stuff and I'll try to kind of get to the point make this really practical so I'm going to go through 10 things number one learn to acknowledge just learn to acknowledge your spouse's feelings

and it can be as simple as just saying this honey I totally get that you're frustrated and that's it zip if you're a guy don't add anything else don't add anything else. Don't try to fix it. Don't try to tell your wife a different way to get it done. Don't say, well, this is how I would do it. Just say, I totally get why you'd be frustrated. And then be quiet and just hug your wife. You know, and wives, same thing. I mean, you can say, hey, I know you're exhausted after working all day. Sometimes that's just a nice thing to say rather than why did you come home in such a bad mood, right? So don't dismiss each other.

You don't have to fix things either. And wives, we're gonna get to this later, but you've gotta be assertive, both of us do. You've gotta be assertive, right? And tell your husband, say, hey, when I express my emotions to you, because look, this scares us as men. We don't know what to do with it, right? Nobody trained us how to do this stuff. I learned how to

jump shot and change the oil and work hard. Nobody told me what to do when my wife is emotional and shares her emotions. I'm just standing there, right? I'm like an engineer. I don't know what to do. So my immediate impulse is, well, I better fix this because her emotion makes me really uncomfortable. I better fix it and make her not be emotional so that I'm more comfortable. See how that works? I'm not just being a jerk. It's my own thing. It's my own discomfort. I don't know what to do. So wives, a great thing to do with your husband is say, hey, when I tell you something, when I complain or when I'm having a bad day, I don't need you to fix it. I don't need advice. I just need you to listen and then just hold me. And that's it, right?

Number two, affirm. I need you to affirm each other, right? Do you know what percentage of mothers feel like they're doing enough or doing a good enough job? The answer would be zero. Zero percent of moms feel like they're doing a good job. And any mom who's listening to a parenting podcast, that means you're a very purposeful, intentional mother. And so you're always trying to get better, but you never feel like you're doing enough. For the husbands out there, when you come home after work, or some of you I know are stay-at-home dads. I know we've got a little bit of everything, right? But just, you know, every few days just say, you know what? You're a really good mom. You know what? I'm glad. I'm glad that my kids get to have a mom like you, right? Just do that. And same thing with your husband. You know what, honey? You work really

hard. You're a really good dad. Now, does it mean he always does things the right way? No, but nobody does. But just hearing that saying, you know what? Our kids got lucky because they get to have a dad like you. That is a big deal. So learn how to do that. That phrase, thank you for working so hard for us. I know as a guy, that means a lot to me. Send a short note to each other, right? Even after you get, just make a note right now, send a short note to your spouse and just say, you know what, you do a really good job and I appreciate you. Look, most of this stuff is not brain science. Some of this stuff is really hard. That part's not that hard, right? Number three, stop proving your point, right? Because when we have to prove our point all the time, it just makes us sound immature and insecure. And because I'm doing a pot, I'll just be blunt

with it. You just sound like a jerk because that is me. I used to have to prove my point, oh, everything. Well, as a matter of fact, you're not right. Honey, let me show you, right? I guarantee for the husbands out here, your wife is never going to say, honey, I'm so glad that I married you. Because sometimes I have these illegitimate feelings and I can always count on you to point out when I'm wrong. It makes me feel really safe as a woman. It doesn't. It makes you sound like a jerk. So just stop it. There's no need for it, right? Maturity means that I can talk to another human being and they can have an opinion different than mine. And I don't feel like I have to change their opinion, right? And so some of us, all we ever

listen to is talk radio or politics and we come home and we just dump day after day after day complaining, you know, about your side because your side is always right and the other side hates America no matter what side you're on. Just cut it out. It's annoying. And I'll tell you, it will hurt your spouse. You know, same thing. I mean, wives, sometimes you just have to prove your point over things, over how things go around the house or with parenting. And it caused your husband to shut down. So please don't take these gender things. Look, they both work. They work both ways, right? We've got like guys who are like controlling yell and scream, but I've got wives who are

controlling yell and scream. It works both ways, right? So number four, connect emotionally. Now, I know as a guy, when I used to hear this, I was like, oh, I just want to connect emotionally. Now, I know as a guy, when I used to hear this, I was like, oh, I just want to connect emotionally. I'd be like, I have no idea what that means. Like we watched the Packers game yesterday, had some chips and nachos. I thought we had a nice connection there. And apparently that's not what my wife meant. And so it's really, really hard. Or my wife would say, or wives, you'll hear people say like, well, I just want to feel valued, right? Well, I don't know what that means. So you need to be very specific about what does make you feel valued, right? Because we're not mind readers. And so, by the way, keep that in mind. We are not mind readers. You have to say what makes you feel valued, right? So I'll give you an example.

