Calm Parenting Podcast - Special Podcast for Father's Day

Episode Date: June 20, 2021

Special Podcast for Father's DayYour son is whining on the soccer field and refusing to be a good teammate. You're frustrated and embarrassed. Now you have a choice as the Dad. You can escalate this and destroy your child's confidence...or use it as a bonding moment to build his confidence. Kirk shows you how to use your power to get respect and build your relationship with a strong-willed child. Our Father's Day Sale Ends Tuesday! 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 Father’s Day gift to yourself or tell your wife THIS is what you want. Want personal mentoring with Kirk via Phone? Click here to learn about mentoring packages. 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. I grew up with a career military father whose parenting style was to use fear and intimidation, the my way or highway approach with his four boys. We all grew up and had families. We had kids and guess what we did? The same thing with our kids. And I nearly destroyed my relationship with my son because I couldn't control myself. Now, I felt justified because my son was very challenging and difficult. He didn't listen to us. He didn't listen the first time. He did everything

half-hearted, didn't do his chores. He fought us over homework. He was at meltdowns all the time. He was very emotional. He was difficult with things. There was power struggles over everything. Put your shoes on. We couldn't get him to go places, eating, sitting still at the kitchen table, going to sleep on time. Everything was a challenge, just like with your kids. But I fell into the trap and I justified my behavior because I didn't know how to control myself. And the truth is I was dependent on my son. And what I was really telling my son back in those days was this, I need you to behave, Casey, because if you don't do exactly what I tell you to do, when I tell you to do it, how I tell you to do it, if you don't do that, I'm not sure I can control myself and you do not want to see me angry.

See, I needed him to behave so that I could behave. Because if he didn't do what I told him to do, then I would just lose it. And what happened was my son knew that I was never happy with him, that I was always frustrated with him. And what I want you to know as guys is this, this is my happy Father's Day message. You have an extraordinary amount of power, dads, an extraordinary amount of power. My son is 28 now. If you ever need help with anything, reach out to him. It's K-C-C-A-S-E-Y at CelebrateCalm.com. By the way, I'm Kirk

Martin, founder of Celebrate Calm, if you haven't heard of us before. But here's the truth. I have so much power with my son because he looks up to me. And I have the power to destroy my son's confidence, but I also have the power to create, to build confidence and not destroy. And I nearly destroyed him and my relationship with him when he was younger, until I learned how to control myself. See, it was my own anxiety because I was looking at this kid and thinking, how's he ever going to be successful in life? And he's not, you know, he's not living up to his potential. And so I'd lecture him and I'd notice every single thing that he did wrong. And I'd be on him all the time. And I control issues because I love going to work. I love work. Work

is easy to me. Human relationships, very difficult for me. And so when I would come home from work and there were Legos on the floor, I couldn't handle it because I need a lot of order. And I was very rigid. And many of you are very rigid and you'll justify all of this. And what I want you to know is you can justify all of your actions. You can, but it doesn't mean that it's right. And it doesn't mean that it's helpful. And this is my tough message for guys. Look, this is not happy mother's day message. And you do way too much moms. Now I talk to dads the way I like to be talked to, which is to be challenged. I want you to blow and smoke up my, you know what about hard I work, because work is easy for me. The hard thing for me is learning how to deal

with relationships, and when things don't go my way, how do I do that? Because my wife had to walk on eggshells around me, because she never knew when I was going to blow up, and almost every man who has a strong-willed child will complain, well, my wife just coddles our daughter, our son. And what I want you to know, men, is that your wife coddles you because she knows you can't even control yourself. And she has to be the go between the child that she's trying to protect and her husband, who she doesn't want to undermine your authority.

And she knows that if things aren't just so around the house, you'll lose it. So she actually coddles you because you can't control yourself, and I'm not being mean to you. I was the same way. I see it in myself. And what I want you to know is this. You have so much power, dads. You are given so—I have more power over my son than my wife does. Way more. With a look of my

eyes, with a shake of my head, I can tear that kid down. I can. But I can also build him up. And when I notice what he's doing well, when I affirm him, when I teach him with wisdom instead of just criticizing, when I give him specific things to work on and I show him and I'm patient with him, I build his confidence. And I want you to use your power to do that, men. Look, you will tell your kids all the time, well, kids, look, you've got choices to make and you're going to sleep in the bed that you make. Well, you have a choice in how you see this child, how you treat the child, how you respond to instead of reacting emotionally to, and how you talk to this child. This child is not an employee. He's not like an army recruit of yours. It's your son. It's your daughter. And I know they're strong-willed and they're challenging and I know this is hard, but men, you have a choice and I want you to use this choice

in purposeful, positive ways. And you're going to have to wrestle with it because you're going to like, oh, I feel like I'm giving in or I feel like I'm being too soft and you're not. Your child wants to please you. They just don't always know how to. And I will tell you that I promise you this. If they do not have a good relationship with you, it will mess them up for a long time and possibly their entire lives. I've seen it in my own life and I've seen it with thousands and thousands of people. So I get this email from a dad yesterday, which I thought was awesome. Because here's what he said. I never learned how to deal with my own frustration,

with my own goals being blocked, with the selfishness of thinking things should just go the way I say they should go and that my kids need to just fall in line with my goals. But he said, I've begun to realize I was viewing parenting as a series of tasks to be accomplished, right? A little check mark. We've got to check it off the boxes rather than seeing it as relationships that need to be nurtured. And he said, I've been listening to you. What you've