My favorite time of year is fall. I love football season, the NFL on Sundays. I love Sunday afternoon, Sunday night, Monday night, Thursday night. I get to watch football. And so I own my own business, which means I'm kind of always working in a way. And I've got my laptop on my lap watching football. My wife comes walking into the room and she starts talking and I glance up at her and I give her a little bit of eye contact and I'm glancing at the screen for the football, down at my work, back at my wife. So I'm thinking like, that's good. It's not what she's looking for. So I remember one day I closed my laptop and I looked straight in her eyes and she said,

that's it. That's what I'm looking for. That emotional connection. What you just showed me is that I am more important than your work. I am more important than your screen or your football. And so, look, you can't do it every time. You've got to get work done. But that idea of I close the laptop and give eye contact,

I'll give you a challenge as married couples. Those have been married a long time. I challenge you tonight to give each other three minutes of eye contact. Three minutes is an eternity, especially if you have ADD, but it's a long time to look in your spouse's eyes and listen. Really listen for three minutes. Not with the kids. Listen to your wife. Try that. I guarantee you're going to head up to the bedroom if you keep doing that. You know why? Because that gets really intense looking at each other like that, and you'll start to connect.

So I remember I used to, I've got in my office, I've got my desk, and there's a chair off to the side. And again, occasionally when my wife came into my office, instead of looking at my desk or looking outside, I would shift in my chair. And that little shift meant my focus is on you, not on the work. It's a very powerful thing to do. For the guys out here, here's a good one, and wives too. When you go to dinner sometime, leave your phone in the car. Just do it. That way you're not tempted all dinner time long, just glancing down at your phone, checking your phone, checking your phone. Now you can give your spouse some eye contact. It's very powerful and it doesn't take that long. I will come back to the feeling valued thing in a little bit. Okay. So we'll come

back to that. Number five, assume the best about the other person's intentions. This is really hard because our spouse, you know, when you're first married, it's all cute and sweet and you work through stuff. Later on, it just builds up his resentments and just like, oh, he's such a jerk. Oh, she doesn't care. Well, listen, sometimes we hurt each other. We just don't even know we're doing it. So here's a great phrase. I know you don't mean to hurt me, but when you dismiss my concerns, it makes me feel like X. I know you don't even realize you're doing this, but when you continually point out what

I did wrong, it emasculates me. It makes me not want to try. See what you've prefaced it with, I know you don't mean to hurt me like this, or I know you don't even know you're doing that, because most of the time we don't. Very few people are just always intentionally hurtful. Or we can be hurtful, but we don't always do it on purpose, right? We just don't even realize. So it's a great way to point that out. So number six, be assertive. Now, being assertive is a huge skill that we all have to learn. And what you're doing, you're not being bossy.

You're telling another person what you need. You're not telling them what they have to do. That's being bossy. You're just saying, this is what I need. So I always do a funny example, especially if it's a mom who kind of stays home or she gets home first and she's been with the kids all afternoon long, right? And she ends up texting her husband like, I need a little help around here. Well, all that means to me as a man is when I get home, you want me to yell at the

kids. And that's not what you meant. But if you were to text or call your husband and say, when you get home, I need 12 and a half minutes of alone time without the children or you are going to see me on the evening news for murdering our children. Right now I know, okay, when I get home, I need to give my wife some alone time and some space. So guys, here's an easy one. You come home, you grab some loose change out of your car because you've got the car in there, loose change there. You walk up to the front door, you whip your front door open, and you yell, treasure hunt, and you throw some coins out in the front or backyard. Your kids go outside looking for it. Wife, you get to double lock the front door, curl up in the fetal position, whatever you want to do,

and enjoy your 12 and a half minutes. And you know what's beautiful? I know as a man, I'm not a mind reader, right? And a lot of those romantic books and movies, Nicholas Sparks books, they always make the man like, oh, he knew what his wife was thinking. Those things are called movies. Those things are fiction. It doesn't exist. I don't know what you're thinking. So we eat, each of us as a spouse has to tell the other person, okay, that it's not fair to expect another human being to read your mind. So if you need some alone time, say it. I need some alone time. Can you give me some alone time? Right. I can deal with that. And I know as a guy, I'm really good at following specific directions. Tell me what to do.