helped me do is hit the pause button to reflect on my own issues, to take steps to change myself, because the quickest way to change your child's behavior is to first control yourself. It's very, very powerful. And to truly listen to and learn about my kids so that I can motivate them in ways that actually motivate my child, not cause them to shut down. So, and he said, I've started to enjoy my kids again. So here's the story I want to tell you. So this dad's at a soccer game. And like many of your kids, his son's out on the soccer field acting tired and whining and crying and not wanting to play. And he didn't care about his friends or his coach, who was a close friend of this dad. And he said, at first, my wife and I were being really tough on him, telling him how

he needed to be a good teammate, how soccer was supposed to be fun, and you should do it with a good attitude and with all your heart and give it your all because that's what we all do. And that didn't work. So the dad took a step back. I can tell he's been listening to our programs because we talk about this principle. When we step back as parents, when we step back from micromanaging, from lecturing, from yelling all the time, it gives our kids space to actually step up and be responsible for themselves without us standing over them all the time, criticizing and pointing out what they're doing wrong. So he said, I took a step back and what I realized was I was feeling embarrassed about my son's behavior because I knew the other parents and my friend who was the coach were silently judging my parenting abilities, right? Like how come your son is being such a

whiny brat out there? Why don't you get some control over him? And he said, I was reacting to what I perceived other people were thinking and my own embarrassment, which is our own immaturity, more than I was focused on really understanding what was happening with my son. Dad says I was sacrificing his emotional needs for the sake of me trying to look like I had it all together. So here's what the dad did. He had a choice in the moment. You would be completely justified pulling that kid over the sidelines, getting in his face and saying, look, you are going to get out there and you are going to play to the best of your ability. And you're going to have a good attitude and you're going to be a good teammate, respect that coach, or I'm going to take you home right now. And you're going to lose all of your video games and all of your privileges until you can learn. See, you'd be justified, right? You'd be right

in that. But what would happen is, one, it doesn't work, and it ruins the relationship with this child. Instead, here's what the dad did. He sat down on the sidelines. Why? Because we teach this a lot. Control your tone of voice. Control your body posture. You have so much control over your kids by how you control the body posture because if you're standing on the sidelines, obviously frustrated, angry, upset with your hands on your hips, when that kid comes over, he knows he's getting earful, so he's already going to be defensive. Instead, the dad sat down. His son came over, and so without saying a word, he hands his son a snack and a drink, and he just started to watch the game with his son without saying a word. Now inside, I'm sure this dad was like, this little

kid needs to get with the program. I paid all this money for him to play. Why can't he do it? But dad didn't do that. He made a different choice. And what he learned was my son was hungry, he was tired, and he was really nervous because he was playing that day without one of his best friends. And his son struggles with anxiety like many of your kids do. So as his son ate the snacks, dad started to focus not on his son, but on the game, cheering for the teammates, high-fiving the kids as it came off the field. And then a minute later, guess what he noticed? His son, cheering for the teammates, stood up, started high-fiving his teammates. One minute later, guess what he saw?

His son walks over to the coach and says, could I go in and play now? And it was a total 180. And watch how beautiful this is. It could have been one more time where you're disappointed, frustrated, and angry, and take your child home and send him to his room feeling like nothing I do is ever good enough, and my dad's always unpleased with me, and always unhappy with me, and I just lost all my stuff again, and nobody likes me, and everybody likes my siblings better. That's what usually happens with us dads, but instead this dad controlled his embarrassment, his control issues, his anxiety, all of that.

And he turned what is usually a nightmare into a bonding experience in which his son gained confidence for the next time to learn how to overcome his anxiety and play. And now at the end, the dad was able to say what? That was awesome how you recovered. Because you started off kind of whining and you were a little bit nervous and you were scared. You came off the sidelines, but then you regrouped. That's really cool how you did that. That's maturity. That's being grown up. Man, I'm proud of you. See how that happens? You would have been justified yelling at the kid, but watch what happened. He just built his son's confidence and now he just built the relationship.

That's an awesome thing. That was a choice that this dad made in a tough moment. Dads, on this Father's Day, it's what I'm calling you to do. You're justified. Put down your own embarrassment. Put down your control issues, your own anxiety, your fear about your child's future, and in the moment, start understanding what's really going on. Lead them. Give them some space. Build them up. Affirm them for the good choices, and I promise you they will begin following your lead, and they will respect you. You can do it. If you want me to mentor you, I can. Look up on our website, CelebrateCalm.com. You'll see a little mentoring tab. I'll mentor you personally with phone calls, but most of you won't like it because it's a little bit expensive. So better than that is if you want, you get the Calm Parenting Package. It's the less expensive option. It's got like 30 hours worth of instruction on how to do this kind

of stuff. And all I'm asking you to listen to, dads, have your wife listen to all the other programs. You just listen to the dad's program. It's just for men. It's me and it's my son talking to you man to man about how you handle about 20 different situations that usually frustrate you in the home. Short, sweet, direct. If we can help you, reach out to us. You can email me. It's Kirk, K-I-R-K or K-C-C-A-S-E-Y at celebratecalm.com. This is really important. And I hope for Father's Day that you make this choice where we're going to do it differently from now on because I have a relationship.

If you listen to our podcast, you'll find this out. My relationship with that kid that I used to destroy all the time, Casey, is now we are so, so close and it's one of the most gratifying things in my life to have that relationship. And I want you to have that as well with your kids. So if we can help you, let us know. Happy Father's Day. Thank you for the hard work you do. Let's dig in and do the tough relationship work now, okay? So let's know how we can help.