And I'm good with that. Right. Like as a husband, it might be, um, Hey wife, honey, I really want some alone time with you. I really want some time when we're not focused on the kids because everything's all about the kids. I want time with you. Instead of getting resentful like, well, my wife puts all of her time into the kids. She's always thinking about the kids, the kids making lunch, doing other stuff. Instead of complaining about it, go and talk and say say so here's owning your part which we're going to do next anyway so i want some alone time with you what could i do to help you out so that we can have that alone time right so for the wives and the husbands out there learn to be assertive

right and and i'll give you an example of this that i always use with women we've got this um so when you're talking about marriage stuff, we talk about discipline. So here's a little special thing we put together for you. And I'm going to get into the rest of these. This is actually my son's idea because my son said, dad, I know from my friends, what they talk about a lot is they get upset because they see their parents can't get along. And they're like, why am I going to get married if my parents don't even like sleep in the same room? They have all these issues and they know this. So he actually came up with this. He said, why don't we put together a program? We give people the calm

couples, marriage mentoring, and we'll give them that, but we'll also give them the bag of CDs. We always have a special of these three CDs. It's discipline CDs, 30 different ways to discipline your kids, 30 different behaviors. There's one on the strong willed child, which is critical because if you have a strong willed child, that will cause division between parents and you both need to be on the same page. And then his CD, which is my son's CD, Straight Talk for Kids, which is for your kids to listen to directly. And it's my son speaking them, teaching them how to calm down their own emotions and control their impulses. So in this month's special, you can email my son.

It's Casey, C-A-S-E-Y, at CelebrateCalm.com. Casey at CelebrateCalm.com. Or you can go to CelebrateCalm.com backslash couples. And you'll see we've got a phenomenal deal on it. Listen, I usually do the marriage mentoring thing for $697. Why? It's a lot of work for me. And it's very emotionally draining.

And by the way, it could help save your marriage and save you from losing half of everything you own and a lot of pain. And so it's usually $697. And Casey's idea, he said, listen, the bag of CDs we sell is usually $150. So why don't we do the bag for $150 and you get the marriage free? Or buy the marriage instead of $697. It's $150 and we give them the bag free. And I was like, a little bit too good of a deal.

I wouldn't do that much. I think it's worth way more than that. And I'd rather sell it to you for $297. But we're going to do this for a week at $150 to see if some people will invest in their marriage. And then I'll just take the rest of that out of Casey's salary for being so nice. Anyway, if you're interested, contact us, 888-506-1871. We'll help you out. So here's a great way to be assertive as moms saying, hey, hubby, it would mean a lot to me if we could work on that marriage program together. It would mean a lot to me if we could work on that marriage program together.

It would mean a lot to me if you go see a marriage therapist with me. It would mean a lot to me if we could get on the same page and listen to these CDs together. It's a great way of being assertive, right? So number seven, this is huge. What's my part in this? We all play a part in every situation. All of us do, right? So we tend to fall into the victim villain kind of mindset of like, oh, I'm the victim. I do everything well. And it's my spouse. He's the one or she's not the one. She's the one who's kind of messing it up. And so we kind of become the helpless victim and then they become the victim. And it's never really like that, right? We both play our part. So let me give two examples that are pretty common. So a lot of guys would I work with are

like, well, I want my wife to be more intimate with me. You know what I mean? I'm like, uh, yeah, no duh. All of us do. Right. So they'll always complain like, yeah, my wife, she's always too tired. She's exhausted and she's got a headache and she makes all these excuses. I'm like, well, you gave her, you know, you were there, right? When you had your three kids and you probably don't do anything around the house. So what can you do to lighten the load? So she actually has energy at the end of the night, by the way, don't make her stay up till 1130, watching sports center and then roll over and say hey, honey, are you in the mood? Because she's going to be like, yeah, I'm in the mood to go to sleep like three hours ago. So what can I do? So here are some questions I need to ask the men out there. What are you doing to make your wife feel safe emotionally? Because listen, if you're dismissing her concerns and not

listening to her, why would she open up to you and have sex with you? I'm just being honest, right? What are you doing to make your wife feel respected and listened to? You've got to do those things, right? Because this is very emotional for your wife. What can you do to take the load off of her? Could you do homework some nights, right? Could you do homework? Could you start doing more things around the house, right? Here's a good one for you. Why don't you tell your wife this? Hey, honey, listen, one night a week, every Tuesday night, I'm going to handle everything with the kids. You just go out, do whatever you want. I've got bedtime, bath time, homework. I'll get it all done. You don't have to worry. Just go out, do book club, go out and drink wine with your friends,

do whatever you want. I don't care. I've got the kids. Now, if you start doing that one or two nights a week, when your wife gets home, I guarantee she's going to be very grateful and she's probably going to have more energy because you're taking load off of her and you'll probably get a little bit more intimate time. And that's just not, that's not the only reason you're doing it. You're doing it because it's a nice, thoughtful thing to do. But now wives, I've got to throw this in here. When your hubby said, hey, I've got the kids tonight, he didn't say how he was going to get it done. So if you walk in and there are pizza boxes on the floor and you notice that he gave a bath by taking the kids outside and spraying them down with the hose and you see a little bottle of Jack Daniels, there's some cough syrup by the bed and

that's how I got him to bed, your appropriate response is, honey, thank you for the night off. Don't be critical of how he got it done. Now, again, some of the hubbies out there, you're awesome at all this stuff. And it may be that your wife would have the pizza boxes on the floor, but try that sometime. What's your part? Wives, I'll throw it this way. Sometimes I know a common one is, well, I want my husband to be more involved around the house or more involved in our parenting. Well, what's your part in that? Because you know what happens? Because wives are so intentional and you read all the parenting books and you kind of know how to do this stuff. When hubby jumps in and tries to do it, we don't always do it the right way. And so you'll kind of jump in and what the guy feels is like, you know what?

I try to jump in. I try to help out, but it's never good enough for you. So why would I even do it anymore? So your part is encouraging your husband and saying, you know what, I appreciate the fact that you're jumping in and helping with this. And then zip and then leave it at that, right? And let him see by your example how to do it. But your part is to affirm that, right? So anyway, what's your part? And then I'll close up with the last three pretty quick.

Number eight I'd written down is this. At some point, you've got to make a decision of what's important in your life and your family, right? And most of us have put a ton of energy into building our careers. And I just ask you at some point, put that same amount of energy into building your relationships with your kids, with your spouse, right? Because the marriage things aren't going away. They don't just magically get better when the kids go off to college. It just doesn't. And the kids know, they can tell in your marriage if you're not sleeping in the same room or that on weekends, dad takes son to his travel sports and mom takes daughter to hers or

whatever it is. They know this stuff and divorce sucks. So work on your marriage now and put an investment in it. It's important and it's worth it. So two final things is number nine, start doing one small thing, right? Because some of your marriage issues are really big and you can't just jump into the big stuff right away. You've got to start doing one small thing. Back when you were dating, you used to do all kinds of sweet little simple things to show that you were thinking of each other. So, you know, one thing I used to do for my wife that was really cool is she hated cleaning out the little lint trap of the dryer. I know it's a small thing, but small things matter. So when I walked by laundry room, I would pull

that little thing out and then I'd clean out the little lint trap. It took me 10 seconds, but she loved it. And you know what it meant? It meant that I had been thinking of her and I did something small. Hubbies, leave a Hershey kiss. When you leave for the office in the morning, unless your wife leaves earlier than you, leave a little Hershey kiss on your car, on her car, right? So if she goes to work or goes to take the kids to school, she's going to find this little Hershey kiss and she's going to be like, aw, was that my husband or was that the neighbor down the street? Just kidding.

If you don't take care of your wife, somebody else will. I'm just kidding. But you know what I mean, right? You've got to really put time into each other or else you're going to be tempted by the other people at work who pay more attention and laugh at your jokes, right? So do that stuff. Send flowers. When was the last time that you sent laugh at your jokes, right? So do that stuff. Send flowers. When was the last time that you sent flowers to your spouse, right? Just do that small stuff. You don't

have to do the expensive ones. You want a cool one sometime? This is for the hubbies who have a stay-at-home mom. Someday take off from work at lunch and go get flowers. Get them from the grocery store. They're a lot cheaper there, and they still are pretty good. And just deal with it. Wives, just deal with it. I'm a frugal guy, and I'm dealing with frugal men. So go get the flowers. Take them home.

And surprise your wife with flowers sometimes. You know what's going to happen one day? She's going to text you at work and say, hey, would you mind coming home at lunch? And you know what that means. And that would be a cool way to spice up your marriage. Final thing is this. Ask your spouse after listening to this. Just go to them and say, you know what? I want to own my part in our relationship.

What's one thing I can begin doing differently? Just one thing. Tell me one thing, and then I want to start doing it. That gives your spouse an opportunity to be assertive about what he or she needs. And then each of you can ask each other that and start with one thing. Then you can start building up into other things, right? So listen, if you have questions, contact me anytime. It's Kirk, K-I-R-K, at CelebrateCalm.com.

We've got a Facebook page, CelebrateCalm.com. We've got a free newsletter. We've got these podcasts. We've got a Facebook page, CelebrateCalm.com. We've got a free newsletter. We've got these podcasts. We've got the audio CDs. If you need help financially with anything, any of our products, be assertive. Email us. Email my son, Casey, C-A-S-E-Y, at CelebrateCalm.com and say, I listened to your dad.

He's described our home. He's described our kids. We need some help, but I'm having trouble financially. What can you do? And we help everybody out. I want you to have an investment in this stuff. I'm not giving it away free because it's worth a lot, but if you ask for help, we'll help you out. So anyway, we see some of you live on the road. We're traveling quite a bit now. Come up and talk to us, but thank you for investing this time. Love you all. Bye-bye.